Chapter 3: Bandits Everywhere

"Screw your mother's asshole!"

Wu Dading, who hated evil with a passion, couldn't take it for a second. Two bursts of angry Qi surged from the soles of his feet straight to the crown of his head. The fire of ignorance in his heart flared up uncontrollably, then rebounded from his crown back to his chest and abdomen, until he let out two loud farts, which made him feel a bit better.

He immediately cursed aloud, struggling to get down from Li You's back.

Li You suddenly let go. The moment Wu Dading's feet touched the ground, his ankles went soft and he collapsed into a sitting position. Just as he was struggling to stand up, he felt a blur before his eyes...

With a loud "thud," the hemp-stalk-thin youth was nailed to the wall by the ghost-head battle axe. The axe pierced straight through his chest cavity; he didn't even let out a single fart before he was dead through and through.

Wu Dading, who had just sat up, was startled by this axe, and then shocked again.

He swallowed a mouthful of saliva and stared straight at Li You. Having suffered a total of four shocks in succession, he finally realized that Li You was different. At the very least, before he came to Lueyang to be beheaded, he had never killed anyone, nor did he have such great strength.

Li You looked at the blood splattered on the wall and began to daze off...

"Screw your mother!"

The bearded man's eyes instantly split with rage. He threw the young girl aside, grabbed his trident, held it halfway with his right hand, and lunged forward to stab at Li You's chest.

Li You stepped to the side, intending to grab it, but the trident had a horizontal crossbar at the top with four-edged blades. Before he could react, the bearded man changed his move from a thrust to a sweep...

With a "swish," the tip of the trident sliced a cut on Li You's left chest, neither light nor heavy. Fortunately, his ribs blocked the head of the weapon, but Li You was still swept off his feet.

The bearded man took a step forward, twisting his mouth, and slid his hand to the front of the trident to hold it in a reverse grip, intending to run Li You through. However, Wu Dading, who was to the side, smashed a porcelain jar used for holding coal onto his head. His face was instantly covered in blood, and his body flipped over.

"Bang, bang... bang, bang..."

Li You didn't know if it was his own heart pounding wildly or the sound of vibrations coming from a cavalry troop. Suppressing the distracting thoughts in his heart, he took advantage of this gap to roll over.

He pulled the ghost-head battle axe off the hemp-stalk-thin youth with one hand, performed a carp-leap to spring up, and unleashed a storm of three axe strikes at the bearded man...

The bearded man had some real skills; he held his trident horizontally with both hands and blocked three times in a row!

But these three strikes shattered the webbing between his thumb and forefinger. After all, the trident in his hands had been bent by sheer force, and it was clear the next axe strike would split his forehead.

Such immense power terrified him until his face turned pale, but there were no such things as accidents...

Li You's next axe strike shattered his head.

Having killed two people in a row, the bloodthirsty scene made Li You instinctively feel nauseated. His entire body, from his muscles to his skin, began to go numb, and strange yet familiar memories darted through his brain, hurting so much he felt he would split apart.

"Run!"

Wu Dading pushed Li You. Li You went over to retrieve the axe and glanced at the woman out of the corner of his eye. As he turned to leave, his foot tripped, kicking aside a blood-red quilt on the ground.

Only then did Li You see that the quilt was wrapped around a dead infant of six or seven months. The infant's face was blue; it had either been smothered or thrown to death.

It felt as if a large balloon had been inflated in Li You's heart, making him feel stifled and pained. He lowered his head to pick up the broken silver dropped by the bearded man, then silently went over to carry the young girl. Only then did he realize the girl was actually awake, trembling like a sieve.

"My name is Li You. Don't be afraid, I'm a good person..."

Li You spoke to her as gently as he could, then carried her on his back, supported Wu Dading, and quickly exited the East Gate.

After walking about a hundred paces, the two just wanted to catch their breath, but before their eyes, a large group of commoners was crying and screaming as they ran back. Following closely behind were dozens of riders in blue trousers and black jackets, men with bristly beards like spears, arrogantly and wantonly driving and slaughtering them from behind.

Behind them followed about fifty infantrymen.

The clamor, the screams, the wailing, the heart-wrenching shrieks of children... it was truly a living hell.

"My hammer! Wolves in front and tigers behind, we can't run! Screw their mothers, there are bandits and horse thieves everywhere!"

Wu Dading, wearing the bearded man's clothes, looked bitterly at an old woman who was clutching a bundle of dried wild vegetables, begging bitterly, only to have her belly stabbed open by a horse thief with a fleshy tumor on his face. Her intestines were filled with dried green tree bark and weeds...

Tragedies were happening constantly all around.

Li You scanned the enemy forces and first threw away the axe.

Then he hurriedly placed the young girl in a haystack and helped Wu Dading stand on the other side.

Only then did he feel his left chest wet and uncomfortable; the wound had been bleeding the whole time.

He reached into his clothes and pulled out a square piece of rough-edged paper. It was stamped with two vermilion seal scripts, one large and one small. A hurried glance revealed the faint words "Confucian School" on one and "Instructor" on the other...

"Zhang Suomin, Chief of the Qingjian County Confucian School, issues this license: It is hereby verified that Li You (missing character), courtesy name Hanchen, a student of the Qingjian County School, is of upright character, diligent in his studies, and has outstanding academic results, making him qualified to be a granary-supported student. In addition to registering him and requesting a report to the Ministry..."

"This is... Li Youyin's student license?"

A student refers to a scholar who has passed the prefectural examination and been admitted to a local government school (prefecture, sub-prefecture, or county school), commonly known as a 'xiucai', also called a 'maocai', 'doctorate disciple', 'disciple', 'xiangsheng', etc.

Since Emperor Wen of Sui, Yang Jian, implemented the imperial examination system to break the monopoly of the aristocratic clans over the government, by the Great Ming dynasty, the imperial examination system had developed to be extremely mature. This student license was the proof of one's status as a 'xiucai'.

After every child candidate passed the 'xiucai' exam, the Ministry of Rites or the county/prefecture Confucian school would issue such a license as proof.

For a scholar, a student license was naturally a great honor. With this, one's social class underwent a fundamental transformation, becoming a member of the ruling class's reserve and beginning to share in privileges.

For example, one could wear a round-collared blue gown, use servants, be exempt from corvée labor, not kneel when seeing a county magistrate, be exempt from corporal punishment, and petition the county magistrate when encountering issues. When commoners saw a 'xiucai', they had to perform the greeting for an official and respectfully address them as "Master" or "Sir," etc.

Li You didn't have time to look closely; the sound of horse hooves rang in his ears. Dozens of riders surrounded the driven commoners like a sack, and the fifty-plus infantrymen quickly followed.

A black-dappled horse with a short, gray mane was the first to gallop over. The man on its back was about fifty years old, with black sideburns and a silver beard, his voice extremely majestic.

"Tie up the young and strong and take them back to the Second Leader. We don't want the children... The rest of you, hurry and follow me to the South Street to see if we can get some meat soup... Don't waste time on these idiots, damn it!"

Having said that, he took the lead and galloped away.

The bandits heard this, and the cavalry quickly followed. The fifty-plus infantrymen shouted and clamored, made a simple selection, and tied up five younger women and nineteen young men.

As for the remaining widows, the elderly, and the young, they were stripped of all money and grain, and those who cried out were often slashed with knives or chopped with axes.

Outside the city, it finally became a bit quieter. Then, they cut down a red elm tree by the roadside that had long been bare of bark, made the captured people carry it on their shoulders, alternating left and right, and then tied them all up one by one, like a string of grasshoppers strung together.

After the matter was finished, only six or seven half-grown child soldiers were left to guard them, while the rest of the group rushed into the city, unable to wait any longer.

Li You's consciousness was much clearer now. There was no chance of winning if he resisted. Under the whip of the mountain bandits, he and Wu Dading carried the tree trunk, one on the left and one on the right, with their hands tied to the trunk as well.

Looking back, he noticed the young girl hiding in the haystack, lying carefully in the weeds. Beside her was another girl; it seemed she was also hiding to take refuge.

Originally, Li You had instinctively reached out to save them, but now he couldn't even protect himself, let alone dare to take them with him. Once they reached the bandits' den, what good could come to them?

Li You met her gaze and winked at her. Taking advantage of the fact that the half-grown child soldier guarding nearby wasn't paying attention, he loosened his hand tied to the tree trunk, and three pieces of broken silver immediately fell to the ground.

Li You immediately stepped on them, secretly applying force to make the silver sink into the mud, and nodded at the girl again.

The girl immediately understood, nodded silently, and then kept her eyes fixed on the soles of Li You's shoes.

About the time it takes to burn three sticks of incense, the man riding the black-dappled horse with the short, gray mane returned with the group. He shouted at the child soldiers guarding Li You's side: "Following this bunch of bastards from Guanzi Mountain, we didn't get a damn thing... Let's go, let's go. Now it's fine, we've got this bunch of two-legged grasshoppers, just bringing back a bunch of burdens and idiots..."

Although he said that, the group behind him was loaded with large and small bags, leading livestock, carrying chickens and ducks, and wearing silk and satin clothes; everyone was returning fully loaded.

The most eye-catching thing was that there were more than a dozen women among them. Some wore coarse cloth, naturally commoners; others were dressed in finery, clearly ladies from wealthy families.

But at this moment, they were all weeping, some cursing, some begging... it was all the same. They were still tied to tree trunks, and those who couldn't be tied were bound by their hands and placed in front of the horses. The bandits with horses touched them wantonly, having a great time for a while.

Immediately after, Li You and the others were driven like livestock along the grassy path, heading east.

After Li You and the others left, the girl quickly ran out, dug up the place where Li You had been standing, and clutched the three pieces of broken silver in her palm.

She pulled her sister along, stood on tiptoe, and watched the direction Li You had left for a long time, murmuring, "My name is Dou Meiyi..."

Li You naturally couldn't hear her, and even if he had, not understanding history, he naturally wouldn't have known that the first imperial concubine of Li Zicheng of the Great Shun dynasty was named Dou Meiyi.

[Note]: "Idiot" was already colloquial in the Ming dynasty; its meaning and usage are the same as today. In Ma Zhiyuan's "Complete Yuan Qu," Yela says: "Idiot, let go!" Yela says: "I know, I'm going to kill that idiot!"