There is a god in the sky

Chapter 424 Own People

Shen Lan watched as the people on both sides slowly approached.

She saw Little Tiger hiding behind the burly man and made a gesture with his outstretched arm.

The burly man approached her, gave her a smirk, and spoke with a hint of sarcasm.

"I've heard that Miss Shen is just as capable as any man, but I think she's nothing special."

He pulled out his belt to tie Shen Lan up, but Shen Lan took the opportunity to raise her leg and kick him hard in the groin.

The other person realized her intention and subconsciously squeezed his legs together, but Shen Lan held a thin needle between her ten fingers and stabbed it into the top of his head.

The burly man rolled his eyes back and fell to the ground.

A whooshing sound came from behind. Shen Lan quickly crouched down, and the young man next to Xiao Huzi fired an arrow in their direction.

A scream came from behind.

Shen Lan had already dodged to the corner of the wall and saw a man behind her with an arrow stuck in his forehead.

"Sister Shen!" Little Tiger ran towards her.

Just as he was about to give her a big hug, Shen Lan dodged it.

She grabbed Xiaohuzi by the collar and asked, "Explain yourself! What happened? How did you get here?"

"This is not the place to talk, Miss Shen, please come with us."

The speaker was the young man who had just shot the arrow. Shen Lan had seen him before; he was one of the fake Taoist priests who surrounded and killed Zhou Ru at the City God Temple.

Shen Lan followed them through a maze of twists and turns until they arrived at a dilapidated temple, so dilapidated that even beggars would turn their backs on it.

“Miss Shen is so clever, she should be able to guess our identities. I am Wu Yong. We were ordered by our master to kill Magistrate Zhou in Tongzhou, and then we waited here for Miss Shen to travel south, and escorted you all the way to Lingnan.”

"Is this how he arranged his affairs after his death? Then who were those two people just now?"

Wu Yong and the others did not know that Li Ge was not dead, let alone that he was nearby.

Li Ge had clearly instructed them beforehand not to hold anything back from Shen Lan.

So they told Shen Lan what happened after they left the capital. As for the two people from earlier, they were former guards of Princess Zheng.

The King of Zheng's family all drowned in the river. The families of the King's wife and the Princess Consort were both powerful.

Although they cannot overthrow the current emperor, it would be easy for them to take revenge on those around him.

If Shen Lan hadn't left the capital, it wouldn't have been easy for them to harm people in the capital.

But once Shen Lan left the capital, she fell into a massive assassination plot.

“There is a bounty on you, Miss Shen, in the martial arts world, with a reward of five thousand taels of silver. Since you left the capital, your whereabouts can be bought in many places.”

Shen Lan was genuinely surprised.

In this era without surveillance, it's highly unlikely that everyone would recognize her, so how did they manage to track her?

"Then you underestimate people from the martial arts world. Wherever there are people, there is the martial arts world."

Perhaps the tea stall owner you bought from, the passerby you asked for directions from, or the hostel you stayed at—anyone could sell your information.

"So you deliberately took this job in an attempt to undermine the enemy from within?"

"Yes, we happened to be staying in Qian County and learned of your upcoming arrival. We deliberately released bait to lure that family into the trap, which led to the ambush in the alley."

Little Tiger grinned and said, "Sister Shen, we saved your life this time, right? Is there any reward?"

Shen Lan could see their loyalty to Li Ge.

Perhaps leaving Lige meant a wider world for them, more freedom, and less danger.

However, now that she is returning to her hometown with Li Ge, she doesn't know what unexpected things might happen on the way.

"Would you be willing to escort me back to my hometown? The reward is one thousand taels of silver."

Escorting people is a business for the security escort agency, and a thousand taels is considered a large sum of money.

Xiao Hu chuckled awkwardly, "Please, no, I was just joking. Protecting you is our responsibility."

Shen Lan shook her head. She had no relation to them, so what responsibility did she have?

"If what you say is true, and my whereabouts have been exposed, then my companions are probably not safe either. We need to hurry back."

"You mean Brother Li Ye? Hey, who can beat him?"

Shen Lan didn't say much. She asked them to take her to the pharmacy, where she bought some essential medicinal herbs, and then returned.

When they arrived at the village entrance, Wu Yong and the others were stunned.

"Isn't this village... this place all empty?"

"You know this place?"

"I know. A few days ago, a group of refugees came to the county town. They said they were from this village and that the heavy snow had destroyed their houses. They had nowhere to go, so they went to the county government to ask the magistrate to take them in."

The magistrate of Qian County was a very kind man. He arranged for them to stay in the city, providing them with two meals of rice a day, all they could eat. We all wanted to go in and get a meal.

Shen Lan led them to their temporary residence.

Although the house was not small, it couldn't accommodate so many people, so they were told to find a place to stay in the village.

We're all just wandering the world; all we need is a place to shelter from the wind and rain.

Li Ye was equally surprised to see them, but even more so, he was delighted.

When he heard about the bounty, he immediately regretted not accompanying Shen Lan into the city.

If she hadn't encountered Wu Yong and his group, Shen Lan might not have escaped this fate.

"Go inside, I'll take you to see someone."

Shen Lan hesitated on the way, wondering whether to let them come into contact with Li Ge.

Li Ge was different from them; he was a death row inmate and should have been dead.

If even a hint of news that he was still alive leaked out, they would all be doomed.

There were seven of them in total, the oldest being in his early twenties and the youngest, Xiaohuzi, not even fifteen.

Shen Lan thought to herself: Since Li Ge can rely on them, he must trust them wholeheartedly.

Even so, she was willing to trust them this once.

"My God... isn't this our boss?" Little Tiger asked, rubbing his eyes hard.

Wu Yong and the others stared at Li Ge for a long time, unable to believe their eyes.

When Wu Yong noticed that he was not moving, he reached out to check his breathing and jumped up in fright.

"Dead...dead person?"

This caused quite a stir.

Several people surrounded Li Ge's "corpse," fiddling with it in various ways, unable to believe the fact.

Shen Lan coughed, reminding the person who was about to strip Li Ge of his clothes, "Don't touch him, he's not completely dead yet."

"what for?"

Shen Lan talked about Li Ge's case and the fake death drug she gave him.

"We'll know whether he'll wake up in three more days."

"So, he's been dead for four days?"

Seeing Shen Lan nod, the others expressed disbelief, and some even touched Li Ge's skin.

They've killed many people and seen many dead bodies; they know all too well what a corpse looks like if left unattended for too long.

The corpse in front of me looks just like a sleeping person.

"Such a miraculous medicine exists in the world!"

"We need to travel early tomorrow morning. There will be three of us in one carriage, so you'd better go and buy some horses too."

They had just run back from the county town at a speed similar to that of Shen Lan on horseback.

Although their endurance was evident, the journey from Qian County to Qingmu County was more than a few hundred miles.

Wu Yong smiled and said, "We don't need to buy horses; we can just steal a few."

Shen Lan quickly stopped them and gave them several silver notes.

"At critical times, it's better to do less than more."

"Alright, we'll do as Miss Shen says."