Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios
The barbarians had almost caught up with him while he was answering Xiao Bai’s call.
While waiting for Fan Shixin, An Xiaoning had already torn up the bottom segment of her shirt. Due to the fact that she was in a hurry to rush out earlier, she didn’t bring anything to mask her face and was simply dressed in a short-sleeved shirt and a pair of shorts. Hence, she had no choice but to tear off some fabric from her shirt to tie around her face, leaving her abdomen bare and exposed.
The people chasing her were exhausted beyond limits. They slowed down to catch their breaths upon noticing that she had stopped running.
One of the men inside the car alighted and asked in puzzlement, “What’s going on? Weren’t we chasing a man? Why has he become a woman? Are they in cahoots?”
An Xiaoning could recognize the familiar voice: it was from one of the men whom she had heard in the wooden house previously.
“Hah, you can’t even differentiate between a man and a woman. Are you blind?” An Xiaoning sneered.
A grave expression formed on their faces as soon as An Xiaoning blurted those words, especially the Third Brother, the man who alighted from the car. “You ignorant dimwit.” He then yelled at his accomplices, “Hold her down and get her!”
They had no choice but to follow the orders given, despite being utterly exhausted. An Xiaoning remained still and watched calmly as they approached.
There were trees on one side of the road and a trench on the other, which was about 40 meters deep.
She was planning to throw all of them down into the trench.
She had no idea if it would kill them. However, all she wanted was for her and Fan Shixin to escape successfully.
Just as An Xiaoning was pushing the dog-tired bunch of people down the trench, the Third Brother could not tolerate it any longer and aimed his gun at her.
“Freeze!”
“I won’t move, come and catch me if you can,” An Xiaoning said fearlessly.
“Both of you, bring her here,” the Third Brother instructed his two remaining subordinates.
The two were overwhelmed with fear and terror after witnessing what An Xiaoning did to their subordinates. Yet, they could not defy the Third Brother’s orders. They approached An Xiaoning and reached their trembling hands out to her, only to have her slap them away.
There was no suspense at all.
The Third Brother was the only one left on the road, the gun in his hands. He did not plan to catch her back alive anymore and instead shot her right away. Coincidentally, An Xiaoning managed to dodge the bullet in the nick of time.
Just as he was about to fire the second bullet, Fan Shixin jumped down from the tree and pinned the Third Brother down onto the ground.
An Xiaoning immediately ran toward him, after which the Third Brother turned over and pinned Fan Shixin beneath him. An Xiaoning quickly took the chance to stab the Third Brother in his neck.
He fell toward the side instantly.
She plucked the knife out and pushed him and his car down into the trench.
The silence was finally restored on the road.
An Xiaoning helped Fan Shixin up. He gave her a thumbs-up and praised in awe, “Bravo, Young Madam!”
“We have to get out of here now. Hurry, let’s go.”
“Alright.”
During their journey back, Fan Shixin told her that he was initially being extremely cautious when following the Second Brother and the rest and did not alarm them at the start. However, his cover was blown the moment he came into contact with infrared beams, causing them to take chase after him.
The fact that cars were scarce in the nation and that gang leaders were the only ones who could drive them had given Fan Shixin the chance to escape.
They returned to the rented accommodation in the town. As soon as they closed the door, Xiao Bai pounced onto Fan Shixin and said, “I was worried sick.”
“Hey, rascal, I’m dead tired right now. Get off me,” said Fan Shixin.
Xiao Bai hurriedly straightened his back and said, “Lie down, quick. I’ll give you a massage.”
Fan Shixin lay down on the mat while Xiao Bai massaged his legs earnestly. At the same time, he also asked Fan Shixin about everything that had happened.
Although Xiao Bai did not experience the incident himself, he could not help but feel terrorized as well.
An Xiaoning chugged a large volume of water before pouring Fan Shixin a glass too.
She then whipped out her mobile phone to see that she had received a reply from Jin Qingyan.
He informed her about a new update regarding the words on the knife.
He briefly explained, “The words on the knife translate to ‘The world will belong to me as long as this knife lies in my hands.’ This is an ancient language of V Nation. After the revolution, the citizens of V Nation decided to abort it in the new era and adopted their current native language instead.”
An Xiaoning showed Fan Shixin and Xiao Bai the text message. She then scrutinized the carvings on the knife again carefully and remarked, “Why are the words carved in an ancient language when they’ve already adopted a new language?”
“I reckon it’s not as simple as it seems. Things are getting complicated. Remember what we heard behind the wooden house? They said clearly that the only reason they’d spread the news about the treasure map is to attract foreigners to the place, just so they could devour their fresh blood. We can’t deduce what they really meant. Does the treasure map really exist? Or is it just a sham? That’s still a huge mystery.”
An Xiaoning lay motionless in bed, feeling an immense ache in her calf that arose from the excessive running she had done tonight.
She said, “Regardless of whether it really exists or not, we still have to make it clear. They’ll be screening and checking every household for our presence. We must make the necessary preparations in order to effectively react to the situation. Let’s just rest for the next two days and hold back from making any further moves.”
“Alright…”
——
“Hello.”
“Hello, Ms. Fang, I’m Jing Yang…”
“Please stop calling me! There’s nothing left to talk about between us!” Fang Erlan hollered, utterly disgusted.
After hanging up the phone, Fang Erlan decided to change her mobile number, for Jing Yang had been constantly harassing her ever since he got her mobile number from Jing Shui.
He insisted on asking her out for some tea.
However, Fang Erlan would turn down his offer every single time, for she was no longer a fan of his and now had a terrible impression of him.
“Sis Erlan, just what is this Jing Yang trying to do? Why does he keep harassing you?” Xiao Yue criticized.
“I don’t know. I reckon he’s just afraid that I’ll tell other fans of his about his arrogant and hostile attitude.”
“There’s no point in that since you don’t plan to leak it anyway. Is he thinking of becoming your friend because you have connections now?” said Xiao Yue.
“Who wants to be his friend?” Fang Erlan stood up, handed the script to Xiao Yue, and said, “It’s my turn now.”
After being rejected countless times, Jing Yang threw his mobile phone onto the bed and snapped, “That damned wretch is asking for trouble!”
His assistant comforted, “I doubt it’d be possible to get to know Director Jing Tian through her. Brother, there’ll still be plenty of opportunities to get close to Director Jing Tian. There’s no hurry in getting that done now. Brother, you’ve already become an A-lister anyway. You have a huge number of fans behind you and superb acting chops. You won’t have to worry about connections or acting opportunities. There’ll be chances for you to work with Director Jing Tian in the future.”
“Fool, what do you know? If I met Jing Tian earlier and had gotten his recognition, I might have just been cast as the male lead of that television drama series they’re currently filming. I heard that more than 100 million dollars had been invested in the production and that it’s a top-quality production. Besides, that drama would definitely become a blockbuster and rise in fame with the help of the investor’s strong connections. By then, they’ll receive several awards and accolades for their work. All the roles the manager has been accepting on my behalf are for lousy and substandard productions.”
