Chapter 460 - 401: Exposed

Chapter 460: Chapter 401: Exposed

In August, the plum rains over Jiangnan lingered, refusing to depart.

A fine, unending drizzle fell, as if woven from silk.

However, the gloomy rain could not disturb the Little World that lay behind the Kao Mountain Wall in the slightest.

Rain, snow, hail—all tangible forces of nature were blocked by a barrier, kept at bay.

On the North Slope of the Little World, nestled by mountains and water, lay a village. Hundreds of houses were scattered about, crisscrossed by footpaths. The crowing of roosters and barking of dogs could be heard, painting the picture of a secluded paradise.

Over four thousand people lived here, the only populated area in this Little World for more than a decade.

But at this moment, the village was plunged into unprecedented chaos.

"Hurry up! What are you dawdling for?"

"Forget those pots and pans! And those rags! Just leave it all behind!"

"You old coot, stop your caterwauling! If you don’t get moving, don’t blame me when I get rough!"

Villagers in mismatched clothes, their faces filled with panic and confusion, were herded toward the village entrance by squads of Celestial Sword Sect disciples.

Cries of grief, curses, pleas for mercy, and the wails of frightened children all mingled together.

Many dragged their families along, carrying meager bundles on their backs.

Others clung desperately to the trees and doorframes of their homes, refusing to budge an inch.

"I’m not leaving! I’ll die before I leave! Just let me die here!"

The hoarse cries of an old man with salt-and-pepper hair were particularly jarring.

"When my son brought me here, he said this was a place where we could live in peace! This field... I tilled it myself, one shovelful at a time. This house... I built it myself, one log at a time..."

A flicker of impatience crossed the eyes of the Celestial Sword Sect disciple in charge of the eviction.

He ignored the old man’s protests and simply gave a pointed look to a fellow disciple.

The other disciple understood. With a blank expression, he stepped forward and chopped the old man on the side of the neck.

The old man’s frantic shouts cut off abruptly. His head slumped to one side as he fell unconscious.

The two disciples deftly hoisted the unconscious man and tossed him into a waiting ox-cart.

Similar scenes were playing out all across the village.

The Celestial Sword Sect disciples’ methods were simple, direct, and even brutal.

They dealt with the crying elderly, women, and children who refused to leave with harsh rebukes or threats of violence. As for those who resisted fiercely or threatened to take their own lives, the disciples simply subdued and knocked them unconscious.

And these people, about to be driven from their homeland, had a rather special background.

The vast majority of them were the immediate family of the core members of the former Seven Kills Association.

Years ago, after the Seven Kills Ancestor had taken control of this Little World, he established a rule to maintain absolute control over his band of desperadoes.

Any member of the Seven Kills Association who wasn’t a true orphan—with no parents and utterly alone—was required to move their parents, wives, children, and even their extended family into this Little World to live.

The purpose of this rule was twofold. First, it was a way to control the members; their families were effectively hostages. Anyone considering betrayal would first have to consider the fate of their loved ones.

Second, the Little World’s 300,000 mu of land and forest needed people to cultivate and manage it. You couldn’t very well expect a gang of assassins, who spent their days contemplating how to kill people, to tend to crops.

This rule was enforced with absolute thoroughness.

For those who were willing, it was a simple matter.

For those who were not, the Seven Kills Association had countless ways to *make* them willing.

Of course, for many members, moving their families into the Little World was also a form of protection in disguise.

After all, they were mostly involved in shady dealings like assassination. If their identities were exposed, they might be able to flee to the ends of the earth, but the family they left behind would never escape the wrath of their enemies or the retribution of the Government Office.

Over the years, the families of more than two thousand Seven Kills Association members had moved here.

After more than a decade of growth and procreation, the population of this North Slope village had gradually swelled to over four thousand.

They farmed and raised their families here. While they paid rents and taxes comparable to those in the outside world, they were spared the endless, layered, and exorbitant levies and heavy corvées of the outside. They lived a life that, while not wealthy, was relatively stable and peaceful, isolated from the world’s conflicts.

The Seven Kills Association controlled the only way in and out of the Little World, a secret unknown even to its ordinary members and most of its mid-level leadership.

And because of this, when the Seven Kills Association’s headquarters was recently raided and nearly annihilated in a joint attack by the Hai Jiao Bang and the Saltwater Bang, the few who managed to escape were powerless to enter the Little World and rescue their families.

As for Feng Suiyun and Hua Wuxin, their families had all perished long ago back in the Southern Border; they were truly and completely alone in the world.

The four thousand relatives of the Association’s members in the North Slope Village were no kith or kin to them. Their survival was, naturally, of no concern to the pair.

Now, the Little World had changed hands.

The Celestial Sword Sect and the Su Family had joined forces to seize the territory, becoming the de facto rulers of this 300,000-mu domain.

Once they understood the origins of these thousands of villagers, what to do with them became a thorny issue.

Keeping them was out of the question.

These people bore the brand of the Seven Kills Association. More importantly, they were a liability who knew of the Little World’s existence.

If the two factions wanted to maintain complete control of the Little World, they could not tolerate the existence of any such destabilizing elements.

But the question of how to dispose of them gave both sides a headache.

If it were four thousand Jianghu vagrants or remnants of the Seven Kills Association, killing them would be a simple matter. Neither the Celestial Sword Sect nor the Su Family were strangers to bloodshed; they wouldn’t so much as bat an eye.

But as it happened, these four thousand people were all ordinary commoners.

They may have benefited indirectly, but at the end of the day, they were not part of the Jianghu, much less wicked villains.

The Celestial Sword Sect prided itself on being a righteous and prestigious sect. Even though they were no strangers to dirty dealings in secret, they still had to maintain their public image.

If they were to massacre four thousand unarmed civilians, the news, were it to leak, would undoubtedly cause a massive uproar in the Jianghu. The blow to the Celestial Sword Sect’s reputation would be devastating.