Suddenly Attacked

A tough but proud smile appeared on the old man's face as he chuckled, "Contrary to your thinking. We aren't celebrating any festival at all tonight. To be honest, it wasn't even a celebration for anything."

A confused expression appeared on Ken's face as he turned to look at the elder's midsection which was heavily bandaged, "Then where did you get your injuries from? Could it be from hunting the tiger?"

"Ah! Not at all, General. This injury came from a bandit attack that we had this evening," Haruto replied with a light smile as he brought his hand towards his ribs.

"Bandit attack?" Ken asked in surprise as he looked around at the scene that was playing out in front of him. This is definitely how a village that just had a bandit attack should be reacting. Even if they had successfully defended themselves from the bandits, it wouldn't have been able to be done without the loss of some villagers.

And yet, the villagers in front of him were all gathered around the campfire in cheerful smiles and hearty conversation… There were only two possible outcomes that happened, either they were all crazy and cared little about life or they managed to not lose a single life.

"It's not what you think, General," Haruto weakly laughed out as he could see the judgement in Ken's eyes.

"We were able to fend off the bandits without any loss of life…"

Ken's eyebrows raised at this statement as he heard it.

"How many bandits attacked?" Ken asked curiously, the next answer was going to determine if he was going to believe Haruto or not.

Hearing this question, Haruto immediately understood that Ken was still not buying his claim. He turned around to see his daughter in the queue and called out to her, "Shino, could you bring the gadget that we all used today?"

Seeing her nod and immediately go off into their house in search of something, Haruto turned his attention back to Ken and answered, "There were about fifty bandits in the attack."

Hearing this, there was a slight pause in Ken's movement, Haurot immediately knew that he was not at all going to believe him. He hurriedly reassured, "My Lord, I understand that this seems impossible to believe but please let me explain the whole story."

"We had a plan to deter any parties that would try to raid the village. It was created by two teens in the village. It involved using a smoke bomb that would expel a huge amount of smoke. We would throw this all over the village to block the visibility of the bandits."

Hearing this seemed to still confuse Ken as he spoke, "How are you able to see through the smoke?"

"Dad, I brought it, here it is," Shino's voice interrupted the intense questioning as she was seen lightly jogging out of the house with a strange cylindrical object.

She handed it to her father before quickly skipping off to join Shoma, who had been waiting for her, back in the queue.

Haruto immediately presented it to Ken and he began to observe it.

It was in the shape of a cylinder and seemed to be made out of bamboo with small vertical gaps for the smoke to escape through. The inside of the gadget was completely black in colour as if something had burned into it.

Seeing this, Ken was left more shaken than before. He had never seen such a smoke bomb before and it should not be possible for such a village to be able to afford such weapons.

"How did you get this?"

"It was made in the forest by two of our villagers," Haruto replied and continued, "Speaking of which, to answer your question, there were the only two who were able to see through the smoke. It was them that took out all the bandits."

Seeing this, Ken's shock rose to a peak, "You mean to tell me that only two villagers were able to take out fifty bandits on their own?"

"Yes, my Lord. They are our village's strongest and most bright males," Haruto replied as a proud look appeared in his eyes.

A moment of silence followed as Ken's interest in this village grew. To be able to take down fifty bandits would mean that their strength would already be able to overpower a garrison commander, they are both stronger than any militia that would come out from a training camp.

"Would you like for me to introduce them to you, sir?" Haruto asked immediately as he saw Ken's complicated expression that was followed by the silence.

"Yes, please," Ken replied immediately as a glint of curiosity appeared in his eyes.

The elder wasted no time and turned around, searching around the campfire for Isao. However, after a few glances, he found that he couldn't locate him. Fortunately, he saw a familiar figure that had just joined the queue for food.

"Oi! Riku!" he called out, gaining the attention of the short teenager who immediately turned to face them, "Where's Isao?"

"He's feeding the General's horses," Riku replied before waving two wooden plates in his hand, "I'm getting food for him as well."

"I'm sorry General, but it seems like you will have to wait for a little bit to meet him," Haruto told Ken, "As for the other boy, he's the person who just got his food served, Shoma."

Haruto pointed towards Shoma and Ken's gaze followed. The instant he saw Shoma he was shocked at how young Shoma looked. With his baggy cloth cloak that he was still wearing, Ken would not have guessed at all that he had the strength to take down twenty-five bandits on his own.

"Are you making a mockery of me?" Ken asked angrily as he refused to believe that such a young person from a village could have such strength at such a young age.

Hearing this, the elder immediately went into a panic as he did not expect Ken to be so disbelieving.

"You mean to tell me this Shoma teen is able to take out twenty-five bandits on his own?" Ken asked, this time in a louder voice as he was convinced that the elder was lying to him and trying to pull his leg.

"So what if he did?" Isao's voice sounded as he emerged from behind the elder's house.

"Nice to meet you, General Ken. I'm Isao Yubokumin," Isao greeted, his gleaming grey eyes staring right at Ken as he came and sat down next to them, "The person that you are talking about is my brother."

Hearing Isao introduce himself, Ken's angry tone immediately calmed down as he observed Isao.

"Haruto told me that you and your brother took down all the bandits"

"That would seem to be true," Isao blankly replied nonchalantly as he observed all of Ken's entourage.

"Come with me. I need to get something from the carriage," Ken spoke as he got up. His whole group were about to follow him and get up but they were immediately shot down by Ken who instructed, "Don't bother following me, go socialise with the people. It's not every day that you get to enjoy such a community."

Isao led Ken behind the elder's house where they had stored the carriage.

"Where are you from?" Ken asked with curiosity as he saw that Isao had stopped a few metres before the carriage, giving Ken some personal space to take out whatever he was going to take out.

"Why do you ask?" Isao replied back with a question curiously. However, as soon as he let out that question, his instincts flared up as an impending sense of danger flooded his nervous system. He immediately dashed backwards as Ken suddenly appeared where he was previously standing and led out a dangerous sword slash.

A cold look immediately appeared in Isao's eyes as he pulled out his dagger, taking a defensive stance.

As soon as he took a defensive stance, he saw Ken immediately dash towards him once again.

'Here he comes!' Isao thought as he hurriedly put up his defence to dodge Ken.

However, before he could even completely bring his dagger forward to redirect the incoming sword, Ken's sword has already arrived.

'Crap!' Isao's mind panicked as he immediately gave up on counter-attacking and dodged backwards. However, he was not able to completely dodge the attack as the tip of the sword had managed to leave a cut on the side of his leg.

Isao landed a metre away and just as he was about to relax, the attack from Ken came again as he slashed downwards, leaving him no breathing room. In that instant, Isao realised that he had to take this battle as if it was one of life and death, he could not afford to take it lightly at all.

Ken's sword came down crashing hard but before it could land, this time, he felt a tingle in his spine.

At that exact moment, Isao's eyes seemed to suddenly light up as they seemed to gain a shade of luminescence, Isao let out a ferocious roundhouse kick straight to Ken's left side.

Ken's body sent off warning signals in his head as he saw the incoming kick. He hurriedly brought his arms around to his side to shield his body with his arm and as he did this, he felt a sharp pain on his right arm.

The kick struck!

The impact of the kick immediately left his arms feeling rattled as he slid backwards one metre to completely cancel out the momentum carried by that kick.

A shocked expression appeared on his face as he could feel his arms being visibly shaken by such a strong kick. He could not believe that Isao would be able to counterattack him so strongly.

Seeing that he had interrupted the momentum of the fight, Isao quickly analysed what had just happened. He realised that Ken was many times stronger than the bandit leader that they had just killed. He could not take this lightly at all.

"No villager would have been able to take that attack and survive with as few injuries as you, much less counterattack," Ken spoke out as he brandished his sword as straightened his posture, "Now tell me, where are you from?"

"I'm from the Kingdom of Gam," Isao replied after a few seconds of silence as he bent his knees and took a different stance, "Why does that matter to you?"