"You can't kill me!"
"I'm a noble! I'm the young chieftain of the Gewo Tribe!"
"Your emperor invited us here to help you fight the rebels!"
"If you kill me, your emperor will punish you! He'll have you whipped! He'll have your heads cut off!"
"I'll never come again! I'll never come to raid you again! Let me go back! If I die here, my mother and younger sister will both become slaves!"
"Spare me! Spare me!"
"Ah—"
A torrent of words burst out like machine-gun fire. From pride to threats, from threats to panic, from panic to pleas for mercy—
Yet none of it could stop the sharp blade from plunging straight into his chest and abdomen, ending the young man's life.
Shen Le lowered his head and looked at the corpse before him. His face was dark and sallow, with two patches of highland red on his cheeks. Yet his skin had not become rough, and the contours of his brows and eyes still retained a boyish immaturity.
His eyes were wide open, staring fixedly at the sky. In those clear dark-brown pupils lingered intense terror, pain, and confusion.
As though he could not believe that he had died just like that—died in a distant foreign land, died young before he could accomplish anything.
"Ah..."
Shen Le sighed softly and reached out to close the young man's eyes. Once, twice, those bulging eyes still refused to shut, as if unwilling to accept the fact of his own death—
"A-Li! What are you dawdling for?!"
A fellow soldier shouted from afar. Moments later, a warrior strode over, clicked his tongue, and bent down.
"Just a Tibetan barbarian. He's dead, so what does it matter whether his eyes are closed? Hurry up and strip him, then get moving—this armor's not