Chapter 114: The Strike of the Blood Crow

sola saw Rayan looking at her with confusion, and immediately bit her lip, gathering the courage to explain, "I want to learn how to serve the master properly..."

As she spoke, she slowly opened her arms, which had been covering her chest, revealing her partially concealed breasts.

Rayan was taken aback for a moment, then his expression turned peculiar, and he asked both angrily and annoyed, "Who tore your clothes?"

"It was me..." Meila replied, trembling.

Rayan glared at the two female slaves, "I saved you, and this is how you repay me by corrupting sola?"

"We, we... we thought the master would like to be served."

"I'm not like your previous masters!"

Rayan yelled, "Your previous masters were bastards, but I'm not! I treat you as normal people, yet you act like pigs and dogs!"

The two female slaves looked both grateful and ashamed.

sola pleaded, "Master, it's all sola's fault, please forgive them. Meila is good at accounting, Taola can cook, please don't punish them. They know their mistake, they will behave well from now on!"

The two female slaves nodded desperately.

"Actually, I had already made up my mind when I bought them."

Rayan put away the Crow Sword, paused for a moment, and then continued, "This incident has only strengthened my decision—they can't stay with us."

As soon as he finished speaking, the two newly freed female slaves began to sob. sola's pretty face was also filled with sorrow, "Master, are you going to sell them? sola won't allow it, sola won't allow it!"

She had initially felt that the two female slaves had a pitiful background, and empathized with them, which was why she had asked Rayan to buy them. But after a brief interaction, she found herself becoming good friends with them and couldn't bear the thought of Rayan selling them.

"It's the right decision for the master to sell us."

Meila, with tears, said with a bitter smile, "Although Taola and I already have a brand, we are still young, selling us now might fetch a good price. Even at the lowest price for second-hand female slaves, we could sell for six hundred gold coins, a hundred more than what the master paid for us at the slave trading post—that way, the master doesn't have to do anything and can make a clean profit of a hundred gold coins..."

Rayan frowned slightly, just about to explain, when he heard cautious footsteps outside the cave from the dense forest.

Rayan listened carefully to the footsteps outside, trying to gauge how many people were there and their strength, but all he could hear were the sobbing voices of the three female slaves inside the cave.

He immediately furrowed his brow and sternly told the female slaves, "Shut up!"

The three female slaves immediately held back their tears, just huddling together sadly, awaiting their fate of being sold by Rayan—sola naturally wasn't worried about being sold, but she was more heartbroken than any of the female slaves because she was the cause of the whole situation.

Rayan, too, scorned any further explanation to the two female slaves, instead focusing intently on listening to the noises outside. Since breaking through to the Tenth Tier Battle Qi, his sensory sensitivity had greatly increased, allowing him to detect any disturbances in the surroundings, even from afar.

The noise of footsteps approached closer and closer, clearly heading towards their cave, and the number of people was substantial.

Rayan's muscles tensed as he turned to sola and instructed, "Stay in the cave."

Before sola could reply, he quickly walked out of the cave, drew the Crow Sword, and waited for the uninvited guests to arrive. He could sense that the dense forest hid not just ten bounty hunter teams; it was nearly all the armed forces of Triumph Town. Although the strongest among them was only Fourth Tier Battle Qi, their combined strength was not to be underestimated.

After a long while, a white triangular flag peeked out from the disordered branches in the dense forest, nervously fluttering a few times.

"Lord Fighter!"

A pale, hoarse voice came from the direction of the white flag, "We are local bounty hunters, we would like to have a word with Lord Fighter."

Rayan's heart skipped a beat, not expecting the other party to be so polite. But after a moment of thought, he understood; with his capabilities, even if the other party had overwhelming numbers, it would only add difficulty to the battle, not affect the outcome, which everyone clearly understood.

Realizing that the other party was not here to fight, but merely to talk, Rayan felt slightly disappointed. Although he was not a murderous lunatic, deep down, he still craved combat. He sheathed the Crow Sword and coldly said towards the direction of the fluttering white flag, "Come out and talk."

"Yes, yes!"

The forest was once again filled with low murmurs, but no one emerged.

"What's with all these big men acting so coy?"

Rayan impatiently said, "If you're not ready to talk, then go back, I still have a lot of pressing matters to deal with here!"

Saying this, he turned to walk back into the cave.

"Wait—"

Someone immediately darted out from the forest, walking timidly up to Rayan.

He wasn't holding any weapons, but he wore a rusty chainmail shirt, a studded leather belt around his waist, and a dirty yellow cloak covered in scratches and bloodstains from wild beasts, hanging on his shoulders. His leg armor was loose, barely covering his groin, and he walked with a limp, either congenital or caused by Rayan's icy gaze.

Beneath his chainmail, he wore a ragged old robe, light red and white, completely soaked with sweat in the autumn sunset. His face was also covered in cold sweat, his long, messy gray hair was clumped together on his rough cheeks by the sweat, looking rather comical.

But his most distinguishing feature was not these, but the crooked smile on his stubbled face, the lifted side almost reaching his ear.

"Lord Fighter, I am the leader of the local bounty hunters, known as crooked-mouthed. I had the honor to witness your Blood Crow Strike when you hunted the Third Rank bristle pig."

His words were stiff, obviously rehearsed several times. However, the name "Blood Crow Strike" was quite aptly chosen, and since Rayan had not yet thought of a name for the technique, he decided to call it "Blood Crow Strike."

Thinking this, Rayan's stern expression softened slightly, but his tone remained uncompromising, "If you're here about the ownership of that Third Rank game, then we have nothing to discuss."

"No no no!"

The crooked-mouthed leader hurriedly waved his hand, "My lord, you misunderstand. Normally, if someone steals our game, we would complain a bit, but since witnessing your Blood Crow Strike, not one of us resented it; that Third Rank bristle pig rightly belongs to you."

Rayan looked at the crooked-mouthed leader curiously, "If it's not about that Third Rank bristle pig, then what is there to talk about?"

"My lord..."

The crooked-mouthed leader forced a smile, his mouth twisting even more severely as he stuttered, "We mean no offense, just wanted to ask—um... when... when are you leaving?"

"Tomorrow." Rayan replied directly.

The crooked-mouthed leader breathed a sigh of relief, "Tomorrow is good, a lucky day, sunny and bright."

Rayan calmly continued, "But before I leave, I will clear out the mature bristle pigs from this hunting spot."

"Clear... out?"

The crooked-mouthed leader's legs went limp as if melting snow, "You don't mean—"

Rayan nodded, "All the mature bristle pigs here, I'm going to kill."

This statement struck the crooked-mouthed leader like an icicle piercing his heart and lungs, leaving him breathless, his body stumbling backwards several steps.

The bounty hunter teams, usually not getting along, had gathered together and chosen him to negotiate with Rayan because they did not want Rayan to kill all the Second Rank bristle pigs, leaving them nothing. So, when he bluntly stated he was going to "monopolize" the area, the crooked-mouthed leader felt like crashing into a wall and dying.

However, carrying the trust of several teams, he naturally couldn't give up so easily. After taking a few seconds to compose himself, he put on a forced smile and asked, "My lord, perhaps we can discuss this?"

"Can't."

Rayan shook his head coldly, "I must kill thirty-five more bristle pigs."

The crooked-mouthed leader nervously licked his cracked lips, speaking softly, "My lord, you might not be aware, but a low-level hunting spot only has about a hundred game animals, including many young ones that haven't grown up this year. We bounty hunters make our living from this, and one hunting spot can support over a hundred people like us. Low-level Fighters like us normally hunt without affecting the reproduction of Feral Beasts, so although we have many people, we probably kill fewer bristle pigs in a year than you just did in a while. If you clean out the entire hunting spot, it will be impossible to hunt here for a long time, and those of us who can only live by hunting Second Rank Feral Beasts would have to leave, spending a lot of time and money to find a new Second Rank hunting spot—and such places are often already taken. So many of us rushing over there would inevitably lead to bloodshed. So please, my lord, spare these bristle pigs, and spare us as well."

These were clearly not rehearsed words, but sincere ones from the heart. Rayan saw the honesty in the crooked-mouthed leader's eyes, and his arguments were logical; destroying a hunting spot indeed meant ruining the livelihoods of hundreds, and the resulting consequences could be even more severe.

"I understand what you're saying, but I'm sorry... I have my own reasons."

Rayan said calmly, "I can promise you, I'll try not to harm the young, not to harm the mother bristle pigs. Restoring the hunting spot's ecology indeed takes time, but it's better than being completely destroyed."