Black Wind Stronghold.
It stood in the northwest of Great Liang, in a lawless backwater that even the mapmakers couldn't be bothered to draw properly.
Ever since Chun Xiaobai had become its bandit king, the place had adopted "three rules of no passage."
No payment, no passage.
No sense, no passage.
No manners, no passage.
The rules were so tyrannical that even a passing goose would lose its feathers, and any donkey passing through would be hauled up the mountain to grind a few rounds at the mill.
So why were these bandits, who prided themselves on being "professionals," still so penniless their empty pockets practically rattled?
Chun Xiaobai had just climbed the last step when an old man carrying fish baskets on a shoulder pole came up to him with two little grandsons who looked like mud monkeys.
The old man glanced at the woman on Chun Xiaobai's shoulder and wisely asked no questions. With a practiced cupping of his hands, he said:
"Great King, I've brought the fresh fish you wanted."
"Mm." Chun Xiaobai raised his chin. "Go find our fifth chief for payment."
"He's already paid me!" The old man patted the money pouch at his waist, his face full of gratitude.
The two children had already boldly crowded around, their dark, gleaming eyes fixed curiously on the red-robed woman on Chun Xiaobai's shoulder as their little noses sniffed.
"Wow, this big sister smells so nice!"
"Great King, is she what they call the stronghold's lady?"
Smack!
Chun Xiaobai slapped the pert backside resting on his shoulder and curled his lips. "That depends on whether she's got money!"
If she could fund his Immortal Cultivation journey, he wouldn't mind letting her be the stronghold's lady for a few days.
The other child hugged Chun Xiaobai's leg and said in his babyish voice, "Great King, when I grow up, I want to be a bandit with you too!"
"Mm, you've got ambition."
Chun Xiaobai freed one hand and gave the boy's head a vigorous ruffling.
"Wait until you've grown a beard, brat. Now hurry and take your grandpa down the mountain. It's getting dark, so don't let him fall!"
The old man nodded gratefully and left with his grandsons in tow.
For all these years, the villages around the foot of Black Wind Stronghold's mountain had enjoyed peaceful lives entirely thanks to this young Great King, who looked like a bandit but acted with honor.
Back when he had taken over, the first thing he had done was use his formidable martial skills to lead his brothers in wiping out every marauder and petty thief within five hundred li.
From then on, the farmers below the mountain, who worked with their faces toward the earth and their backs toward the sky, could let their daughters go out to wash clothes and their wives climb the mountain to gather firewood, and every household had grain to spare.
Yet their young Great King refused to accept any gratitude.
He insisted that if the hundred li around them were deserted, even an idiot would know a nest of bandits lurked there, and legitimate merchant caravans wouldn't dare pass through.
Without travelers, they couldn't collect tolls.
That was the only reason he protected ordinary folk like them.
As time passed, the villagers below the mountain became like family with the bandits, even helping cover for them whenever the authorities conducted searches.
Worried they might be caught colluding with bandits, the young Great King then claimed he had an impractical dream of becoming emperor.
If the Great Liang dynasty ever truly collapsed, all he would have to do was raise his arm and call, and the villagers for hundreds of li around would be his loyal core, ready to shoulder their hoes and join his rebellion.
But even that failed to scare the common folk. Instead, every household began waiting for him to raise his arm and call.
Bang!
Carrying his "hostage," Chun Xiaobai crossed the training ground and kicked open the doors beneath the plaque reading "Loyalty Hall."
Gulp!
The moment he turned around, he saw a whole crowd of Adam's apples bobbing up and down.
Behind him stood the second chief, the third chief, and the fourth, fifth, and sixth chiefs, who hadn't been out on the mission...
All eight bandit chiefs had gathered without a single one missing, drool flowing like mountain springs as they stared fixedly at the woman on his shoulder.
"Get lost, all of you!" Chun Xiaobai roared.
"Well... um..." The scar-faced fourth chief rubbed his hands and sidled up with a fawning expression. "Great King, is... is this the lady you've found for our stronghold?"
"Lady?"
Chun Xiaobai tossed the red-robed woman from his shoulder onto the long table as though she were a sack.
Three years ago, her beauty would indeed have qualified her to become the lady of his Black Wind Stronghold.
But after witnessing an immortal fly through the sky on a sword, his dreams had grown too vast for a mortal dragon throne to hold.
The stronghold's lady?
However beautiful a mortal woman might be, a hundred years later, she'd be nothing but a handful of yellow earth and a thin wooden coffin.
He wanted to become an Immortal Emperor!
And the woman he sought had to be an immortal maiden who could stay with him for tens of thousands of years!
As for the woman before him...
Right now, she could only be travel money!
Funds for his Immortal Cultivation!
"Out, out, out!"
Chun Xiaobai waved impatiently, shooing the whole hopeless bunch out of Loyalty Hall like flies, then bolted the doors behind them.
With the drooling gazes outside shut away, the hall fell quiet.
Chun Xiaobai rubbed his hands, chuckled, and reached for the red-robed woman's neck once more.
He seized the string of glittering red gems and gave it a hard yank!
It still wouldn't budge.
Refusing to believe it, he pulled harder.
Riiip-!
He hauled the unconscious red-robed woman off the table by her neck. She swayed in midair before falling back onto it with a bang.
"It's just a damn ordinary red cord. How's it tougher than ox sinew?"
Chun Xiaobai stared at the thin red cord in his hand, his face full of disbelief.
He leaned closer to inspect it but couldn't find a slipknot.
"That's freaky!"
"She couldn't possibly have been wearing this pendant since birth, could she?"
Muttering to himself, Chun Xiaobai gave up on the pendant for the moment as another important matter came back to him.
The valuables at this woman's waist!
He immediately shifted around and reached his large hand straight toward her lower belly, only to find nothing.
He tried another spot, repeatedly searching her flat lower belly.
Flat and smooth.
The hard box he'd felt earlier... was gone?
Chun Xiaobai turned the woman over, leaving her face down on the table, and lifted her red skirt. A red dudou came into view, tracing her breathtaking curves, but there was still no sign of the box.
"Damn it, the ride must've been too bumpy. I lost it!" Chun Xiaobai's face darkened.
Then again, if he'd dropped it on the mountain path, there was no need to worry. There was only one trail. He could have his men form a line later and comb every inch.
As long as no hungry beast had gotten to it, they would probably find it.
Setting that matter aside, he searched the red-robed woman from head to toe.
After all that effort, Chun Xiaobai discovered that apart from the pendant he couldn't pull free, the bracelet he couldn't slide off, and the missing box, all that remained was her red dress.
He didn't know what material the dress was made of. It felt silky and cool, was exceptionally supple, and seemed to shimmer with a faint flowing light. One glance told him it wasn't ordinary cloth.
"I don't care what you're made of. I'll strip you off and sell you for money in a minute!"
Chun Xiaobai's gaze fell on the purple jade bracelet again.
Grabbing her soft, seemingly boneless hand, he tried with all his might to slide the bracelet off. But after a long struggle, it remained stuck around her wrist without moving an inch.
Clang!
His patience ran out. He turned and snatched a pointed ox-ear knife from the nearby weapon rack, the one he usually used to carve whole roast lambs.
Its sharpness was beyond question.
Chun Xiaobai held the red cord at her neck in one hand and the knife in the other.
Scrrrk, scrrrk!
The blade sawed back and forth across the red cord at her neck, making a sound like sawing iron. Yet the cord was as tough as steel wire and showed no sign of being cut.
"What the fuck is this stuff made of?"
Chun Xiaobai tossed the knife aside, pulled on the red cord, and leaned his head closer to study it.
His breath fell directly on the red-robed woman's cheek, making her brows draw together ever so slightly.
"Could it be braided from diamond thread?"
Still unwilling to give up, Chun Xiaobai pulled the red cord onto the table's edge with one hand, picked up the pointed knife with the other, and hacked furiously at it.
The dull pounding made the red-robed woman's brows knit tighter and tighter.
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