Chapter 77: Chapter 77: Heavy Grief
"Uncle Tian, as long as we seize the Ye family’s market share, the Li family will definitely support you in becoming the head steward of the Wang family," Li Yue chimed in with some timely flattery.
"Hahaha, say no more, say no more. Let’s just wait for the good news. I expect it’ll be soon." A vicious glint flashed in Wang Tian’s eyes as he muttered, "The Ye family... oh, the Ye family. You have no one to blame but yourselves for offending the Wang family. You more than deserve to die."
"Patriarch, it’s bad! Something terrible has happened!"
Suddenly, a panicked commotion came from the front hall, and a Li family steward burst in from outside, looking utterly disheveled.
"What’s the matter? Such a panic... Have you no sense of decorum?" Li Haoran’s face darkened.
"Patriarch," the steward said, his voice on the verge of tears, "Several of our Li family manors have been attacked! The losses are devastating!"
"What?" Li Haoran shot to his feet, his face darkening. "What happened? Could the Ye family have made a move? That damned Ye family! How dare they openly attack my Li family’s manors! Is there no law? No justice? Well, this is just perfect. Even if my Li family doesn’t act, the City Lord won’t let them get away with this."
"No, it was the Blood Saber Stronghold," the steward said urgently. "The same Blood Saber Stronghold that attacked the Ye family yesterday morning. An hour ago, they suddenly stormed our Li family manors and went on a killing spree. They’re too strong! The Li family has suffered heavy casualties!"
"What? Impossible!"
Li Haoran was so shocked he dropped his cup. "Why would the Blood Saber Stronghold attack our Li family? You must be mistaken!"
"I don’t know either, but it was definitely the Blood Saber Stronghold. They wore blood-red robes and were incredibly ferocious. Many of our Li family guards were poisoned, and it looks exactly the same as what happened to the Ye family yesterday."
"Patriarch, this is bad!" Just then, another panicked voice was heard as the Liu family’s steward came running over in a hurry.
Seeing the look on the steward’s face, the Liu family Patriarch, Liu Tianjie, felt his heart sink.
Sure enough, the steward knelt on the ground and said frantically, "Patriarch, our Liu family’s manors were attacked by the Blood Saber Stronghold! Several manors are almost completely destroyed! Many of our guards have been poisoned. They’re in the courtyard now, and the physicians are powerless to help!"
"What!" The cup in Liu Tianjie’s hand slipped from his grasp, shattering to pieces on the ground.
"This is impossible," Wang Tian said, his eyes wide with shock and anger. "Why would the Blood Saber Stronghold attack the Li and Liu families? Something isn’t right here."
"Quick, take us there to see," Li Haoran said sharply, suppressing the panic in his heart.
The group quickly made their way to the courtyard.
In the courtyard, guards from the Li and Liu families lay on the ground, their faces deathly black, their bodies emitting a nauseating stench.
"It really is the poison used by the Blood Saber Stronghold... How is this possible?" Wang Tian and the others were stunned.
"Lord Wang, the antidote! Where’s the antidote?" Li Haoran grabbed Wang Tian, his voice urgent.
"Yes, Lord Wang! Your Wang family provided this poison, so you must have the antidote! Quick, give it to us!" Liu Tianjie was also getting frantic. These guards were his Liu family’s best men. If they died, it would be an immense loss for the family.
"I don’t have the antidote!"
Faced with their questioning, Wang Tian was panic-stricken. His mind was a chaotic mess. Even now, he was still wondering why the Blood Saber Stronghold would attack the Li and Liu families.
"What? You don’t have the antidote? How could you not have the antidote? This is your Wang family’s poison!" Li Haoran was so agitated he coughed up a mouthful of blood.
"I really don’t have it." Wang Tian was on the verge of tears. The Wang family had dealt with the Blood Saber Stronghold directly for the poison. Wang Tian’s role was merely to gather intelligence for the stronghold; he never had the antidote at all.
They had simply never anticipated that the Blood Saber Stronghold would turn on the Li and Liu families.
"Wang Tian, you... Ugh..." At that moment, Li Haoran and Liu Tianjie wished they could tear Wang Tian in two. The courtyard descended into chaos.
"Father, Uncle Liu, panicking here won’t solve anything. The fact that the Blood Saber Stronghold attacked us means something is very wrong, but the priority right now is to stop them from destroying our manors. Father, Uncle Liu, we have to mobilize all the forces from both our families to stop them."
At this critical moment, Li Yue, who had managed to remain somewhat composed, spoke up.
"Right, we have to stop them." Li Haoran and Liu Tianjie came to their senses and quickly began to rally their forces to stop the Blood Saber Stronghold from doing more damage to their two families’ manors.
"Uncle Tian," Li Yue said to Wang Tian. "With so many guards from our Li and Liu families injured, please send a message by falcon to the Wang family immediately. Tell them they must send people with the antidote. This is a matter of utmost urgency. We have to save who we can."
"Alright." Wang Tian also calmed down and did as Li Yue instructed. Soon, a falcon departed under the cover of night, flying toward Blue Moon City.
An hour later, by the time the Li and Liu families had gathered all their remaining guards and rushed to the manors outside of town, the sky was already beginning to lighten with dawn.
The Blood Saber Stronghold bandits who had been rampaging through the two families’ manors were nowhere to be seen. All that was left was a scene of devastation and the almost entirely burnt-down manors.
After taking stock, they found that of the eleven manors belonging to the Li and Liu families, eight had been utterly destroyed. Only the last three, which the enemy hadn’t had time to sweep through, were still standing.
In a single night, the Li and Liu families had lost nearly eighty percent of their assets.
Upon hearing this news, Li Haoran and Liu Tianjie both spat out a mouthful of blood right on their horses and fainted.
And just as Li Haoran and Liu Tianjie were brought back to their residences and had woken up, another piece of news spread from Cyan Mountain Town.
After attacking the manors of the Li and Liu families, the Blood Saber Stronghold bandits then attacked the Ye family’s North Manor at dawn. However, they were stopped by the heroes of the Ye family. The entire Blood Saber Stronghold was annihilated, including their Great Chieftain, Blood Saber, and their Second Chieftain, Blood Fang. Not a single one survived.
As for the Ye family, they were completely unharmed!
At the same time, the Ye family issued a statement, expressing their profound sorrow over the Li and Liu families’ ordeal, and hoped that the two Patriarchs would restrain their grief and accept their losses.
PFFT!
Having just regained consciousness, Li Haoran and Liu Tianjie heard this news, spat out another mouthful of fresh blood, and fainted once again.
"The Ye family... It must be the Ye family’s doing!"
When the two of them woke up again, this was the very first thing they said.
The Blood Saber Stronghold had been secretly hired by the Wang and Zhou families to destroy the Ye family’s manors. Why would they attack the Li and Liu families instead?
Even if the Blood Saber Stronghold had turned on them, it was impossible that after destroying the two families’ manors, they would wait until morning to attack the Ye family’s manor, only to walk right into a Ye family ambush and be completely wiped out.
And yet the Ye family suffered no casualties.
As long as they weren’t idiots, they could see something was wrong with this picture.
But even though Li Haoran and Liu Tianjie knew the Ye family must have been behind it, they were helpless, because they had absolutely no evidence.
They couldn’t exactly jump out and say, "Impossible! We were the ones who hired the Blood Saber Stronghold! Why would they attack us?"
If they did that, forget the Ye family; the whole of Cyan Mountain Town, and even the City Lord’s Mansion of Blue Moon City, would wipe their two families out.
The Li and Liu families could only grit their teeth and swallow this bitter pill.
When the news that the Ye family had wiped out the Blood Saber Stronghold spread through Cyan Mountain Town, it caused a tsunami-like sensation.
First thing in the morning, it was the first thing people said to each other.
The Blood Saber Stronghold was the most infamous bandit group in the vicinity of Blue Moon City. For years, they had burned, killed, and pillaged, stopping at no evil.
Countless ordinary people had died at their hands, and innumerable merchant caravans had been robbed by them.
For this reason, the Blue Moon City Lord’s Mansion had specially ordered the City Guard to carry out several large-scale extermination campaigns, but none had succeeded.
The Blood Saber Stronghold had practically become a malignant tumor on Blue Moon City, causing every traveling merchant caravan to live in constant fear.
But today, this terrifying bandit group had actually been completely annihilated in an ambush by the Ye family, leaving everyone utterly shocked and, at the same time, clapping their hands in applause.
The Ye family had rid Blue Moon City of a great menace.
To add to the sensation, at Ye Xuan’s suggestion, Old Master Ye Batian had the one hundred-plus heads from the Blood Saber Stronghold hung along the main road outside of town, watched over by Ye family members and three City Guard captains, including Ji Ling.
In just half an hour, the main road, wide enough for several carriages to pass, was blocked solid with onlookers.
Among them were local residents of Cyan Mountain Town, as well as medicinal herb merchants traveling along the road. Looking at the ferocious, snarling, and demonic-looking heads, everyone was deeply shaken.
Thinking back now, they found it hard to believe.
Just yesterday at noon, news had spread that the Ye family’s West Manor had been attacked by the Blood Saber Stronghold, suffering heavy casualties. Everyone had thought the Ye family was finished.
They never expected such a dramatic turnaround the very next day. The Ye family had displayed their might, beheading the two chieftains and ambushing all the bandits. Instead, it was the manors of the Li and Liu families that had suffered devastating losses in the Blood Saber Stronghold’s attack, almost completely destroyed.
This contrast immediately made the power and ferocity of the Ye family clear in everyone’s mind.
The number one powerhouse was truly the number one powerhouse. Although the Li and Liu families had seemed to be on the rise lately, when a real crisis hit, comparing them to the Ye family was like comparing heaven and earth.
In the past month or two, the Ye family’s reputation in Cyan Mountain Town had taken quite a hit due to the suppression from the Li and Liu family alliance.
But after this incident with the Blood Saber Stronghold, the Ye family’s prestige soared once again, even surpassing what it was before the suppression.
It wasn’t even noon yet, but the front of the Ye family residence was already crowded with countless caravan leaders, bearing gifts, coming to pay their respects and celebrate the Ye family for ridding the people of a great evil.
Some medicinal herb merchants, in particular, came with lavish gifts, practically beating down the Ye family’s door, desperate to establish a partnership.
What choice did they have? Seeing that the manors of the Li and Liu families were now destroyed, if they didn’t hurry to cooperate with the Ye family, what would these medicinal herb merchants do when they had no business left?
As for the Wang family’s blockade, at this point, nobody cared about it anymore.
’Sure, your Wang family is powerful, but can you blockade all the medicinal herb merchants in Blue Moon City?’
’Besides, it’s not that we don’t want to cooperate with your Wang family alliance. The reality is, your alliance can’t even protect itself. You expect us to follow you to our deaths?’
