Ch. 33 - Ambushed
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"Screw you!"
Starshine could no longer maintain what little dignity he had left.
Embarrassed and enraged, he couldn't help but pull out his wand.
"Are you sure you want to do this?"
Tang Qi became the calm one instead.
"We're still supposed to face the court's judgment and Lord Merle's punishment. Young Master Melade was even planning to offer me a job just now... So if you're going to cast something, please aim it at him."
Black Snake's mouth twitched.
Seeing this shameless bastard's appearance, Starshine wanted nothing more than to hit both of these assholes in the head with a Fireball—
Too bad he hadn't learned it yet!
Tang Qi's words did have some merit. After weighing it carefully, he decided it wasn't worth the trouble.
He could only distance himself from that chattering mouth and leave in a huff:
"You'll pay for this!"
"You truly are a respectable scholar—even your threats are so feeble and powerless," Tang Qi responded.
"Go to hell!"
"Rua!"
Watching Starshine fuming yet helpless, Kuru felt a refreshing sense of satisfaction at venting his frustrations.
Tang Qi exchanged a glance with Black Snake:
"Looks like we cooperate pretty well."
Even with the cangue still on his shoulders, Black Snake felt like he could finally sleep soundly.
"I knew it—with that mouth of yours, we'd never have trouble chasing people away."
"So did you two really bring back some treasure from the Great Wasteland?"
"I'd advise you not to pry too much. Ever heard the saying—curiosity killed the cat?"
"I'm human, not a cat."
"I've heard enough of your bad jokes."
The brief united front ended. After laughing for a while, Black Snake returned to his previous lethargic demeanor.
Seeing he couldn't extract more information, Tang Qi could only sort through the current intel.
So that group of adventurers Kuru scavenged the items from were wiped out because they didn't have tools to detect illusions?
No.
Kuru mentioned that when he found the adventurers, they were already extremely weak.
The mist was just a contributing factor.
Before being disoriented by the mist, they must have encountered some danger...
Whatever could scatter an entire organized party definitely wasn't as simple as a few walking corpses or goblin bandits.
Just as Tang Qi was increasingly sensing the crisis, he noticed his hair standing on end again...
It felt very similar to the time not long ago.
"Poet, since your hands are free anyway, why don't you sing some lullabies so I can sleep more soundly?"
Black Snake's voice echoed in his ears but soon became muffled and sluggish.
In an instant, Tang Qi felt as if time had stopped.
His five senses were sharper than before, his vision clearer.
In his peripheral vision, the campfire's flickering frequency seemed to slow down.
The mist formed by tiny water droplets drifting through the forest. Even just grazing his skin, it pressed down his hair, bringing a needle-like itch.
His whole body began to heat up, yet his mind was remarkably calm—
"This isn't right."
"What isn't right?"
Seeing Tang Qi frozen in place, Black Snake couldn't help but want to kick him.
But Tang Qi seemed to predict his movement.
The moment he lifted his leg, Tang Qi's whole body tensed up like he was shivering. He rolled to the ground and pressed tight against the wagon's large wheel.
"Thud!"
"Hey, I haven't even kicked yet!"
Is this poet faking an injury?
Was he always this cowardly?
Just as Black Snake was about to mock him in surprise, at the same moment Tang Qi rolled under the wagon's sideboards, he heard him shout:
"Get down!"
"Swish—"
That subtle sound of something cutting through the air nearly pierced Black Snake's eardrums.
He couldn't identify the source of the sound, but past experience proved it was definitely not friendly.
So almost without thinking, he used his bound legs to kick hard against the wagon's sideboard, toppling the entire wagon on its side.
But the wagon's crossbar was tied to the old ox, causing it to fall completely into the muddy ground.
It tried to struggle to its feet, shaking the wagon that sheltered the prisoners.
But in just an instant, "bang bang"—sounds like something being nailed down came from under the overturned wagon.
The old ox also let out a muffled groan, struggled for a moment, then fell silent.
"Rua!?"
Kuru was also flipped to the ground, but using the wagon as cover, it cried out and pointed behind Tang Qi.
Looking back, several rough arrow shafts covered in barbs were irregularly stuck at an angle in the wet muddy ground—
As expected!
This sense of crisis was identical to the previous one.
It wasn't because of Black Snake that he felt danger.
Rather, under the effect of [Feat: Alertness], he had sensed the danger lurking in the dense forest—
The first time was vigilance, the second time was evasion.
"Ambush! Ambush!"
At the distant campfire, Explosivewolf's roar was as resonant as ever.
He had already drawn the greatsword from his back, seeing the direction of the attack clearly.
"Everyone, ready your weapons!"
"Yes!"
They were well-trained mercenaries.
Even in all of Longgold City, their names were known.
After brief panic, they immediately rallied their spirits.
Seeing the direction the greatsword pointed, and the short figures barely visible in the dense forest and thick fog, they immediately realized where the enemy came from:
"Goblins!"
Ugly in appearance with short stature, the yellow-green-skinned enemies had already drawn their bows to full draw.
The whistling sound of arrowheads breaking through the air was uniform and orderly. The shrill noise was like birds and beasts screeching. They stirred up the white fog, shooting into the sky, then fell indiscriminately into the camp—
The well-trained mercenaries wouldn't be affected by this scattered arrow rain.
But the pampered young master was far from having their quality.
Even when he clearly saw the arrows overhead, flashing silver-white cold light, stabbing toward his eyes, that obese body only trembled!
"Young Master!"
Huss pushed Melade's shoulder with one hand. In the face of danger, he couldn't care about maintaining aristocratic dignity and fell into the muddy ground with him.
"Huss, Huss..."
Melade nearly knocked his head on the ground. The brief dizziness was enough for him to recover his senses.
"Are you alright?"
"Thanks to your concern, of course not."
As a human, once you cross the threshold of fifty years old, many things become difficult.
But fortunately, as the steward of the entire family and leader of the caravan, Huss always practiced some self-defense martial arts, so his body was even more robust than Melade's:
"Young Master, they're just some goblins. Let's retreat for a moment and let these mercenaries handle it."
After the brief shock, Melade also realized these goblins were nothing to worry about.
He slowly nodded and hurried toward the pitched tent nearby.
As the most common danger in the wilderness, few people would maintain respect for these scattered humanoid creatures.
Adventurers out in the field would feel like they'd wasted the day if they didn't kill a couple of highway-robbing goblins.
But contempt didn't mean carelessness.
At least Explosive wolf understood that every night before leaving the city, one should be prepared to not return.
Only this way could one safely triumph.
"[Longstrider]!"
Starshine never slacked off in battle. A handful of dirt floated in mid-air with his chanting, sprinkling onto Explosive wolf's plate armor.
The latter immediately roared and charged forward, dragging his giant blade.
Hard to imagine, but fully armored in plate, he seemed completely unaffected—still running like a tiger or wolf.
Almost in the span of a breath, he reached several goblins who were still drawing their bows.
As he planted his feet, his iron boots scraped against the earth, splattering mud that would blind the goblins' eyes.
But just as the mud was about to reach the corners of their eyes...
The blade howled past.
"Splurch—"
The crimson blood splashing through the air instantly overwhelmed the spraying mud.
Where the sword passed, three goblins were cut in two.
"Not done yet!" he roared.