Chapter 423: Drum Sound

Wu Mingxiao delivered the final strike, severing the last neck before sheathing his blade.

His stamina was almost exhausted, so he used the scabbard to prop himself up, adjusted his breathing for a moment, and then walked toward Li Miao.

"Brother Li, let's enter the city."

Li Miao narrowed his eyes and lifted a finger.

"Drive."

The bandits pulling the carts shuddered in unison, hurriedly pulling the carts and stepping over the corpses to head inside the city gate.

Passing by the corpses, Li Miao glanced at them.

"Even elite imperial guards should retreat if their casualties exceed thirty percent, yet these people fought to the last man without retreating... It's interesting that such a backwater could produce a bunch of elite soldiers."

"It seems that relying on Wu Mingxiao alone would really have been difficult to get through this Kangfu County."

While he was pondering this, the carts entered the city.

The moment he crossed the city gate, Wu Mingxiao, who was walking at the front of the convoy, shuddered violently.

It wasn't cold; after all, he was a small-time expert, and even though he practiced Japanese martial arts that didn't emphasize internal energy, the chill of early spring shouldn't have caused such a reaction.

His shudder was more of an instinctive reaction.

It was just like the feeling he had when he was fighting Japanese pirates in Dengzhou and someone had snuck up behind him, making the hair on his body stand on end.

Wu Mingxiao instinctively wanted to draw his blade and retreat, but he suddenly realized the situation, turned his head to look at Li Miao, who was feigning sleep on the cart, and couldn't help but sneer in his heart.

Right, today, where was there any room for him to shoulder the burden?

As if hearing his thoughts, Li Miao suddenly raised his hands and stretched.

"Haa—alright, little brother, go take care of the children."

"You can't wade through the muddy waters of this Kangfu County."

"I'll do it."

Having said that, he stepped off the cart.

The bandits scrambled to run to the sides, all falling to their knees with a thud, smashing their foreheads against the ground, cold sweat dripping down.

Wu Mingxiao went to the back to take care of the infants.

Li Miao walked to the front of the carts and scanned the houses along the street.

Wu Mingxiao didn't know why he had suddenly shuddered, but Li Miao knew the reason—it was because he had been scanned by too many gazes, triggering a stress response.

Behind every window and every door crack in this Kangfu County, there was a pair of eyes staring fixedly at Li Miao's group.

More accurately, they were staring at the infants on the carts.

And with Li Miao's hearing, he could even hear the owners of these eyes murmuring some fragmented words.

"Children... the children are back..."

"They aren't dead..."

"Which one is my child..."

The voices were of men, women, old, and young, and the emotions contained within them were chaotic.

There was fear, sorrow, joy, and hatred.

The emotions were extremely sharp and surging; they should have pushed their bodies out of the doors to rush over.

Yet, not a single movement occurred.

Some even sobbed uncontrollably, but hurriedly covered their mouths, not daring to make a sound. Hands were raised and pressed against the door panels, then trembled and dropped, clutching their clothes tightly.

Li Miao's gaze turned cold.

"Heh, 'people only dare to look at each other on the road' (a state of extreme terror), is that it?"

"I want to see what kind of thing is doing this great deed!"

Having said that, he stepped forward and walked toward the County Magistrate's office.

Kangfu County was not large, with a population of less than ten thousand, and even though the heavily wounded bandits dragged the carts slowly, Li Miao stood outside the County Magistrate's office after the time it takes to burn a stick of incense.