Mutated Tao

The bandit held his wound and howled in pain.

Seeing this, Li Huowang was tired and couldn’t be bothered to question him any more.

Just as he was about to kill the bandit, someone shouted, “Senior Li! Look at what this is!”

Sun Baolu revealed something. Li Huowang glanced at the item and saw that it was a well-polished tobacco pipe.

The smoke pipe and the bag of tobacco looked quite familiar.

“Senior Li, this smoke pipe and tobacco bag belong to Troupe Leader Lu! They are definitely his. I remember him lending them to me a few times while we were traveling together,” said Sun Baolu.

Hearing this, Li Huowang checked the smoke pipe and his face immediately became gloomy.

It was very likely that the Lu family had been captured by these bandits.

He showed the smoke pipe to the bandit in front of him and asked in a voice that grew increasingly cold, “Where did you get this? Did you recently rob a group of performers?”

Li Huowang was infuriated, but instead of becoming angry, he smiled. He released the clasp on the goatskin pouch on his waist.

Kling~

At that moment, the sound of metal clanking together was heard as various torture tools revealed themselves. Li Huowang had been taking such good care of them that they were shining brightly from being polished regularly.

“You must be dreaming if you want me to kill you,” said Li Huowang.

For the next few minutes, Li Huowang slowly ground the bandit’s fingers, causing the latter to howl and sob in pain. His voice echoed throughout the stony mountains.

As this was happening, the rest of them all turned around; they couldn’t bear to continue watching.

Finally, when the bandit had his entire left hand ground down to the stump of his wrist, he relented. “I will speak! Our leader’s mother recently celebrated her 70th birthday, and so he purposefully caught a group of performers to perform for her. They are still up on the mountain!”

Hearing this, Li Huowang threw the bloody torture tools in front of the bandit, causing the latter to shrink back in fear.

“Get up. If you don’t want to be tortured again, then bring us to your camp,” said Li Huowang.

The bandit no longer dared to act so tough. He just stood up and led them to their camp, just like a defeated dog.

Just then, Sun Baolu, who was rubbing the blood off his sword using a corpse spoke out in a voice filled with hesitation, “Senior Li, maybe we should just leave. We have no relationship with the Lu family and it would be better for us to not get into any more trouble…”

Hearing those words, Li Huowang gave a stern glare to Sun Baolu, causing the latter to avert his gaze.

“I am Li Huowang, not Dan Yangzi. It would’ve been fine if we hadn’t found out about it, but now that we know that they were kidnapped, we will go and save them. Plus, I hate people who attack us out of nowhere. I’m gonna go and give them a piece of my mind,” declared Li Huowang. He was pissed that a group of bandits dared to attack them. At this point, he no longer wanted to live within the shadows.

There were definitely monsters out there that he shouldn’t offend, but not just anyone had the ability to command his respect. He was more than happy to kill those who tried to kill them for no reason.

At that moment, they turned their horse carriage around and followed the bandit back to their camp.

“Safe travels. I hope we will meet again,” said a voice behind them.

Li Huowang turned around and saw that it was the old man who had already crawled past the boulder and was on the other side of the path. After a moment, he waved his arm before continuing with their journey.

After forgetting the old man, Li Huowang focused on what he should do next.

The name of the bandit they were following was Liu Waizui. Thanks to him, Li Huowang quickly learned about how their organization operated as well as what their organizational structure was.

Their leader was called Da Jinlong, and he controlled the area around here. They weren’t bandits who wandered the lands, but instead had a nearby camp with a proper structure.

“What does your organizational structure look like?” Li Huowang asked.

According to Liu Waizui, there were various roles and names for all of them.

Those in charge of robbing others were called “knife heads” and those in charge of managing their resources were called “grain stations”.

The guards within their camp were called “fragrant water”, and those in charge of strategy were called “stack turners.”

Those who kidnapped rich people were called “granaries,” while those who blackmailed people to pay money were called “flower tongues.”

Those masquerading as normal villagers to collect information were called “planted sticks.”

And finally, those who were in charge of writing blackmail letters and other documents were called “wordsmiths”.

Their chain of command was also quite simple. The leader was at the top, followed by the second-in-command, the third-in-command, the various department heads, and finally the ones who did the odd jobs.

The organizational structure of the entire bandit camp was quite rigid and clear.

“You guys are nothing but bandits. Why do you have such a structure? How many people do you have in your camp?” asked Li Huowang.

“I never counted, but probably a few hundred people,” replied Liu Waizui. At this point, he had given up on fighting back as he told Li Huowang everything the latter wanted to know.

“How strong is your leader? What kind of powers does he have?” asked Li Huowang.

“He doesn’t have any supernatural powers; he’s just big and strong. He uses the hammer as a weapon,” responded Liu Waizui.

A few hundred people, and no supernatural powers. So just normal bandits…

Li Huowang carefully gauged the difference in strength between his group and the bandits.

Since the bandits had initially surrounded them while on horsebacks, and Li Huowang’s group was walking on foot, it was almost night time by the time they finally arrived near the bandit camp.

Soon, they were already halfway up the mountain. There were several torches lit up on the mountain, indicating the location of the camp.

Ji ji~ Ji~

At that moment, the sudden sound of a bird rang out from the side of the forest.

Then, Li Huowang kicked Liu Waizui. “Tell them that we are here to talk. It would be best if we can talk this out peacefully or there will definitely be blood. You’ve seen how we fight, so just think about how many more of your brothers will die by our hands.”

Hearing this, Liu Waizui nodded in defeat and whistled, his whistle resembling the sound of a bird.

Soon, the forest came alive with the chirping sounds.

And so, none of the bandits stopped them during the rest of their trip.

They soon arrived at a cave on the mountain with several fierce-looking bandits glaring at Li Huowang.

“Brat, you got guts! You dare to come and find us even after killing our brothers?” roared one of them.

However, Li Huowang just ignored the normal bandits and directly walked inside.

Soon, they arrived in a large hall. Here, Li Huowang saw three big burly men eating meat and drinking wine as they cursed and laughed. When the sound surrounding them slowly died down, all three of them sized up Li Huowang.

“A sharp target? Or a stinky target?”[1] asked the bald man first.

However, Li Huowang was too tired to bother with the codewords at this point. “Since I can come up here unharmed, you should know just how strong I am. Hand over the group of performers and I will overlook your sins.”

“Hahahaha!” The three men laughed.

Jiang!

Seeing this, Li Huowang unsheathed his sword and a dense killing intent filled up the entire hall.

1. A real Daoist or a fake one? ☜

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