Castle of Black Iron

It soon came to late October as it turned a bit cold. However, demons' strike was still surging towards the west border of Taixia Country. As a result, Wuzhou Province, Zhuzhou Province and Yinzhou Province almost collapsed consecutively. Cities in Taixia Country almost collapsed every day. Taixia Country was shocked as a whole. Tens of thousands of miles' land on Eastern Continent were covered with smoke signals while the battle flames of the holy war started to spread over the Eastern Continent...

Wuzhou Province, Zhuzhou Province and Yinzhou Province were neither barren provinces nor lower provinces, but medium-sized provinces in Taixia Country. They were much more powerful than lower provinces and barren provinces. When demons' vanguard entered the three provinces and gradually expanded, the battle situation facing the west border of Taixia Country almost made every commoner of Taixia Country concerned.

Over these months, wing demons were always mentioned in the news about demons. As it was wing demons who invaded the three provinces, a lot of news were about wing demons. It was said that demons had assigned over 100 million LV 9 wing demons as the vanguards. Besides, there were thousands of wing demon knights in the vanguards.

Within the three provinces, billions of commoners deteriorated into refugees as they were evacuating towards eastern provinces...

...

In a mountain area of Helan Mountain Range, all the maple leaves had turned red after the autumn arrived. Like wildfires, they spread over one hundred square miles.

As the sun had just come out, the dew in the woods had not fully evaporated. A frost was suffusing in the valley. With the sound of footsteps, over 20 people suddenly drilled out of the woods in embarrassed looks with luggage on the back, male or female.

At the sight of those dense and high maple trees hundreds of meters in front of them, the front ones had cheered up, "Sugar maple, we've got something to eat..."

After hearing that there were something to eat, all the people became spirited as they accelerated towards that maple woods...

As for starved ones, nothing was more attractive to them than food.

"Wait for me...wait for me...leave some to me..." A panting fat man at his 50s lagged behind those people for a distance. Given the extremely dirty and broken golden silk robe of ministry councilor and the expensive fox-fur robe of the fat man, they must have traveled a lot of days in the woods.

Watching those people running towards those maple trees, leaving him alone, the fat man couldn't help but swear, "You...b*stards...how could you only care about yourself at this moment...and leave your owner alone...when this owner leave out of here, I will punish you by beating your butt...none of you could get any copper coin from this owner..."

In front of the team were some bodyguards in leather armor and wristbands who looked strong and powerful with weapons in hand. Although they looked embarrassed, they were much more agile than the fat man. After reaching that maple woods, one of them selected a 30 m higher maple wood whose diameter was about 2 m as he made a cut on the trunk; closely after that, some dense, slightly tawny fluid started to flow off the cut.

After taking some by his dagger and putting it into his mouth, the person immediately started to receive the fluid with his iron-sheet kettle.

All the other men also imitated him. Some people in the uniform of servants directly approached their mouth onto the cut and started to suck the dense fluid...

"Thankfully, it's autumn...when it comes to winter, there will be no syrup..." Someone said as he drank the fluid.

"This one...this one...choose this one...yours look too dark...the more transparent the syrup is, the sweeter it will be..."

The maple woods became noisy at once.

A person who looked like a steward at his 40s with a thin face and three wisps of long beard didn't run towards here; instead, he just walked leisurely behind these people. Among all these people, this steward looked tidiest with fewest broken places on his clothes.

This steward directly walked to the front of the bodyguard who rushed into the maple woods first. The sturdy bodyguard hurriedly gave the kettle of syrup to the steward.

After having two mouths of the syrup and licking his lips, the steward looked much better as he said, "God bless us. I've not imagined that we could meet such a large area of sugar maple woods at such a critical moment!"

"Thanks to Steward Li's guidance; otherwise, we could never leave Helan Mountain Range!" A servant hurriedly flattered him soon after Steward Li finished his words.

Steward Li neither looked pleasant nor blamed the servant for speaking the wrong words; instead, he just revealed a smile which looked profound more or less. He then told the bodyguard who gave him the kettle, "Although few fierce magical beasts above LV 10 is left in Helan Mountain Range, there're still many wild beasts below LV 10. You bodyguards need to be alert by shifts. We will rest 2 hours here. After being full, fill all your kettles with syrup. It seems that we will leave Helan Mountain Range after hundreds of miles. With syrup, as long as we could drink some water in later days, we will survive ourselves..."

"Yes, sir..." The bodyguard replied. After looking around, the bodyguard's eyes turned a bit weird. Before he said something, two women had walked over here with an enchanting smile in a bashful way. The steward threw a glance at the bodyguard, who hurriedly lowered his head and walked away...

...

When the fat man entered this maple woods, the others had rested for over 10 minutes.

Previously, the fat man moved slowly. After being flurried, he fell down, bruising his forehead and spraining his ankle. As a result, he moved slower.

When he came to the maple woods, the fat man's face had turned green and white while his forehead had been covered with fine sweat drops. The fat man instantly threw himself onto the ground and sat against the trunk of a maple tree while panting heavily.

"Owner, try some. This humble man especially kept it for you. I wanted to prepare your drink, therefore, I ran so fast just now..." A servant gave a kettle of syrup to the fat man as he licked the syrup over his lips.

"Hmm, Liu Shan is most loyal to me...after leaving this damn place...this owner will reward you greatly..." The fat man said while panting. Only after throwing a casual glance at the servant, he had grabbed away the kettle and drank it as if he didn't mean to leave even a bit to the servant.

"Thanks, owner; thanks, owner..." The servant called Liu Shan smiled while narrowing his eyes. At the same time, he bowed deeply towards the fat man as he dreamed about the owner's reward.

After bottoming up the syrup served by "loyal" Liu Shan, the fat man felt a bit better. However, he still had a pain in his sprained foot. Soon after he put down the kettle, the fat owner had turned around and saw his two concubines sitting on both sides of Steward Li and drinking his syrup.

Of course, this was not the point. The point was that the two concubines had completely stuck to Steward Li's clothes. One concubine even whispered to Steward Li in an enchanting way while having one breast stick to Steward Li's arm. The other concubine was helping Steward Li rub his shoulders.

At the sight of the two bitches' movements, they had long forgotten about the existence of the owner. Those outsiders would mistake them as Steward Li's women.

People's hearts would be seen in adversities. Since their airships crashed in Helan Mountain Range by accident a few days ago, this fat owner had felt that something was wrong with his two "beloved concubines" as if they were staying with Steward Li longer and longer. Just now, the two b*tches directly ran over here, leaving the fat owner behind.

In a split second, the fat owner felt extremely furious as he immediately threw his kettle towards Steward Li and the two b*tches.

As the three people were over 10 m away from the fat owner, the fat owner didn't hit his target; instead, he only hit a maple tree beside the 3 people.

The sudden noise startled all the others who were resting here.

With exclamations, the two beloved concubines turned around as they immediately saw their owner whose eyes almost burned.

The steward also turned around. Although the steward changed his look, he didn't dodge away.

However, the moment he was going to reprimand Steward Li, he realized that they were all escaping and he was inconvenient in movement; if he stirred up the steward, he might not have a good result. Therefore, he directly lost his temper towards his two concubines.

"Liu Shan..." The fat owner roared as he pointed at the two beloved concubines with a quivering finger, "Come over there, draw the two b*tches over here and slap each of them 10 times!"

Only after being slightly hesitated, Liu Shan had rolled up his sleeves and walked over there.

Steward Li and the two beloved concubines of the fat owner had stood up. After hearing the fat owner's order, the two women changed their looks at once as they tightly held the sleeves of Steward Li and hid behind Steward Li. Seeing their response, the fat owner was more furious as he realized that the two b*tches had long been on the side of Steward Li.

At this critical moment, women's response was real. If the two women still treated the fat owner as their husband, they would kneel down and beg for his forgiveness; however, they hid behind Steward Li, which meant that they only had Steward Li in their hearts.

"Steward Li, please give way to me, owner let me..." Liu Shan told Steward Li politely and carefully.

Before Liu Shan finished his words, he had quivered all over as a wisp of blood flew out of his mouth corner. He lowered his head and looked at his chest with widely opened eyes.

A dagger had been inserted into Liu Shan's chest. Steward Li was holding the handle of the dagger. Not until then did Liu Shan know when Steward Li had a dagger in hand; neither did he believe that Steward Li could kill him...

Liu Shan had seen Steward Li holding a pen and using abacus; however, he had not seen Steward Li holding any dagger.

Steward Li looked gloomy. His hands didn't quiver at all. He clutched the handle of the dagger, exposing the green veins on his hand. Under the shocked eye light of Liu Shan, Steward Li forcefully wrenched the handle of the dagger.

As the dagger had hit Liu Shan's heart. After Steward Li wrenched the handle of the dagger, Liu Shan immediately spurted out a mouth of blood over Steward Li's face. At the same time, he fell down and died.

The sudden event and the strong killing qi of Steward Li startled all the others in the maple woods.

"Murderer..." A timid servant exclaimed as he immediately scrambled away towards far.

The two women behind Steward Li had been scared too much that they directly stood on the ground. More people were dumbfounded. The fat owner also exclaimed like a pig being slaughtered, "Zhao Wu, Zhao Wu, Steward Li is mad, hurry, catch him...".

The sturdy safeguard immediately ran towards Steward Li with saber in hand. However, he just watched Steward Li instead of launching a strike.

Steward Li wiped off the blood from his face. After that, he threw a glance at that servant who was running far away. Zhao Wu immediately caught up with the servant as he stabbed into the servant's heart...

At the sight of this scene, all the other servants exclaimed as they ran towards the outside of the woods with great fear.

"Kill them all..." Steward Li said icily.

Those bodyguards then rushed towards those escaping servants...

...

As was imagined, only after 1 minute, all the bodyguards had returned with bloody sabers. They then surrounded the fat owner with brutal and greedy eye light like a flock of wild wolves surrounding a fat pig.

Watching these grim and terrifying faces which were usually familiar and humble, the fat owner became scared too much that he even had a pee in his pants. Sitting against the maple tree, he had nowhere to go. He had not imagined that all the bodyguards had been bought over by Steward Li. "Ste...Steward Li...what...what are you doing?"

"Previously, I want you to die in a relatively graceful manner as you were once my owner. However, I've not imagined that you could lose your temper here. Don't blame me for that then!" Steward Li walked over here. Although he had wiped off the blood from his face, his face still looked red which was pretty terrifying.

"You...you want my wealth?" The fat owner realized it at once.

"Whatever, you have no posterity and have so many diseases. You couldn't even f*ck women. Isn't it worthless for you to keep so many properties? Why not let me enjoy them for you?" Steward Li sneered which sounded a bit terrifying.

"You...aren't you afraid of being punished by God?"

"Being punished by God?" Steward Li burst out into laughter at once as if he had heard a joke, "It's really funny for you to say that. If you believe in God's punishment, how could Boss Hong of Huaien Cloth Store die soon after becoming your sworn brother for less than 1 year? Don't you think that I don't know that?"

After hearing Boss Hong, the fat owner's face turned pale at once as if he was struck by a lightning bolt. At the same time, his body quivered all over as he pointed at Steward Li with a finger and stammered, "You...you...you...".

"I will let you die clearly. Don't you feel strange why you're getting worse with more and more diseases these years and have no posterity? Even doctors couldn't help you?"

"You did that..." The fat owner quivered all over. Closely after that, he shook his head as he said, "Impossible. All the doctors said that I was suffering from the shortage of sperms and weak sperms. Because of my physique, I could barely make women pregnant!"

"Hahaha, if you have posterities, it will not be my turn to inherit your properties..." Steward Li burst out into laughter, "Do you remember what I usually told you? Even though you're rich, you have to read more books. There're gold and beauties in books. You read too few books. Additionally, you despise scholars. Now you know that, if you read too few books, it would be useless no matter how much money you have. Because you don't even know why you have no posterities and are getting worse spiritually and physically. The method is not strange at all. I just added some potassium iodate in your salt. After so many years, of course, you're getting worse. If you could read some more books like me, you will know that demons and Three-eye Association had used the same method to strike and exterminate Hua people. If you read some more books, you will know the secrets..."

"Potassium iodate?" The fat owner muttered as this name was too strange to him. It sounded that he had heard about this thing before, "Is...isn't it used to add iodine to human bodies in case of a big neck?"

Steward Li let out a sigh as he said, "This is why, if you could reincarnate into another person, you have to read more books. Otherwise, you don't even know the difference between potassium iodate and potassium iodide and don't know why you're getting worse spiritually and physically. Although you can widely open your eyes, you're living nothing different than a blind. If it were before, demons and Three-eye Association must like such a kind of idiot like you. Although they're utterly different, you think they're same just because they sound similar to each other..."

In the beginning, the fat man thought that it was caused by excessive drink and sex; he had not imagined that he was framed by someone. The elements of the salt that he ate 3 times a day had long been changed by someone. Therefore, he was getting worse spiritually and physically.

"I will kill you..." The fat owner immediately sprung up with a grim look as he wanted to charge at Steward Li. However, the moment he sprung up, he had been forcefully kicked by a bodyguard onto his chest and fell down, causing him to spurt out a mouth of blood. He then shouted with a miserable smile, "You will be punished by God. Even if you kill me, don't dream about taking my properties."

Steward Li sneered as he said kindly, "Didn't you sew the gold notes inside your fox-fur robe? How could you take away your gold checks after I kill you? Do you really think this airship crash is an accident? Without this accident, how could I know that you've carried all of your properties with you?"

"You..."

The fat owner still wanted to say something; however, Steward Li had released his battle qi while chopping off his head, spraying his blood over the trunks of maple trees on one side. The fat owner's head then rolled away with widely opened eyes...

After chopping off his head, Steward Li immediately peeled off the fat owner's fox-fur robe, exposing the brilliant gold checks inside. The minimal par value of those gold checks was 10,000 gold coins...

The surrounding bodyguards panted. When Steward Li looked around them, all the bodyguards' hearts pounded as they lowered their heads at once. All the bodyguards knew the power of Steward Li; otherwise, Steward Li couldn't buy over them all these years.

Steward Li took out those piles of gold checks from the corpse's fox-fur robe and put them in his portable luggage before saying, "Now we're grasshoppers on the same rope. Don't think too much. I will pay you what I promised you. As it's chaotic in Taixia Country. We could leave Huanzhou Province by chance and settle down somewhere. Later on, I will be your owner. You will live much better than now if you follow me..."

"As you will, owner..."

"Fine, clean up these corpses. Dig a pit here and bury them all..."

"Yes, sir!" Zhao Wu and the other bodyguards started to dig a pit on the ground with their tools and buried all the corpses.

Only after such a short while, the 2 beloved concubines of the fat owner had been scared too much by the series of accidents. Watching Steward Li walking towards them with a bloody face, the two enchanting women quivered all over with pale faces.

"Steward Li, later on...we will both follow your orders..."

"Steward Li, we...our sisters...will serve you well later on..."

Steward Li just walked towards them with a glassy-eyed look. Even though the two women begged for his forgiveness, he still killed them, one prick for one life.

After that, Steward Li squatted down and cleaned his dagger on the collars of the two women. After that, he said, "You were just two prostitutes previously. Owner bought you over given your beautiful looks and provided you good clothes and delicious food. However, you betrayed him. How do I know whether you will not betray me one day? Do you really think that the man will not kill you if you could make him happy on the bed? You're just b*tches. Do you think that you could dally with a man based on your tricks and beautiful looks? Do you think that the man couldn't live without you..." After cleaning his dagger, Steward Li stood up. Watching the two human corpses which were gradually turning colder, he shook his head as he made a conclusion, "You should read some more books..."

In less than 10 minutes, all the corpses had been buried, leaving a faint, bloody smell in the maple woods.

After doing all this, the moment Steward Li was walking out of the maple woods, followed by his bodyguards, they stopped as their pupils contracted.

A 17-year old young man was standing in front of them. They didn't even know how long had this young man stood there.

The young man didn't carry any weapon as if he was a noble childe who was making an autumn outing.

The young man looked at the maple leaves, then the fresh blood stains in the woods before shaking his head and saying pitifully, "The red color of the maple woods looked beautiful previously; however, after being covered with blood, it turned dazzling!"

Steward Li narrowed his eyes as he couldn't see through the true abilities of this young man. However, there was no servant on the side of this young man. What was more, this man looked too young that he didn't look like a powerhouse. Therefore, Steward Li had a fluke mind that he could kill this young man here.

"Zhao Wu, kill him!" Steward Li sent an order to Zhao Wu.

Soon after receiving Steward Li's words, Zhao Wu had rushed out.

Watching Zhao Wu rushing over here, the young man rubbed his fingers, causing a sound. The sound was seemingly magical. The moment the sound deepened into the consciousnesses of everybody else, all the people at present became stiff all over at once. They couldn't even move.

The young man watched these people as he shook his head and said which carried a bizarre heart-breaking resonance and strength, "I don't even want to contaminate my hands by killing you myself. You'd better commit suicide to beg for my forgiveness!"

Soon after the young man's words, all the stiff bodies had taken their weapons and stabbed into their own necks or chests forcefully.

The strong bloody smell diffused over the maple woods once again...

...