Chapter 146: An Injury from a Conditioned Reflex

Chapter 146: Chapter 146: An Injury from a Conditioned Reflex

Rian Sinclair’s movements caught the attention of the man holding the whip. He barked at her, "Look up."

When Rian didn’t move, the man lashed out. With a sharp CRACK, the whip struck the ground. "Refusing to look up, huh?"

At that, Rian immediately raised her head. The man looked at her and laughed. "I didn’t expect you to be just a little girl. Have you had some training?"

Rian hesitated for a moment before shaking her head. Strictly speaking, she hadn’t received formal training, though she had secretly picked up a few moves here and there. At best, she was a half-baked amateur.

She wasn’t sure how she had provoked the man, but his smiling face instantly darkened. She met Jasper Rivers’s eyes for a split second before turning her head away, avoiding his gaze.

The next moment, the whip lashed toward her chest. Because she was standing slightly farther away, the strike missed her face. The tip of the whip merely scraped heavily from her chest down to her stomach.

Instantly, a burning pain flared across Rian’s chest. Sweat beaded on her forehead, and her expression was tight with endurance. There was nothing she could do but take it. If she dared to make another move, the surrounding guards would not hesitate to point their guns at her. Her earlier dodging had been a mere conditioned reflex, and at this moment, she absolutely loathed that reflex.

The man’s second strike didn’t fall on Rian. Instead, he turned to whip the others, venting the anger boiling inside him. Her abrupt movement had only drawn fleeting attention, nothing more. As the lashings continued, Rian kept a watchful eye on the guards, subtly dodging the whip whenever she could. Beside her, Jasper did the same. Although Jasper had previously managed to make the guards laugh, the moment they lost their tempers, he was beaten right alongside the rest of them.

As the whip-wielding man’s anger began to subside, the captive tied to a nearby tree slowly raised his hand and flipped him the middle finger.

Enraged, the man snatched a gun from a guard next to him and fired wildly at the captive on the tree, sending a flock of birds scattering into the forest sky. He then threw the gun onto the ground and glared at the rest of the prisoners, grinding his teeth. "If I catch anyone trying to escape or snitch, your fate will be worse than his!"

His voice boomed, seemingly venting his remaining fury. Another guard stepped up to stop him. "That’s enough. If you make too much noise and attract the military, and the Lord finds out..."

The man angrily shook off the guard’s hand but refrained from doing anything else. Rian was too far away to hear them clearly, but reading their lips, she noticed they seemed to be saying the word "Lord."

She wondered, "Lord? Who is this Lord? Is it a code name for their boss?"

Rian turned her head to look at Jasper, only to catch a dark, brooding look in his eyes. It seemed highly likely that Jasper knew of this "Lord"—or perhaps he was here specifically for him. At this point, Rian was incredibly curious about what Jasper used to do for a living, and what his true background was.

Around eleven o’clock that night.

Rian leaned against the iron cage to rest. Beside her, Jasper leaned in and whispered, "The schedule has been moved up."

Rian didn’t respond. Considering she was already locked inside the cage, wasn’t it painfully obvious that the timeline had been accelerated? It was probably because of the man who had tried to escape earlier today.

Jasper’s voice sounded again. "Another group will be arriving soon. They’re a fresh batch, so they’ll take up the cages, which means we’ll get to walk on foot. The handover period is the best time to run.

"There are a lot of kids and adults, but they’re short on manpower. They’re just relying on their guns to intimidate everyone. Under the moonlight, that outfit of yours will blend perfectly into the darkness."

Jasper looked at her originally blue clothes, which had now darkened significantly. He looked somewhat guilty. Rian didn’t understand what he was blaming himself for. It wasn’t even her own jacket; she had stripped it off a corpse. However, the blood on it didn’t solely belong to someone else. Most of it was her own. After all, that whip strike in the afternoon had split her skin wide open.

After hearing Jasper out, Rian nodded silently. Time quickly ticked by, and they soon met up with the other group. However, the number of new arrivals was fifty percent higher than what Rian and Jasper had estimated.

The two of them were fraught with worry, mentally calculating their chances of a safe escape. "Sixty percent," Jasper whispered.

Hearing him, Rian couldn’t help but curl her lips into a smirk. "Seventy percent. I have a seventy percent chance of getting away. Don’t underestimate me."

Jasper turned his head, taking in the absolute confidence radiating from Rian’s expression. He believed her. She never made empty boasts and never acted without being certain.

The two carefully monitored the guards’ movements. The moment Rian was finally let out of the cage, she felt an immense wave of relief. Immediately after, more children were shoved inside.

Rian watched as the cage, which was only meant to hold a few people, was packed to the brim. The remaining captives were practically crammed in by force. It was like a suitcase being aggressively stuffed with clothes, tightly compressed until it was utterly airtight.

Looking at the crowd, Rian knew full well that many would die on this journey. Under these conditions, plenty of them would be crushed, trampled, or suffocated to death.

Jasper nudged Rian with his elbow. She turned to look at him, and he silently shook his head. Rian retracted her gaze. She wasn’t about to do anything stupid.

A few burly guards stood nearby, discussing the arrangements. "Are you sure it’s okay to let these kids walk outside? What if they make a run for it? Maybe we should just stuff them all in."

Another man shook his head. "No need. The ones in the cages are a fresh batch, so obviously we need to torture them a bit first to break their spirits. As for the ones walking with us, we’ve had them for weeks. We’ve already beaten any thought of escaping out of them.

"Yeah, just keep the new ones locked up. These brats outside can’t cause any real trouble anyway. They’re just a bunch of underaged runts. You really think they can pull off anything major?"

The man’s tone was full of disdain. After all, kids who had been beaten into submission were the most obedient. Besides, what kind of child could possibly escape under such harsh conditions? The guards continued to flatter each other and chat. Since they were pressed for time, they didn’t entertain any wicked thoughts of toying with the kids. They just wanted to arrive early, hand over the captives, and go off to enjoy their own free time.

The large convoy began to move. During this time, Jasper slipped away to do God-knows-what. Shortly after, a commotion broke out in the iron cages as the children inside began wailing.

Kids were prone to crying, and once one started, the rest followed suit in a domino effect. The burly guards yelled at them to shut up, but surprisingly, the louder they roared, the more the children cried. Given the situation, they didn’t dare fire their guns. If the headcount fell short at the handover, the guards would be the ones to suffer the consequences.

Soon, a figure appeared beside Rian. She looked at Jasper. "Was this your doing?"

Hearing her question, Jasper chuckled. "I just told them the truth."

"What did you say?"

"Just that they would never see their mommies and daddies again, never go home again, never play with their favorite toys again, and never eat delicious candy again."