I am the Ruler of the Kingdom of Mysterious-Chapter 137 - 111: Burning the Bandit Lair

In the bandit lair.

After nightfall, all living people returned indoors, the doors adorned with talismans were tightly shut, releasing all white-haired zombies to wander and guard the fortress.

Deep within the bandit lair, in a hall built upon the hillside, various fire pits were lit to illuminate the place. Over fifty bandits on their day off sat around in groups, holding wine jars, eating meat ravenously, drinking wine heartily, and causing a ruckus.

At the head position, a burly man with a scarred face, his waist adorned with a ring-headed saber, sat on a stone seat draped in tiger skin, raising a wine bowl high.

"Brothers, drink deeply!"

"To the Big Boss!"

All the bandits drank the strong liquor in their bowls, laughing heartily.

In front of the Big Boss lay the loot from the recent robbery, along with over twenty prisoners, confined in a wooden cage beside the hall by a group of knife-wielding bandits.

All around the floor were sticky, greasy bloodstains, with a large pit in front of the cage, and several blood-stained wooden barrels next to it, the stench of rotting bodies emanating from the pit.

Kou Yushan huddled among the crowd; as he came in earlier, he saw five coffins weighed down with chains at the bottom of the pit.

Two bandits struck the cage with knives, watching the people inside scream in terror, laughing viciously.

Most of the escort agency’s masters were killed; the remaining ones were merchants who had traveled with the escort company’s team to Wangshan City, and men and women were separated and confined.

Unlike other bandits, this group did not touch the women, instead guarding them strictly, as if they had other uses for them.

The cage door confining the men was opened, and a small-framed young man was roughly pulled out and thrown to the ground.

"Look at this skinny little chick; do you think he can fill half a barrel with blood?"

The bandit holding the frail man jokingly asked those around him, and the other bandits laughed and jeered.

"Probably not even half a barrel."

"Maybe half a barrel of piss, hahaha."

The frail man trembled all over, crying and begging pitifully.

"Don’t kill me; I have money at home. Send a message to my family, and my parents will bring money. Don’t kill me, please, I’m begging you."

The bandit dragged the frail man to the wooden barrel, kicked him down, and slashed his throat with a knife.

"Ah!!!"

The caged people screamed in terror as the frail man was bled into the wooden barrel, his hair held like a slaughtered chicken.

"Next!"

Another older man was dragged out, wetting his pants in fear, kneeling and begging, but to no avail.

Screams, cries, and pleas filled the air, drawing laughter from the bandits, who were used to such scenes, continuing to eat meat and drink wine as they pleased.

Once a barrel was filled, someone picked it up and poured the contents over the five coffins at the bottom of the pit.

Bang! Bang!

The coffin lids shuddered, and low, beast-like growls came from within.

Sitting at the top, Big Boss Xiong Yi picked up the black bell beside him and shook it, immediately silencing the noise inside the coffins.

A middle-aged man in a scholar’s robe next to Xiong Yi smiled obsequiously, "Big Boss, our Second Master Qu is really something, coming up with this fast corpse-raising method, it only takes a month to raise a white-haired zombie. In a few years, the Evil Suppression Bureau won’t be able to handle us!"

Xiong Yi laughed proudly, "It’s a pity Second Master Qu isn’t willing, otherwise I’d let him take my position as Big Boss."

"Big Boss, is our Second Master Qu really... the ’Bell Doctor’?" the middle-aged scholar asked tentatively.

Xiong Yi’s drinking paused, snorting with laughter, "Everyone thinks so, so it must be! Go send some more good wine and meat to Second Master Qu and tell him there’s a new batch of women for him to choose from."

"Aye! I’ll get to it right away."

At the doorway of the hall, two bandits clinked wine jars; just as they were about to drink, one sniffed the air, looking puzzled.

"What’s that strange smell, did you smell it?"

The other responded nonchalantly, "Blood, piss, and the stench of corpses, what else? Come on, drink!"

They tilted their heads back to drink, not noticing the smoke and strange liquid flowing in under the door.

Over by the cages, five people had been taken out in succession. Kou Yushan, unable to watch any longer, stepped in front when the two bandits came for more.

Kou Yushan ducked his head out of the cage, stood upright, and the snub-nosed bandit felt a large shadow envelop him, looking up at the taller, more imposing Kou Yushan, and burst into laughter.

"Wow, a big guy hiding in there? Brother, interested in staying and living the good life up here in the mountains with us?"

Kou Yushan was momentarily stunned; he had thought if he were to die, he’d die standing. But these bandits pulled such a trick on him?

"Are you in or out? Give a straightforward answer!"

Just as Kou Yushan pondered what to do, the hall’s door was suddenly slammed open. A bandit, with an arrow lodged in his body, dashed in frantically.

"Big Boss, it’s bad! The Evil Suppression Bureau brought hundreds of Night Travelers and charged in!"

At this, the entire venue fell silent, and everyone paused mid-drink, until Xiong Yi, seated at the head, burst into a furious tirade.

"What nonsense are you spouting? The Evil Suppression Bureau Night Travelers? Hundreds of them? There aren’t even twenty Night Travelers in the whole of Wangshan City!"

Hearing this, the bandit at the door gradually restrained his expression, turning into a face devoid of emotion.

"Sorry, I’m not very familiar with the Evil Suppression Bureau."

The appearance of a bandit, but the voice of a woman, calm and indifferent, this bizarre situation once again left everyone dumbstruck, staring as the bandit at the door took out a flint.

Whoosh—

A breath blew out a bright flame, casually tossed to the side.

Boom!

The two massive wooden doors instantly erupted into a roaring fire, and the bandit at the doorway transformed into a gray mist, vanishing suddenly.

Through the burning doors, all the bandits could finally see that the lair outside had already been engulfed in a sea of flames. Many white-haired zombies were scorched by the fire, letting out painful howls.

Before this, they hadn’t heard a sound!

And this fire, it burned too fiercely, too quickly, stronger than normal kerosene!

"Quick! Close the door, put out the fire!"

Xiong Yi stood up with an angry shout, and only then did the bandits at the door react. The hall’s door had talismans that could prevent the white-haired zombies outside from charging in.

Now the doors were wide open, burning, the talismans lost their function, and the hall’s heavy scent of blood wafted out. The seventy or eighty white-haired zombies wandering outside, like starving ghosts, poured towards them.

The man rushing to close the door was caught off guard, grabbed by two white-haired zombies, and had his throat bitten through, blood splattering everywhere.

Bang!

A large wine jar bizarrely flew up, smashing into the fire basin with a crash, the splashing wine igniting fiercely, instantly enveloping several bandits nearby.

The gray mist flitted around the hall, dodging left and right, moving forward and back. The wine jars flew chaotically, the fire burned hotter and fiercer, more and more white-haired zombies lunged inside.

Some white-haired zombies were still soaked with the gasoline Sang Que had splashed on, indiscriminately slaughtering without distinguishing friend from foe.

The scene descended into chaos.

Sang Que spread the Evil Mist, concealed within to remain unseen, using the capability of Evil Mist Instant Teleportation to set fires throughout the hall. The moment everyone’s attention was drawn, Kou Yushan seized a bandit’s arm in front of him, using the bandit’s knife to slit his throat.

The surrounding bandits reacted, swinging their knives to chop, but several locks of black hair darted like the wind, springing from the ground, and in the blink of an eye, twisted the necks of those bandits.

Along the way, Xia Chan had practiced twisting the force of her hair with branches and stones; now stones couldn’t break under her skill, but with the technique Sang Que taught, she could twist and snap logs as thick as a person with one move.

Xia Chan’s head was hidden in the darkness, her face completely covered by her hair to avoid being seen. She used her hair to hook Kou Yushan’s hand, signaling him to follow her.

Kou Yushan immediately understood, slashing open the cage door and releasing everyone inside, turning to follow the path marked by Little Chan’s black hair to escape from the less crowded side.

The ones behind, panic-stricken, stumbled and crawled after them. When encountering a white-haired zombie, Little Chan could only prioritize ensuring the safety of the Kou Yushan she cared about, leaving the others to fend for themselves.

"Everyone scatter, splash the black dog blood!"

Xiong Yi stood deep in the hall, shouting loudly, and the chaotic bandits immediately ran towards the edges of the hall, which was naturally uneven rocky ground, with exposed stones.

Once the bandits found their shelters, they hurriedly tore away the bamboo tubes filled with black dog blood from their bodies, but instead of splashing it on the white-haired zombies charging in, they poured the whole tube over their own heads.

Black dog blood holds quite a deterrent power against white-haired zombies; those zombies immediately distanced themselves from the bandits drenched in black dog blood, instead assaulting the group frantically fleeing outside.

Jingle jingle jingle!

Xiong Yi fiercely shook the Corpse Control Bell, and a great sound emerged from the deep pit in the center of the hall, with five blood-stained coffin lids rising into the air.

Entirely black, with skin shriveled like tree bark, five black zombies rose straight from the coffins. With a powerful jump, they leaped out of the ten-meter-deep pit, accurately lunging towards Sang Que hidden within the Evil Mist.

Sang Que paused on a high ground, glanced at Xiong Yi in the distance continuously shaking the bell to control the black zombies, simultaneously releasing the Yin Child, quickly taking out the copper mirror and flipping it downward.

"Hey!"

Sang Que shouted loudly, and all the bandits and pursuing black zombies looked up at her.

Silently, twenty-something suicide ropes looped over the necks of the five black zombies and several nearby bandits, instantly hoisting them to the ceiling.