The battle-axe hit the ground and landed squarely on Niguer's own instep. But just then his brain seemed to short-circuit; he stood there gawking at the "petty thief" in front of him, and only after quite a while did the pain in his foot arrive. Then he let out a yowl, clutched one foot in both hands, and put on a one-legged hopping show.
A nasty grin flickered across Xia Ya's face. He braced both arms and hurled the great tree he was holding straight at him: "Big fellow, catch!"
"Waaah! No—"
Poor Nigu'er only got that one cry out before the tree's dark mass of shadow came down over him. Luckily his size wasn't wasted after all; in that scramble he wrapped both arms around the trunk and braced with all his strength, but he was pinned flat on the ground, his face going red as a monkey's backside, wheezing and gasping, and he began shrieking at the top of his lungs: "Help!! Somebody get this damned tree off me—cough, cough..."
"Bidar Duo, use magic, quick!" Geli, still putting on his one-man streaking act, finally reacted and yelled at the mage beside him. The mage Bidar Duo did move at once! Nimbly he sprang back a few steps, fished a little wooden stick not much longer than a reed stalk out of his sleeve, waved it about a few times, and from under his cloak came a rapid string of strange notes.
Even Xia Ya felt a pang of misgiving. He's an actual mage?!
He'd grown up on Wildfire Plain and had a fair amount of confidence in his own fighting strength. He'd wrestled beasts and magic beasts in the wild, and he'd been in more than a few brawls back in Wildfire Town too. Once he'd seen through these "experts," he truly hadn't taken them seriously at all. But… this fellow is actually a real mage?
I've never fought a mage before.
He was still stewing in unease when he saw the stick in Bida'erduo's hand swiftly conjure a glow that wrapped the mage himself up in it. Then—bang!—a puff of smoke burst out, and there in the smoke the mage had become a gray-furred rabbit. Swish! It darted into the grass and went pelting south as fast as its legs would carry it.
"…That's his magic?"
Xia Ya nearly burst out laughing. Eyes fixed on the rabbit darting into the grass, he yanked the fire fork from his belt with one hand and hurled it after the thing.
Pfft!
The fire fork streaked off as a line of black light, struck the rabbit's tail dead on, and pinned the beast to the ground. There was a flash of bloody light, the mage Bida'erduo gave a wretched shriek, and he was human again, sprawled on the ground howling, Xia Ya's fire fork stuck in his backside and the wound still spurting blood.
"Hahahaha…" Xia Ya came over in a few long strides, planted a foot on the mage's rump, and pulled the fire fork out. That sent Bida'erduo's shrieks up several octaves; he lay there pounding the earth with his fists.
Xia Ya turned around. That left only one opponent — the goddess of archery, Masha.
Never mind that she was only a fake "Goddess of the Night" — even if she'd been the real Goddess of the Night, with no bow and arrows in her hands she was nothing but a punching bag as far as Xia Ya was concerned.
"Hmm… the old man always said a man had best not hit a woman, so you…" Xia Ya hesitated; what he meant was, so you might as well just surrender.
But the lovely Miss Masha had apparently misread this vicious petty thief. Facing a bandit who'd taken out three of her companions in one breath, she went pale as death, her legs quaking — and then her face crumpled and she burst into tears.
"Waaah… y-you… you can rob us of our money, but you're not allowed to rob my virtue…"
Xia Ya: "…………"
He bugged his eyes out at Masha — then suddenly shouted, "Rob your virtue? Off an ugly hag like you? In your dreams!"
Xia Ya was furious. He felt insulted! Rob her virtue? An ugly hag like her?
Hmph. Even if yours truly wanted to rob a woman of her virtue, it'd have to be a real woman — someone like Aunt Sofia back in Wildfire Town.
Xia Ya walked over, kicked the Silver Sword Sage Geli out of his path, planted himself in front of Masha, and snatched the iron-frame bow from her hands. Masha didn't dare resist in the least — she practically handed it to him herself, then squatted down meekly.
"Huh?"
The moment the bow was in his hands, Xia Ya could tell something was wrong.
A genuine iron-frame bow should be extremely heavy, but this "iron-frame bow" in his hand weighed next to nothing. The limbs were jet-black, sure enough, but a closer look showed it was just black lacquer; he flicked it with a finger and it rang out with a bright ping-ping.
"Pah! And I thought it was some fine bow — turns out it's a fake plated with tin-iron. No wonder it's so light." Xia Ya was thoroughly contemptuous.
Tin-iron is light and brittle stuff, generally used for ornament. Out on Wildfire Plain, some of the kids even made swords of tin-iron to whack each other with in play…
No wonder, when he'd just watched this woman draw that "iron-frame bow" to full moon, her arrows had flown all crooked.
Xia Ya thought it over: the bow was fake, but the silver thread serving as the string was real. He snapped the bow in two, pulled the silver thread free, rolled it into a bundle, and stuffed the whole thing into his shirt. Then he smacked his lips: "What other good things have you got? Don't make me search you — hand them over yourselves."
Geli lay on the ground and eyed this gentleman fearfully: "I—we've got a bit of money on us, it's on my belt…"
His belt had already been split apart by Xia Ya's axe earlier; sure enough, Xia Ya picked up a money pouch from the ground, opened it, and found only a dozen-odd silver coins — not a single gold one.
The haul wasn't exactly small, but Xia Ya still felt rather glum.
These fellows called themselves experts, and they were carrying less money than that poor wretch.
What Xia Ya did next was what finally drove home to the Four Gallants of the Royal City the true meaning of "poor and vicious" — the man was a starving ghost reborn!
He collected Nigu'er's battle-axe first. That axe was the genuine article, a fine piece of work, several grades above his own firewood-chopping axe. And Masha — though she was shaking all over with fright, under Xia Ya's coercion she still pulled off her white-rhino hide armor and handed it over.
What made Miss Masha want to die of shame most of all was that, with the hide armor off, the underlayer beneath was thin stuff. She clutched both arms over her chest in terror, afraid of flashing something before this bandit and stirring up his beastly lust.
But the vicious bandit just gave her a look of utter contempt, and even sighed in a tone that sounded like pity: "Ai, a woman who grows up looking like you — truly pitiful. Ai… being ugly isn't really your own fault. Just try to stay indoors from now on."
Masha stared at him with dead-fish eyes: "…………"
Geli's armor, split in two by Xia Ya's axe, was bundled up by Xia Ya along with everything else (fine steel, all of it — it'd fetch money back in Wildfire Town).
Then Nigu'er, whom Xia Ya finally dug out from under the tree, was likewise stripped of his leather armor; and his big shield made Xia Ya's eyes light up.
A battle-axe in one hand, a giant shield in the other… haha, now I really do look like a well-equipped demon hunter!
Luckiest of the lot was the mage Bida'erduo. Xia Ya had originally had his eye on the leather robe the fellow wore, but then discovered that his own fire fork had punched a hole through it at the backside, all blood, so Xia Ya finally gave up on the idea of stripping the mage bare.
"Are you really a mage?" Xia Ya was a shade more polite to this one. "Just now, you turned into a rabbit — was that really magic?"
Bida'erduo's forehead was slick with cold sweat from the pain, but he had no choice but to answer: "Of course it's magic…"
"Ai, so a mage's skills really are that pathetic?" Xia Ya was rather astonished.
Bida'erduo hastily shook his head: "Of course not. What I cultivate is shapeshifting; it's only a pity my shapeshifting has reached just the first level. If my magic power ran deeper, I could take the form of fierce beasts like bears or lions. Shapeshifting mages of a higher order can even become powerful high-grade magic beasts…"
Who would have thought he really was a mage.
Xia Ya was filled with solemn respect!
And then, with no courtesy whatsoever, he reached into Bida'erduo's robes and began searching…
By all the stories, mages were supposed to be rich. Magic gems, magic cores, magic crystals… every last one of those things meant gleaming gold coins!
But Xia Ya was disappointed.
This mage Bida'erduo's pockets were cleaner than his own had been two days ago! Never mind gems — there wasn't a single copper coin!
"How do you even call yourself a mage?!" Xia Ya was angry. "Where are the magic gems? The crystals? The magic cores? The gold coins?"
Bida'erduo opened and shut his mouth. In his heart he was thinking, If I had that kind of thing, I'd have been promoted long ago — I wouldn't be getting bullied by a bandit like you.
But coming up empty had put this bandit boss in a very bad mood, and if this boss was in a bad mood, then he himself was bound to be in a much worse one…
"This… I can tell you a secret." Bida'erduo struggled a little. "A secret for getting rich."
Seeing that Xia Ya didn't believe him, the mage squirmed and hurried on: "What I'm saying is absolutely true!!!"
As he spoke, the mage's expression turned a little complicated; he glanced at the other three of the Four Gallants of the Royal City beside him, his eyes hesitant.
Xia Ya was no fool either; he saw at once that something was odd in the fellow's eyes. He rubbed his chin, grabbed the mage, hoisted him up like a chick, carried him a few steps into the nearby woods, and dropped him on the ground: "All right, talk!"
Bida'erduo landed so hard he saw stars, but how would he dare cry out in pain now? He struggled up into a sitting position, glanced uneasily at his three companions in the distance, and once he'd made sure they were far enough away not to hear him, said with a bitter smile: "Actually, the reason I came to Wildfire Plain is different from theirs. I have a special reason — I came for… I came for a treasure!!"
The fellow's expression was positively mysterious.