Chapter 82: The Tartar Massacre

Bai Lang looked at the Tartar before him who was not shorter than him; the Tartar's padded armor was also quite splendid, with blue trim and a helmet that looked like a lightning rod, all indicating that his status was not low. Bai Lang smiled kindly, "Hello, chief!"

After saying that, Bai Lang stretched his arm, seized the Tartar's arm and pulled it into his chest. The Tartar felt as if a red‑hot iron ring had clamped his arm—once the heat passed the sensation vanished, and a great force yanked him toward the Ming officer. Before the Tartar could even shout, Bai Lang's other hand grabbed his jaw and, with a clank, pushed him forward, causing the Tartar's head to snap ninety degrees and hang on his own back.

Like a tiger crushing a deer, Bai Lang easily killed the Tartar, tossed the still‑breathing corpse aside, and noticed something odd. The approaching Tartars smiled with their upper lips slightly upturned, baring canine teeth, showing a ferocious, savage look. "Good! Good deal! This raid on the grass valley was worth it!" Bai Lang snapped his claws, lowered his body a little, and surged forward with a gust of foul wind.

The Tartars before him were not much shorter than Bai Lang, and many were even bulkier, with tiger‑back and bear‑waist builds; compared with the slender Bai Lang, they resembled human bears. All wore heavy armor, making them even more massive, and their weapons were heavy—mostly greatswords, thick‑backed knives, and bone‑spike weapons, with some carrying half‑person‑high powerful bows.

Bai Lang moved like a tiger into a wolf pack; when a heavy sword swung at him he neither dodged nor avoided, letting the blade strike his body. The padded armor first absorbed part of the force, then the plates cracked, yet the flesh beneath was unharmed. As for meeting bone‑spike weapons head‑on, Bai Lang did so without a flicker of expression. Relying on his Golden Bell Shield that repels blades and spears, Bai Lang seized the crowd and slaughtered them fiercely.

His limbs were essentially ever‑changing weapons—could be a hammer, a whip, claws, even an iron staff. The force was extraordinary; a single punch could, even if aimed to avoid the skull, shatter a burly man's entire sternum and internal organs, and even deform the opponent's body outward. One must admit that the Qing now take military equipment far more seriously than the Ming Dynasty; at least these mail and padded armors are well‑crafted with no shortcuts.

Thus a single punch cannot pierce the person, but it can severely deform the mail and the iron plates riveted onto it, and the body inside is surely a mess. A palm strike has the same effect—like an iron plate striking a person—crushing the hit area into mud with no chance of rescue. When his claws clamp onto someone, they tear the flesh apart, which looks even more terrifying than a punch or palm strike.

But actually this can keep one alive—at worst an arm or leg gets torn off. Yet Bai Lang usually attacks in succession; a tear is followed by a punch or kick, so a torn victim still gets a finishing blow and is essentially doomed. Bai Lang's leg techniques are equally fierce; with power greater than his arms, his legs sweep like two iron pillars, snapping anything kicked as if it were a ruler, or even cleaving it in two, tearing mail armor apart with sheer force.

Bai Lang spent only the time it takes to drink a cup of tea and had nearly wiped out the heavily‑armored Tartars on the city wall; they could not escape. Bai Lang moved with such speed that his form was like a huge beast, as swift as an assassin tiger. He left three Tartars alive, but used a clever technique to gather them together. After pausing, Bai Lang walked to the seat on the wall and sat down; the three Tartars dared not flee—someone had tried earlier, but the monster before them leapt out in a single bound and ripped out the heart and half a rib cage from behind…

The ground was slick with blood and runoff, the stench overwhelmingly pungent, and Bai Lang lamented, "Next time don't kill like this; try to finish with a light punch, because tearing with claws just rips open the belly and drenches everything in blood." The Ming officer sat casually on the chair, tapped one of the Tartars and said, "You! Go cut off the heads of all the dead here! Cut them and you'll have a chance to live today; if you don't, you'll die instantly!"

"By the way, when you cut, don't press the blade against the skull! Leave some neck bone for me to pick up! Damn, that pig‑tail‑like braid is hard to grab and tie! It's ugly as hell!" Bai Lang ordered, and the three Tartars shivered; even Tartars weren't that brutal. "You two, I have a pair of weapons left here in your Jianlu, deliver a message for me! In half a month I'll return, and then you'll give me back those two water‑polished Purple Gold Halberds."

"One last thing, I'm here to raid the grass valley, don't worry—I can't take your city alone. I'm a bit broke lately, so I'll come roughly once a month; rest assured I won't wipe out all your people. If I slaughter everyone, where will I get more reward money? You can't run a business into a dead end, right?" Bai Lang finished, watched the trembling head‑cutter fumble. "Damn, I'll have to finish this myself! Useless Tartar!" Bai Lang kicked the man out of the city wall; he screamed miserably, fell, and with a final splash went silent.

Bai Lang began deftly pulling off heads, muttering, "Once you get used to it, it's like pulling a radish." He whispered while casually extracting the heads. The two Tartars had already rolled their eyes and gone limp, even wetting their pants; but the ground was flooded, the smell already foul, so Bai Lang didn't kill them outright. He gathered the heads, tossed them out of the city—perhaps one or two might break—but that should count toward his merit. In any case, Bai Lang thought that, given his status, the civil officials assessing his deeds would likely acknowledge it.

"A Tartar head fetches fifty taels!" Bai Lang quickly dealt with the heads; the city had already mobilized a large army, and Bai Lang leapt straight off the wall. Before that he kicked the cannon base on the tower, sending the artillery tilting. After landing, he swiftly gathered the heads of the Tartars he had killed outside; once collected, taking them away would be a problem. "Fine, go get a big carriage inside!" Bai Lang gritted his teeth and, this time, charged straight through the doorway. Inside there were indeed no cannons and hardly any people—they'd all fled. On the street, a formation of Qing soldiers marched; Bai Lang rushed forward, pulling a man who looked like an officer from his horse. "Send a horse and a carriage over, or I'll slaughter him!"