Translator: Wuxia Dog Editor: Wuxia Dog
“Even if he was confused, do you think he would admit it? You have got along with him for a long time. You know him.” Han Jin laughed, “He will never allow others to insult his intelligence! Even if he does not understand, he will pretend he does.”
“Yes, he will…” Cessacioun also laughed, then fixed his eyes on the guy beside them. “You are Reg, aren’t you?” He asked, knowing clearly why Han Jin would release a charm to ‘induce’ him. The team of them lacked a thief, which had caused many inconveniences for its actions. They had discussed this many times. While the appearance of Reg could cover this shortage.
“Yes, I am. Nice to meet you.” Reg smiled.
“Nice to meet you, too. I am Cessacioun. We are friends now.”
Reg was slightly stunned, but he understood it immediately, “If you don’t mind a burden, then we are friends. I will try my best not to trouble you.”
When the greeting’s finished, Cessacioun turned his head to Han Jin, and gave Reg a glance stealthily, as if he was asking for Han Jin’s opinion about this decision. Sunier had warned them not to recruit people at random. That’s why their team was still very stable for now. Though they each had secrets, they were mutually trusted. If the new guy joined them was a smelly fish, the whole pot of soup would be destroyed!
Han Jin nodded slowly after some thought. The loyalty showed by Reg’s old servant, who choose to die in such an unyielding way, was the best proof that both Reg and the father of him wereextraordinary men. Blind loyalty was rare. Any affection in this world was bidirectional! Taking Han Jin himself as an example, if he had bullied and scolded his servant Steelberg all the time, and enjoyed all the enjoyment himself while letting Steelberg to suffer all the sufferings, would Steelberg be willing to tolerate these and still be so loyal to him?
Since the decision had been affirmed by Han Jin, Cessacioun felt assured. He changed the topic in a natural way, “What shall we do next, Raphael? Beitman is going be a mess not long later. Alas… What a chaotic world it is. Why is it so difficultfor us to find a peaceful place?”
“We have no ability to change anything, but only to take every step cautiously, and go with the stream.” Han Jin replied in a slow way.
“Beitman? What happened to Beitman?” Reg was taken aback.
“The vampire guards and Dark Elves of Zaganide have already invaded Beitman.”
“How is it possible…” Reg wanted to get up and ask it more clearly, but only to make his wounds aggravated. He let out a stuffy groan due to the pain.
“Calm down. We can do nothing about this, nor can you.” Han Jin forced a smile. “We’d better seek the opinion from Sunier tomorrow morning.”
“I have no idea, either.” Came the voice of Sunier suddenly. “The guards of vampires are famous for their fast speed and flexibility, the same as the Silver Horse Regiment. They are good at sneak attacks and avoiding decisive battles. The troops of Beitman can’t defeat them.”
“What would you do, if you were a Commander of Beitman?” Han Jin asked.
“Me…” she paused, and then moved on,”Have you noticed the tactic adopted by the vampires? They have broken up their whole team into small parts. That’s why we would encounter those vampires just now. If I were the commander, I would employ lots of mercenary teams, no matter how much it will cost, to fight the scattered enemies with scattered mercenaries, to deplete their forces, and to arrange our regular forces to launch flank attacks. The guards of vampires will retreat if they find their lossesare too heavy. But… Beitman will also suffer great losses due to the action style of the vampire guards. At least hundreds of small towns and villages will be turned into ruins.”
“Is thereany other way except this one?”
“Yes. To ask help from the Dragon Race.” Sunier replied. Her expression turned complicated. Inside her eyes there were both sarcasm and hatred. She must have recalled the battle that led to the overall collapse of the Silver Horse Regiment. “But the Dragons take interest in watching the wars on the mainland. They don’t care about the fate of Beitman at all, I guess, though they hate the creatures of darkness too.”
“Well. Let’s stop talking about these.” Han Jin interrupted. “We’d better go to bed now. There is a long way to go tomorrow.” This topic must be stopped for that Reg had become increasingly agitated. He obviously cared about the safety of Beitman very much. If they kept talking about this, he might change his mind and leave them when he got better.
* * *
No more talking for the whole night. The next morning, Moxinke opened his eyes slowly with a yawn. The scene around him startled him.
All the others had woken up and stared at him with creepy expression in their eyes.
Moxinke suddenly realized that half of Sylner’s body was covering on him, and his hands were holding her waist. Moxinke felt greatly embarrassed. He pushed Slyner away without hesitation.
However,the strength he used was too much that Slyner was pushed to fly away over one meter in height before she thudded down onto ground with a loud sound of collision. She lay there in an awkward posture.
Any one who had suffered such a violent attack would wake up no matter how sound asleep she had been. Sylner opened her eyes all of a sudden, but still unmoved. Her face was full of puzzlement.
She had bit bleeding her lips by her own teeth during the collision. When she felt her mouth was sweet and her lips were painful, she jumped up after turning over, and roared, “Who dare to attack me?!”
Half of them pointed to Moxinke. Sylner stepped a pace forward and pulled the ear of Moxinke heavily. “Do you want to die?!”She shouted angrily.
Moxinke put on a long face. He was a reasonable man. If Sylner did this without reasonable ground, he would by no means tolerate her bad temper. But now it was him who did the wrongfirst. He wanted to explain, but found himselflack of excuses. If he admitted his fault and fawned on Sylner, he was afraid of being mocked by the others. After all, how could a man admit himself being defeated by a woman?
Han Jin made a dry cough, “I think, we need to buy some tents. It’s inconvenient without tents at night.”
“Yes, yes.” Cessacioun nodded immediately.
“Don’t blame Moxinke too much, Sylner. He might have a nightmare just now and kicked randomly like a madman. You happened to lie on his body. He didn’t mean to kick you away.” Sunier explained in a soft tone.
“She is right… Dear sister. I didn’t mean to kick you.” Moxinke showed an apologetic smile.
“Coward! Are you still a little boy? What man will have nightmare like you?!” Sylner scoffed at Moxinkefor his failure to live up to her expectation.
Han Jin and Cessacioun looked into the eyes of each other speechlessly. The point of Sunier’s words did not lie in ‘nightmare’, but ‘you happened to lie on his body’. Apparently, Slyner had not realized her own misbehaves at all. Or it might be that… she considered it nothing unusual? Gossip went that Sylner’s father had passed away many years ago. Since then she and Moxinke had always shared their life together. They must had lots of stories during those years.
Sylner let go Moxinke’s ears finally. But then she found her armor before her chest was wet and covered by mud. “Eh, why is it so wet? The dew last night was so heavy!”
Hearing this, none of them could hold their laughter anymore. Camping out in the wild was hard. It’s understandable for her to drool during sleeping. But she should have realized it instead of asking a silly question like this.
Moxinke let out a sigh of helplessness. He could do nothing but lie down on the ground again and play dead.
“What are you laughing at?” Sylner asked angrily with her feet stamping.
“Nothing, nothing.” Han Jin stepped out, trying to distract their attention, “Is breakfast ready,Michelle?” He asked.
“Yes. I also brought some bread with me. Breakfast today is simple, we can only eat these.” Michelle replied with a smile.
Hearing the word ‘breakfast’, Moxinke sat up reluctantly. As a professional fighting against enemies in a close distance, he would never let his belly empty, otherwise, his combat capacity would be weakened greatly.
The food prepared by Michelle was not very much, but enough for them to fill their belly. Han Jin no longer relied on food to accumulate energy. His cultivation had been greatly improved during the past winter and his energy accumulation had reached one hundred Jia. Thus, the work of Michelle became much easier.
Han Jin was still pondering something while eating. Suddenly, he turned his head to Reg, “You are from Beitman, you must be very familiar with it. Where do you think we should go during this time?”
Little Joseph was feeding Reg the bread. He retracted his hand and stepped aside when Han Jin was asking this. Reg swallowed down the food in a rush, “The Ninth Town.” He replied after some thinking.
“Is it safe there?”
“The Ninth Town is located at the back of the capital. It is relatively safer than other places. And I have a friend there. He will entertain us.”
“But, considering your status now… Aren’t you afraid to get him into trouble?” Han Jin asked tentatively.
The expression on Reg’s face changed. A moment later, he let out a sigh, “You are right. We’d better go to the capital. Though Beit City is nicknamed as City of Betrayer, and is mocked by people all the time, its defensive ability is indeed very strong. The vampires are unable to occupy it.”
“We just need a quiet place. Beit is too big. It will bring us lots of inconveniences.” Han Jin smiled, “As long as we avoid public contact with your friend, he will not be involved in your trouble.”
“You mean… we are going to the Ninth Town?” Reg asked.
“Yes.”
Reg was somewhat puzzled. Since Han Jin had made the decision, why would he still remind him of the trouble?
While Han Jin had his own reason to do so. It was actually a test for Reg. One couldn’t wait until the last moment to see through a person. Otherwise it would be too late! To know a person well, one could judge by himself via minor details. Reg changed his idea immediately when he was told his appearance might bring trouble to his friend.It’s enough to prove that he was a decent and righteous man. If he insisted on going to the Ninth Town by saying something like how powerful and faithful his friend was, Han Jin would undoubtedly consider Reg an untrustworthy person. “Pack our things up! We need to leave now.” Han Jin ordered.
