Chapter 42: Beastmen Rebellion
Tripleblade had left the tavern.
Hei Fei and the others gathered together with ugly expressions.
The first mate indignantly whispered, “Captain, why didn’t we seize that arrogant guy?”
“From start to finish, he never even told us his name! He clearly looks down on us.”
“Not only does he look down on me, he, an insignificant iron level, doesn’t even put you in his eyes!”
“We could have seized him and used him to threaten those guys. Even if we can’t beat them, at worst we could walk away.”
“Da Zhao’s pirate ships cannot compare to the speed of ours!”
“Our ships can still sail!”
“An urgent maintenance from the boatwrights can last us until the next island.”
Hei Fei instantly became gloomy, and he grabbed the first mate’s checks, veins popping from the back of his hands as he twisted the first mate’s face.
Hei Fei coldly said, “Do you have a brain?”
“The one who lost face was not me, but you!”
“You were subdued in a single move, you are an iron level!”
“Also, what was that stupidity you just said?”
“Why did we come here to rest and reorganize? Because pirates are too rampant nowadays, if we run into pirates with our ships in this state, what do we do?”
“When that moment comes, if you die in battle and have our goods robbed, what’s the use if we aren’t alive?”
“Bo, boss, my mistake, my mistake.” The first mate begged for mercy.
“Humph!” Hei Fei released his wrathful hands.
The first mate stroked his cheek with his own hand, frightened and doubtful.
His check had gone completely numb, and he could no longer feel it.
He even felt that his gums had gone slack.
Captain Hei Fei looked at the tavern door, his eyes narrowed and his voice low, “Who do you think they are?”
“They are arms smuggling criminals!”
The first mate’s and the others’ eyes opened wide, this was hard to believe.
Hei Fei sneered, “Use your pitiful brains to think about it.”
“How can a group of people that appeared from nowhere be able to beat back Rou Zang?”
“They have many alchemy crossbows and firearms on hand, these things, they are rechargeable and can be used by ordinary people. One or two is fine, but they have hundreds on hand!”
“They even have a gold level cannon! Gold level. Their strongest cultivator is only silver level, how can they use this battlefield treasure?”
“It’s very clear that they want to clandestinely transport these arms to the Wilderness Continent. As a result, their secret base on Stone Egg Island was raided by Da Zhao’s pirate group.”
“Ah, they were exposed, thus they had to act!”
“There is no recently organized mercenary group, it’s hogwash!”
Selling armaments was a serious crime.
Alchemy crossbows and firearms, especially rechargeable types, were all controlled by the empire.
Let alone the gold level cannon that could collapse city walls.
Hei Fei was a slave trafficker, at most he plundered small beastman villages, stole away the populace, and sold them into slavery.
The slave trade was allowed and considered an honorable business.
But arms smuggling was different.
It was a crime!
Arms smugglers were groups of fugitives with a backer.
Without a backer, how could they obtain such arms, how could they sell them?
The water was very deep here, and Hei Fei was unsure of it.
He glanced at the tavern, then sighed, “Move, we’ll sleep on the ship tonight.”
After a pause, he then added, “All of you be on guard.”
After this group of people left, the tavern became lively once again.
The goblins were taken away, the small stage was quickly wiped clean, then the band and female dancer took center stage once again.
The customers watching this production started to converse more energetically.
Disguised as a normal person, the silver level warlock, Mo Kong, had arrived in this place at some unknown time and took the spot where the first mate had been sitting.
“That iron level is also somewhat interesting.”
Outwardly, he was drinking, while in reality, he was converging Tripleblade’s life aura.
Not long after, he left.
“Aura, still need a bit more…”
Night enveloped the town as Mo Kong walked towards the port.
The ships berthed at the port were the survivors’ five and Hei Fei’s three.
Mo Klong gazed at the survivors’ distant ships and noticed the weak precautions onboard. Despite having many sailors keeping watch, due to the painful training during the day, they were dispirited and looked like they wanted to sleep.
Mo Kong hid in a corner and wanted to infiltrate the place when suddenly, he stopped.
He looked at the seabirds perched on top of a ship, then gradually became bewildered.
“Alchemy puppets?”
“Hmph, these people have many types of weapons.”
Mo Kong did not give up, as his gaze shifted towards Hei Fei’s ships.
Hei Fei’s ships also had sailors visible in the wind, they were on deck, the bow, the aft, and on the mast keeping watch.
They were heavily guarded.
Mo Kong carefully observed for a moment, sneered, then began to quietly sneak in.
On the ship, he smoothly found the first mate.
Because of his close quarters fight with Tripleblade, he still had some residual life aura from the latter.
“Too hard to act on…”
Mo Kong felt somewhat awkward.
Because Tripleblade easily defeated the first mate and lost face, Hei Fei punished him by putting him in charge of tonight’s watch.
He was an iron level, and his heart was full of indignance, his bright eyes were completely wary, and he frequently moved.
Although Mo Kong was a silver level warlock, many of his methods were useless. After all, most magics needed motions that would leak his aura.
“I need to keep an eye on time, if this takes too long, that iron level swordsman’s aura will scatter.”
Mo Kong thought for a bit, and a stratagem appeared in his mind.
He quietly left the first mate, and went down some stairs, into the ship. Regardless of whether it was the first mate or the patrolling sailors, none of them noticed a trace of him.
He entered the hold and saw many unconscious beastmen.
These beastmen were in a drugged sleep. Only a part of them were awoken, they were wrapped in iron chains and tightly watched.
When dawn came, these people would be escorted to the market and sold.
Mo Kong glanced at these people, then gave up.
These people were old, weak, or disabled. Some were even close to death, otherwise Hei Fei wouldn’t have been pressed to dump them here.
Mo Kong went further into the depths of the hold and chose his target.
He took out a bottle of perfume and popped the cork.
A gentle puff of smoke quickly dissipated into the hold.
The beastmen captives’ eyes slackened and they quickly became conscious.
Mo Kong quietly faded away and headed towards the other ship olds to spread the fragrance.
These people had been unconscious, but because of the fragrance, their consciousness had been restored.
Hei Fei and the others were very confident in their incapacitating agents, and due to them taking precautions against the survivors, most of the sailors were on the deck.
Like Mo Kong wanted, the beastmen awoke and began to secretly assemble together.
“Our village is already destroyed!”
“Boohoo…father, he’s dead, those devils killed him.”
“Vengeance, we will kill them!”
The beastmen united against a common enemy.
But their leaders were not blinded by hatred.
“We only awoke because of their carelessness. We must grab hold of this golden opportunity, we won’t have a second!”
“We aren’t those demons’ match! I still feel drugged, and only have half my strength.”
“We are unarmed and defenseless!”
“Even if we die, we won’t make it easy!”
A beastman elder looked at the younger one, “Young patriarch, although our clan has been ruined, it hasn’t been destroyed.”
“We will stir up a rebellion and give you a chance to escape.”
The young patriarch shook his head with a resolute bearing, “I won’t abandon you, we will die together!”
“No. You cannot die, you must live.” The elder put their hands on the you patriarch.
Even if we rebel, they won’t kill us.”
“Because we are their merchandise, they will capture us alive and treat us as slaves to sell off.”
“As long as you survive young patriarch and gather strength outside, you can return, save us, and allow our clan to emerge once again!”
But the young patriarch did not heed their advice, “I won’t desert you all!”
Just as the elder was about to speak, the sailors above started to yell.
They noticed that people in the holds weren’t responding and began to muster together to rush down.
“Come quickly, the beastmen are waking up!”
The beastman elder sighed, “It’s too late.”
“Charge!”
“We will kill them together.” The young patriarch took the lead and charged first.
The hold immediately exploded with noise.
The beastmen gathered together and grappled with the human sailors
The beastmen were united, and hatred caused their moral to skyrocket in spite of life or death.
Although there were many sailors, in the narrow confines of the ship, they could not display their full forces. Their equipment was also of subpar quality, at best they had leather armor and cutlasses.
During this time, when everyone thronged together and rubbed shoulders to do battle, the situation sank into chaos and deadlock.
“What’s going on?” The first mate arrived at the mouth of the stairs, but was in no rush to go down.
A subordinate reported that the beastmen were rebelling.
The first mate stood there in indefinite bewilderment.
“We drugged them all, how did they awaken?”
Slave traffickers were very confident in their drugs, otherwise they wouldn’t have sent out this ship with people on it.
“There is something strange inside!”
The first mate thought of the survivors first.
“Don’t tell me they really want to attack us?”
“Previously, it was obvious they were dissatisfied with our quoted price. If they could snatch our slaves, why should they buy them?”
That group of wretched fugitives!”
Thus, the first mate stood above deck and didn’t dare to go down.
He was scared that the survivors had caused this, if this was the case, then there would be an expert hidden down there, setting up a trap specially built for him to fall into.
“Ask the captain to help!” The first mate instructed an underling.
The underling went and came back with news, the captain had insulted the first mate, and asked why he, a cultivator and his first mate, hadn’t acted yet to suppress the rebellion.
The first mate looked at the flagship and found Hei Fei standing there, coldly watching him, his admonishment very strong.
“Damm it!” The first mate immediately realized that Hei Fei had the same worries as him.
Hei Fei wanted his first made to charge in first and let him trigger whatever traps and schemes there were first.
The first mate could only stiffen his scalp and charge in.
He was an iron level, and immediately suppressed the situation.
Mo Kong quietly withdrew from the chaos, and moved with the stream of people to approach the first mate and gently draw Tripleblade’s aura from him.
Despite achieving his original aim, he was hesitant to leave.
Because he noticed the first mate and the young beastman patriarch were deadlocked with each other.
The young beastman patriarch was also iron level, but because of the drugs, he could only display a third of his strength.
However, the first mate was warry of potential traps, most of his mind wasn’t focused on the young patriarch, thus creating this kind of battlefield situation.
“Perhaps, I can accomplish more.” After noticing this spectacle, Mo Kong chose to stay and help the beastmen.
With his hidden magic, the beastman elder suddenly noticed a swelling power emitting from his body.
At that moment, he seemed to have regained the pinnacle of his youthful stamina.
The beastman elder did not help the young patriarch, instead he used all of his strength to activate his diminished battle qi and smash through the hull.
“Young patriarch, this way!” He roared, then charged forth to replace the young patriarch in his duel with the first mate.
“Elder?!” The young patriarch wanted to keep fighting on zealously.
“Go now!” The beastman elder anxiously cried.
“Go, go!” Many of the beast men grabbed the young patriarch and pulled him away.
The young patriarch was already seriously injured, and didn’t have much strength left. Despite struggling with all of his might, the other beastmen dragged him away.
“Go, this way!” As a silver level warlock, Mo Kong was an expert at confusing the mind.
Presently, he was hidden in the darkness and was quietly influencing the beastmen’s decisions.
The beastmen, in a panic, chose not to go further inland, but instead rushed towards the survivors’ ships.
Mo Kong wanted to use them to attack the survivors’ defensive perimeter and expose the many cards in their hands.
If it also triggered a conflict between Hei Fei’s group and the survivors, then it would be even better for him!