Chapter Eighty-six: Stone Bridge

  It was almost done, Su Tang tore a strip of cloth from the big man's body and slowly wiped the fresh blood on his hands. The big man lay softly on the ground, already dying, his left rib cage had been cut open, revealing a row of bloody ribs.

  Su Tang's interrogation method was learned from Xiao Buwu. According to Xiao Buwu, writing on a person's bones is much more effective than torturing their muscles, and the sensitivity of the ribs far exceeds that of the fingers and toes. Xiao Buwu had even summarized that within five minutes, slowly crushing one rib would cause most people to become incontinent with pain. Crushing another rib could cause the person's breathing to stop. Crushing three ribs...Xiao Buwu hadn't met anyone who could withstand this level of torture, so he couldn't summarize further.

  Xiao Bu Hui is a pervert, but Su Tang always thought he was a normal person. He only asked about this topic out of curiosity, and at the time, he absolutely did not think that one day he would do what Xiao Bu Hui said, and do it so calmly.

  The girl in the house had long been frightened into a coma, and her brother's face was also pale green, almost vomiting. To him, Su Tang wrapped in a cloak, seemed like a human devil.

  Back at the inn, the fellow had already prepared everything that Su Tang wanted. Su Tang took out a package from his room, unfolded the map to take a look, then put it away and mounted his horse, galloping towards the city gate.

  There is a small town fifty miles outside the east gate of Bafang City. In the town, there are many tea houses, wine shops, inns and brothels, which are specially provided for traveling merchants to rest and have fun. It's already past noon, and the traveling merchants who temporarily stopped over have all left. The town seems a bit deserted, but a large-scale merchant group has not left, because the boss of the merchant group is an old friend of the town guard, and they are chatting happily, so it doesn't matter for half a day.

  A horseman rode swiftly from the direction of Bafang City and stopped at a teahouse, where a big man jumped off his horse and shouted loudly: "Boss, I want two pancakes and a pot of tea. Hurry up!"

  "Come on, come on." The owner of the teahouse hastily replied.

  In the tavern, the boss of the merchant group glanced down and then turned back to chat with his friends. He was an old man, and the town's guardian was about the same age as him. As people get older, they become more nostalgic, and when they meet old friends, there is no end to their conversations and sighs.

  "Boss, look over there!" one of the guards shouted.

  The boss of the caravan followed the direction pointed by the guard and his eyes suddenly froze, on the horizon in the distance, a knight appeared, galloping towards this side.

  The ferocious mask, under the sunlight, emits a cold glow. The cloak worn by the knight is extremely unusual, with a length and width of several tens of meters. Due to the strong wind's pulling, the cloak keeps rolling, and the range it can cover seems to be getting larger and larger.

  The knight was like a black comet that was unstoppable, the rolling and roaring tail of the comet seemed to contain endless darkness.

  The old town guard noticed that his friend's complexion was somewhat off, and hastily turned his head. When he saw the knight rushing over, he also froze.

  They have rich experience and have seen many strong people, among whom there are also masters, but they have never seen anyone who can emit such a shocking killing aura.

  It was just one person rushing by, but it brought with it a momentum of galloping horses, an inexplicable heavy pressure that came crashing down.

  The big man in the tea house was in a hurry, and he drank all the tea in the teapot with several mouthfuls. He stuffed the pancake into his mouth and turned around to leave. The owner of the tea house hurried out to ask for the money for the tea and the pancake.

  The big man was somewhat impatient, reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of copper coins, just then, a piercing whistle suddenly cut through the air.

  The big man wanted to turn around and take a closer look, but as soon as he moved, his body exploded. Not just him, the horse in front of him also split into two pieces. The owner of the teahouse was still stretching out his hand for money when he was splashed with blood, and he let out a shrill cry, scrambling to escape into the shop.

  The guards on the wine tower immediately drew their weapons, and the leader of the merchant group suddenly shouted loudly: "Put them away, it's none of our business!"

  Several guards looked at each other and put away their weapons. The knight had already galloped into the town, continuing forward along the street, passing by the corpse of the big man without even a glance, as if his death had nothing to do with him.

  It wasn't until then that the people on the second floor of the tavern saw clearly that the material of the knight's cloak was flowing, and before entering the town, the cloak was almost tens of meters wide. After entering the town, it shrank to a strip, just equal to the width of the street. The knight ran past, and the long cloak kept rubbing against and colliding with the two sides of the street, making a rustling sound, and also stirring up flying sand and gravel.

  "This is outrageous! He dares to kill someone in broad daylight. I'll go down and reason with him..." The old town guard said slowly, then stood up.

  "Alright, alright, Old Zhao, what are you pretending for? By the time you're gone, they'll have already run out of town." The leader of the merchant group said with a low chuckle.

  The old town guardian's eyes flickered and he suddenly said: "What are you thinking of?"

  "And you? What are you thinking of?" The caravan leader asked back.

  ****

  The sun was setting in the west, Su Tang pulled the reins on a hillside and took out a map from his backpack, examining it carefully.

  It's hard to save someone who has fallen into a pit of fragrance. Whether or not to rescue is not worth thinking about, the key is how to rescue and what to do after rescuing.

  Pragmatists tend to believe in fate, thinkers tend to believe in the will of heaven. When they parted ways in Changshan County, Su Tang asked everyone not to reveal their whereabouts to avoid being implicated. In the vast land, each went their separate way, and according to reason, the probability of them meeting again was close to zero. Even if they did meet, it's possible that they would be old by then. Yet, only half a year had passed when he saw Wen Xiang again, and Wen Xiang was in a desperate situation - wasn't this the will of heaven?

  Besides, Su Tang had only a few friends he could trust with his life, so whether to save him or not was never an issue. Su Tang made the decision without any hesitation.

  Of course, Su Tang would not lose his rationality. If the elders of the Hu family had already joined forces with the cavalry, then even if he was in great pain and could not bear it, he would give up. Saving people and burying them were two completely different things! He would grit his teeth and survive, and one day, he would surely uproot the entire Hu family!

  Nan Xi Bei Hu, Xi should be the Xi family of Hong Ye City, that is to say, the strength of the Hu family and the Xi family are about the same. However, the strength of those warriors in the convoy should be very limited, which is easy to understand. Any city has its own local forces that have become a climate, they will not allow external forces to invade, and large numbers of elite warriors to enter, no doubt is provocative. So, Hu Ge would turn to Su Tang for help, and so, the meeting point was set at Tou Dao Ridge, on the one hand, to get rid of Wen Xiang as soon as possible, to prevent leaks, on the other hand, because the elders of the Hu family could not get too close to Ba Mian City, which would inevitably alert the local forces of Ba Mian City.

  Rescuing Xiang was relatively easy, but escaping from the pursuit of the Hu family elders to survive would be much more difficult.

  Moreover, it's not the worst-case scenario. If the Hu family can't find Wen Xiang, they might as well reveal Wen Xiang's information to Bajiao City and seek assistance from local forces, willing to share the spoils with everyone in order to capture Wen Xiang. In that case... they will set up a dragnet, making it extremely difficult to escape.

  Su Tang likes to plan before acting, he has been considering all kinds of possibilities, the prospects do not allow him to be optimistic, although thinking more and more, the pressure is greater, but it's better than being stupid and sending himself to death.

  Su Tang slowly put away the map and then urged his horse on, galloping down the mountain ridge.

  A stone bridge appeared ahead, and from the map, the name of the bridge was called Dashiqiao Bridge. The river under the bridge was called Green River. After crossing the bridge and walking through a dense forest, they arrived at Yiren Town. It's said that Yiren Town produces beautiful women, and many concubines of some big shots in Bafang City come from Yiren Town. Su Tang didn't have the mood to verify the authenticity of the rumor, so he pulled tight the reins after crossing the bridge.

  It was also a coincidence that on the stone at the bridgehead, several big men dressed as warriors sat, seeing Su Tang suddenly stop in his tracks, they all lowered their heads and didn't dare to look directly at Su Tang. It wasn't just because of the evil spirit emanating from Su Tang, but also because the cloak that almost spanned the entire river surface was like a black curtain condensing towards Su Tang. For them, this scene was too strange and it was natural for them to make judgments. A warrior with such an extraordinary spiritual instrument was absolutely not someone they could afford to provoke.

  "A few brothers, want to make some small money?" Su Tang said slowly.

  Those warriors exchanged a glance, and a burly man with pockmarks on his face smiled and said: "Of course we want to make money, but... what does this lord need us to do?"

  "After a while, a cavalry will pass by the bridge." Su Tang said: "You hide in the woods and shoot a few arrows and shout towards this side."

  Several warriors showed a tense look, the big man with a pockmarked face rolled his eyes wildly, this is going to be a robbery... kidding? Who knows which family's merchant caravan is being robbed?

  "Just shoot a few casual arrows." Su Tang saw the other's thoughts and added, "Then you can leave." In fact, whether or not someone helped, it didn't make much of a difference. Su Tang just wanted to set up more, trying his best to ensure safety.

  "Will shooting a few arrows casually be enough?" The big man with pockmarks on his face was somewhat moved, and immediately fled into the town after shooting a few casual arrows. There shouldn't be any problem.

  "That's right." Su Tang nodded.

  "Adults, I don't know about this reward..." The big man with a face full of acne looked up at Su Tang and immediately shifted his gaze away.

  Su Tang threw out a few gold tickets, and the atmosphere immediately became lively as several warriors saw the face value of the tickets. They shouted loudly, asking the scar-faced man to take on this task.

  Money can move people's hearts, the vigilance just now has been thrown to the clouds, the swarthy man excitedly collected the gold ticket and patted his chest to guarantee it to Su Tang.