Seeing his men itching for a fight, Brother Meng drew a steel knife from his waist too. "Ning Zhe, I gave you a way out, but don't mistake that for fear. Since you won't take the offer I'm giving you, don't blame me for what comes next."
"Careful, these guys aren't ordinary thugs." Seeing the knife in Brother Meng's hand, Ning Zhe's expression turned cold at once.
There was no law in the refugee zone, no one to keep order, but the stronghold kept an iron grip on weapons out here. Any refugee caught carrying a firearm faced public hanging as serious punishment, which meant blades had become the most common weapon around. Ning Zhe could tell at a glance that the knife in Brother Meng's hand was finely made steel. In a place this starved of resources, anyone who carried a real metal blade was no ordinary man.
"Brothers! Get them!" The narrow-eyed man, gripping his spiked club, had already run out of patience. The moment Brother Meng gave the order, he charged forward without hesitation.
"Whoosh!"
The instant the attack began, Lin Xun drew his bowstring taut and loosed an arrow at the pair on his side, dropping one man instantly, then switched to his bone knife and charged the other.
"Whumph!"
At that same moment, the narrow-eyed man closed in on Ning Zhe and swung the club straight at his head, but Ning Zhe leaned back and caught the man's arm with a reverse grip.
"Squelch!"
"Squelch!"
Two knife strikes, smooth as flowing water, both landed square in the narrow-eyed man's chest. Ning Zhe's fighting style was brutally efficient, honed entirely through years of hunting. Against a dangerous beast, every strike had to land true and lethal, or the next second, it would be his own life on the line.
"Whoosh!"
At the same time, Brother Meng charged in, swinging his steel knife toward Ning Zhe's chest. Ning Zhe caught the motion just in time, stepping back half a pace on instinct, the blade opening a gash across the front of his shirt.
"Damn it!" Brother Meng, missing his first strike, thrust the knife toward Ning Zhe's throat next.
"Tramp, tramp!"
Ning Zhe shifted sideways, dodging the blade's path with ease, then swung his left arm up, driving a punch at the man's face. But Brother Meng turned out to be no stranger to fighting either, his own movements unusually quick. As Ning Zhe threw the punch, he dropped low and drove his shoulder into Ning Zhe's stomach, aiming for a takedown.
Ning Zhe's reflexes proved sharper still. As the man dropped low, Ning Zhe drove his knee up hard, catching him square in the shoulder.
"Thud!"
The knee slammed brutally into Brother Meng's shoulder, cutting off his charge, and as the man reeled back, Ning Zhe followed with an uppercut that landed solidly against the side of his jaw.
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"Thud!"
The blow sent Brother Meng crashing onto his back. Before he could react, Ning Zhe was already on top of him, wrapping both arms around his lower leg, and using the full weight of his body, wrenched it sharply to one side.
"Crack!"
A sharp snap sounded from Brother Meng's knee joint.
"Aaargh!"
A scream tore through the length of the alley an instant later.
Seeing this, the two remaining thugs turned and fled. The narrow-eyed man Ning Zhe had already killed, and Brother Meng now writhing on the ground, had been the strongest fighters of the group, undefeated in one-on-one brawls throughout the settlement for years.
"Thud!"
Just as Brother Meng went down, Lin Xun finished off another man across the alley behind them.
Ning Zhe twisted his wrist, laying the edge of his knife against Brother Meng's throat.
"You can't kill me! If I die, my brother won't let this go!" Brother Meng, staring up at the man the settlement called a walking death omen, forced down the searing pain in his leg and spoke with false bravado. "My name's Xiao Meng! Xiao Qi of the Black Banner Gang is my own brother! Kill me, and he'll come after you, guaranteed!"
Hearing the threat, Ning Zhe's eyes narrowed at once. "Xiao Xun! Go after the other two! Don't let them get away!"
"Got it!" Lin Xun scooped up his longbow off the ground and vanished at once toward the mouth of the alley. Watching him go, Ning Zhe felt a flicker of unease settle in.
Trouble had found them.
He knew of Xiao Qi. The man led the Black Banner Gang, which controlled the flesh trade throughout the settlement, running every one of the larger brothels in town. Plenty of the settlement's idle thugs gathered around Xiao Qi, and the gang would regularly head out in packs to the refugee villages beyond the settlement, hunting for good-looking boys and girls to swindle or outright kidnap and sell for profit.
In that moment, Ning Zhe felt a genuine flash of regret.
Not regret over crossing Xiao Qi's brother, but regret that he hadn't found out who the man was sooner. Had he known, he never would have let the other two escape in the first place.
"Let's talk this over. Let me go now, and we call this whole thing like it never happened. I won't hold you responsible for hurting me either, deal?" Seeing Ning Zhe hesitate for a moment, Brother Meng pressed on.
"You really think I'd believe that?" Ning Zhe lowered his head, meeting Brother Meng's eyes, and let out a cold laugh. "A pack of thugs who'll kill women and children without a second thought, telling me you'll let bygones be bygones?"
"Then what do you want? Don't you know what kind of power my brother holds around here?!" Seeing that his threat hadn't shaken Ning Zhe in the slightest, Brother Meng's pupils shrank, his breath catching without his even realizing it.
Back when Brother Meng was still active in the gang, he'd once heard Xiao Qi warn the others that there were two forces in the east city not worth crossing.
The first was the Trapper Gang, led by Old Trap. The second was the band of hunters led by Ning Zhe. That was exactly why Brother Meng had been wary of Ning Zhe from the start. He'd never actually laid eyes on the man before, but word had it Ning Zhe's group had seven or eight fierce hunters in it. If he hadn't seen with his own eyes that there were only two of them today, and hadn't been egged on by the narrow-eyed man, he never would have dared take the risk.
"Squelch!"
Facing Brother Meng's demand, Ning Zhe gave no answer. In his place, the only response was the sound of the blade cutting through skin.
Ning Zhe didn't believe a word Brother Meng said, and had no faith at all that the man would actually let him go. Out here on the wasteland, trusting a stranger was gambling with your own life, and he'd already paid that price once before, at Li Bin's hands. Which was exactly why, this time, he trusted his own judgment far more.
As a hunter, more often than not, you weren't just choosing your prey. Your prey was choosing you right back.
Ning Zhe had killed more beasts than he could count, and by comparison, he found killing a man far simpler than killing an animal.
But even so, compared to beasts, it was people he feared more.
An animal showed you its intentions through action. A person hid their true purpose behind lies.