Chapter 148: Under the Intersection, 'Blood Dagger

Walking out of this secret chamber filled with valuable items, the innkeeper fumbled along one side of the wall, and with the dim illumination from a glowing stone at his waist, he found a mechanism.

Pulling the mechanism, a sound came from inside a portion of the wall, and the locked bolt was released.

The innkeeper gave it a push, opening what looked like a brick wall but was actually a secret door made of thick wooden planks disguised with paint; behind the secret door was a slightly curved underground passage.

This passage was even somewhat spacious, but it was dark and damp, the ground was sticky, and occasionally there was the sound of frogs. In some inconspicuous corners, things were even crawling about.

"Didn't it not rain this year? Why are there still uncleared slime monsters? Shoo, shoo, don't come over here." The innkeeper picked up a croaking frog from the ground and tossed it toward a dark corner in the distance.

Those crawling slime monsters seemed very familiar with the scent of frogs, thinking it was a stupid frog that had boldly jumped over, so they immediately spat small amounts of acid in that direction, then swarmed over to fight for the frog carcass.

After driving away the slime monsters, the innkeeper held the glowing stone at his waist in his hand and, with this meager illumination, skillfully walked to the right.

As he walked, he muttered some words: "After coming out, turn right at the first intersection."

Just as he said, in the underground passage that was spacious enough for two people to walk, he turned right at the intersection.

Then he continued to mutter: "After turning right, walk forward, go straight past two intersections, and then grope along the right wall."

He strode forward, and after confirming he had passed two intersections, he immediately began to grope along the right wall with his hand.

Soon, something resembling a tree root was caught by him, and with a fierce pull, the lower part of the earthen wall on the right—a wooden-disguised earthen wall—lifted, revealing a small passage that a person could crawl into.

The innkeeper pursed his lips in dissatisfaction, bent down, and carefully crawled inside.

But no matter how careful he was, he still got covered in stains.

After wiping himself off haphazardly, he closed the wooden wall behind him from the inside and then crawled up along the narrow wooden ladder in front.

Above was another secret chamber located underground, but this place was no longer under his inn; it was the secret room under one of the wooden shops surrounding the inn. And the underground passage he had just walked through was also something that the people of these scattered wooden shops had repeatedly dug out under the intersection over the years.

Originally, these were underground storerooms for small merchants to store goods, or places to hide when local Tax Officers brought troops to collect taxes.

But if your family digs a storeroom, cellar, or secret room underground, then I can dig one out too. After all, the soil quality in the area where 【Meiqian Chakou】 is located is loose; with a shovel and a piece of bread, one can dig more than a meter deep in a day, and in a month or two, one can dig out a place to hide things.

But the problem is, you dig and I dig, and as time went on, these underground spaces dug out by each family unfortunately connected together.

In the end, everyone simply opened up the connected underground spaces and agreed on their respective spheres of influence, ensuring no more excessive digging. Places that needed to be covered were supported and reinforced with thick wooden planks, and over time, it became like this.

However, saying that, this underground space is actually not very large, and when those people were digging under the few large inns and shops, they also deliberately avoided them. But after this innkeeper illegally obtained 【Siren Ganzi】, he occasionally heard about this kind of thing, so he also dug out a secret chamber under his own room, as well as a wall secret door connecting to the secret chamber.

With this thing, some of his illegal affairs became easier to handle, without having to walk out of his inn in the middle of the night to meet with people in secret.

For a very long time, he had been meeting people secretly in this place; after all, even the small merchants of the various wooden shops who dug out these underground spaces rarely went to these underground spaces to move about after a long time.

It is unknown when it started, but there were large, ferocious Caoshu active here, but later, the Caoshu were gone, and a batch of slime monsters that couldn't be driven away or killed off came to occupy the place. When the climate was humid, this place was also full of a large number of frogs from who knows where.

It wasn't until last year, when the Shanglu became depressed and those small merchants sold their goods at low prices and evacuated, that this underground space was rarely visited by anyone.

However, the innkeeper guided those outside Bandits to share these little secrets.

Climbing up the wooden ladder and opening the wooden board covering the top, the space that emerged was still a secret chamber. This place was located under an inconspicuous wooden shop, with the thick wooden floor of the shop overhead, and this place had been transformed by the outside Bandits into a small Jiedian for scouts.

"Ouch, gently, gently, those dog things, their hands are really ruthless! Just because we aren't locals, they hit so hard!"

As soon as he came up, the innkeeper saw a scout who had been beaten, sitting on a wooden bed to the side receiving treatment.

Beside him, another scout from the Bandit Group held a small jar, impatiently dipping a bit of Ointment from the jar with his hand and applying it to the beaten scout's wounds.

"Bear with it, it'll be done soon. You too, knowing that the inn opened by that local family is hostile to us, don't go up to peek. Just look from afar, or listen to the sounds in the inn to judge the scale of the people staying overnight."

"After all, getting a beating, the one being beaten is you. Getting the news and reporting it to your group's leader, the one who ultimately benefits isn't you, right?" The scout from another group responsible for the treatment saw it clearly, and he tried to persuade the other party not to work so desperately.

The innkeeper used to be a Bandit, and after making contact with the surrounding outside Bandit Groups, he had some face. At this time, after he climbed up, both Bandit scouts greeted him with respectful attitudes.

After all, this innkeeper not only started early but even successfully retired and opened an inn on this Shanglu. And after contacting these outside Bandit Groups, he also provided a lot of help, including local intelligence, intelligence on passing merchants, and intelligence on Duoen Town, and even undertook some of the fencing of stolen goods, as well as providing intelligence on this underground space at the intersection.

However, unlike the bold innkeeper, these outside Bandit scouts had rarely gone down since they first encountered the acid attack of the slime monsters in that pitch-black place in the underground space. They just secretly found a few empty shop underground storerooms in these deserted wooden shops to use as their temporary Jiedian.

But no matter where they stayed, this innkeeper could suddenly appear from inconspicuous places; clearly, the other party really understood this underground space.

"Hmph, you young man, if you want to climb up, you have to work hard when you are young and energetic, and accumulate various resources. Including your reputation on the road, the money in your hands, reliable companions under your command, and the trust of your leader. Without these things, or missing a few of them, you will only be a small character in the group for the rest of your life! And then, in some inadvertent looting operation, you will die in a meaningless battle that no one cares about."

The innkeeper, as if lecturing his own Shop Assistant, patted the stains on his body while stating his views: "By then, your existence will only be remembered by a few close friends or drinking buddies, your bedding will be thrown away by others, and your meager wealth will be seized by others; they won't even remember your name."

His words made the two Bandit scouts' faces look ugly, especially the Bandit scout who had just advised the other not to work so desperately. This person gnashed his teeth, and his hands lost the motivation to continue treatment. He wiped the other's wound haphazardly with his hand, then put down the Ointment jar and sat dejectedly on the ground to the side.

The Bandit scout who had just been beaten rubbed the Ointment on his wound, spreading it evenly. This Ointment was very ordinary; not only did it have no analgesic effect, but the wound also burned painfully after the Ointment was applied.

But the Ointment's effect of stopping bleeding and sealing the wound was still quite good.

"'Blood Dagger' senior, I didn't become a Bandit for fame or any other reason. I did it to keep my family from starving. My brothers and I all joined the Bandit Group so that we and our families could have enough to eat. Even if, in our hometown, we were the ones who fled the village because of the rampaging Bandits."

This person looked at a Steel Dagger in his hand: "Our family had no relatives in the town willing to take us in, so we could only walk along the main road toward the prosperous places. The family's savings were soon spent. If I hadn't met a fellow villager who asked me if I wanted to join the Bandits and go out to loot those Caravans to earn money to live, I don't know if my family would have starved to death on the side of the road somewhere long ago?"

The innkeeper nicknamed 'Blood Dagger' snorted, didn't answer, but instead told the uninjured scout to notify the scouts from the other Bandit Groups scattered at the intersection to come over, as he had news to report to them.

Knowing this was an important matter, the uninjured scout climbed up in a few steps, then bent over and secretly went out to find people.

After the person had gone far away, the innkeeper sat by the wall and reached out to the beaten and injured Bandit scout opposite: "Give me your Dagger."

The injured scout was a bit afraid. After all, he was thin and weak. He was certainly strong enough when he was farming at home, but the subsequent life of fleeing made him too thin, and the little food there was almost all given to the women and children in the family.

However, the person opposite was a Bandit senior who had cooperated with them several times. Not only had he made a name for himself in the Bandit profession, but he had also successfully retired. His life achievements were naturally much stronger than his own as a nameless Bandit scout.

Even if there were only the two of them here, and even if he knew it would be very dangerous to hand over his self-defense weapon, this scout still didn't dare not give the Dagger to the other party.

Tremblingly handing over the Steel Dagger in his hand, the innkeeper impatiently snatched it away.

"Kid, I haven't heard anyone call me by that nickname for a while now. Let me show you what I relied on to get such a nickname."

As soon as the words fell, the innkeeper who had snatched the Dagger skillfully spun the Dagger rapidly on his fingers, then grabbed the handle of the Dagger and quickly swept it through the air with both forward and reverse grips.

The tip of the Dagger even made the sound that only long weapons could make when swung; the whistling sound was very terrifying, just like a Poisonous Snake ready to take a life at any time, sticking out its tongue in front of people and showing its terribleness.

After the innkeeper finished playing with the Dagger in his right hand, he quickly flashed it to his left hand to hold. Similarly, his left hand could also skillfully use the Dagger's offensive killing moves. This scene made the injured Bandit scout swallow a mouthful of saliva, fearing that the other party's murderous intent would surge and he would be slaughtered on the spot.

After all, just as the innkeeper said, he was a nameless pawn. If he were slaughtered by such a big shot, his group leader wouldn't even stand up for him. Presumably, only his own brothers would be willing to avenge him, right?

Or, because of the burden of his family, his brothers wouldn't even dare to take revenge. After all, if someone else died because of revenge, what would happen to the other family members? How could they continue to live in this cruel world?

"Hmph."

Seeing the other party's cowardly side, the innkeeper was furious. The level of these Bandit Groups he cooperated with was really average; they couldn't fight, they couldn't be ruthless, and they only relied on being numerous to have their current power, making the local forces near Dorn Town wary and afraid.

Once before, he had relied on his own connections to contact a Steward inside the 【Wealth Fruit】 Merchant Guild of the Dorn Town Chamber of Commerce Union, and through the intelligence from the other side, he contacted almost all the outside Bandit Groups nearby and pulled off a big job.

Just the income from that one looting was over a thousand Gold Coins, not to mention those captured Merchant Guild Shop Assistants. If the 【Wealth Fruit】 Merchant Guild wanted to maintain internal stability, they had to save those people, or spend a lot of money to redeem them.

That was also a not-insignificant income.

As a middleman, the innkeeper did not need to risk betraying the Merchant Guild, nor did he need to risk fighting or looting on the scene; just by acting as a middleman, he could obtain a five-percent cut of the final proceeds.

This was much faster money than his poorly managed Siren Ganzi inn.

After all, his management ability was limited, and he possessed the greed of a Bandit, so the inn, which had some fame a few years ago, had been run into the ground by him over the last two years to the point where it barely made any money, and he had even started doing things like killing the goose that lays the golden eggs just to scrape together cash.

Under these circumstances, how could he not take the crooked path?

Thinking of this, the innkeeper flicked his hand, and the Dagger in his left hand slammed into the wooden board to the right of the injured Bandit scout's neck with a bang, the sharp blade only two centimeters away from the other's neck.

"Ah!" This injured Bandit was terrified; he collapsed onto the bed, trembling as he touched his neck with his hand, fearing that if he touched it, he would find it covered in blood.

Fortunately, he was not injured; the Bandit senior opposite him was only trying to scare him.

"Say nothing else, kid, in this line of work, at the very least your skills can't be lacking. Otherwise, your own life and death will not be in your own hands."

After lecturing this person, the innkeeper crossed his arms and stopped speaking; after a while, a succession of footsteps arrived overhead, and one Bandit scout after another climbed down the wooden ladder.

Including the injured Bandit scout slumped on the bed, a total of seven scouts belonging to different Bandit Groups gathered in this cramped wooden basement warehouse.

The Oil Lamp in the room flickered, casting the faces of these few scouts in a way that looked somewhat distorted and twisted.

They stared intently at the innkeeper, hoping that this very capable old Bandit could provide them with some additional intelligence. After all, everyone had cooperated very well last time, all the groups had made money, and today, another fairly large caravan had arrived at the Chalu, and the Bandit Groups, whose appetites had been whetted by the success of the last looting, had already set their sights on this caravan.

?? Welcome everyone to subscribe to this book, follow this book, bookmark this book, and give this book recommendation votes, monthly tickets, and tips for support, thank you.