Chapter 81: The Martial General

With a thunderous crash, Yan Luo shoved open the factory’s battered gate with the shaft of his spear and saw the scene within.

The vast workshop was dimly lit. On the cluttered chairs lay a scattering of empty beer bottles, and some forty men sat sprawled about in disarray.

Deep in the building hung a signboard:

Green Dragon Gang.

Beneath it stood a painted clay statue, unmistakably that of Guan Yu. It was taller than a man, with a face the color of rich red lacquer, a long flowing beard, and a green cap upon his head. One hand rested at his waist while the other was raised, supporting a Green Dragon Crescent Blade more than two meters long.

So this must be where the gang got its name.

Before the statue of Guan Yu stood an incense burner with three sticks of incense burning in it. Such a scene was usually seen only in old Hong Kong gangster films; to find it in a gang hideout in a fourth-tier city was absurd beyond belief.

“Who are you?”

The gang boss, Da Fei, stared in astonishment. He had seen his share of the world, weathered storms, and even done time in prison, yet he had never encountered anything like this before: a young man on horseback, armed with a spear. Strange. Too strange. The gang members exchanged bewildered looks.

What in the world was going on?

You have sensed intense emotions:
Shock +1, +1, +1...

In an instant, more than twenty points of emotion were gained.

Riding a tall steed, clad in archaic armor, and brandishing a spear nearly five meters long... If Guan Yu himself had walked out of the statue in this workshop, he might not have seemed as bizarre as Yan Luo did upon entering.

“Didn’t we agree you’d come before nine tonight?”

“You’re... that student!”

The three kneeling thugs had been thoroughly taught a lesson by Yan Luo. They had originally suspected he was some sort of martial artist, but they had never imagined the one arriving would be a Western-style armored knight. Now the three of them were utterly dumbfounded.

Da Fei, the boss with a crew cut, bare torso, a face full of rough flesh, and a green dragon tattoo winding across his body, stood up from his seat.

“You’re wearing armor and riding a horse. What, do you think you’re filming a movie?” said Da Fei, a man of few words but ruthless disposition. He grabbed the black, heavy cleaver on the table beside him. “Brothers, get him! Don’t kill him yet. Break his arms and legs first. As for the horse, we’ll have a horse barbecue later!”

“Charge!”

The thugs snatched up their weapons—cleavers, steel pipes, even chair legs and bricks.

Bang...

The man charging in front was sent flying by a single thrust from Yan Luo’s five-meter spear. If Yan Luo had not reversed the shaft, that blow would likely have pierced him clean through. Even so, struck by the spear’s force, the thug spat blood at once.

Seeing that a mere student could strike so brutally, the entire room erupted in uproar as the gangsters surged forward like a tide.

Yes, a mounted warrior in armor looked outrageous, but Yan Luo was still only a student, and this was the Green Dragon Gang’s headquarters. They had numbers on their side. Yet Yan Luo urged his horse forward and wielded his spear—though in truth, this Macedonian spear might as well have been an oversized staff.

Every move of the Ten Directions Staff Technique was etched in his mind. With one sweeping strike that roared like fierce wind tearing through the void, the five-meter shaft sent a whole cluster of men flying.

Then came another blow, Earth-Shattering Twin Poles. Even without the collapsing force behind it, the mere form of the technique was enough: when the spear shaft smashed into a head, it split it open on the spot, blood streaming down the face. As one thug after another collapsed to the ground, the rest grew ever more terrified.

Among the three still kneeling, the long-haired one suddenly felt that this scene looked strangely familiar.

He thought about it for a moment.

Wasn’t this exactly like those scenes in Dynasty Warriors, where generals ride through and mow down soldiers?

You have sensed intense emotions:
Shock +1, +1, +1...
Fear +1, +1, +1...

The emotional energy inside the heartless doll rose rapidly, surging past fifty points, sixty points, seventy points...

Cries of agony rose one after another. The thick spear shaft crashing into flesh was as brutal as a steel bar. Seeing how ferocious Yan Luo was, the crowd shouted and scattered in all directions, trying to flee.

At that point, it became Yan Luo chasing the gangsters on horseback. A few minutes later, under the charge of man and horse alike, the members of the Green Dragon Gang were all laid low across the ground—either screaming in misery or groaning in pain.

The emotion within the heartless doll reached ninety points.

Da Fei, the society boss with the green dragon tattoo, stood slack-jawed. The butcher knife in his hand clattered to the floor. The ferocity on his face had vanished; all that remained was a deathly pallor as he watched Yan Luo approach step by step on horseback, his gaze fixed upon the armored youth. A ludicrous feeling rose in his heart.

Forty-odd men, and they could not beat one?

Was this some kind of joke?

And why was this guy dressed like that?

You have sensed intense emotions:
Fear +1
Confusion +2
Wronged grievance +3

“It seems the armor was put on for nothing.”

Yan Luo had heard that the Green Dragon Gang was famous, and that their boss, Da Fei, was a ruthless man of few words. He had thought he would face a hard battle, but it had ended so easily. Still, that was understandable. This was the age of peace, after all, with the state striking at crime again and again.

The so-called Green Dragon Gang was nothing more than a pack of small-time thugs surviving in the cracks.

On ordinary days, they might manage a brawl by swarming their target, but against someone like him, whose physical abilities far surpassed ordinary people, who had hundreds of lives on his hands in the ancient Greek world, and who now rode a horse while wielding a five-meter spear shaft, they were naturally no match at all.

“I don’t like causing trouble. I’ve never had dealings with the underworld or gangsters. This time, you lot came after me first. I thought about it, and if I didn’t make a personal trip here, maybe there would be more people bothering me later... So I came to say hello.”

He looked at the statue of Guan Yu and said indifferently, “You lot worship Guan Yu, and yet look at yourselves. If the Martial Saint knew that in later generations he had become the guardian deity of gangsters, I wonder what he would think.”

Hearing Yan Luo’s words, Da Fei lowered his head in a half-bow, inwardly cursing furiously.

Damn it, how did a petty matter of a student’s jealousy and rivalry end up bringing out someone like this? Riding a horse, wearing armor, carrying a spear... Was this guy some ancient general?

You have sensed intense emotions:
Wronged grievance +1

“It was my men who were blind and offended you. Please, show us your mercy,” Da Fei said sincerely.

Yan Luo remained expressionless. “You wasted my time, and you think one ‘please be understanding’ is enough?”

“Tomorrow, our brothers will treat you to an apology feast at the finest restaurant in the city, the Imperial Golden Hall!” Da Fei said, his eyes turning as he tried to see whether this disaster might be turned into a blessing. If he could seize the chance to befriend someone this capable...

“Who said anything about eating with you? Pay up!”

After all, this was not ancient Greece. In modern society, getting beaten was no issue, but if he actually killed these people and a murder case involving forty-odd victims broke out, the police would probably be at his door by tomorrow, and his peaceful life would be over. Beat them, then extort some money from them—that would count as earning a little extra on the side.

“Fine!” Da Fei gritted his teeth.

Better to lose money and avert disaster... He could only blame those blind idiots for provoking such a person... Damn it, all because of that brat An Zixuan.

After Da Fei went into a small room inside the factory and pulled a password case from beneath the bed, Yan Luo fused the emotion that had finally reached one hundred points within his consciousness.

The fusion failed.

Exactly twelve percent fragments.

All the fragments were assembled.

Within his mind, the pieces joined together, forming a crimson mask covered in cracks.

Heroic Spirit Mask, General Guan Yu.