The clearing fell into a stunned silence.
The only source of light flickered across twenty-nine faces. The bandits, guards, hostages — all staring at the young man who had just said what he'd said.
Lu Chen stood with his lazy smile, hands loose at his sides, looking for all the world like he was waiting for something mildly interesting to happen rather than facing down a bandit leader with a body count.
Ma Fu blinked.
His brain, which had processed countless ambushes, betrayals, and bloody negotiations over the years, hit a wall.
"...What did you call me?"
His voice came out strange.
Lu Chen tilted his head. "You deaf? I called you shit face."
He even pointed.
Just in case Ma Fu wasn't sure which face he was referring to.
Ma Fu's brain, which had run smoothly for three years of deep cover infiltration, finally crashed.
Blue screen. Reboot loop. Permanent damage. Emotional damage
His eye twitched. His mouth opened. Closed. Opened again. No sound came out. It was like watching a fish having an existential crisis on dry land.
From the ground, Old Guard Wei stared.
The old warrior had seen many things in his long life. He'd watched comrades fall. He'd faced demonic beasts. He'd survived assassination attempts that would have killed lesser men.
But he had never — never — seen anyone call a Peak Body Tempering 8 bandit leader "shit face" to his face.
His vision blurred.
Not from blood loss.
From sheer disbelief.
Who is this madman? he thought, his old heart pounding against his ribs. Where did he come from? What kind of death wish does he have? Is he... is he actually enjoying this?
In the wagon, Lin Xue and Lin Mei peered through the canvas flap.
Lin Xue's hand flew to her mouth. Her fingers pressed hard against her lips, trying to contain something that had no business being here. Laughter. The kind of hysterical, completely inappropriate laughter that arrives when terror and absurdity collide head-on and neither one yields.
Lin Mei had no such restraint.
A snort escaped her nose.
She immediately covered her face with both hands, but her shoulders were already shaking. Her eyes, peeking through her fingers, were warm with tears — not of sorrow, but of the sheer, overwhelming ridiculousness of what was happening.
"Sister," Lin Mei whispered, her voice barely holding together, "did he just—"
"Don't," Lin Xue whispered back, strained. "Don't say it. Don't laugh. You'll make it worse."
"It's already worse. That's why it's funny."
Lin Mei buried her face in her sister's shoulder, trembling. Even Lin Xue's lips were twitching now despite everything, despite the bound guards, despite the blood, despite the fact that they were currently cargo waiting to be sold.
We're being kidnapped, she thought. Our guards are bleeding. Our horses are gone. And I'm about to laugh at a man being called "shit face."
She hated that she found it funny.
She found it very funny.
Lu Chen, apparently not satisfied with the damage already done, tilted his head further.
"Hoy. Your father drop you head-first as a kid? That why you're so slow?"
Ma Fu's face cycled through red, then purple, then a color that had no proper name yet but would probably be described by future scholars as humiliation incarnate.
Old Guard Wei, still on the ground, closed his eyes.
How can a child's mouth be this foul? he thought. If we survive this — and that's a significant if — I'm advising the Young Mistresses to stay far away from people like this.
He immediately recognized the absurdity of his own thought.
Wait. 'If we survive'? I'm lying here, tied up, bleeding from my side, surrounded by twenty bandits, and I'm already planning the Young Mistresses' future social conduct as though we're not currently being sold into slavery.
He opened his eyes.
Lu Chen was still standing there, looking mildly bored.
Somewhere in the back of the bandit formation, a skinny man with a crooked nose made a sound.
It started as a choke. Then a cough. Then, despite every survival instinct in his body throwing itself against the door, a short, sharp laugh escaped.
Like a dam giving way.
A younger bandit near the wagon — dumber, less experienced, lacking the self-preservation of his elders — let out a chuckle before he could stop himself. He immediately covered his mouth, eyes going wide with the kind of terror that comes from knowing you've done something irreversible.
But the damage was done.
Ma Fu's head snapped toward his men.
The look on his face was the kind that men remembered in nightmares. Eyes wild. Veins raised on his forehead. Lips pulled back.
"WHO LAUGHED?!"
Silence.
The bandits stared at the ground. At the trees. At the sky. Anywhere that wasn't their leader's face.
"I said—" his voice cracked, "—WHO. LAUGHED?"
The skinny bandit took a step back. "Boss, no one—"
"I HEARD IT."
An older bandit, presumably wiser, cleared his throat. "Boss, it was the wind."
"The wind," Ma Fu repeated, dangerously flat.
"Yes, boss. Just the wind."
"The wind laughed at me."
"...It was a very disrespectful wind, boss."
Ma Fu's hand tightened on his sword. For a moment it genuinely looked like he might kill his own man just to make a point. Then he remembered the stranger.
He turned back to Lu Chen.
"You." His voice was low. Venomous. "You think this is funny?"
Lu Chen shrugged. "I think your men do."
Ma Fu's face contorted. Three years of careful infiltration. Three years of building this reputation. All of it. every wall, every layer of fear he'd constructed now shattered in two sentences by a teenager with a lazy smile.
"KILL HIM!" His voice cracked like a boy going through puberty. "KILL HIM AND LEAVE NOTHING INTACT! I WANT PIECES! I WANT TO MAIL HIM BACK TO HIS CLAN IN A SACK!"
[TO BE CONTINUED...]