Chapter 2508: Burning the Tower (21)
The sky was dimming toward the hour of You. Eleven riders came thundering down the official road, bodies pressed flat against their horses' necks as they flew past like a gale. Dense trees and mottled boulders blurred by in a rush of retreating shapes. Wei Mingchen calculated the distance in his head and gradually tightened his reins, raising one arm high before pressing it down—the signal to slow. The riders eased their pace.
Wei Mingchen's group scanned the river channel running parallel to the road, searching for the boat carrying Li Jian and his nephew. Yun Ting's orders had been simple: whoever they were, kill them. Sever every thread of Xue Tu's plans.
A little further on, Wei Mingchen spotted a small boat bearing the secret marks that identified vessels used to transport meeting participants. He reined in at a short distance, swung his leg over, and dropped lightly to the ground.
"Dismount," he said in a low voice. "Stay sharp. Everyone keep your eyes bright."
The ten riders followed suit, drawing Qi Family sabers and Japanese swords from their waists. Several produced hand crossbows from their satchels. Six formed a circular defensive formation facing outward while the remaining four split into pairs to hold both sides of the road. Wei Mingchen approached the skiff with care. The boatman lay dead on the riverbank, half his body soaking in the shallows.
Wei Mingchen examined the corpse first. All the wounds were on the back—a merciless pursuit. The killing blows had been concentrated stabs to the kidneys, followed by a puncture to the side of the neck. The wound was large, torn wide by someone twisting the blade after insertion. A follow-up strike, most likely, after the kidney stabs had brought the man down.
Another boatman lay sprawled on the sandy beach. Both had been Xue Tu's subordinates, bought off long ago by Wei Mingchen's side. When they'd set out, they hadn't rowed to the predetermined location but had grounded the boat here at this desolate stretch of the channel—making it easier for the pursuing riders to catch up.
Though the spot bordered the official road, travelers were rare. And any who happened by could be easily silenced.
Wei Mingchen drew in a sharp breath. He turned toward the small boat, held his saber horizontal before him, and advanced inch by inch toward the cabin with full alertness. As he approached the awning, a pungent smell of blood hit him. From beneath came a steady dripping—tick-tock, tick-tock—blood seeping through gaps in the planking. The rhythm of it unsettled him. Frowning, he used the tip of his single-handed cloud ladder saber to lift the curtain.
Inside lay the corpse of a large man in black. His hollow, lifeless eyes stared wide, seeming to fix on Wei Mingchen. His heart lurched before he steadied himself and studied the scene.
Blood. Blood everywhere. The man had multiple puncture wounds clustered below his Adam's apple at the jugular, a deep cut across the femoral artery in his leg, and a slash along the left side of his neck that had opened the carotid. That last wound had sent blood spraying like a fountain. Every strike had been fatal—death would have come within seconds. The viscous blood hadn't fully dried; it crept slowly downward under gravity's pull, nauseating to behold. Two knife marks scored the cabin's wall panels and frame, the cuts fresh—likely left during the struggle.
This Li Jian was indeed a trained expert. In such cramped quarters, fighting alone, he'd killed three men in moments. The two boatmen might not have been martial artists, but they were hardened, violent men—not easy prey.
Wei Mingchen shifted his attention outside the boat and examined the surrounding area. No footprints, but one patch of sand appeared suspiciously uniform in color. He crouched and brushed it with his hand, revealing dark spots of dried blood beneath the grains. The uniform surface had been created by Li Jian using branches to sweep away traces during his retreat. The blood meant at least one of them was wounded.
He followed the direction of the marks to the eastern roadside. Li Jian and his companion hadn't continued along the official road—they'd entered the reed marshes flanking it. Perhaps they meant to hide and wait for their pursuers to give up. Perhaps they expected reinforcements.
Wei Mingchen looked around and found several freshly broken branches, their exposed surfaces still pale. The undergrowth showed clear signs of trampling. Further on, in a flat patch of mud, he discovered footprints. He studied them carefully. Judging by density and spacing, only two people had passed through. No one had come to meet them. One set of prints pressed deeper into the earth with drag marks trailing behind—someone carrying a heavy burden. Dragging a wounded man.
Wei Mingchen exhaled slowly. So long as people moved through nature, they left traces. Carrying a wounded man, they wouldn't get far.
He waved his hand. The ten men gathered immediately.
"One stays with the horses," Wei Mingchen said coldly. "The rest follow me. Communicate with bamboo whistles if you encounter danger—but only for critical matters. Using them carelessly reveals our position."
Everyone nodded. Several shadows flickered and vanished into the dense forest climbing the hillside.
Xu Tong crouched on the ground, breathing hard. He needed to recover some strength. Li Baiqing sat nearby, looking desperately weak. The half-old man's abdomen was wrapped in strips torn from clothing. Blood kept seeping through, dyeing the makeshift bandage red.
The moment the boat had suddenly grounded, Xu Tong knew there would be no easy escape today. He'd torn open the stitching at his cross-collar, where a short, refined steel knuckle duster lay hidden. He'd anticipated betrayal, but what surprised him was the enemy's boldness—attacking without numerical superiority. The man escorting the boat had probably hoped to eliminate one target first, then join the boatmen to finish off the other.
Li Baiqing had been sitting at the awning's entrance and took the first knife. In the same instant, Xu Tong caught the big man's knife-hand with his left, used his right elbow to pry away the man's guard, and drove the knuckle duster into his jugular. The short weapon couldn't hack or chop—only stab and scratch—but inside the cramped awning where a man could barely bend his arms, it proved more agile than any short knife. It needed only centimeters of space to deliver repeated, concentrated thrusts. Massive bleeding from the jugular and carotid stripped the big man of resistance in an instant. The killing blow was over in a heartbeat, leaving only a mess.
Li Baiqing's wound wasn't serious. Xu Tong had pressed the bleeding point on his abdomen and performed a quick field dressing before the two avoided the official road and slipped into the marshes. Now Xu Tong checked the wound again. A laceration—not deep, and it didn't seem to be worsening—but rapid movement would tear the abdominal wound open, drastically slowing their pace. A fatal problem.
Xu Tong removed his coat and cut it open with his short knife, extracting a 1:5000 map, compass, and tape measure from the hidden lining. Comparing notes from his journey here, he estimated their position and bearing. His mental arithmetic wasn't strong; after brief calculations, he'd only managed to determine the correct direction. He felt a flash of annoyance, but there was no time to waste. He didn't know if more pursuers were coming, but he had to assume the worst.
He pulled the stopper from his water bag, took a sip, and handed it to Li Baiqing. After the older man drank, Xu Tong took his short knife and sliced open the bottom of the bladder—but no water spilled. The specially made container held two independent compartments: one for water, one for storing other items.
From the hidden space he withdrew three small bamboo tubes. Two were slightly larger than paper cartridges; the largest was only as thick as a circle made by thumb and forefinger. Xu Tong tucked all three into his shirt, stood, and looked at Li Baiqing.
"Still okay?"
Li Baiqing managed a weak smile. "Still okay."
Xu Tong nodded. "You go first."
Li Baiqing glanced at him, said nothing, and rose with the help of a tree branch. He began walking slowly forward.
Carrying a "colorful number"—a wounded man—made quick disengagement impossible. Whether from duty, morality, or something else entirely, Xu Tong couldn't abandon Li Baiqing. He wasn't one of the elite covert operatives trained by the Senate, ready to sacrifice his life for any mission. He represented more than himself—he carried the weight of Old Li Village and the Lower Six Villages Mutual Defense.
If he died on this mission, the Senate's influence throughout the Lower Six Villages would suffer a serious blow. That outcome served no one in the current situation.
But bringing Li Baiqing along made hiding their tracks nearly impossible. If pursuers existed, they would follow the trail. Xu Tong needed to confirm whether they were being hunted.
He stood and searched for a suitable spot. Deliberately, he stepped on and snapped a few vines and wild grasses, leaving obvious signs of passage. Then, on a narrow path wide enough for only one person, he dug a shallow pit with his short knife and buried a bamboo tube vertically inside. Most of it lay hidden in the soil; only a small section protruded above ground. He covered it gently with loose earth and a few fallen leaves, checked for flaws, and rose with satisfaction.
Time to move. Xu Tong glanced up at the sky and thought: We'll definitely be spending tonight in the wild.
Wei Mingchen moved quickly. Two scouts ranged ahead while seven men followed close behind, strung out like segments of a centipede. He could feel himself drawing nearer to the prey. The anticipation of bloodshed quickened his pulse.
The lead swordsman beat and hacked at the undergrowth with his blade, attention fixed entirely forward. Suddenly something caught his foot—it felt like stepping on a small stone. The bamboo tube sank beneath his weight.
Inside the tube, a cartridge of enhanced black powder pressed downward with the swordsman's step. A brass spacer separating propellant from percussion cap continued its descent, forcing the cap down onto the convex platform at the tube's base. To ensure this small booby trap's reliability, the percussion cap used was more sensitive than standard gun caps—normally kept separate, only loaded by unscrewing the tube's bottom when deployed.
(End of Chapter)