Chapter 148: Chapter 134: Great Fire Burns the Enemy, Moonlit Archery Duel
Kerosene burns incredibly fast. In the blink of an eye, the entire Moqin Pavilion was engulfed in a sea of flames.
It was already too late for anyone inside to escape. Even the defiant few who gritted their teeth and made a desperate charge were mercilessly swallowed by the flames.
For a moment, screams and agonizing cries echoed through the night sky.
Zhang Pengcheng felt his blood run cold. The majority of those who had just charged in were his own soldiers, over two hundred of them.
The Black Banner Camp had fewer than a thousand men in total. Losing a fifth of them in one fell swoop was a devastating blow.
These were, after all, the elite troops he had painstakingly trained. The death of even one was agonizing, to say nothing of losing over two hundred at once.
His heartache gave way to a towering inferno of rage. Zhang Pengcheng couldn’t hold back any longer; he flung open the carriage curtain and roared.
"Xie San! And you, that bastard Wu! You motherfuckers set a fire in Flower Square! Aren’t you afraid you’ll burn your own damn nest to the ground? I’ll fuck your mothe—"
But his only reply was an arrow, streaking out from the darkness in a sudden attack.
But just as it flew into the light, another arrow shot out from the side and knocked it from the air.
Zhang Pengcheng broke out in a cold sweat. He suddenly remembered Wu Liangchen’s astonishing archery, and he hastily pulled his head back, even sliding the carriage window’s steel plate shut.
The carriage had been specially built, its exterior reinforced with incredibly tough iron plating to make it arrow-proof.
Once the window was shut, Zhang Pengcheng breathed a small sigh of relief, then turned to Mo Daoyuan at his side and snarled.
"What do we do now?"
Mo Daoyuan was taking things much better than Zhang Pengcheng.
The Beheading Gang had also lost a considerable number of men, including a few elites, but the vast majority had been mere cannon fodder.
And in Huangpu Guard, cannon fodder was never in short supply. Some street thugs would even join for a meal, no pay required.
Thus, Mo Daoyuan only felt a brief twinge of pain before regaining his composure. He then said to Zhang Pengcheng.
"Marshal Zhang, the fire is a lost cause. Our only option now is to eliminate Xie San and that man Wu as quickly as possible. Otherwise, this whole venture will be a total loss."
In truth, Zhang Pengcheng didn’t need the reminder. His eyes were already bloodshot, his heart overflowing with murderous intent.
It was just as Mo Daoyuan had said. If they failed to eliminate Xie San and his subordinates this time, not only would this venture have been for nothing, they would become the laughingstock of the entire Huangpu Guard.
At that point, forget about getting a promotion; he’d be forced to flee Huangpu Beach in disgrace.
Thinking of this, he gritted his teeth. "Of course I fucking know we need to eliminate Xie San and that bastard Wu! The problem is, do you dare stick your head out right now?"
Mo Daoyuan faltered.
And he didn’t. The ghost-like arrows were too difficult to guard against.
"However, judging from that last arrow, this little gal I hired has some real skill. For now, we’ll just have to wait for her to kill that bastard Wu."
By now, both Zhang Pengcheng and Mo Daoyuan understood clearly. The one defending Flower Square wasn’t Xie San, but this man, Wu Liangchen.
The endless stream of cunning ploys made that much clear.
Therefore, as long as they could kill Wu Liangchen, the others were nothing to fear.
Zhang Pengcheng thought for a moment, then ordered the guards outside the carriage, "Hold formation! Advance and search, step by step."
"Yes, sir!"
He was a true battlefield veteran, after all. Having learned a painful lesson, Zhang Pengcheng immediately calmed down and adopted a slow and steady strategy to deal with Flower Square.
After all, even with the loss of over two hundred men, his side still held an absolute advantage in terms of numbers.
By advancing slowly and steadily, even if they couldn’t eliminate Wu Liangchen, they could at least cause him significant trouble.
Under his command, the remaining soldiers, their panic subsiding, formed a battle line and began to push deeper into Flower Square.
Meanwhile, Wu Liangchen had already slipped away from the rooftop, running swiftly through the darkness.
He was completely focused, his senses honed to a razor’s edge as he sifted through the noisy, chaotic environment for the information he needed.
Suddenly, as if he’d caught something, he loosed an arrow into the distance even as he ran at high speed.
The feathered arrow slipped silently into the darkness, vanishing in an instant.
Wu Liangchen didn’t stay put to see the result; he just kept sprinting.
He knew that when facing an archer of this caliber, his opponent would lock onto his position the very instant he fired. To linger in the same spot was no different from suicide.
Yet he felt not a shred of fear. Instead, he felt an indescribable excitement.
A cold smirk played at the corners of his lips, especially when he thought back to the arrow that had just intercepted his.
’So you’re still haunting me, chasing me all the way from Huai Mountain to Huangpu Guard.’
’But this isn’t your Cyan Cloud Mountain’s turf.’
’Since you issued the challenge, let’s see whose arrows are sharper!’
Wu Liangchen had only fled last time because he was wary of the Great Village Chief of Cyan Cloud Mountain.
But since Chen Baimei was so relentless, she couldn’t blame him for what was about to happen.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the battlefield, Chen Baimei was also running.
Clad in black and holding a longbow, she was like an agile cheetah, sprinting rapidly across the rooftops.
Suddenly, she snapped a roof tile underfoot, and a mere instant later, an arrow came streaking toward her in a surprise attack.
Luckily, Chen Baimei reacted in time. The instant the tile broke, she flung herself to the side, dodging the otherwise fatal shot.
She instinctively started to raise her bow to return fire, but quickly thought better of it.
She knew that Wu Liangchen would have moved the instant he loosed that arrow.
Firing now would just be a waste of a precious arrow, completely pointless.
She gritted her teeth and continued the chase, her eyes glittering in the moonlight. Only one goal remained in her heart: to kill her enemy and slay her inner demon.
Buoyed by this conviction, Chen Baimei entered a state of pure focus, blocking out all extraneous information. Her senses sharpened, catching only the faintest sounds carried on the wind.
Suddenly, she heard a flicker of movement. Her muscle memory reacted faster than her mind, and in an instant, she had raised her bow and loosed an arrow.
But in the next instant, a shower of sparks exploded in midair.
It was the result of two arrows colliding.
Aided by the faint light of the sparks, Chen Baimei finally saw the figure in the distance, standing on an upturned roof eave.
Behind him, a crescent moon hung in the sky, outlining his figure in a silvery glow.
Though they were far apart, in that daze, Chen Baimei felt as if she could see his eyes.
They were a pair of eyes like deep pools: cold and merciless.
He was like a god descended to the mortal world, one that inspired only worship.
And in that moment of distraction, three feathered arrows were already upon her, flying in a tight triangular formation that sealed off her every escape route.
Chen Baimei retreated!
She fell back hastily!
Simultaneously, she drew her bow, nocked, and fired three consecutive arrows in an impossibly short time.
Two more bursts of sparks erupted, but her third arrow—its angle thrown off by the reverberating bowstring—failed to strike its target dead-on. It only managed to knock the incoming arrow slightly askew.
SWOOSH!
The arrow grazed past Chen Baimei’s cheek. Though she had dodged the lethal arrowhead, its fletching sliced a long gash across her face.
