This battle had been under Jin Feng’s complete control from beginning to end.
He had said he could rescue the hostages from the water bandits, and he truly did.
He had said a few hundred escorts could defeat the bandits, and they truly had.
Even now, Zheng Chiyuan still could not fathom how Jin Feng had sent men to the rear mountain.
Nor could he understand where the fireball in the sky had come from.
It was precisely because he could not understand that Jin Feng seemed all the more mysterious, all the more fearsome.
“From now on, no matter what, I must never make an enemy of this man.”
Zheng Chiyuan silently reminded himself.
Jin Feng appeared far too composed, far too calm.
It was as though he had come to Crab Pincer Island not to fight a war, but to sightsee.
Such poise left Zheng Chiyuan feeling utterly inferior.
Little did he know that when Jin Feng had first crossed over, killing a mere ruffian had made him so nervous he nearly vomited.
Only after experiencing the battles of Clear Water Valley and Great Python Slope had his nerves been tempered.
To Zheng Chiyuan, more than a thousand water bandits represented a formidable force.
But to Jin Feng, who had faced over ten thousand ferocious cavalry, a rabble of disorganised bandits was beneath notice.
The escorts were simply not skilled in naval warfare. Had these been mountain bandits, he would not have needed to lead the expedition himself.
At most, a hundred black-armoured escorts paired with a hundred female soldiers would have been enough to steamroll their lair.
Hands clasped behind his back, Jin Feng slowly passed through the burning bandit camp, heading towards the rear mountain.
“Sir, why have you come?”
Seeing Jin Feng, Monkey hurriedly led his men down the mountain to greet him.
“Well done. You have worked hard.”
Jin Feng patted Monkey on the shoulder.
The bandits on the rear mountain had long since fled, but the ground littered with corpses silently testified to the ferocity of the earlier fighting.
“It was no hardship. Just a mob of rabble. A few casual strikes and they scattered in fright.”
Monkey spoke modestly, yet his eyebrows arched high with pride, his face brimming with satisfaction.
“Have the captured brothers been rescued?” Jin Feng asked.
Monkey’s expression darkened, his voice growing heavy. “They have been rescued, but… only a small fraction of the brothers survived. The rest were tortured to death by the bandits… Even this remnant, we do not know how many will ultimately live…”
Hearing this, Jin Feng strode towards the mountain peak.
At the summit, he saw Old Liang and the other captives.
Before coming, Jin Feng had known that Old Liang and the others must have suffered greatly at the bandits’ hands, but he had not imagined it would be this wretched.
Old Liang had been among the first veteran soldiers recruited. Jin Feng knew him well.
Once a powerfully built man, he was now skin and bones. The areas around his hands and feet were raw and bleeding from rope abrasions.
His hand and foot tendons had clearly been severed. Even if he survived, he would never stand again.
Whether he could even hold chopsticks to feed himself remained uncertain.
Despite such misery, upon seeing Jin Feng approach, Old Liang struggled to roll off the rock, pressing his forehead to the ground, sobbing uncontrollably.
Shame filled his heart.
Jin Feng had equipped them with so many heavy crossbows and trebuchets, yet they had lost to a mere band of water bandits.
This was the most humiliating defeat since the founding of the Zhenyuan Escort Agency.
The other escorts also struggled to kneel, their faces similarly etched with guilt.
Though the merchant association clerks did not kneel, they kept their heads bowed in silence.
“Sir, it was my uselessness… I caused brothers to die or be maimed, and even forced you to travel thousands of li across the Eastern Sea…”
Old Liang wept as he spoke. “Why did you risk your own life for our sake?”
“I have said that the Zhenyuan Escort Agency will never abandon a single comrade, nor forsake a single partner.”
Jin Feng declared, “Your faults will naturally be investigated upon return, but you are men of the Zhenyuan Escort Agency, men of the Jinchuan Merchant Association, my men, Jin Feng’s men.
If you erred, the agency and association will mete out punishment. After judgement, those who deserve beheading will be beheaded, those who deserve the dark cell will be confined, but no matter what, it is not for a pack of water bandits to humiliate you.”
Hearing Jin Feng’s words, Old Liang sobbed so hard he could no longer speak.
The expressions of the surrounding escorts grew solemn.
“No abandonment, no surrender” had been a slogan they heard on their very first day with the Zhenyuan Escort Agency.
Yet it had remained merely a slogan.
Like the words “Women hold up half the sky” painted on village walls, everyone knew it, but few truly took it to heart.
In the villages, men still ruled the household.
But from this day forward, “no abandonment, no surrender” was no longer just a slogan.
Because when escorts and clerks had been captured, Jin Feng had personally led men to fulfil that promise.
From this day onward, the cohesion of the Zhenyuan Escort Agency and Jinchuan Merchant Association rose to a new level.
The escorts’ and clerks’ sense of loyalty to Jin Feng reached an unprecedented height.
Seeing Old Liang and the others in such a pitiful state soured Jin Feng’s mood greatly.
Words were empty at a time like this. Jin Feng sighed, signalling Da Zhuang to help him up.
An escort ran up from below, cupped his fists, and asked,
“Sir, the water bandits have all been herded onto the open ground midway up the mountain. Group Leader Han sent me to ask how you wish to dispose of them.”
“Herded together?”
Jin Feng climbed onto a nearby boulder and looked down.
By now, dawn was breaking, and the situation midway up the mountain could just be discerned.
There was a protruding rock there, shaped somewhat like a tongue.
The pirates who once occupied Crab Pincer Island had cleared this space to serve as a drill ground.
Now the bandits were packed shoulder to shoulder across the entire field.
At the far end stood several hundred black-clad escorts.
As always, male soldiers in front, female soldiers behind.
Both sides faced each other in standoff.
Whether to fight or not awaited Jin Feng’s command.
After a moment’s thought, Jin Feng spoke. “Have them hand over the bandit leaders.”
This expedition to Crab Pincer Island had three objectives.
First, rescue the captured escorts.
Second, eliminate the bandits to establish dominance, deterring other water bandits from thinking the Zhenyuan Escort Agency easy prey.
Third, uncover the mastermind behind the scenes and discover who was pulling the strings.
Jin Feng intended not only to intimidate water bandits and road thugs, but also the court itself.
The enemy had dared to strike at Tang Xiaobei and had directly caused the deaths of over a hundred escorts and clerks. Jin Feng had to give an account to the families of the fallen.
Though he knew court nobles were orchestrating it, he did not know which house.
Thus, he needed to seize the bandit leaders for interrogation.
“Yes, sir.” The escort acknowledged, then hesitated before adding, “And the remaining bandits?”
“The rest?” Jin Feng glanced back at Old Liang and the others, then said coolly, “Let them jump off the cliff themselves. Their survival is up to fate.”
If this were in Jinchuan, Jin Feng might have spared the bandits’ lives and sent them to the mines.
But here in the Eastern Sea, he had no mines for them to work.
Nor could he transport them thousands of li back.
Zheng Chiyuan had just led his men up the mountain and overheard Jin Feng’s words.
Jin Feng spoke without gnashing his teeth, his expression held no ferocity, his tone was not harsh, yet it sent an involuntary shiver through Zheng Chiyuan.
