Chapter 416

The other diners in the wonton stall, who had been chatting loudly before, quickly slurped up their wontons as soon as Su Qiao and the others entered and sat down.

They then tossed down silver coins and hurriedly left.

In no time, only Su Qiao and his group remained in the wonton stall.

While waiting for the wontons, Su Qiao did not look outside; instead, he observed the nimble elderly couple.

The old man was in charge of cooking the wontons, collecting money, serving the wontons, and attending to the customers outside.

The old woman kept rolling out the dough and wrapping the wontons, her hands moving with incredible speed, attending to the work inside.

Both the old man and the old woman wore coarse cloth clothes, had graying hair, deep wrinkles on their faces, and appeared to be quite old.

However, they were nimble, and judging by the customers just now, business was quite good.

"Noble sirs, the wontons are ready!"

At this moment, the wontons were floating in the boiling water; the old man quickly scooped them into bowls and personally placed them on the table for Su Qiao and the others.

A layer of chopped green onions and coriander floated on top, releasing a fragrant aroma.

But neither Su Qiao nor Zhu Di ate.

They did not even lift the bowls.

The other Embroidered Uniform Guards did not move either.

Mainly because Su Qiao and Zhu Di had not moved, they dared not move first.

"These are fine wontons, but they are not meant for the living to eat."

Su Qiao looked at the steaming, fragrant wontons before him and said in a calm tone.

The elderly couple busy in the wonton stall stopped their movements.

Both stared at Su Qiao simultaneously.

The old man asked in a curious, deep voice, "How did you discover it?"

This voice was completely different from the trembling, sycophantic one before; it was steady and powerful, and although it still carried a hint of weariness, it sounded more like that of a vigorous middle-aged man.

Clang, clang, clang!

The Embroidered Uniform Guards responsible for protecting Su Qiao and Zhu Di immediately drew their Embroidered Spring Blades and formed a protective circle around Su Qiao and the others.

Their eyes, filled with vigilance and ferocity, turned toward the old man and the old woman.

Su Qiao smiled slightly and said, "Actually, when I saw this dock, I guessed you would make your move here; even if not here, you would follow us and look for an opportunity to get close and attack me."

"Guessed correctly, but we didn't show any flaws, did we?" The old man was still fixated on the previous question.

Su Qiao shook his head, then nodded. "How to put it? Your performance was actually very convincing; by all rights, it should have been undetectable, but your temperament doesn't match."

"Temperament?"

"Exactly. True people of the lower class, when facing nobles, are not calm like you. Despite your humble appearance, if they were truly from the lower class, seeing their Flying Fish Robes, they would have run away just like the previous diners. How could they remain so calm, doing their work as usual, with only a slightly sycophantic tone?"

After hearing Su Qiao's analysis, the old man and the "old woman" exchanged a glance and both saw two words in each other's eyes.

Damn!

269, the counter-move!

At this moment, Su Qiao also asked a question in return, "I want to know, where is Xu Chunming?"

"The Xu Chunming you speak of is unknown to us; we were hired by others specifically to capture you. If we cannot capture you, we will kill you!"

Having finished speaking, the old man and the "old woman" threw a handful of flour directly at Su Qiao and the others.

Then they drew their weapons and charged forward to kill.

Ma Kui and Sun Youxu led the Embroidered Uniform Guards in drawing their blades to meet them in fierce combat.

It was not like the high-flying scenes in the movies Su Qiao had seen in his later life; instead, the combat was extremely perilous in the blink of an eye.

They were truly hacking at each other's bodies!

The strength of this "elderly couple" was quite formidable; each was besieged by three or five Embroidered Uniform Guards.

Yet, holding short blades, their reactions were incredibly fast; they either dodged or blocked directly.

It was impossible to take them down in a short while.

At this moment, from other stalls, more than a dozen people also emerged, drawing their weapons and charging toward this side.

They were also here to capture Su Qiao!

"They can't hold back anymore; these people really set up a lot of ambushes." Zhu Di showed no sign of panic.

Su Qiao nodded. "What a waste of all this grain."

"There is poison in these wontons," Zhu Di couldn't help but say.

"It's not exactly poison; it's drugged. It's Monghan Medicine!"

The Bai Bai Lianjiao's goal was still to capture Su Qiao, not to kill him.

Therefore, they would not have put poison in it.

"Oh, Monghan Medicine, then you shouldn't die after eating it. Don't you plan to taste it?"

Su Qiao: "..."

Zhu Di must have learned bad habits.

Absolutely learned bad habits!

Where is the former dominance?

Heh, tui!

More than a dozen thieves swarmed in to surround them, while Su Qiao and Zhu Di, having gone ashore with their Embroidered Uniform Guard escorts, numbered only eight or nine people.

Ma Kui and Sun Youxu were still leading men to besiege the two elderly couple assassins.

Currently, only three Embroidered Uniform Guard escorts remained by their side.

Yet, facing enemies several times their number, Su Qiao and Zhu Di remained unpanicked.

Three Embroidered Uniform Guards each drew a hand crossbow from their lower waists, aimed at the charging thieves, and pulled the triggers.

Each hand crossbow held ten bolts for consecutive fire; the range was short, less than thirty paces.

Within fifteen paces, the lethality was greatest.

The thieves closing in, wielding short daggers, had barely charged forward when they met a head-on barrage of crossbow bolts!

"Dodge quickly!"

"Ah..."

"Damn it, how are there crossbow bolts?!"

With only a dozen paces between them, the fastest charger in front had no time to dodge and was pierced straight through by a bolt.

Those behind actually survived the ordeal because they had "human shields."

Originally, over a dozen men could have besieged the three Embroidered Uniform Guards.

Now, of the dozen or so thieves charging forward, only seven or eight remained unscathed.

The rest were either unluckily shot dead on the spot or suffered grave injuries, rendering them useless.

At this moment, the two assassins besieged by Ma Kui and Sun Youxu had expended most of their strength and were beginning to fall behind.

Several more wounds had appeared on their bodies in quick succession!

"Wait! My lord, we surrender!"

Just as the pair of assassins were about to be killed, the old man suddenly dodged a fatal slash in a flustered manner and shouted.

Su Qiao and Zhu Di exchanged a glance; both felt somewhat surprised.

"Don't kill them yet!"

Su Qiao spoke up after all.

In fact, he had originally thought that since the old man and old woman were assassins themselves, they must possess sufficient mental fortitude, having endured hardship and feared neither life nor death.

Secondly, due to their age, having seen more life and death, they should have possessed a more steadfast mindset.

Yet they surrendered at the critical moment.

Truly unexpected!

Ma Kui and Sun Youxu searched the weapons from their bodies, threw them to the ground, and then had people bind them with ropes.

On this side, people were quickly dispatched to help block the thieves charging again.

These men were skilled, but not as much as the two assassins.

Within a few short exchanges, they were slain by the Embroidered Uniform Guard.

"This is too perfunctory! With such a good opportunity, they only sent out so few people; who are they trying to fool?!"