Chapter 27

This is troublesome, the house has only a few entrances and exits, the interior space is not small, the size of the vents definitely cannot let a person in——Bai Lang doesn't know the bone‑shrinking skill. This house has hardly any windows, just vents and ventilation fans, of course it also has air conditioning. "Not easy." For a moment Bai Lang wasn't sure how to proceed; he's neither Ethan Hunt nor Jason Bourne, and he has no idea how to extract the two targets he needs in this situation.

Charging in and killing everyone would probably be the stupidest move; Bai Lang now thinks trying to sneak in as an audience member is also unlikely—having once been a boxer, he knows these guests all enter with invitations, and it's now obvious the venue is closed off—meaning even if more guests came, they wouldn't be let in. In that case, posing as someone else is impossible; he can only try to lurk outside and see if he can wait for those two people to appear.

From the head of the drug‑trafficking line, Bai Lang confirmed that these two will definitely appear, but he also knows that as time passes they could leave early at any moment—and Bai Lang dares not guarantee there's no secret passage here; he's merely a martial artist who has passed the first level of the Golden Bell Shield, not a super‑master who can roam freely like an immortal or Buddha. If those two leave, Bai Lang truly has no way to keep tracking them—without a doubt they'd immediately cut off any possible contact with him, the simplest being to isolate anyone he might know, send them away or just kill them.

Bai Lang sat cross‑legged under a tree outside the house; the situation's development indeed seemed that way, with no one coming or going, yet he felt his action was likely to fail—he had that premonition. After sitting a few more minutes and hearing the noise from inside due to the boxing match——the door was shut tight, the sound actually low——Bai Lang decisively stood up, preparing to leave directly; Thailand seemed no longer a place to stay, and he intended to go elsewhere along the Mekong River.

On the Mekong River there are many Chinese cargo ships that often transport fruits and rice from Southeast Asia to China; Bai Lang, still holding a Chinese ID to prove his identity and having money, found a freighter called Yuhua 3 willing to take him to Myanmar. Thus, Bai Lang boarded with a little luggage; the ship carries mangoes and bananas, shipped for domestic merchants.

As a passenger, Bai Lang watched from the upper deck as crewmen worked, using a crane to lift crate after crate of fruit into the hold. At that moment, armed Thai military personnel approached, speaking to the supervising captain; Bai Lang didn't hear what they said but saw the captain shaking his head repeatedly. The personnel soon left; what happened, Bai Lang didn't like to ask—anyway, once they reached some point in Myanmar he'd disembark, and if there really was something, they'd talk about it later.

Because he'd also heard that Thai and Burmese armed drug‑trafficking syndicates often use Mekong River cargo ships for smuggling, which is apparently quite common—Myanmar here has the Golden Triangle, long a major disaster zone. As for these backward Southeast Asian nations, is collusion between officials and bandits to sell addictive drugs even noteworthy? Especially since both Thailand and Myanmar are actually military‑government states, with all sorts of warlords.

The ship set off, sailing upstream along the Mekong; this mother river of Southeast Asia has a huge flow, its banks lined with continuous fields, quite beautiful. Bai Lang couldn't well train his fists and feet on board, so he practiced internal cultivation (qigong), of course doing a little movement as well—this time he trained the close‑quarters fist of a small area, with small motions, belonging to short‑range striking, which he could practice in his own cabin.

Roughly at the Thailand‑Myanmar border, Bai Lang that day heard the sound of a speedboat approaching. From his porthole it looked like a Thai military speedboat, though maybe not—just some armed personnel in uniform. They shouted hey‑hey as they wanted to board, perhaps for an inspection? Bai Lang opened his cabin door and stepped out. He immediately saw the captain in the bridge, while the first mate was negotiating with those few people—the situation looked bad, as the first mate's face was dark.

Bai Lang could also understand quite a bit; he certainly grasped the first mate's firm refusal of their demands, "requesting to transport certain items……." Looking at those armed men, Bai Lang already sensed killing intent. So he made the first move.

It's better to believe it might be true than to dismiss it as false; although these men look like Thai soldiers, it's entirely normal for them to collude with the syndicate to smuggle drugs, and if they were to act, Bai Lang wouldn't bet they'd spare him—moreover he's always loathed such things. With a "thud"‑like explosion, everyone jumped; those soldiers almost fired accidentally, and all turned toward the sound's source—this all took only a few tenths of a second.

This was Bai Lang stamping his foot on the deck, adding force to launch Grass Flying—this lightness skill had already merged into his Golden Bell Shield and Tiger Form True Meaning; now the situation could no longer be called Grass Flying, because that light, wind‑drifting feeling had given way to the sensation of a fierce tiger riding the wind. As the saying goes, clouds follow the dragon, wind follows the tiger; accompanied by a sudden gust of harsh wind, Bai Lang in those few tenths of a second had already crossed over ten meters of deck, and directly lashed out with a claw.

That claw was mighty; in one grab it seized the chest‑abdomen of the armed man before him, and at that moment Bai Lang's other hand also reached out, directly tearing open that man's front, while pulling his hand back he had already wrenched away the man's assault rifle—of course the strap had been torn. Bai Lang had never handled this weapon; he pulled the trigger but it wouldn't fire—"Damn safety! What junk gun? Is it a 95?" In fact it's an Israeli TAR‑21 assault rifle, which indeed resembles a 95 somewhat.

Can't waste time fiddling with the safety, or he'll turn into a sieve. Bai Lang suddenly bellowed, sending internal force to his throat in a tiger's roar; he instantly felt a burning metallic taste and pain in his throat, yet this shout indeed intimidated those present—even birds on both riverbanks took flight in large numbers. Bai Lang ignored his throat's pain, using that momentum to launch his body forward; in midair he lashed out with a kick, directly shattering the skull of the soldier before him.