I'm Too Kind

"Get up!"

Hearing Zhang Yu's voice, Niu Mancang immediately scrambled up from the ground.

"Xiao Yue, let him carry the bundle," Zhang Yu said flatly.

"Alright, benefactor!" Li Yue froze for a moment, then immediately handed the bundle of food to Niu Mancang.

They had bought many meat buns and flatbreads in the little town, along with two large water skins. Li Yue's small frame struggled to carry all of it.

Niu Mancang looked overjoyed. He hurriedly slung the bundle over his back and thanked them, "Thank you, martial master! Thank you, miss!"

"I'm not a miss," Li Yue said softly.

Zhang Yu looked at Niu Mancang, suppressing the urge to take him as a disciple right away. "Keep up."

"Yes, sir!" Niu Mancang answered.

He was still in a daze. Happiness had come too suddenly.

Zhang Yu, Li Yue, Niu Mancang, and that mother and son continued onward.

The refugees behind them saw that Niu Mancang had also been allowed to follow behind Zhang Yu, a martial artist. They helped each other to their feet and silently trailed after them.

Half-grown children, frail women, honest-looking men—they did not want to eat people as those others had. They wanted to live, yet this world had left them no path to survival. So they followed behind Zhang Yu in numb silence.

Zhang Yu frowned tightly and turned to look. More than thirty refugees were silently following them, all elderly, weak, sick, disabled, or children. If they remained behind, they could only be eaten by the grown men.

They said nothing, merely following behind.

Zhang Yu thought for a moment. In the end, he did not drive them away, but neither would he actively help them. How long they could endure depended on their fate.

Two days later, the woman holding a child collapsed onto the ground. With her last sliver of strength, she crawled before Zhang Yu, pushed her child to his side, then bang, bang, bang, knocked her head against the ground three times.

The woman gritted her teeth and rose to her feet. She looked at her child once, then with a bang, smashed herself to death against a huge rock by the roadside.

She knew she could not live. She wanted to fight for a way out for her child, gambling on Zhang Yu's kindness.

"You..." Zhang Yu looked at the woman who had killed herself against the rock, fury rising within him.

But she was already dead. What could he do?

"Mother, sob..." The child threw himself onto the woman and burst into tears.

Zhang Yu glanced at him without saying anything, then turned and continued onward.

Li Yue felt a little unable to bear it, but after looking at Zhang Yu's back, she ultimately said nothing and hurried after him.

Seeing Zhang Yu leave, the four-year-old boy remembered what his mother had told him before she died. He climbed to his feet and tearfully chased after Zhang Yu and the others.

Zhang Yu said nothing. Neither Li Yue nor Niu Mancang dared to help the little boy carelessly, allowing him to follow behind them on his short little legs.

They walked for three shichen.

The little boy fell more times than he could count. His knees and feet were bleeding, his whole body covered in wounds. Hunger made his vision go dark, and he wanted to sleep.

He did not dare cry. Tears streamed silently down his face, but he did not allow himself to fall behind. He kept thinking of his mother's final words: "Erdan, this martial master has a kind heart. You must follow him. Perhaps he can let you live."

"Promise Mother that you'll keep following him."

Zhang Yu stopped and looked at the little boy. It was not that his heart was hard, but on this Western Desolate Continent, where danger lurked on every side, he himself might lose his life at any moment.

Those three shichen had been his test for the boy.

If the boy had not gotten lost and had endured until now, then Zhang Yu would give him a chance to live.

"Xiao Yue, give him half a flatbread," Zhang Yu said.

"Alright." Li Yue obediently answered, "Benefactor, I can take care of him from now on."

Zhang Yu glared at Li Yue.

Over the next stretch of time, more and more refugees followed behind Zhang Yu. And after seeing Erdan's mother's example, many refugees who could no longer survive copied her: to give their children a chance at life, they killed themselves before Zhang Yu and threw their children at him.

"Fuck, are you morally blackmailing me? Gambling that I'm kind enough to raise your children? I'll roast this bunch of brats and eat them later!" Zhang Yu flew into a rage.

In only ten days, the number of children behind him had reached thirteen, and it was still growing.

This could not continue.

When they passed through another small town, he rented two horse carriages and sped away with Li Yue, Niu Mancang, and the thirteen children, leaving hundreds of refugees behind.

At last, he had shaken them off.

I'm still too kind.

When Zhang Yu saw that the refugees behind them had not caught up, he let out a breath of relief.

That night, they spent one tael of silver to stay in a small mountain village. Zhang Yu looked at the thirteen sleeping children and frowned slightly.

None of the thirteen had a fate trait. Their aptitude and comprehension were all poor or mediocre. As for why he had taken them in? Because they had all passed the test—surviving ten days on half a flatbread a day without falling behind him.

Of course, many children had fallen behind as well. And those who fell behind never caught up again. What became of them was obvious.

It was all fate!

Zhang Yu's abilities were limited, and so was his silver. He could only help this much.

That night, after Li Yue and Niu Mancang had settled the children down, Zhang Yu called them before him.

After spending this time together, Zhang Yu planned to take the two of them as disciples tonight. The cultivation of Iron Shirt had to be put on the agenda. As they drew closer and closer to Boundless City, they encountered more and more martial artists on the road.

"Li Yue, Niu Mancang." Zhang Yu looked at the two before him.

"Benefactor!"

"Sir!"

The two looked at Zhang Yu, not knowing why he had called them over so late at night.

"Do you two want to learn martial arts?" Zhang Yu asked.

"Yes!" Niu Mancang immediately answered. He wanted revenge. He had always wanted revenge.

Li Yue thought for a moment before saying, "Whatever Benefactor asks me to do, I'll do."

"I have a third-rate cultivation technique here, Iron Shirt. It does not require great comprehension or talent, only the ability to endure hardship. Do you two want to learn it?" Zhang Yu asked.

With a thud, Niu Mancang dropped to his knees and knocked his head against the ground, bang, bang.

"I want to learn. Please teach me, sir."

Zhang Yu nodded faintly, then looked toward Li Yue. Li Yue possessed the Forged Through a Thousand Trials fate trait. Though her aptitude was not as good as Niu Mancang's, so long as she persisted in cultivation, she might be able to deduce this Iron Shirt to an unimaginable realm.

Thud!

Li Yue also knelt down.

"Good. Today, I'll take you two as my disciples. Niu Mancang will be the senior brother, and Li Yue the junior sister. Bow your heads." Zhang Yu made the decision with one hammer blow, without any nonsense.

Bang, bang!

The two knocked their heads against the ground.

"Disciple Niu Mancang greets Master!"

"Disciple Li Yue greets Master!"

"Good. Get up," Zhang Yu said.

The next second, the system's voice rang out in his mind.

[Host has accepted two disciples and obtained 2 Master-Disciple Points. Master-Disciple Points will be issued punctually at midnight every day.]

"What the hell are Master-Disciple Points?" Zhang Yu was startled inwardly and hurriedly looked at the system panel.

[Name: Zhang Yu]

...

[Iron Shirt not yet initiated (1/10)]

[Master-Disciple Points: 2 points. Master-Disciple Points can be used to increase the host's own skill proficiency, or to increase a disciple's skill proficiency.]

This...

System, why didn't you say so earlier?!

Zhang Yu was furious. If he had known there was such a thing as Master-Disciple Points, he would have taken Li Yue and Niu Mancang as disciples ten days ago.

"System, you've led me astray!"

He felt as though he had lost one hundred million.