Chapter 34 - Brothers
“Everyone, stop!”
Lu Chengfeng’s voice resounded from the other end of the street. Following his voice came several dozen daggers, unleashed from the Grand White Gold Dagger Formation. They were slashing their way through the rain of arrows and breaking these arrows into pieces. Not only this, these daggers even chopped off the front legs of the rides of those visiting soldiers, forcing them to fall off their rides spill onto the street in a mess.
Luckily, these soldiers had not reached to their full speed yet. Right when they saw their fellow soldiers, who were at the foremost of the army, start falling onto ground, they pulled their reigns tight and immediately stopped their charge.
Dozens of daggers continued swirling for a few more rounds through the sky. Eventually, they disintegrated with an ear-splitting *swoosh* sound.
With a pale face and cold sweat on his forehead, Lu Chengfeng had almost depleted his internal energy after unleashed that attack. He grabbed all three of the formation pillars and put them in his bag, leading a group of personal guards and running up to Wu Qi. Lu Chengfeng glared at Wu Qi, who was standing among the crowd, and murmured to him, “Really? How could you do this in front of so many people? Why can’t you just find somewhere remote to do things like this?”
Liu Suifeng stared blankly at the archers who were attacking from rooftops beside the street, then, with a trembling hand, he raised up the sword in his hand and pointed at Wu Qi. With an extremely angry tone he cursed, “You dirty peasant! You really dared to order these archers to attack me? You’re dead meat! You, how dare you to assault me, you’re doomed!”
Wu Qi picked his ear with his pinky and shook his head in disdain, “A dog who barks, never bites. How many times had you said you wanted to kill all of my family members?” Throwing a mocking smile at Liu Suifeng, Wu Qi shouted the next second, “If not because of Young Master, I’d kill you right here on this street!”
Liu Suifeng couldn’t help but to keep trembling in anger. With his long sword, he pointed at all the bystanders along the street and, with an angry tone, said, “In front of so many peoples, you really dare to assault the Marquis! You dirty peasant, you’re outrageous!”
Wu Qi took a glimpse at all the town folks around, suddenly he burst out in a laugh, “Pooh! So what if I really kill you in front of these peoples? Do I fear the revenge from your family? If your dad, Lord Puyang wants revenge, and sends an army to attack me, he will find himself lacking an army!”
Slamming on the shoulder of a City Guard standing beside him, Wu Qi snapped, “Remember this, Little Meng City is the territory of I, your master Wu Qi!”
Liu Suifeng shut his mouth. He stared at Wu Qi blankly, and couldn’t think of a thing to say right now. Had he ever met someone as ferocious as Wu Qi? Among the hundreds of kingdoms in the Great Yan Dynasty, Princes, Lords, and Marquis were the superior peoples. No civilian dared to show even the slightest disrespect to a Marquis! But, this Wu Qi, who was just a tiny little General in Little Meng City, he was trying to kill a Marquis in broad daylight!
Placing his hand on his own neck, Liu Suifeng felt a little bit scared and didn’t dare to look at Wu Qi, but he turned around and gazed at Lu Chengfeng, who was pushing his way through the crowd.
“Lu Chengfeng! So this man is your subordinate! Do you know how he almost killed me just now? If even just one hair my head was hurt, you, you……”
With a stern expression on his face, Lu Chengfeng came over and nodded to Wu Qi.
Wu Qi let out a loud laugh again, and he stared at Liu Suifeng and said, “Why doesn’t my lord say it like this. If I even hurt one hair of yours, you’ll execute all of my young master’s relatives?”
Liu Suifeng shuts his mouth up again, while Lu Chengfeng glared at Wu Qi once again. Executing all of Lu Chengfeng’s relatives? Even the King of the Lu Kingdom dared not to say this, let alone this Liu Suifeng? Although he was the son of Lord Puyang, Lord Puyang was only a foreign noble with some relations to those in the government of the Lu Kingdom!
Compared to the influence of the government of the Lu Kingdom, the Lu Family had a far greater influence than this Lord Puyang.
With just a simple sentence, Liu Suifeng had his breath taken away and almost fainted, due to anger. He glared at Wu Qi with extreme anger, while his sword trembling in his hand. He just wished he could kill Wu Qi right now, without considering the consequences.
Right when Liu Suifeng was being pissing off by what Wu Qi said, an indifferent voice suddenly came out from a coach behind him, “Marquis Liu, have we arrived at Little Meng City? Hmm, why are the City Guards of Little Meng City are blocking our way? Is it because the General of Little Meng City neglected his job, and turned these City Guards into some sort of robbers that stop innocent travelers and demand money?”
At the same time, a tall young man came out from the coach, with just a step, the young man flew past Liu Suifeng’s coach, like a weightless feather, moving to stand beside Liu Suifeng. Wu Qi focused his vision on the man. It looked like his cultivation level was higher than Wu Qi’s. It seems like he was just one step away from the Xiantian level.
However, after injecting some innate water energy into his eyes, Wu Qi found out that this young man’s energy was not concentrated. It looked to be a little out of control when he was circulating his energy. If Wu Qi’s guess was correct, his cultivation level was entirely obtained from foreign objects, either pills or some powerful herbs.
The young man had facial features that were similar to Lu Chengfeng, however, he had a malicious expression and always had his brow dangling down. An evil look kept glowing within his eyes, and his frequent out of focus vision let people who stared into his eyes instantly know that this was not a good guy.
Standing on the coach, this young man stared down at Lu Chengfeng and, with a stern voice, said, “Elder brother, look at your General. Look at him! Does he knows any rules or laws? According to the law of the Lu Kingdom, civilians shall avoid disturbing a Marquis when they are on their way. But, not only did you disobey this law, you even sent your army to halt the coach of Marquis Liu. What do you actually want?”
The more this young man spoke, the more rage built up within Wu Qi.
Lu Chengfeng, who had begun to understand Wu Qi quite well, took a step forward, standing between the young man and Wu Qi, who was about to explode. Without showing any emotion on his face, Lu Chengfeng said, “So, it was sixth brother? Why didn’t you inform elder brother that you were coming?”
Lu Quyuan, the sixth brother of Lu Chengfeng and the son of Lu Chengfeng’s second uncle, sneered. With his hands on his back, he said, “Marquis Liu has just been assigned as the Military Supervisory Officer for eight provinces. He is responsible for supervising all the military affairs within eight provinces. Little Meng City was ruled under the Province of the Three Mountains. It is one of the eight provinces under the supervisor of the Marquis.”
Staring at Lu Chengfeng with a cold shoulder, Lu Quyuan continued on with a stern tone, “It is time for Quyuan to work in the government too, therefore I had requested father to help and get me a job as the assistant Military Supervisory Officer. Now I can come to Little Meng City and visit you, my eldest brother!”
Liu Suifeng let out a loud laugh, then he went back into his coach and, after some searching, finally found an official letter and a silver token piece. With a proud expression, he threw both of them to Lu Chengfeng. Lu Chengfeng examined the letter and token closely. On top of the letter it was stated that Liu Suifeng was the new Military Supervisory Officer for eight provinces. He was responsible for supervising all military related affairs within these eight provinces.
Lu Chengfeng’s face instantly darkened. Wu Qi dashed over to Lu Chengfeng and asked him what this Military Supervisory Officer actually did. After some whispering, Wu Qi’s face turned awful too. He murmured to himself, “If I knew this earlier, I would have killed them just now! After all, there are countless barbarians around Little Meng City, so no matter how many people are killed here, I’ll just blame it on those barbarians. I don’t think anyone would have doubted us on this!”
The so-called ‘Supervisory Officer’ was not a regular position in the government. It was just a temporary position created for training the younger generation of those influential families within the Lu Kingdom. They were either supervising the internal affairs or the irrigation systems. Agriculture or business. A few of the sons of influential families would travel in groups around the kingdom, supervising military affairs or internal affairs, and nitpicking every tiny detail they could. After they had done a few of these rounds, they would be familiar with how to work in the government.
The power of these Supervisory Officer was actually not all that big, but, at the same time, they couldn’t be underestimated. They had the authority to report anything directly to the top man in the government, and their reports would be put on the table of those lords and the most powerful ministers within the Lu Kingdom. These reports controlled the lives of all the more ordinary government officials in the Lu Kingdom.
If they really found something wrong with a government official, by simply placing a few minor wrongful remarks on the person in a letter, the future of that official would be completely destroyed.
Besides, all these Supervisory Officers were from wealthy and influential families. They had a powerful family at their back, therefore they could do almost anything they wanted when they out and about. If someone offended them, that person’s family would be heavily attacked. Even if the person was the Governor of a province, he would still be in a mess for offending these rich kids.
Liu Suifeng and Lu Quyuan both stared at Lu Chengfeng and let out loud laughs at the same time.
While laughing in joy, Lu Quyuan said, “Elder brother, please make the arrangements as for where we shall stay? Also, seal all the official documents and records of the General’s Office in Little Meng City. All the money, army provisions, weapons, and equipment have to be sealed too. Until we have run a thorough audit on all military-related affairs, none of the soldiers in Little Meng City shall receive any order from this General!”
Wu Qi had hidden both of his hands in his sleeves, and taken a few steps back. He tilted his head and threw an examining look at Lu Quyuan, calculating in his mind on how much this guy’s clothes were worth. At the same time, he was also calculating how much the coach of Liu Suifeng was worth. He swore in his mind that if he couldn’t steal everything from them, including their underpants, he would renounce his status as a disciple of the Darkhand Sect!
Lu Chengfeng clenched his teeth tightly and stared at the arrogant and proud Liu Suifeng, then he looked at Liu Quyuan, who was gazing back at him. With a dark look on his face, Lu Chengfeng waved his hand and said, “All soldiers, return to the camp. Without my order, you’re forbidden to leave the camp. Marquis Liu, sixth brother, you two follow me!”
With rapid clatter of footsteps, all the City Guards started to return back to their camp.
Wu Qi pulled over Zhao Chenzui and whispered to him. After that, Zhao Chenzui sneaked into the crowds and left. He was rushing to the new recruit boot camp within the woods, delivering the order of Wu Qi that told them to increase the patrols these next few days, and forbade anyone from leave the place. Silently expanding the army with twenty thousand new recruits and having them privately trained… If this was found out by Lu Quyuan, then… Wu Qi would be forced to blame those barbarians for killing government officials one more time!
Breathing out a long sigh, Wu Qi murmured to himself, “Let’s cut down some troubles! Before I become stronger, I shouldn’t provoke these bastards!”
Suddenly, Wu Qi felt a gaze from the coach of Lu Quyuan that made his body tremble. It rapidly shot through Wu Qi’s body.
Wu Qi was stunned for few seconds and felt numb on in his head. He didn’t dare to look back. He just turned around and set his vision on Lu Chengfeng.
Lu Quyuan jumped off the coach, holding onto Lu Chengfeng’s hand intimately, and said, “Hahaha, elder brother, long time no see. I, your sixth brother, has missed you very much!”
Giving Lu Chengfeng a powerful hug, Lu Quyuan whispered to him, “Elder brother, second brother wanted me to pass you a message. ‘This time, I’ll have fun killing you!’ Do you know why that fatty Yi Yan kept spurning you? It was all second brother’s arrangement, understand?”
Letting go of Lu Chengfeng, Lu Quyuan laughed out loud again, “Elder brother, to be able to see you again today makes me extremely happy!”
Wu Qi kept shaking his head while standing to the side. Could this person really be ‘his brother’?