412: Chapter 327 412: Chapter 327 The shopkeeper was callously cast aside, and all the others were even more terrified.
Previously irritated by him, they now feared they might be thrown down too and didn’t dare make another sound.
“Speak up, what exactly is going on?”
The man who was about to speak earlier, threatened by the shopkeeper, didn’t expect the shopkeeper to become a corpse the next moment, and now he dared not keep silent.
“The Mountain King intends to take a Bandit Chief’s Wife.
It’s actually a group we captured a few days ago, three men and one woman.
The woman caught the Mountain King’s eye, and today he plans to marry her as his Bandit Chief’s Wife,” he explained.
Luo Yaxuan asked for the features of the captured individuals as well as the woman’s appearance.
The person from the kitchen said they hadn’t seen their faces and suggested the waiter might know.
All eyes turned to the waiter, who felt too frightened to deny anything now, fearing he might be the next one thrown down.
“My lord,” the waiter confessed, “it’s just as you described.
The girl seemed to be only about fifteen or sixteen years old.
The Mountain King is truly an old ox eating tender grass, preparing for a grand celebration!”
Upon hearing this, Luo Yaxuan could no longer stay calm: his master, his mistress, his junior sister, and that servant disciple had all been captured.
If he hadn’t accompanied them this time, he might have remained oblivious, a consequence too horrifying to imagine.
His junior sister was being forced into marriage as the Bandit Chief’s Wife, and he had no idea how his master and mistress were faring, or whether the servant disciple was unharmed.
He grabbed someone and quickly moved toward the mountain Mo Wen had described, with others following suit, each carrying a person as they flew through the air.
The stockade at the mountain’s peak was not far, and from high above, they soon reached it.
The sudden appearance of so many people at the stockade likely alarmed its inhabitants.
The Bandit King, his face buried in a beard, wielding a Magical Treasure resembling a pair of large hammers, stood on the stage at the center of the stockade, looking upward.
The people from inside the stockade rushed out, armed and ready for a fight.
There had been a report earlier about the teahouse on the main street being kicked in, and the shopkeeper and his employees captured.
The Mountain King, upon hearing this, was furious.
He couldn’t believe his lair had been tampered with.
Always the undisputed tyrant, he had never experienced such an affront.
It didn’t matter that those people were at best Golden Core Cultivators; even Golden Core Cultivators had been easily taken care of.
The Mountain King, blinded by his hubris, failed to see that they had previously used underhanded methods and that in a fair fight, their stockade might not be a match.
For many years, they had used poisons effectively, and any stranger passing through fell victim to their schemes, causing everyone in the vicinity to fear them.
They took whatever beauties or items they desired, and no one dared refuse them.
A few days earlier, they had captured a beautiful woman and were planning her wedding ceremony today.
Unexpectedly, they caught four more beauties, thinking not only of having a Bandit Chief’s Wife but also several concubines.
They discarded the men to one side, fed them poison, and threw them into a dungeon, feeding them a long-term diet that dispersed their Spiritual Energy.
Once their Spiritual Energy was sufficiently diminished, they could join the stockade’s ranks, or thanks to the Mountain King’s drugs, they would obey his commands and serve as tools for his malfeasance.
The most skilled at concocting potions in the stockade was none other than the Mountain King, who in his youth had roamed the lands and fortuitously found a book of the Medicine King.
After intensive practice and concoction, he learned to create several of the book’s described remedies.
These remedies were useful, allowing him to set up camp here and recruit various wanderers from the Martial World, some skilled in martial arts, others with Cultivation powers, all becoming his accomplices.
Years of carefree living had made him a Local Tyrant of the place, with even the Governmental Authorities wary of intervening.
Of course, these authorities also benefited from the arrangement.
Whenever someone formidable arrived to suppress the bandits, they would notify the Mountain King in advance.
Facing formidable opponents, they would escape through secret tunnels, and they would capture weaker ones outright.
He ruled like a true Local Tyrant; moreover, in the Cultivation World, the true powerhouses wouldn’t bother with such places, a poor region mostly inhabited by common people.
Occasionally some individuals from the Martial World might pass through.
If they were too powerful, the bandits wouldn’t dare engage; if they were average, they would attack and rob them.
The teahouse employees had captured a couple cultivating at the Golden Core stage, along with a pair of young men and women.
They knew nothing of the captives’ backgrounds, but having already committed the deed and seeing the youth and beauty of the woman, they boldly decided to make her the Bandit Chief’s Wife.
While they made these plans, they remained wary of a potential rescue.
Little did they expect that after several days, no one would come to the captives’ aid.
Today, deemed an auspicious day, was being prepared for the wedding ceremony.
On this day of wedding preparations, the teahouse employees brought up a few more people, four more beautiful women.
The Mountain King felt it was a lucky day and took all five women for himself.
Suddenly, reports came in that both groups of captives were from the same party kicking up trouble at their doorstep.
With only a few people challenging them, the Mountain King felt that his stockade, teeming with his men, held the upper hand, so he summoned a crowd at the stockade square to await the rescue party.
Wielding two hammers, he saw the young people flying in, each carrying a teahouse employee, except for one person missing.
He remained secretly on guard, prepared with his drugs, and others in the square, seeing the formidable individuals descending from the sky, sensed the impending confrontation.