Chapter 178: The Dwarfs Run Away
“Open the door!” A group of pirates came to the hotel entrance.
They had pockets of silver and gold, some had fine ceramic vases, and others were carrying enormous bundles.
These were the things they had stolen.
“Open the door now, offer up your money and valuables!”
“Open the door now, and you’ll live. I’ll give you 10 seconds, and when its up, we’ll kill you!!”
The pirates’ knocks and constant threats echoed through the hotel.
These threats were actually very useful.
Ordinary residents were scared witless and would open their doors to offer their belongings.
Pirates usually followed this agreement, and after milking the people dry of their property, they usually wouldn’t kill them.
This was in fact the standard for pirates.
Normally, when they were plundering the seas, they usually wouldn’t commit wanton massacres as ransoming was an important revenue stream.
More crucially, this kind of standard could usually reduce the risks of looting and reduce their prey’s resistance.
After this standard and common understanding formed, pirates could pay a smaller price to obtain loot.
To pirates, there was more benefits than losses to doing this.
Of course, this was only during normal situations.
If a pirate was desperate or had a murderous nature, pirates could choose to slaughter everyone and leave no survivors. When that happened, they would usually raise the blood flag.
Currently, the pirates were robbing Two Eyes Island, their main goal was looking for riches and it wasn’t worthwhile to kill indiscriminately.
Murder also wastes time.
With that time, couldn’t more things be stolen?
Furthermore, this was Two Eyes Island, and the gold level cultivators were merely impeded. If one massacred too excessively, they might provoke Hun Tong or Song Shou into disregarding all negative considerations for the sake of revenge, people almost every pirate here couldn’t withstand.
“I beseech you.”
“Lord Men Shi, I took you in.”
The hotel owner implored the dwarfs, kneeling towards them.
The hotel was surrounded by layers of pirates, and the doors were on the verge of being smashed open by their blows.
Men Shi was very vexed.
He had returned from buying his people from the auction and came to this hotel to rest.
He didn’t want to get involved in the chaos outside.
“Wait until things calm down, then I and my people will depart to continue our search for a new home.” This was what Men Shi, and the dwarfs had planned to do.
“Don’t listen to the human!”
“Why should we help these humans? We can stay here because we reserved a room in advance.”
“That’s right. When we came here, the boss wanted to lock his doors and ignore us.”
“But what are we going to do about the pirates outside? They have surrounded this place already.”
“WE will charge out!”
“We have nothing to steal, we are all destitute.”
“Those wretched humans are to blame. They swindled the clan’s savings!”
The dwarfs’ blunt disposition caused them to not mince words and to tell it as it was.
Men Shi looked around.
The dwarfs all looked determined.
Men Shi knew breaking out was risky. Although he had done his best to arm them, they only had some inferior weapons and no armor.
But Men Shi could feel his people’s resolve.
“We’re leaving!” Men Shi ordered.
“No don’t go. Help me, please, I can pay you, I can pay you a huge sum!” The hotel boss anxiously wept.
The dwarfs displayed an unfeeling demeanor.
Under Men Shi’s leadership, they walked down the stairs and turned a deaf ear to the hotel owner’s pleas.
In desperation, the hotel owner suddenly changed his attitude and began to loudly curse the departing dwarfs.
The dwarfs loathed humans, but none of them attacked the hotel boss.
Just as they reached the first floor, they saw a window break, with three iron balls rolling onto the floor.
Men Shi blankly stared, then his face radically changed as he roared, “Get back!”
Boom!
The iron balls exploded a second later.
The force of the explosion and sharp iron shrapnel inflicted a terrible price on the dwarfs.
Three were killed and 8 were injured.
It was obvious the pirates’ countdown hadn’t finished yet.
As it turns out, the situation outside the door had changed.
A stronger group of pirates had rushed in, pushing aside the previous pirates.
“Hahaha, get lost you cowards.”
“Charge in, this hotel belongs to the Applaud Pirates!”
The newly arrived pirates spoke more arrogantly.
They belonged to the Applaud Pirates.
This pirate group’s commander was the frogman Hu Li, a silver cultivator almost as strong as Dian Wan and Yang Cong Tou.
Dian Wan and Yang Cong Tou had landed on different sides of the island, then both rushed towards the Wealth Church, leading to some friction between them there.
The Applaud Pirates landed closer to the port.
Unlike Dian Wan and Yang Cong Tou, Hu Li was deeply fascinated with the Vinegar Jar.
In the port battlefield, the mighty Vinegar Jar, driven by Yao Guan Zi, had smashed into many light cannon towers, something that had stimulated Hu Li’s greed.
Hu Li was waiting for a chance to seize the Vinegar Jar.
Therefore, he had his men move near the port.
The hotel the dwarfs checked into was near the port.
The reason why Men Shi had selected this place was because he wanted to be near the port after he redeemed his clansmen.
First, it was easy for them to board a ship bound for other islands.
Second, if there wasn’t an appropriate outbound ship, they could work at the port as porters, selling their toil to provide for themselves for a time.
Men Shi’s choice seemed to be the right one, but now it had let to a terrible outcome.
The house was inundated with dust.
The dwarfs’ ears were ringing.
From the dim ringing, wailing gradually rose.
Men Shi was a silver level and stood at the forefront, tall and unmoving.
But he was only one person, and silver battle qi couldn’t form outside the body, thus he couldn’t hold back the explosion.
He looked at his clansmen behind him.
The dwarfs had fallen to the ground, some were crawling back up, and others clutched heir dead relatives, crying bitterly.
Men Shi’s heart welled with tides of fury and hate.
“Hehehe!”
“Charge in!!”
“Take all they have!!”
The pirates kicked the door down and flooded in.
“You will die!!” Men Shi angrily narrowed his bloodshot eyes.
He roared, raised his long war hammer, and like a mad bull, brazenly crashed into the pirates.
The pirates were caught off guard, how could they have foreseen this hotel had a silver level fighter hidden in it?
Men Shi’s hammer smashed down, and like a falling watermelon, a pirate’s heard burst open.
Men Shi’s charge broke bones and bruised flesh as he launched them out of the hotel.
Five or six landed as corpses, while many more were badly bruised.
Men Shi rushed out of the inn and began to slay pirates.
By the time he came to his senses, almost all of the pirates around him were slain by his hand, with only one or two able to escape alive.
“Just wait! Men Shi, we recognize you.”
“You killed our Applaud Pirates’ people, damn you dwarf!”
“Boss Hu Li will avenge us!!”
The pirates ran for their lives as they shouted threats.
Men Shi’s face changed.
His people came out of the hotel with anxious hearts: “Hu Li is a silver level frogman; he should be close by.”
“We need go now.”
“We cannot stay here for long!”
The dwarfs knew the severity of the situation, and a number of them lent arms or carried their dead relatives on their backs before proceeding to leave the hotel.
“What? Our people were killed by Men Shi. He’s got guts!” Hu Li quickly obtained this information.
He gazed at the port battlefield.
The port battlefield was still deadlocked.
The Vinegar Jar was still mighty and had smashed into the final light cannon turret.
“It still isn’t time to snatch the ship.”
Let’s deal with Men Shi first!”
This guy, leading his burdens, still dares to provoke us!”
Hu Li sneered incessantly.
Although he never interacted with Men Shi, it was clear the dwarfs as a whole were far weaker than Hu Li’s pirates.
Hu Li was not just one solitary person; he had troops ready to fight.
Although the dwarfs could fight, they were not soldiers and their battle experience was inferior to a full time pirate group.
More importantly, the disparity of equipment was stark between both sides.
“Little ones, follow me!”
“Avenge our dead brothers, kill those wretched dwarfs!!”
Hu Li issued a call to action and led away a large group.
Of course, he left behind a few people to shadow the Vinegar Jar.
“Where is my first mate?” Hu Li ordered, “Call them back!”
The Applaud Pirates had been plundering near the port; Hu Li now gave the order to assemble back together.
Like a magnet, he gathered pirates around him as he moved.
The Applaud Pirates’ first mate was in the middle of attacking a villa.
The humans inside the villa were doing their best to fight back.
“Try harder!”
“Little ones, this is the Flint Merchant Alliance representatives’ residence, there must be good things inside!!”
The first mate shouted encouragement from the back.
The pirates tried to get through windows and force their ways through doors, however, the defenders stood firm.
The first mate narrowed his eyes, following the progress of the battle.
He had led his pirates all over in plundering; this was the only place that met unexpected resistance.
To him it seemed that although the defenders weren’t outstanding, they were luxuriously equipped. All of them had a star iron hatchet in hand.
They were iron level weapons!
Unfortunately, these people didn’t have much armor.
The first mate wasn’t sure who these people were, therefore, he didn’t attack himself, instead he urged his underlings to attack in his stead.
Although the pirates were fully equipped, their armor couldn’t withstand even bronze level weapons.
In addition, the other side had location on their side, and for the moment, the attackers could only search for gaps in their defense.
“First mate, the captain wants us to return.”
“We need to hunt down Men Shi and his dwarfs.”
“They killed our people!”
Hu Li had dispatched a pirate to inform the first mate.
The first mate’s complexion changed, and he hesitated.
He didn’t want to let the cash cow before him go.
One couldn’t be a good pirate without greed.
As the first mate hesitated, he saw an iron level pirate kill a defender at a window, finally able to charge into the villa.
The first mate suddenly burst into laughter, he took out his cutlass and said to the messenger pirate, “Wait, let me attack this villa.”