Ch. 21
Chapter 21: Danger Closes In!
“Uh...!”
The expression on Luo Li’s face froze instantly. She stared at Chen Guan with wide eyes.
Luo Tong and the others were equally stunned.
What exactly had this brat just taken out?
They had spent decades walking the escort roads, traveling north and south through every storm and wave imaginable, yet this was the first time any of them had ever heard of something like a “Party A, Party B Route Contract.”
And from the way he put it, this was only Clause Two Hundred and Seventy-Three?
Did that mean there were more than two hundred clauses before this one that he had not even read out loud?
After finishing his recitation of the Route Contract, Chen Guan did not give Luo Li any time to process it. He flipped straight to the last page, pointed at the red handprint there, and said coldly,
“Black ink on white paper. The handprint is the proof. Honest and fair to young and old alike. Are you certain you want to violate the Route Contract directly?”
Before Luo Li could answer, Li Fei exploded.
He rushed up in two strides, pointed at that tattered little booklet, and roared,
“I say, are you really even an escort?”
“What escort makes an employer sign this kind of indenture contract? Which black inn did you learn your rules from? Waving chicken feathers as if they were imperial arrows and bullying some young girl, is that it?!”
The corner of Luo Li’s mouth twitched slightly.
Though she did not truly understand Chen Guan, she had heard enough about him in Sanhua Town to know what sort of person he was.
Not only was he greedy and black-hearted, but he also had more rules than anyone had a right to possess.
She had assumed there would only be a few clauses in that Route Contract, yet to her shock there were actually more than two hundred, and from the sound of it, he had not even finished reading them all.
But then she smelled that rotten-peach stench on herself again.
She remembered her grandfather’s warning.
In the end, Luo Li drew in a deep breath, suppressed the grievance in her heart, bit down on her lip, and said,
“Fine! We do as he says! Go!”
Chen Guan cast her a glance, and a flicker of surprise passed through his eyes.
The girl might be willful, but at the critical moment she still had at least a bit of sense and knew she could not indulge herself.
Yet the instant Luo Li agreed, that became the spark that set off the powder keg.
Li Fei and the others’ faces turned as dark as the bottom of a pot.
A mere yellow-haired girl would rather listen to some wild brat from out of town than give any weight to them, the seasoned veterans of the jianghu?
“Enough!”
Zhao Ren swung down from his horse. Shing! The nine-ring saber in his hand struck the ground with a heavy crash, sending dust spraying into the air.
Among this group, apart from Luo Tong, he was the oldest in seniority. He ranked eleventh on the Pingyang Commandery Escort Master Rankings and was widely known as the Iron-Faced Judge.
Ordinarily, he was taciturn, like some shut jar, but that did not mean others could trample on his dignity.
Carrying that heavy saber, he strode several paces forward until he stood before Chen Guan’s horse, lifted his chin, and said in a deep voice,
“Chen Guan, I don’t care which backwater you came from, nor do I care what rotten rules you keep.”
“Since this escort mission is being carried out by all of us together, then by the old rule, we’re all eating from the same pot. That means you must follow the escort rules of Pingyang Commandery!”
“That nonsense Route Contract of yours is your own private set of rules. In Pingyang Commandery, it counts for nothing!”
Zhao Ren’s voice rose with every word.
“And another thing!”
“The command of an escort convoy has always been decided by seniority. Old Master Luo has crossed more bridges than you’ve walked roads. By every proper rule, the command belongs to him!”
“On what grounds do you flap your lips and make us stop when you say stop, or detour when you say detour?”
“And now you’re directly making us add two thousand li of pointless extra road. Who do you think you are? The Escort King?!”
The instant the words fell, Li Fei and the other escort masters, who had already been holding back a bellyful of anger, all stepped forward and bared their weapons.
Chen Guan sat steady atop his horse. He gave the reins a tug, and the white horse turned in place beneath him. Then his face darkened all at once.
“Who I am doesn’t matter. But when it comes to my escort, I am the one who decides! What the hell are the lot of you supposed to be?”
The moment the words fell, a bloody baleful aura suddenly burst from within him, violently shaking the air around him.
That was not true qi.
It was killing intent condensed out of mountains of corpses and seas of blood!
“Hiiih—!”
The fierce horses around him, which had already been restless, all let out sharp screams beneath that dreadful pressure. Their forelegs rose into the air, nearly throwing the escort masters from their backs.
Luo Tong, Zhao Wu, and the others were all shaken inwardly.
This brat... such heavy killing intent!
Was he really an escort, or had he come down from a battlefield?
Even ten-thousand-man commanders on the battlefield did not possess killing intent so solid as this.
But Li Fei and the others were startled for only an instant. They were all old escorts who licked blood from knife-edges. How could they be frightened off so easily?
Zhao Ren advanced another step with his saber in hand, the blade-point aimed straight at Chen Guan’s throat.
“Stop putting on this act! I’ve walked more escort roads than you’ve eaten salt. Today I’d like to see exactly what right you have to shout orders here!”
Chen Guan said nothing.
He merely raised his right hand slowly, pinched the tip of Zhao Ren’s saber between two fingers, and gave it a light twist.
Crack—!
That saber, forged from refined iron, snapped in two as though it were a pair of chopsticks.
The broken tip landed in Chen Guan’s palm. With a casual flick, it shot past Zhao Ren’s cheek with a sharp whoosh and nailed itself into a tree three zhang behind him, sinking three inches deep into the wood and trembling with a humming sound.
A line of blood opened on Zhao Ren’s face, and he froze on the spot, cold sweat soaking through his back in an instant.
Silence fell across the entire scene.
Not one of the escort masters who had just been brimming with menace dared move now. Even their breathing grew lighter.
Liu Shuo and Li Fei swallowed dryly, and both instinctively retreated half a step, the weapons in their hands already drooping down.
Zhao Ren was an established late Profound Passage expert, yet before Chen Guan’s hand he had not possessed the slightest power to resist.
Fortunately, the two of them had not pushed forward to show off. Otherwise, given how they had been targeting him earlier, things would likely have gone very badly for them.
Chen Guan lowered his hand and swept his gaze over them.
“Anyone else want to test my strength?”
No one answered.
Zhao Ren stood where he was, the cut on his face burning hot, yet he did not even dare raise a hand to wipe it.
He was a late Profound Passage cultivator. He had rampaged across Pingyang Commandery for twenty years, and never once had he seen anyone snap his saber with two fingers.
This young man... just what realm was he in?
Chen Guan glanced at him and casually threw the broken blade to the ground.
“You should count yourselves fortunate. There’s a hard battle ahead. Otherwise...”
He did not finish the sentence, but the meaning was obvious.
He turned his horse and moved back toward the carriage, not bothering to look at them again.
Luo Li stood beside the carriage, staring with wide eyes.
So this fellow was actually this ruthless?
He alone could suppress so many old veterans?
She suddenly realized that although this man loved raising the price, perhaps she was not losing out after all.
Her grandfather’s eye for people truly had been viciously sharp!
Luo Tong stood at one side without saying a word, but his brows twisted tighter and tighter.
He had walked the escort roads for fifty years. If he had not seen a thousand experts, he had at least seen eight hundred. But someone who could reach such a level at barely twenty years of age—
he had never seen a single one.
This young man was either the true disciple of some hidden great power, or else... a monster even Luo Tong himself could not see through.
More importantly, there was that line he had just spoken—
“There’s a hard battle ahead.”
Combined with his earlier description of the Grudge-Bearing Demon Apes, and the abnormal silence on the road so far...
Luo Tong’s heart sank.
This brat very likely was not trying to scare anyone at all.
And besides, old escorts like them could usually throw their weight around, flaunt their seniority, compare prestige, and even suppress younger men.
But there was one red line they could never cross...
If the employer came to harm because of infighting within the convoy.
In that case, they would be struck from the Escort Guild without mercy.
Everything they had built over decades—their names, their reputations, their signs—would vanish like smoke, and they would become the laughingstock of the entire escort road.
These old escorts had given the greater part of their lives to the escort trade. To let all those years of effort go to waste over this would be utterly worthless.
Besides, that brat had no reason to invite suffering upon himself.
“Listen to Chen Guan!”
In the end, old Master Luo Tong finally spoke, settling the matter with one word.
Zhao Ren spun around in shock. “Old Master Luo?!”
“Enough.” Luo Tong waved a hand and cut him off. “Can’t you see it yet? If he truly meant to harm the employer, would he still need to waste words arguing with you?”
The words were blunt, but no one could refute them.
That was true. A man who could snap Zhao Ren’s saber with two fingers—if he truly wanted to do something to them, would he still need to “trick” them?
Zhao Ren’s face turned ashen. The veins on the hand gripping his saber bulged violently, yet not a single word came out of his mouth.
The other escort masters were still unwilling in their hearts, but all they could do was mutter curses under their breath and sheath their swords again.
Chen Guan gave Luo Tong a look.
The old man, at least, had not grown senile.
He was just about to turn his horse and continue onward—
when suddenly his mind tightened.
“Damn it, those things can’t wait any longer!”
Without the slightest hesitation, Chen Guan reached out with one large hand, seized Luo Li’s slender arm, and hauled her straight up off the ground, pressing her into place in front of him.
“Ah! What are you doing?!”
Luo Li let out a cry of alarm, her face turning pale with fright. Before she could even react, she was already seated before Chen Guan.
Her back was pressed tightly against the man’s broad, hard chest. A strong masculine scent flooded over her, and her mind went blank in an instant.
Chen Guan had no time to explain. He clamped his legs around the horse’s belly.
“Hyah!”
The white horse beneath him let out a shrill neigh, drove off with all four legs, and shot forward like an arrow loosed from the bow, instantly pulling away from the convoy behind them.
The whole scene happened so quickly that Luo Tong and the others were left staring dumbly.
“Has that brat gone mad?” Liu Shuo muttered blankly as he watched the retreating figure.
Luo Tong’s brows leapt sharply. At last, the instinct honed through long years on the escort road let him sense the danger rushing in.
From the forests on both sides. From the direction of Heishi Town ahead. From the far end of the road beneath their feet—
it was closing in from every direction.
“Not good!” His face changed drastically. “Quick! Mount up! Withdraw!”