Chapter Nine: The Matter Fails

  It just so happened that Liu Fushan was unlucky, and Xiao Tianjian led a group of people to carefully sneak out of the woodshed and head towards the front yard. When they reached the door of a room, someone opened it and bumped into Xiao Tianjian.

  Just as Liu Fushan was about to shout in surprise, Xiao Tianjian took a deep breath, raised his knife and slashed it down, the sharp blade slicing across Liu Fushan's neck, suppressing the cry of surprise in his throat. He fell forward onto the door, splashing blood all over Xiao Tianjian's face and body.

  Under the dim light of the candles indoors, Xiao Tianjian's face looked extremely ferocious, and everyone was shocked. They secretly admired Xiao Tianjian's ruthlessness and decisiveness. When they heard a woman speaking inside the house, Xiao Tianjian turned his head and made a killing gesture to Zhao Erlu who was following behind him.

  They had just come in and couldn't alarm the people inside the villa. Perhaps these men shouldn't die, but for them to live on, he could only steel himself and kill mercilessly.

  Zhao Erdui nodded, immediately picked up his shovel and stepped over the corpse on the ground. Soon, a woman's faint cry was heard from inside the house, followed by a commotion. The woman's mouth was apparently blocked by Zhao Erdui. After a while, the struggling and kicking sounds disappeared. Zhao Erdui seemed to walk out of the house with a face full of regret and pity, nodded at Xiao Tianjian, and muttered: "Not bad for a woman, what a pity! That body..."

  Xiao Tianjian glared at Zhao Erlu, and Zhao Erlu wisely shut his mouth.

  Feng Gouzi brought a man to drag the dead body at the door into the room, and then closed the door. Under Xiao Tianjian's lead, they continued to rush towards the front yard quickly.

  Liu Bopi indeed had money, his mansion was divided into three sections, the innermost being where he and his family lived, but now they have all moved to Fengxiang Prefecture, so it's been idle. Conveniently, Xiao Tianjian and others can enter the rear mansion without disturbing anyone. The middle section is home to some higher-ranking servants, like Liu Guanjia, who lives here, and there are also other rooms for various purposes. People of lower status cannot live here, as a result, Liu Fushan made it convenient for Zhang Widow to commit adultery with them.

  The front yard was where the family servants and some low-ranking slaves lived. If Xiao Tianjian and his group wanted to control the mansion, they would have to deal with these people left in the front yard, which was also their first real challenge.

  But things went smoothly, making it somewhat unbelievable for them. When they entered the front yard, however, they found that it was just as quiet as before, without a single sound. The situation had progressed so smoothly until this point that even Xiao Tianjian felt it was almost unbelievable.

  Then he had Feng Gouzi point out the rooms where the family's servants and guards might be living, and Tie Tou divided his men to sneak up to the doors of these rooms. Perhaps due to overconfidence, none of these rooms were bolted from the inside, allowing them to easily enter. However, except for a few old and frail maidservants, there were hardly any male servants. The men following Xiao Tianjian also steeled themselves, and as soon as they entered, they started beating people up. Before anyone could let out a cry of surprise, they had already knocked them unconscious or killed them. It didn't take much effort at all. Even if someone did manage to shout, they were immediately gagged and knocked out on the spot.

  When the crowd returned to the center of the courtyard, this large mansion was basically under their control. What delighted them was that in one room, they unexpectedly found a pile of weapons, which suddenly allowed them to trade in their bird guns for cannons, and each of them was equipped with a handy weapon.

  It turned out that this place had been attacked by bandits before, and Liu Bopi spent a lot of money to buy a batch of knives, guns, swords, and halberds to equip his family guards. He also stored some of them, planning to distribute them to the tenant farmers in the village when necessary, so that they could help defend the village together. Since there was no situation at present, these dangerous things would not be left in the hands of those tenant farmers, lest they have any ulterior motives and make trouble from within the village. Therefore, these idle weapons were all stored in his family's large courtyard, but unexpectedly, they were taken advantage of by Xiao Tianjian and his men.

  After getting these weapons, everyone was delighted to choose the ones that suited them and armed themselves. The broken hoes, pitchforks and other things they had in their hands were thrown aside, no one paid attention to them anymore. Zhao Erduo even exaggeratedly hung two waist knives on his waist and held a long gun in his hand, proudly smacking his lips, as if he had become a brave and invincible general in an instant.

  Looking at the armed mob under his command, Xiao Tianjian felt even more reassured. With this, their combat effectiveness would be greatly improved, and they would have a better grasp of things to come.

  If it were someone else, they would have probably retreated by now, gathering the stolen food and valuables from the courtyard and escaping through the tunnel. However, Xiao Tianjian thought for a moment and dismissed this idea. This was a rare opportunity for him, and he couldn't just take a little something and leave. It wouldn't be worth it, considering the huge risk they had taken. Since he had come this far, he wanted to maximize his gains and make the most of this chance. He didn't think that with just a few men, he could get away with so little. As someone who possessed knowledge from a later era, he wanted to achieve more than the bandit leaders of this time. If he couldn't do better than them, it would be a shame to his identity. Food was the most crucial thing; without it, he wouldn't be able to recruit followers. Therefore, he wanted to take as much food as possible.

  For this question, Xiao Tianjian has been thinking for a long time. As a person from the future, he is clearer than anyone else about the course of history, and this is his only advantage. According to the current situation, the Ming Dynasty, this big company, will not be able to hold on for much longer before it goes bankrupt. Li Zicheng finally entered Beijing City, forced Chongzhen Emperor to death, and almost seized power, but in the end, he let the Manchu people take advantage of him and seize power.

  What he couldn't figure out was whether he existed or not in history, and whether his appearance had an impact on the development of history. The real history had never heard of a character like him existing, so there could only be two reasons: one is that he did exist in history, but because he was unlucky, he died without making a splash!

  Another possibility is that he never existed in history, and his arrival here may have caused a butterfly effect, changing the course of history. Of course, this assumes that he must be strong enough to influence the course of history.

  This problem has been troubling Xiao Tianjian for a long time, and now he finally understands that he was actually self-deceiving. No matter what, his current priority is to expand his own strength, so that he can have the power to survive in this world. Otherwise, everything would be pointless. If he doesn't work hard, the sky won't drop meat pies for him, but it's still possible for bird droppings to fall on him.

  So he wants to take advantage of every opportunity to expand his own strength, and for now these people are just the first step he took when he came into this world. In the past, it was a small matter, but today he finally grasped such an opportunity, got some small benefits, and left. That's not his style of doing things.

  From a young age, he was the strong type among his peers, simply put, a child leader, who liked to take charge and be in control. Being content with the status quo is not enough, let alone for future generations; here, it can only make him a stepping stone for others.

  "Alright, everyone's ready, let's go out and take care of those strongmen on the wall. Once we do that, Liu Family Village will be ours to command." Xiao Tianjian waved the knife in his hand and picked up a long-handled wooden sword, which was even more powerful and easier to wield.

  Everyone was so stimulated by the smoothness of things that they had forgotten what was happening in front of them. No one thought that things would go so smoothly, so no one expressed opposition to Xiao Tianjian's decision. They immediately nodded and followed Xiao Tianjian towards the gate.

  But their good fortune ended there, just as they were walking towards the gate in big strides, wanting to go out and take control of the entire Liu Family Village, the gate was pushed open from the outside, and two men with yawns walked in.

  When the two of them walked through the gate, they looked up and saw Xiao Tianjian and others in the yard. Everyone involuntarily froze and stopped in their tracks.

  The two people who came in were obviously the Liu family's guards, and they seemed to be changing shifts or returning from a patrol wanting to sleep. As a result, they ran into Xiao Tianjian and his group, and after being stunned for a moment, with the help of the weak light from the two lanterns in the courtyard, they finally saw clearly the attire of these people inside the courtyard. After a brief daze, they quickly figured out the identities of these people.

  "It's all over! Come quickly! The pole has entered the village!......" Two people almost simultaneously let out a terrified cry, and together turned around to flee towards the outer gate.

  The sudden change caught Xiao Tianjian and the others off guard, as the two village guards came in when they were still some distance from the main gate, and they couldn't control the opponent at all, resulting in the opponent breaking through their operation in one go.

  Xiao Tianjian was so angry that he wanted to slap himself, but after all, his experience in struggle was not rich enough. When they reached the front yard, they were busy dealing with the servants and slaves who lived there, and forgot to send someone to guard the gate, resulting in such an irreparable mistake.

  Just as the two strong men were about to break through the door, Xiao Tianjian hastily pulled out a small short axe from his waist and threw it out with all his might. The short axe flew through the air, making a whizzing sound, and shot straight at one of the strong men's back. The unfortunate strong man let out a blood-curdling scream as the short axe deeply embedded itself into his back, causing him to fall forward due to its immense inertia. His body was now covered in blood, and he instinctively tried to reach for the axe on his back, attempting to pull it out, but his efforts were in vain. The intense pain soon drained all his strength, leaving him writhing on the ground, screaming in agony as he crawled towards the gate, trying to escape the courtyard. However, the axe on his back eventually sucked out all his energy, and just as his hands grasped the doorframe, he fell silent, lying motionless on the ground, leaving behind a thick trail of blood.