Chapter 168: The Dwarf Soldier's Heart Ailment, the Captured Shop Assistant, and the Poisoned Dagger

Before resting at midnight that day, Jier roughly distributed the bounties for today's battle to his subordinate Warriors, which made the Dwarf Warriors, who had also been busy, look on with great envy.

Having no choice, Jier took out another one hundred Silver Coins and had the old Dwarf distribute them to the Dwarf Warriors according to the situation; although it wasn't much and couldn't compare to the generous bounties Jier's own Warriors received, at least it ensured they didn't work for nothing, right?

Especially since the Dwarf Warriors provided important combat power while guarding the Caravan, and were also important labor for capturing enemies and clearing the battlefield afterward.

After the Dwarf Warriors got the money, they didn't think Jier was stingy; compared to this bit of bounty money, they cared more about everyone's performance in today's battle.

Although the Dwarf Warriors who use Double-handed Heavy Weapon and have Faith in the God of Strength did not have a chance to strike this time, at least as an important trump card in the hands of the old "Iron Fist," they had the qualifications to evaluate others' combat, and were currently critiquing the various performances of other Dwarf Warriors today.

Jier listened for a while and found that most Dwarves were quite satisfied with their martial advantage over Humans, except for those few Dwarf Soldiers who lost their Dwarf Soldier Armor and weapons; they seemed very dissatisfied that they had performed mediocrely in this battle and could not lead the others by a wide margin as they did in every previous battle.

Others felt it was still a matter of weapons and equipment, and they felt the same way, complaining that it was because Jier had taken away their weapons and specialized armor as spoils of war, causing their current combat level to drop severely, to the point where they failed to kill at least ten enemies each in the battle.

Jier, however, felt that the problem with these few individuals was not the weapons and equipment, but a lack of self-confidence based on ability and armament. One must know that even the Dwarf Soldier Armor that the Dwarf Miners made for him—which they self-deprecatingly called "just for fun"—was armor full of personal style that Jier himself could find no fault with in terms of specific protective capabilities.

The enemies this time—those Bandits and hotel Shop Assistants—used almost all weapons that could not cause any damage to the armor on the Dwarf Warriors. Even if those few Dwarf Soldiers were given their original Dwarf Soldier Armor, they would just end up with the same result of not being injured.

As for weapons, the Dwarf Soldier Spear is indeed easy to use; when Jier rides a horse, using them is like adding wings to a tiger. If his skills with a Knight's lance weren't so unrefined, he would have already routed all of today's enemies using just this one weapon.

But even if the Dwarf Soldier Spears were returned to the Dwarf Soldiers, they would still only be able to stab one enemy to death per sortie at most. In terms of combat efficiency, there is no significant difference compared to the Dwarf Single-handed Weapon they currently hold.

The Dwarf Soldiers have seasoned combat experience; in every battle, they either use the Dwarf Crystal Shield for tight defense or kill an enemy the moment they strike.

The combat efficiency is not much different.

Therefore, don't look at these few Dwarf Soldiers complaining to others; the real problem actually lies within themselves. Even though the armor on their bodies can protect them without damage, they always feel that their armor is far inferior to the Soldier Armor, and they are always too conservative during battle, not daring to truly let go and fight.

The same goes for weapons; relying on the strength of a Dwarf, an enemy dies with one swing of a Dwarf Single-handed Weapon, there is almost no difference, but these few Dwarf Soldiers keep comparing the weapons in their hands to their original Long Spears, causing them to fail to correctly recognize and treat the weapons in their hands; there is no trust or tacit understanding between the person and the weapon.

Unlike Jier, Jier trusts his Hunting Sword very much; even if no one else helped today and there were no other weapons, facing enemies of the same scale, Jier is confident that as long as he is given enough time, he could kill all the enemies with his own Sword.

And his weapon itself also firmly believes that it can accomplish this.

After finishing the extra payment to the Dwarves, Jier was planning to continue counting the various captured weapons, keeping the fine weapons and equipment that could be used, and planning to sell the other captured weapons and equipment as soon as they reached the next town.

At this moment, Weier, whom he had sent to monitor the unconscious Xiao Aokesi, was escorting a strange young man over.

This person had his mouth stuffed, his hands tied behind his back with his own upper-body clothing, and a look of terror on his face, especially when he realized he was being escorted by Weier to Knight Jier.

Before anyone even questioned him, the man was shaking like a sieve, and liquid was running down his leg from his crotch, flowing all the way into the short boots he was wearing.

"Jier, just as you predicted, near midnight, several young Shop Assistants from the Caravan were walking back and forth around the unconscious Xiao Aokesi, which was very suspicious."

Weier kicked the back of the knee of this captured Caravan Shop Assistant with disgust, forcing the man to kneel on the ground: "Just now, when you were distributing money to the Dwarf Warriors and the Dwarf Warrior guarding Xiao Aokesi left for a moment, this guy couldn't help but approach Xiao Aokesi, intending to kill him with a Dagger that looked expensive at a glance. I stopped and captured this person, while the others took advantage of the chaos and fled. I have now escorted him to you. Of course, I have transferred that unconscious guy to a place guarded by others."

After speaking, Weier also took a sharp Dagger with gold decorations from his waist, unsheathed it, and threw it on the ground.

"Actually, that unconscious Xiao Aokesi is not important, so there is no need to really protect his life," Jier explained first.

Afterward, he used the surrounding lighting to see that the blade of the half-unsheathed Dagger was stained with some viscous green liquid, and just as he was about to ask, Weier said directly: "I asked this person; the mucus on the Dagger is a type of poison. Without detoxification and relevant treatment after being cut, a normal person cannot survive."

Jier snorted: "They were quite willing to pay the cost. Make him lift his head."

Weier grabbed the Caravan Shop Assistant's hair and pulled his head back. The man had his mouth blocked, but his eyes and ears could see and hear; currently facing Knight Jier directly, and thinking of the terrifying slaughter results the other party had achieved that afternoon, the young Caravan Shop Assistant sent to assassinate Xiao Aokesi was trembling with fear.

Seeing that the other party showed signs of being scared into fainting, Jier stepped forward and gave the man two "light" slaps.

Slap, slap.

Being hit actually made the man's spirit a bit more normal. Seeing that the man's state had improved, Jier asked: "Are you intending to assassinate Xiao Aokesi? If yes, nod; if no, shake your head."

Being stared at by Jier like this, fearing that Jier would kill him directly, the Caravan Shop Assistant nodded repeatedly, not daring to lie.

"Then, is this assassination your own idea? Same as before."

The Caravan Shop Assistant was about to nod, but realizing the possible consequences of lying, he didn't think his Steward would have the courage to save him, and perhaps at this moment, his Steward might have even ridden away upon seeing the matter exposed.

So he shook his head, not intending to be a stupid guy absolutely loyal to his Steward.

"Then, is this assassination from the Steward of the Caravan you belong to? Did he tell you to do it?"

The young man kneeling on the ground nodded repeatedly.

Jier looked at the Merchant Guild mark on the man's pants; it was a crude Merchant Guild mark, a sort of simple trademark. For commoners with low literacy, identifying a Merchant Guild mark is much easier than remembering the text of the Merchant Guild's name.

"Is this Dagger yours?" Jier asked.

As expected, the Merchant Guild Shop Assistant shook his head.

"Then is it the Dagger of your Merchant Guild Steward?" he continued to ask.

But the Merchant Guild Shop Assistant still shook his head, trying hard to point with his chin toward the Caravan's overnight camp on the other side of the hotel ruins not far away, where the most conspicuous thing was the Merchant Guild mark closest to them.

"It seems this Dagger is a weapon lent out by this Caravan, right?"

Although Jier was talking to himself, the Merchant Guild Shop Assistant still nodded repeatedly upon hearing Jier's words.

Glancing at the man, Jier said to Weier: "Let's go, take this person and the Dagger on the ground, and we will meet these Caravan Stewards to see what they have to say."

"What they have to say?" Weier was stunned. For such an important matter that could clearly uncover many things behind the scenes, is just a "say" enough?

Seeing that Weier didn't understand, Jier explained: "Why they did this, I have already guessed. But how should I put it, in today's incident, these Caravans ultimately chose to do nothing. I don't know if they were timid or if their prior plan was to do nothing. But since they did nothing, I cannot directly identify them as the hidden accomplices of these two groups of enemies today."

Jier gestured with a hand motion of handling coins and said: "Therefore, this person and this Dagger can come in quite handy, helping me to vigorously recover my losses."

"What losses? Are you bleeding?" Weier asked in surprise.

"Not literally bleeding, it's just a metaphor. Do you understand metaphors? This person and this poisoned Dagger are good things that can be exchanged for a lot of money," Jier said, rubbing his hands excitedly, looking impatient.

Weier did not expect that Jier was going to use this person and this evidence to threaten and blackmail the party that sent the assassin.

"This..." He hesitated for a moment, feeling that doing so was not good, but then he thought that Jier always had his reasons for doing things, and they were always right.

Perhaps this matter should also be handled this way.

When Jier and Weier threw the failed assassin Caravan Shop Assistant on the ground and threw the conspicuous Dagger with gold decorations in front of him, these Caravan personnel, who hadn't slept in the middle of the night and were still gathered together discussing everything related to the battle they saw today, were collectively stunned.

Most of them didn't understand what Knight Jier meant, but some felt their hearts tighten, knowing it was bad.

"M-My Lord, what do you mean by this? We don't quite understand," a Caravan Steward asked hesitantly.

A Caravan Steward next to him also spoke up: "Yes, what mistake did this young man commit? Is he light-fingered, or did he offend you?"

Jier looked playful, watching the expressions of these Caravan Stewards. The expression on each of their faces was very serious, but pretending to be too serious is sometimes an overly obvious way of playing dumb.

"This Caravan Shop Assistant, which team does he belong to? Come out and claim him. And this Dagger, whose thing is it? Stand out and admit it yourself."

After Jier finished speaking, none of the Caravan Stewards said anything, only exchanging glances, and Jier didn't speak either, just watching them.

They remained in this stalemate for a while, and the other Caravan Shop Assistants nearby realized the atmosphere was wrong, so they scrambled up from the ground one after another and specifically moved further away. This was the other end of the ruins of an inn beside the Shanglu; everyone, including Jier's men, was not living inside the ruins, but had set up a Temporary Camp to spend the night around the perimeter of the ruins.

The main concern was that there might be Poisonous Snakes or venomous insects in the cracks of the brick walls of the ruins; out here in the wilderness, being bitten by a Poisonous Snake could be fatal. Although being bitten by a venomous insect was not fatal in most cases, the itching was enough to make one miserable, and no one liked that.

The Shop Assistants all ran off to a further spot to relight their campfires, frequently glancing back at this side where everyone was silent.

Jier had been silently confronting these few Caravan Stewards who would neither speak nor admit anything for a while, but he still lost his patience; he had been tired all day and needed to rest early, and he did not want to continue wasting time with these fellows who were not very tired.

"I won't waste any more time with you. It's not like I absolutely must find the truth, or pursue any connections or responsibilities. The life of that Xiao Aokesi is of no use to me; if, however, some generous person can come up with a sum of money—not much, just twenty Gold Coins or something of equivalent value—I am willing to set this reckless Shop Assistant free, and I will treat what he did just now as if I never saw it."

The few Caravan Stewards looked at each other, and the atmosphere loosened.

"Furthermore, if any wealthy person claims that their valuable defensive Dagger was accidentally lost, I happen to have picked up a Dagger with gold decorations that someone lost, and I am willing to return it to them, but the wealthy person who lost the item needs to give me, the one who picked it up, a little bit of monetary reward. That's no problem, right? The price isn't much, how about ten Gold Coins? Although generally speaking, a Dagger isn't worth that much, this Dagger has quite a lot of gold decorations on it, so it is valuable in itself; besides, its blade also seems to be coated with some 'Anti-rust Coating' that doesn't look cheap."

Jier emphasized the 'Anti-rust Coating' at the end.

This made many of the Stewards on the scene look at one particular Caravan Steward, and this man's face turned visibly red.

This red-faced Caravan Steward reached into the inner pocket of his clothes, felt around, took out ten Gold Coins, and walked over with a smile on his face: "Thank you, Knight Jier, thank you for picking up the Dagger I accidentally lost just now! This thing is too important to me; it was a commemorative gift given to me by an elder in my family. This is a reward for you picking up the lost item; it's not much, please accept it, please accept it."

Jier smiled as he reached out to take the Gold Coins handed over by the other party, his eyes sweeping over them; it was more than ten, about twelve Gold Coins.

"Weier, please return the Dagger to this owner; losing something must be very worrying, right? Make sure not to lose it next time."

Facing Jier's deliberate reminder, the Caravan Steward took the dirt-stained Dagger from Weier's hand and nodded repeatedly, sweating profusely, to express his agreement.

Afterwards, Jier asked: "Is there no one to claim this Caravan Shop Assistant? That is truly pitiful."

As soon as Jier said this, the Caravan Shop Assistant on the ground whose mouth was gagged began to struggle violently, but his hands were tied behind his back, and though he tried hard to crawl up with his feet, Weier stepped on him, making it impossible for him to get up.

With his mouth gagged, he seemed to have a lot to say, especially the look in his eyes as he glared at a certain Caravan Steward, which was practically murderous.

Because he realized that if his own Caravan Steward did not come to pay the money to redeem him at this moment, he would most likely be killed right here by Knight Jier, whose hands were stained with blood.

Damn it! Just for a reward of one Gold Coin, he had lost his life for it; it really wasn't worth it. If he had a choice, he definitely wouldn't have been greedy for this money, but would have given his own Steward a fierce punch.

?? This is yesterday's chapter; today's is currently being written.