The air inside the ruined temple still carried the sharp, unpleasant smell of burnt flesh and scorched hair.
The firelight flickered across Sang Wanwan’s breathtaking face, casting shifting shadows over her features.
To the assassins who had just regained consciousness, the smile on her lips was far more terrifying than any King of Hell from the deepest circles of the underworld.
Crackle—
Sang Wanwan casually twirled the stun baton in her hand and lightly tapped the switch.
A blue arc of electricity danced between the metal prongs, releasing a crisp snapping sound.
To the assassins, that tiny sound hit harder than a war hammer.
The dozen burly men who had been struggling to stand instantly shuddered.
Their knees gave out.
Thump! Thump! Thump!
Every one of them dropped to the ground.
“Mercy, Heroine! Please spare us, Grandmother!”
The assassin leader, who had been arrogantly threatening to chop Sang Wanwan into pieces just moments ago, now kowtowed so hard that his forehead repeatedly slammed against the floor.
His electrocuted bird’s-nest hairstyle bounced comically with every bow.
“We were wrong! We really know we were wrong!”
“You’re magnanimous, just treat us like a fart and let us go!”
Tears streamed down his face.
The grime and soot smeared across his skin washed away in streaks, leaving two muddy trails that looked utterly ridiculous.
Sang Wanwan didn’t even bother raising her eyelids.
She dragged over a mostly intact wooden chair and sat down with the swagger of a bandit king.
From her elevated position, she looked down at her defeated captives.
“Let you go?”
She snorted coldly.
Her clear voice echoed through the temple, carrying undeniable authority.
“You kicked down my door in the middle of the night.”
“You came waving knives, trying to chop my head off.”
“And now you think saying ‘sorry’ is enough?”
She crossed one leg over the other.
“Where in the world do you find a deal that cheap?”
The assassins trembled violently.
They were convinced she was about to strike them all dead with her terrifying lightning magic.
One particularly timid assassin had already wet himself.
Nearly crying, he wailed:
“Grandmother, we’re not elite assassins!”
“We’re outsourced laborers from the bottom rung of Blood Blade Pavilion! We usually just collect debts and crack a few skulls for extra cash!”
“This mission only came to us because the payment was too low! None of the real assassins wanted it!”
The assassin leader hurriedly joined in.
“That’s right, Grandmother! Making a living isn’t easy!”
“The client only offered two silver notes! More than ten of us had to split the money!”
“We couldn’t even afford decent swords with that payment!”
“Oh, right! The client was Sang Rourou from the Marquis Zhen Guo’s residence!”
“Had we known you were an immortal who commands heavenly lightning, we’d never have come even if we had a hundred lives to spare!”
Listening to the pitiful complaints, Zhao Tieniu and his men stared in disbelief.
Were these really the infamous assassins who supposedly killed without blinking?
They sounded more like market vendors haggling over vegetable prices.
In a dark corner, Zongzheng Zhan continued hugging his head and pretending to be terrified.
Yet behind the curtain of messy hair covering his eyes, amusement flickered briefly.
Outsourced laborers?
Sang Rourou really was an idiot.
She couldn’t even spend properly when hiring assassins.
Sang Wanwan’s smile widened.
She planted the stun baton against the floor with a heavy thud.
“Enough crying.”
“Since your lives are so miserable, and since I’m such a kindhearted person, I’ll generously leave you a path to survive.”
The assassins nearly burst into tears of joy.
Their eyes lit up immediately.
“Thank you for sparing us!”
“Thank you, Living Bodhisattva!”
“Don’t thank me yet.”
Sang Wanwan slowly raised a slender finger and waved it.
“You can keep your lives.”
“But you’ll have to buy them.”
“My rules are simple.”
She smiled sweetly.
“Pay money to avoid disaster.”
The assassin leader froze.
Instinctively, he clutched his money pouch.
“G-Grandmother… we didn’t bring much money with us…”
“You didn’t?”
Sang Wanwan sneered.
Then she turned toward the offering table.
“Zhao Tieniu.”
“Are you dead under there? Get your men out here and start working!”
The moment he heard her call, Zhao Tieniu sprang into action.
After witnessing Sang Wanwan single-handedly destroy an entire assassin squad, his admiration and fear had already reached fanatical levels.
“Lady Master has spoken! Brothers, move!”
Leading over a dozen deputies, Zhao Tieniu charged out from under the table like a pack of hungry wolves.
Armed with cudgels and sabers, they immediately surrounded the now-defenseless assassins.
“Lady Master, give the order! What do we do?” Zhao Tieniu asked with a flattering grin.
“Search them.”
Leaning lazily against the chair, Sang Wanwan spoke only two words.
“Leave them their underwear.”
“Everything else valuable comes off.”
“The clothes, the shoes, even a hair tie if they’ve got one.”
Silence.
The dowager consorts and elderly maids from the prince’s residence had only just recovered from their fright.
Hearing such shameless words, their old faces turned red.
They hurriedly covered their eyes.
Though, notably, the gaps between their fingers remained quite wide.
The assassins felt as though they had been struck by lightning again.
Their faces twisted with humiliation.
“You woman! Have you no shame?!”
“A gentleman may be killed but never humiliated!”
“The hell with that!”
Zhao Tieniu kicked the loudest protester flat onto the floor.
“If Lady Master says strip, then you strip!”
The deputies surged forward.
Like a band of highway robbers, they began tearing clothes from the assassins.
Rip!
“Oww! Easy! That’s my belt!”
Moments later, the fierce black-clad assassins had been stripped clean.
Inside the freezing temple, they stood hugging themselves.
Each man wore nothing but a thin pair of white underpants.
Shivering in the cold, they looked like innocent maidens bullied by a gang of villains.
On the floor lay a pile of cheap black clothing, worn boots, and chipped swords.
Zhao Tieniu respectfully handed over several pitiful money pouches.
Sang Wanwan dumped the contents into her palm.
A few pieces of silver.
A handful of copper coins.
Not even ten taels altogether.
“Poor bastards.”
Without hesitation, she stuffed every last coin into her sleeve, which was really her storage space.
Then she looked at the trembling men huddled against the wall.
“You think this amount is enough to buy thirteen lives?”
“What am I, a charity organization?”
The assassin leader looked ready to cry blood.
“Grandmother, you’ve squeezed us dry!”
“Even these underwear were bought on credit!”
“What more do you want?”
Sang Wanwan’s eyes suddenly brightened.
From somewhere, she produced an old piece of white cloth and tossed it onto the floor.
“No money?”
“No problem.”
“You can sign a debt agreement.”
The assassins stared blankly.
Sang Wanwan pointed at the cloth.
“Every one of you bites your finger and writes a blood oath.”
“Write this.”
“‘By order of Sang Rourou of the Marquis Zhen Guo’s residence, we serve Sang Wanwan as loyal workers. We now owe five thousand taels of silver. Payment due within one month. Failure to pay shall result in heavenly punishment and extinction of our descendants.'”
The assassins hesitated.
Sang Wanwan immediately raised the stun baton again.
Her thumb settled on the red switch.
Crackle! Snap!
Blue lightning exploded into existence once more.
The threat of death filled the room.
“We’ll write! We’ll write!”
The assassin leader nearly screamed.
He bit his thumb hard enough to draw blood.
With tears streaming down his face, he shakily wrote his name onto the cloth and pressed a bloody handprint beside it.
The others followed suit.
Each man signed while trembling like a leaf.
Only after the cloth was covered in bloody fingerprints did Sang Wanwan finally nod in satisfaction.
She folded it away carefully.
“Good.”
“When you get back, take this debt agreement and stand outside the Marquis Zhen Guo’s residence every day demanding payment.”
“If they refuse to pay the five thousand taels…”
A wicked smile spread across her face.
“Dump buckets of manure on their front gate every single day.”
The assassins nodded frantically.
At this point, none of them dared object.
In their minds, this woman was a hundred times more terrifying than any devil.
Not only had she squeezed every remaining ounce of value from them, she had even found a way to humiliate Sang Rourou at the same time.
“Alright.”
“Get into the corner.”
“And stop disturbing my sleep.”
The rest of the night passed surprisingly peacefully.
The assassins huddled together in their underwear, trying desperately to stay warm.
Not one of them even dared sneeze.
…
The next morning.
As the first rays of sunlight pierced through the wilderness fog, the exile convoy resumed its journey.
Only now, the group featured a sight so absurd that anyone who saw it would question reality.
The cart carrying Sang Wanwan and Zongzheng Zhan had previously been pulled by Zhao Tieniu.
Today, however, Zhao Tieniu strutted proudly beside it with a whip in hand.
Taking his place were the assassins.
All thirteen of them.
Still dressed in nothing but their white underpants.
A thick rope had been tied around each man’s neck.
The other ends were secured firmly to the heavy cart.
In the chilly autumn morning wind, the muscular men were lined up in two rows like livestock.
Barefoot on the rocky dirt road, their bruised bodies bent forward as they strained with all their might.
Pulling.
Running.
Dragging the cart like draft animals.
“Move faster, damn it!”
“Haven’t you eaten anything?!”
Zhao Tieniu waved his whip enthusiastically.
He didn’t dare actually strike them.
But his booming voice carried across the countryside.
Several refugees passing nearby nearly lost their minds at the sight.
What kind of heartless contractor was supervising this construction site from hell?
Meanwhile, the owner of this magnificent human-powered rickshaw service—
Sang Wanwan herself—
Lay comfortably atop the cart.
Thick straw and blankets cushioned her seat.
The warm autumn sunlight bathed her beautiful face.
She looked completely relaxed.
“Mother, open your mouth. Ahhh.”
Beside her, little Yuanyuan carefully held out a peeled walnut.
The adorable girl had cleaned it with her tiny hands and was feeding it directly to her mother.
Sang Wanwan accepted the walnut and smiled.
Life was good.
Not far away, Zongzheng Zhan was competing with Tuantuan over a foxtail grass stem.
On the surface, he still appeared silly and carefree.
Yet every now and then, his gaze drifted toward the assassins pulling the cart.
The look in his eyes grew deeper.
This woman wasn’t merely ruthless.
Her ability to squeeze every last drop of value from her enemies was even more terrifying than anything he had seen on the battlefield.
The convoy moved steadily onward.
For once, everyone was in a remarkably good mood.
Unfortunately, the peace didn’t last long.
“Lady Master! Bad news! Something terrible has happened!”
A frantic shout suddenly rang out.
Zhao Tieniu, who had gone ahead to scout the road, came tumbling back down a hillside.
He was running so fast that he tripped and face-planted directly in front of the cart.
But he didn’t even notice the pain.
His face was deathly pale.
His voice trembled with unmistakable terror.
“Lady Master!”
“Up ahead…”
“Up ahead is Blackwind Pass!”
“The bandits from Blackwind Stronghold have completely blocked the canyon entrance!”