This Is All It Takes to Make You Think You Can Rob People?

"We didn't want to do this either." The Skinny Pole's voice dropped. "But we can't do anything else. Our Soul Master ranks are too low. Spirit Hall won't take us, neither will the families or the sects... Even people hiring bodyguards think we'd be an embarrassment."

The Fatso, sprawled on the ground, picked up where he left off. "We only know a few lousy tricks. Spirit Hall gave us the lowest-level Soul Master certification, saying we were 'permitted to engage in Soul Master-related work,' but nobody over in Nuoding City would hire the likes of us. It's just that... the year's almost over, we're short on money, and then we saw three kids..."

He didn't finish, but his meaning was clear enough.

Tang San fell silent for a moment.

He heard something familiar in their words.

Martial Soul rankings, quality determining one's future, the plight of low-ranked Soul Masters.

He'd read about these things in books before, but they'd been cold words on a page. Hearing them now from three living, breathing people felt completely different.

Huang Fei leaned against a tree and had hardly said a word.

After hearing the three men's confessions, his expression barely changed. He showed neither sympathy nor contempt.

"Let them go," he said.

Tang San turned to look at him.

Huang Fei straightened from the tree trunk and dusted off sleeves that weren't even dirty. His tone was so casual, you'd think he was commenting on the nice weather.

"Nobody put them up to this. They're just three useless bachelors who don't want to work. They saw three kids and thought they could make a quick buck, then bit off more than they could chew. People like this only need a beating before you send them on their way. No need to make a big deal of it."

Tang San furrowed his brow, apparently giving Huang Fei's words serious thought.

Xiao Wu was more straightforward. She hopped down from the Fatso's back, brushed the dirt from her hands, and flicked her ponytail twice. "Fei-ge's right. Let them go. If we take them along, we'll have to feed them too. What a hassle."

Tang San thought it over and decided she had a point.

Besides, unless he had no other choice, he didn't want to kill anyone.

He crouched down and looked the Scarface in the eye. "I'm letting you off today. But remember this: if we catch you doing something like this again—"

He didn't finish. He merely swung the Blue Silver Grass vines outward.

The vines lashed like a green whip against a nearby tree trunk, cracking sharply. A deep groove was left in the bark, and sap seeped from the split, glistening in the sunlight.

Scarface nodded frantically. "We won't! Never again!"

Tang San withdrew his Blue Silver Grass, and Huang Fei withdrew his vines as well.

Shards of the shattered rocky coating slid off the Skinny Pole and clattered to the ground like broken eggshells.

The Skinny Pole slumped on the ground, gasping for breath as if he'd just been hauled out of the water.

Once the three men were untied, they scrambled away.

Scarface ran in front. He even lost a shoe, but didn't look back to retrieve it.

The Skinny Pole followed in the middle. The rocky coating on his body hadn't fully recovered, and flakes of it fell away as he ran.

The Fatso stumbled along behind them. He hadn't yet retracted his two Bear Paws, and as he ran, he looked like a clumsy bear.

Watching them flee, Xiao Wu burst out laughing.

"This is all it takes to make you think you can rob people?"

Tang San didn't laugh.

He stood where he was, watching the three pitiful figures until they vanished around a bend in the main road. Only then did he look away.

When Scarface had said they were "looking for work," Tang San had noticed the Spirit Hall token hanging at his waist wasn't from Nuoding City. The inscription read "Fasinuo Province · North Bay City."

It was a city smaller than Nuoding City, at the northernmost edge of Fasinuo Province, near the mountains.

He committed the name to memory.

For some reason, he felt it might come in handy someday.

"Let's go." Tang San turned and set off toward Nuoding City.

Huang Fei ambled after him, slipping his hands back into his sleeves. His whole person had returned to that lazy state of "I could walk myself to death under the sun."

Xiao Wu skipped along in front as if nothing had happened.

They'd gone about a hundred paces when Huang Fei suddenly spoke.

"Xiao San."

"Hmm?"

"Do you think they were telling the truth?"

Tang San's steps faltered slightly, then he continued walking.

He didn't answer right away, because he was considering the same question.

What Scarface had said sounded genuine—his tone, expression, and the details all seemed unscripted.

But someone who'd spent years robbing travelers could also come up with a convincing lie in a situation like that.

"Seventy percent," Tang San finally said, offering a vague answer. "Seventy percent true, thirty percent uncertain."

Huang Fei nodded and didn't ask anything more.

Seventy percent was enough.

He also thought they'd been telling the truth. Not because those three were good actors, but because they were simply too weak.

Too weak to be anyone's pawns.

Who would send such a bunch to get something done?

Unless the point of the task wasn't to succeed in the first place, but merely to have someone show up.

Huang Fei shook the thought out of his head.

He was overthinking it.

Who would lay an ambush on the main road for a kid who'd just started school?

It wasn't as if they were anybody important.

The four of them returned to the main road. The sun shone straight down from overhead, shrinking their shadows to little patches at their feet.

Nuoding City's outline was faintly visible in the distance, its gray-white walls glinting in the sunlight.

Xiao Wu suddenly turned around to look at Tang San and Huang Fei.

"By the way, did you two plan those vines together? One wrapped around their feet and the other around their bodies. You worked together pretty smoothly."

Tang San looked at Huang Fei, and Huang Fei looked at Tang San.

"We didn't plan it," Tang San said.

"We didn't need to," Huang Fei said.

They spoke almost at the same time. Their words meant different things, but both pointed to the same fact.

They'd grown up together, trained together, fought together, and scrambled around the back hills together. Their understanding of each other no longer needed words.

Tang San only had to step to the left, and Huang Fei knew which way he would strike.

If Huang Fei's vines were a beat too slow, Tang San knew what moment he was waiting for.

That kind of understanding hadn't been trained into them. It had grown with them.

Xiao Wu tilted her head and looked at them. Her mouth opened, then closed. In the end, she just said, "Oh," and turned around to keep walking.

Her ponytail swayed behind her, and the sunlight dyed it gold.

After a few more steps, she suddenly spoke again.

"We've reached Nuoding City."

The three of them looked up.

Nuoding City's north gate was less than a mile ahead. A few people were lined up to enter, while the guards leaned beneath the gate tunnel and yawned.

They were back.

Huang Fei picked up his pace and, unusually, moved to the front.

Tang San asked him curiously why he was walking so fast. Without turning around, Huang Fei replied, "If we get back late, there won't be any food left in the cafeteria."

Tang San and Xiao Wu exchanged glances, sighed at the same time, then both sped up without a word and caught up.

The three of them walked side by side through Nuoding City's north gate and into the afternoon sunshine.

The city streets were bustling. A vendor selling buns lifted the lid off his steamer, and a cloud of white vapor rose up, turning into golden mist in the sunlight.