The Affairs of the Martial World - Vol 2: Chapter 6

It had been three days since the bodies of the Five Tiger Gang were discovered.

That evening, Fuying walked ahead, suddenly leaping onto the camel’s hump, shielding his eyes with his hand, looking ahead as if he saw something, his face showing a look of terror.

Everyone, including Zhu Que, felt a chill in their hearts when they saw Fuying’s expression. They followed his gaze but saw nothing.

Fuying leaped down from the camel, used his lightness skill, and rushed forward more than one hundred feet, then crouched down on the sand to observe carefully. Zhu Que arrived shortly after, looking at the sand, feeling a chill in his heart.

There were faint footprints on the sand.

The footprints were very shallow, and if it weren’t for the keen eyes of the observer, they would be hard to notice. The footprints must have been left not long ago, so even though the wind had blown sand over them, a little could still be seen. Moving forward and looking closely, it could be determined that these were not the footprints of a single person but rather many people, along with camel hoof prints.

A few people gathered together, and no one spoke; they were all worried about one thing: these footprints were left by themselves.

Mu Qingshan was the first to break the silence: “These footprints are probably our own. If that’s the case, then we must have taken a wrong turn, going in circles.”

Mu Qingshui took out a map from his pocket and said, “We have been out of Welltown for nine days now. If the direction is correct, I estimate that at our current pace, we should arrive in about ten more days. Now that we’ve gone in circles, we can no longer determine our current location.”

Zhao Qiankun from the Jianghuai Gang took a compass out of his pocket, looked around, and said, “All along, we’ve been judging our direction by the rising and setting of the sun. With this compass, we shouldn’t have strayed so far that we’ve ended up going in circles.”

Zhu Que and Fuying exchanged glances, both thinking the same thing: if there were no detours, how did the footprints ahead appear? Could there be others walking this path as well?

They stayed in Welltown for more than ten days, and it was impossible for anyone to come from Welltown. Therefore, it could not be ruled out that someone was deliberately misleading them.

Zhu Que said, “Keep moving forward. If someone else misleads us, ignoring it will naturally lead us to our destination. If we doubt randomly, it will only throw us into chaos.”

Though it was said this way, Zhu Que secretly felt a sense of worry. If they were indeed unconsciously going in circles, then food and water in this boundless desert would become fatal reasons.

Indeed, the concerns were not unfounded.

The next day, around noon, Zhu Que saw the sword hilt stuck in the ground. He immediately walked over and pulled it out; it was the sword of the Five Tiger Gang people, which they had used as a tombstone in the sand when burying the members.

At this moment, everyone’s heart sank.

Zhao Qiankun from the Jianghuai Gang began to curse the damned desert.

Shui Mingyue from the Three Rivers Sect also seemed to have lost the strength to ride the camel, sliding down from the hump and collapsing onto the sand. She was the only woman on this journey, and encountering these bizarre events, her endurance was naturally weaker than that of the men. The fact that she had managed to hold on until now without breaking down was already quite strong.

Zhu Que also seemed to be at a loss, suddenly, he jumped off the camel and began to dig in the sand.

Fuying thought he had gone mad and wanted to pull him back, but Zhu Que shrugged him off and continued to dig in the sand, saying to Fuying, “You help me dig, too.”

Fuying dared not oppose him and could only accompany him in his madness.

Indeed, the corpse of the leader of the Five Tiger Gang was still in the sand. The sand was dry, and the body had not decayed, looking no different from when they had just buried it.

Fuying suppressed his anger and asked, “Are you satisfied now? Or do you want to dig up something else?”

The others also stared intently at Zhu Que. Although the sun was blazing and the sky was clear, there was an eerie feeling about Zhu Que’s strange behavior.

What should they do if Zhu Que goes mad?

Even more terrifying was when Zhu Que looked at the corpse in the sand and suddenly burst into laughter.

Everyone thought, “It’s over, he’s gone mad.”

But Zhu Que was not only not crazy, but could also speak very clearly, “These are their bodies.” 

Fuying comforted him, saying, “Yes, we all know.”

“But these are not what we buried.”

The leader of the Swallow Tail Gang (1), Qin Xiong, said, “Wasn’t it us who buried them? Are you crazy, stupid, or just forgetful? Don’t you remember that you also helped carry the bodies into the sand pit? The three masters were watching from the side, right?”

The three monks of White Horse Temple nodded and joined their palms, chanting “Amitabha.”

Zhu Que said, “I remember very clearly, it was you who forgot.”

Shui Mingyue stood up at this moment and said with confusion, “Even though I didn’t contribute, I was watching from the side while you were burying them. Could it be that I can’t even remember that?”

Zhu Que said, “I remember very clearly. Look, when we buried them, we first buried the third, then the fourth, fifth, and second, and finally the eldest. The jade on the eldest fell off when he was buried last, but now the first one I dug up is the fourth’s body.”

Others suddenly realized that someone had been following them all along. After they left, the body was dug up, and then made a detour to bury them ahead, making them mistakenly believe they were going in circles at the same spot.

But who would put in such great effort to do this in this vast desert? What could be the reason for doing so?

Zhu Que looked into the endless distance and, after a while, said, “Someone is doing this because they don’t want us to find that treasure. Regardless of their motives, they have already killed six people to achieve their goals. These people are so brutal that we naturally won’t let them succeed.”

Fuying was not foolish; it was just that in the vast desert, when they suddenly encountered something inexplicable, he momentarily couldn’t wrap his head around it. Once he understood the reason, his mind cleared up, and he said, “Since that’s the case, it actually indicates that the direction we’re heading is correct, allowing them to make some moves ahead of us. If we were truly going the wrong way, we wouldn’t have encountered their traps.”

Zhu Que nodded, “Because I kept thinking about the people from Five Tiger Gang along the way, suddenly encountering misfortune, I felt regret for not stopping them from leaving Welltown early, and I was also angry about Wei Chu dying beside me, so I could immediately think of this flaw.”

Fuying knew that the people from Five Tiger Gang had sneaked away on their own, probably fearing that if they moved slowly, they wouldn’t be able to find the treasure first. Little did they know that although they left first, they ended up in the Hall of Yama. Zhu Que should have known they slipped away secretly and was afraid of causing misunderstandings, thinking that Zhu Que had ulterior motives in trying to stop them. Therefore, that night, Zhu Que ultimately did not intervene and let them leave.

Since they understood the truth of the matter, everyone secretly breathed a sigh of relief and continued on their way.

But everyone understood that the group of people hidden in the dark corners of the desert would not simply give up; there would surely be more challenging problems waiting for them ahead.

(1) Swallow Tail Gang — Here, the author used 燕尾帮 – Swallow Tail Gang. In other chapters, the author used 凤尾帮 – Phoenix Tail Gang.