Instant Kill

They came rushing in, blades howling through the air.

Yet in Lin Qing's eyes, the two men were full of openings, moving as slowly as crawling turtles.

There was no trace of blood-qi cultivation on them. They relied on nothing but their savagery.

"Fools courting death."

Lin Qing gave a cold snort. He neither dodged nor retreated, charging straight at them.

Just as the steel blades were about to strike him, his feet shifted and his figure swayed lightly like the wind.

By a hair's breadth, he evaded the blades slashing in from either side.

At the same time, he spread his arms and shot out both hands as fast as lightning.

He clamped down hard on the wrists of the two men wielding the blades!

"Crack! Crack!"

Two crisp snaps of breaking bone rang out almost at the same time!

"Argh—!"

The two bandits let out shrieks like slaughtered pigs. Lin Qing had crushed their wrists with his bare hands, and their steel blades clattered to the ground.

Showing no mercy, Lin Qing threw two punches in quick succession, slamming into their Adam's apples like iron hammers!

"Ugh!"

Their screams cut off abruptly.

The two bandits' eyes bulged. They clutched at their throats as bloody froth spilled from their mouths.

Their bodies went limp and collapsed. After twitching for a moment, they fell silent.

The mountain forest grew quiet once more.

Only the blood that hung in the air and the woman's stifled sobs bore witness to the brutal slaughter that had just taken place.

The woman was already stunned, curled up on the ground with her child clutched tightly in her arms.

She looked at Lin Qing as if he were a god of slaughter who had descended from the heavens.

She had watched with her own eyes as those three vicious bandits killed her husband.

Yet against this seemingly ordinary man, they had been utterly helpless, dispatched in the blink of an eye.

Lin Qing paid no heed to the woman's gaze. He quickly went over to the three corpses and crouched to search them.

From the bald man's clothes, he pulled out a purse and weighed it in his hand. It held around twenty or thirty taels in silver.

He found another dozen or so taels on the other two men.

Without hesitation, he tucked the bloodstained silver into his own robes.

It was his spoils of war, and the resources he would need for cultivation in the future.

Only after finishing did he turn to the woman, who was still shaken.

When the woman saw Lin Qing look her way, she suddenly snapped out of it, struggled to her knees, and kowtowed again and again. "Thank you, hero! Thank you for saving my life!"

"Please see us safely all the way through and escort my son and me to the Qingping County yamen. My elder brother is Wang Ping, a constable at the county yamen. He will surely reward you handsomely."

"This is all the money I have. Please, hero, have mercy!"

As she spoke, she hurriedly took a slightly deflated but finely stitched purse from her robes and held it out to Lin Qing with trembling hands.

Her eyes were full of desperate pleading.

"Wang Ping?" Lin Qing's heart stirred.

The fair-minded Head Constable Wang, who had spoken up to stop him when he and Pan Yun had been at odds, and had shown some regret over Fan Kui's death.

So he was this woman's elder brother?

He glanced at the purse she was offering.

It was probably the last of her travel money.

Lin Qing shook his head and did not take it. His voice was still hoarse, but had softened a little. "Keep your silver."

Seeing him refuse, the woman thought he was unwilling to escort them any farther. Panic seized her, and tears welled up again as she broke into sobs. "Hero, please, I beg you. We're out here in the wilderness. If we run into more villains, my son and I are as good as dead. Please, have mercy..."

Lin Qing looked at the child in her arms, whose little face had gone pale with fright as he clung tightly to his mother's clothes. He let out a quiet sigh.

In the end, he couldn't simply look away and stand by.

"I'll take you there."

He cut off her pleas, his voice calm.

"Put your silver away."

The woman froze. Then, wild disbelief and joy flooded her face, and she hurried to kowtow again. "Thank you, hero! Thank you! In my next life, I'll be your ox or horse to repay you!"

"There's no need."

Lin Qing waved a hand and looked toward the corpse of the scholar-robed man nearby.

"First, let's lay your husband... to rest."

At his words, grief surged through the woman. She nodded through her tears.

Lin Qing found a patch of soft earth and used a steel blade he had picked up from one of the bandits to dig a shallow grave.

He carefully laid the unfortunate scholar-robed man's body inside, covered it with earth, and placed a few stones nearby as a marker.

The woman held her child and wept bitterly beside him, giving her husband this final act of devotion.

When it was done, Lin Qing removed the simple face covering he had worn all along, revealing his true face, slightly refined by the Thousand Aspect Technique.

Since he was going to meet Head Constable Wang, it would be better not to keep up his disguise.

Perhaps making this connection in his true identity would benefit him more in the future.

He escorted the mother and son in silence, carefully avoiding any possible watchers along the way.

At last, they reached the Qingping County yamen before sunset.

After a runner went in to report, Wang Ping soon strode out in his official uniform.

When he saw his younger sister and nephew outside, disheveled and drenched in tears, his expression changed drastically.

"Little Sister! An'er! What happened to you?"

"Elder Brother!"

Seeing her family, the woman's grief, held back for so long, burst forth completely. She threw herself into Wang Ping's arms and began to weep aloud.

Through broken sobs, she told him how her family had fallen on hard times and she had come to seek refuge with him, how they had encountered bandits along the way, how her husband had been killed protecting her and their son, and how Lin Qing had ultimately saved them.

As Wang Ping listened, his expression shifted from shock to fury, then turned ashen.

A terrifying Killing Intent rose from him!

His fists clenched with a crackle, veins bulging at his temples.

"Wild Mountain Bandits! A pack of beasts that deserve to be hacked into a thousand pieces!"

His expression darkened. He roared, "Men! Gather the troops and follow me out of the city to wipe out those bandits!"

"Head Constable Wang, please wait." Only then did Lin Qing speak.

Wang Ping finally noticed Lin Qing standing nearby, his expression calm.

At first, he thought the young man looked familiar. Then he took a closer look and recognized the young proprietor of Benevolent World Hall on Yongning Street.

"Lin Qing, you saved my little sister?"

Wang Ping was astonished.

He remembered that Young Master Lin knew a few fighting moves, but to kill three hardened bandits by himself... His strength seemed far greater than Wang Ping had imagined.

"That's right." Lin Qing cupped his hands slightly.

"I was passing through the mountains and happened upon them. I killed the three bandits. Their bodies are in the forest northeast of the city."

"If you go now, Head Constable Wang, you may still find them."

Wang Ping was even more shocked.

He looked Lin Qing up and down, his gaze full of scrutiny and disbelief.

But his sister's account, and Lin Qing's candid manner, did not seem fabricated.

Suppressing the urge to go check the bodies at once, he took a deep breath and gave Lin Qing a solemn fist-and-palm salute.

"Young Master Lin, no amount of thanks can do you justice. You saved my little sister and An'er—you saved half of my life!"

"I, Wang Ping, will remember this kindness."

As he spoke, he took a purse from his robes and tried to press it on Lin Qing. "It's only a little silver, but please accept it as a token of my gratitude."

Lin Qing sidestepped it, his expression calm and his words carrying a touch of chivalry. "You're too kind, Head Constable Wang. When you see injustice on the road, you draw your blade to help. It's only right."

"If I'd been after money, I wouldn't have stepped in. Please take the silver back. It would be put to better use comforting your sister and nephew."

Seeing how firm Lin Qing was, and how clear and sincere his eyes looked, Wang Ping knew he wasn't pretending.

His favorable impression of Lin Qing grew, and he thought all the more highly of him.

The young man was not only brave, but also possessed a chivalrous heart and had no hunger for money—rare qualities at his age.

He was nothing like the calculating man rumored to have seized his family's property on Yongning Street.