The peaceful atmosphere was completely ruined. The young boy was so angry that he stomped his feet, but he couldn’t beat Li Xi anyway, so all he could do was glare blankly.
In the end, under Li Xi’s calm, dead-fish-like eyes, he fled defeated.
Li Xi merely shook his head slightly, feeling no surprise at all. After all, whether he went out to play or not, he would still go out.
The next day, as expected, Cheng Qiang also changed into a neat outfit that could make hearts flutter and came early to wait for Li Xi.
Upon seeing Li Xi, the young boy immediately took out a map from his sleeve and said, “I asked some local hunters. We’ll enter the mountains from this direction.” He pointed to a spot on the map for Li Xi to look at, then continued, “Then…”
Cheng Qiang had even done his homework in advance, so Li Xi quietly listened.
After Cheng Qiang finished speaking, the two of them immediately mounted their horses and headed into the mountains. Naturally, a few guards followed behind.
At this moment, when they had just set out, Li Xi truly did not expect that during this hunting trip in the mountains, he would meet someone he had never thought he might encounter.
By noon, having long since entered the forest, Cheng Qiang suddenly noticed a pure white fox at the corner of his eye. His eyes immediately lit up, and he ran swiftly after it.
Seeing Cheng Qiang running to chase the heart-fluttering fox, Li Xi could only signal to the guards behind him and then quickly follow the boy’s pace.
The forest was full of wild animals. Anyone entering it could easily encounter one. Cheng Qiang himself was only a half-skilled fighter, and if he truly ran into a ferocious beast, he would likely just become someone else’s snack. Who would dare let him run off alone?
When Li Xi caught up with Cheng Qiang, he saw the boy crouching behind the grass, sneaking forward and preparing to pounce on the snow-white, truly beautiful fox.
Li Xi could not help but slow his pace and walked a short distance away.
Just as Cheng Qiang had been crouching in the grass for a while, having found the perfect moment to pounce and surely catch the fox, a sudden figure leapt from a corner. The large figure landed under the tree where the white fox was resting, startling the fox and causing it to run away, making the young boy’s careful ambush fail.
Seeing this, Cheng Qiang’s eyes widened with anger. He turned furiously to the culprit who had scared away his fox. “You—!”
But as soon as he opened his mouth, he froze. The figure that had fallen from the tree was indeed a person. The problem was that this person appeared to be a boy of similar age. When he fell, he landed on his back, holding something in his arms.
After a moment of confusion, Cheng Qiang looked at the boy on the ground, dressed in commoner’s clothing, and asked, “Who are you?”
Judging by his attire, he did not look like a hunter from the mountains. And if he were a hunter, he was far too young.
“Ah.” At this moment, the boy on the ground finally got up. He sat up on the ground, rubbed his head, and said in pain, “Ouch, that hurts.”
If he had not spoken, it would have been fine, but once he opened his mouth, Cheng Qiang’s face turned completely serious.
Cheng Qiang stared at him coldly without blinking. “You’re from Chu.”
He said this very precisely because he could recognize the Chu accent—the person in front of him was undoubtedly from Chu. But if that was the case, a new problem arose.
Cheng Qiang casually picked up a branch from the ground, coldly pointed it at the boy’s neck, and demanded, “Tell me, why are you in Qin?”
This action seemed to frighten the boy on the ground. Reflexively, he raised both hands and held the small creature he had been carrying high, pleading, “Hero, don’t kill me. I’m not a spy. You see my appearance—I obviously don’t look like I would do anything bad, right? I only came for this little guy!”
At this moment, Li Xi, walking slowly behind, also arrived. Seeing the small creature in his hands—black and white, plump and adorable—Li Xi squinted his eyes and said in a somewhat strange tone,
“You… stole a panda?”