"Hahaha!"
"Men of valor over there, stop hiding!"
"Are you the brave men who raised troops on Wangwu Mountain to punish the villains?"
Several bandits lay in the mountain woods. Hearing the voice from afar, they exchanged looks, and one said to their leader beside him, "Brother, what a loud voice that man has!"
"Could he be some famous gallant hero?"
The gallant heroes of the time had three very simple ways to judge a man's fighting prowess.
The first was to see whether he was tall and sturdy, the second was to see whether he had an enormous appetite, and the third was to hear whether his voice rang out loud and clear.
The leader glanced at the strong crossbow in his hands and decided to hide no longer. He immediately rose with the other four and cautiously advanced toward the man.
"Brave sir! What brings you to this mountain road?!"
They slowly surrounded him and saw a man standing on the road, dressed as a wanderer, with a battered short sword hanging at his waist. His face was wreathed in smiles, and he had an easy, forthright air.
"Brave sirs!"
"My name is Yang Zongfu! I am a wanderer from Hebei. There were notices posted for me before, and I sought shelter here and there. A while ago, I pulled off a big job back home, but the leather villains broke it up, so I led my men toward the rising ground. I heard there was a great army here to punish the villains, one that drove back a hundred thousand leather villains, and came expressly to pay my respects!"
He spoke with a strong Hebei accent, and his words were full of expressions commonly used by wanderers.
It was much like exchanging underworld passwords. Wanderers used different