Chapter 16: Chapter 16

I Can Continue to Hide

Jiang Ming still didn’t know that he had inadvertently avoided trouble because of his caution.

He hummed a little tune as he walked back to the mountain. He was in a good mood and was already thinking about how to build a house and where to dig a vegetable field.

“What?”

Jiang Ming’s footsteps suddenly stopped. It seemed like trouble was brewing.

The sky was dark, and trees were flanking both sides of the road. The shadows of the trees were dark, like a black abyss.

However, Jiang Ming had already sensed the blood Qi, so his five senses were enhanced. He could hear some subtle sounds behind the shadows of the trees.

“Kid, what a high level of vigilance.”

A slightly familiar voice sounded, and a few figures jumped out from both sides of the road. Three in front and two behind him, blocking him on the road.

Jiang Ming squinted and looked at these people. “You guys are the people who bought my goods, aren’t you?”

They were the vendors who had bought his hazelnut mushrooms in the market this morning.

However, at this moment, they were all holding weapons in their hands. It was obvious that they were here to kill.

“I’m still not cautious enough.” Jiang Ming sighed. These people could follow him out of the city, meaning he must have been exposed somewhere.

“But you really shouldn’t have caused trouble.” Jiang Ming sighed, his meaning difficult to understand.

He liked to hide and didn’t like to cause trouble, but if he really encountered such trouble today, there was only one way to deal with it.

Because even if he paid them money and pretended to be a coward now, it wouldn’t change the fact that these people had already found out that there was something wrong with him.

If they survived the night, they would only bring him more trouble.

“Brat, you’re quite arrogant!” The leader smiled calmly, but his eyes revealed a light of contempt as if he was looking at a lamb in a cage waiting to be slaughtered. “Leave everything behind and take off all your clothes. After that, I’ll ask you a few questions and let you go.”

This kind of calmness was not faked. They had been in the prefecture and the mountains all year round and had done all kinds of shady things. Robbing a person who was alone was just a common occurrence.

Naturally, they lied. They would not let their victims live.

The other vendors immediately laughed mockingly and surrounded him with their long sabers.

“I’ll give you everything, but I also have a question.” Jiang Ming seemed to be frightened. He quickly put down the herb basket and took out a few strings of copper coins from his arms and threw them on the ground. Then, he asked curiously, “How did you know I still have money?”

“Don’t play dumb with me!” The leading vendor glanced at the strings of copper coins and laughed, “The hazelnut mushrooms you picked all have silver-white patterns on them, and they only grow in the depths of the forest. Ordinary harvesters won’t be able to pick them at all. If you tell me the safe route you took to pick the hazelnut mushrooms, I’ll let you live. Otherwise...”

He brandished his long saber, his eyes filled with ferocity.

In the eyes of these vendors, Jiang Ming must have been lucky enough to find a safe route to enter the deep mountains and pick the best hazelnut mushrooms.

The price of this type of hazelnut mushroom was several times higher than that of ordinary hazelnut mushrooms. It was currently the peak season for its growth. If they found such a route, wouldn’t they be rich?

“Oh, I see.”

Jiang Ming was suddenly enlightened. He thought to himself, “Different professions are really worlds apart.” He was familiar with picking herbs, but he knew nothing about picking mushrooms. He didn’t notice these differences at all.

“But there’s one thing you’ve misunderstood!” Jiang Ming figured out the truth and stopped pretending. He smiled, “I don’t rely on safe routes to pick mushrooms. You’ve wasted your efforts.”

“You’re asking for death!” The vendors shouted and cursed, and they rushed forward with their sabers.

Until now, they were still toying with Jiang Ming, trying to force him to tell them the safe route.

Jiang Ming’s eyes were calm, and he had already rushed out. His upper body leaned back like a spring, and after avoiding the slashes, he suddenly straightened up and punched a man’s neck as fast as lightning.

With a crack, the man’s head immediately tilted to the side, and his body flew out. He stopped breathing before he even hit the ground.

The vendor’s eyes were still wide open, and blood was flowing out of his mouth and nose. He couldn’t believe that he was killed by someone he thought was easy pickings.

At the same time, Jiang Ming had already jumped back, picked up the axe he had just bought, and stood his ground.

“Something’s wrong; kill him quickly!” This sudden change made the leading vendor furious.

“F*ck you, you little brat!”

The four of them attacked from the front and back.

In the battle, Jiang Ming’s understanding of the Tiger Subduing Fist seemed to have deepened a lot in an instant.

His body was like a fierce tiger, and his axe was an extension of his body!

At this moment, the axe seemed to have a mind of its own as it bypassed a long saber that was about to block.

The axe was mighty and heavy, directly cutting through the chest and abdomen of a vendor, bringing with it a large spray of blood and broken bones.

The man’s chest was immediately torn open, and blood flowed out like a pillar. His heart was still beating in his chest, but his body had already fallen to the ground, motionless.

“F*ck!”

“This kid has practiced martial arts!”

There was a burst of exclamations. The face of the leading vendor was as dark as night. He was no longer as calm as he was at the beginning. Today, they had made a huge mistake.

There were two more scars on Jiang Ming’s arms and back, and his clothes were dyed red, but he didn’t care and shouted, “Come on!”

“He’s injured; go!” the leading vendor shouted angrily. Tonight, for the sake of some money, they had actually lost two people. It was truly a great loss.

However, after just ten breaths, when the third person’s head was chopped off, and he fell to the ground, the leading vendor and the other person were already frightened.

“Why aren’t you dead?”

He looked at Jiang Ming’s stomach, where a long blade was dislodged, and his face was full of horror.

Jiang Ming sighed, “Your weakness is that your eyes are too sharp.”

The other person was scared out of his wits. The blade in his hand fell to the ground, and he turned around to run.

“It’s too late to run away now!” Jiang Ming pulled out the blade from his stomach and threw it. It pierced the chest of the man who was running away and nailed him to a big tree.

In the blink of an eye, only the leading vendor was left in the group of five. He was so scared that he fell to the ground and said incoherently, “Don’t... Don’t kill me. I won’t tell anyone!”

Jiang Ming’s eyes were calm. “From the moment you came to me, there was only one ending for this matter.”

The axe cut into his neck, and his begging stopped abruptly.

“Phew... I was so scared. I was almost exposed.”

Jiang Ming let out a long breath, looked at the five motionless people, and nodded with satisfaction, “I can continue to hide away again.”