It was terribly unfortunate that his astonishing momentum was not backed up with enough skills; no matter how promising he looked, his execution was clumsy and showed his inexperience. He was disarmed with a flick of the hand before he could land a hit, and was knocked back a few meters after a blow to the stomach.

The boy stood up after that, faced covered in grime. Without fear, he shouted and charged again empty-handed.

The fisherman also wanted to stand, but he was so heavily injured that he fell back right away.

The enemy smiled coldly, “Look at this rabbit trying to bite.” He dodged the attack, fingers crooked with the intention of clawing at the middle of the boy’s back. Under the moonlight those fingers didn’t seem to be made out of human flesh and blood, they glowed a faint blue, ready to deliver the killing blow.

Initially Zhou Zishu refrained from sticking his nose into this, but he had somewhat of a fate with this fisherman, having been ‘on the same boat’ with him; and the boy was too young to be met with death at his age. He took a small rock in his palm, but before he could shoot it, there was suddenly a whistle. The man in black flinched and threw himself to the flat ground, making the boy trip in midair since he caught nothing.

At the place where the man in black had stood moments before was a hidden weapon4 in the shape of a lotus.

They heard a delicate female voice, “What kind of person bullies elders and children this late at night in the middle of nowhere? How audacious.”

Zhou Zishu startled as this voice was quite familiar. He withdrew the small rock, returning to his makeshift bed to watch things unfold silently.

The man in black’s expression twitched, gaze throbbing — Zhou Zishu thought it was because of the scar acting up. His face froze, looking a little funny despite the viciousness. He spoke angrily, “Show yourself, you whore!”

The young lady appeared at the door, smiling. Zhou Zishu recognized her as the one in purple who had threatened to poison him earlier. What a roll he was on today, seeing that half of the people gathered here was someone he had run into beforehand.

The girl’s master was nowhere to be found; she tilted her head, leaning on the door with an innocent expression, a finger lightly scraping her face. “Old shameless bastard, how dare you come here to attack elders and children, not sparing even one who’s at death’s door?”

At being called ‘one who’s at death’s door’, the fisherman, having been swearing up and down vigorously just hours before, collapsed in silence.

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Footnotes