Chapter Ninety-Three: You Are Utterly Foolish

The moment Wei Ruo saw the three of them, the two men and Wei Yilin saw her as well.

Wei Ruo quickly regained her composure. Her gaze turned away coolly, as though she did not know Wei Yilin at all.

She acted like nothing more than a passerby, pretending she had failed to recognize Wei Yilin and the two men beside him as kidnappers, and continued walking on with no sign of alarm.

The two men watched her warily. Seeing that nothing in her expression had changed, that she had not recognized them, they gradually relaxed.

So long as they had not been discovered, they would follow the principle that fewer troubles were better than more, and would not lay a hand on a random passerby.

Wei Ruo turned naturally, reversed direction, and began walking back.

At the same time, she kept pleading inwardly: Little ancestor, do not make a sound. Do not call out to me. Pretend you did not see me! If you keep quiet, I will go back and bring people to save you! If you speak up, we are all finished!

Seeing that Wei Ruo had clearly noticed him, yet turned around and left, Wei Yilin, who had never sincerely called Wei Ruo “Big Sister” before, shouted at the top of his lungs, “Big Sister!”

Wei Ruo froze. A chill ran through her from head to toe.

While cursing Wei Yilin in her heart for being a worthless idiot, she broke into a run.

But after only a few steps, one of the men caught her.

“Don’t use force, don’t use force, I’ll walk myself!” Wei Ruo feared he might treat her brutally, and hurried to beg for mercy.

This was a barren, open stretch of land. The odds that someone would immediately appear if she cried for help were vanishingly small, and if no one came in time, her refusal to cooperate would only bring violence, and she might even lose her life on the spot.

Wei Ruo wanted to live, and if she could suffer less flesh-wounding pain, she would suffer less. So she very obediently surrendered.

The man dragged Wei Ruo over to Wei Yilin, and they tied the two of them up together.

Then the two men spoke to each other in a language Wei Yilin did not understand.

Wei Ruo had a rough idea that they were speaking the language of the Wa country. In fact, the very first time she saw the two men, she had already guessed their identity as Japanese pirates.

Though they had covered the distinctive pirate hairstyle with headcloths, their build and appearance were worlds apart from the gaunt commoners working to reclaim the land in the south of the city.

After a brief discussion, the two Japanese men escorted Wei Ruo and Wei Yilin up the mountain.

The two pirates found a cave, only about one or two meters deep and more than a meter high, barely enough to fit two adults.

Then they tossed Wei Ruo and Wei Yilin inside as though they were objects.

Once they were confined in the cave, Wei Ruo looked at Wei Yilin across from her and smiled. “Well, now we can die together.”

“It was your own cold-heartedness. You saw me in danger and did nothing, then turned around and tried to leave.” Wei Yilin did not think there was anything wrong with himself at all; in fact, he even felt a faint sense of satisfaction.

At that, Wei Ruo smiled again.

“What are you laughing at?” Wei Yilin said unhappily. At a time like this, how could she still be in the mood to laugh?

“I used to think you were only a little stupid. Now I realize you are completely foolish.”

“Who are you calling foolish?”

“Aren’t you foolish? In that situation, how was I supposed to rescue you from two skilled pirates by myself? Am I some kind of deity? If I pretended not to know you, and they saw that I showed no reaction, they would assume I had not realized they were kidnappers and let me go. Once I got away, I could bring reinforcements back to save you. Which do you think has a better chance of succeeding: me rescuing you alone, or bringing Wei family guards and the authorities together to save you?”

Wei Yilin was left speechless by her questions.

At the time, he had truly thought Wei Ruo had walked away because she was heartless and unfeeling. If it had been Sister Wanwan, she never would have done such a thing. But he had never considered the way Wei Ruo proposed to handle the problem.

Yet after thinking it over carefully, Wei Ruo’s method really was more effective. Because whether it was Wei Ruo or his Sister Wanwan, neither of them could possibly have the ability to rescue him from the hands of two ruthless pirates. In such a situation, going to fetch help was obviously far more useful.

Wei Yilin realized he had acted rashly, but in front of Wei Ruo, he refused to admit his mistake.

“So what if that’s the case? Who knows whether you would really have gone to find people to save me after leaving? Now that we’ve both been captured, we live or die together! If I die and you’re buried with me, that counts as avenging my Sister Wanwan!”

“Heh. Wei Yilin, if you want to die, suit yourself. I’m not dying.” Wei Ruo let out a cold laugh.

“Keep boasting. These two aren’t even people from Xingshan County. They’re pirates, killers who do not blink! You think you have the ability to survive in their hands? I don’t believe it!” Wei Yilin shot back.

Wei Ruo curved the corners of her mouth and said no more to Wei Yilin.

She leaned back against the stone wall of the cave and rested for a while.

By now, she had roughly grasped the situation. The two pirates outside were probably survivors of the war. To live, they had braved the natural dangers and crossed Moonview Mountain, likely hiding in the south side of the city to recover their strength and wait for an opportunity to flee.

As for Wei Yilin, he had probably gone to the south side of the city for some reason or other, and by chance had been captured by the two pirates in disguise, to be used as a hostage in case they were ever discovered.

What she had to do now was find a way to buy time and fight for a chance to survive, because at the slightest disturbance, they would surely choose Wei Yilin, who was easier to move, as the hostage, not her.

Besides, these pirates were vicious and cruel. She was only a thirteen-year-old girl; who knew what they might do to her? A swift knife to end it all would count as merciful.

Hearing one of the pirates enter, Wei Ruo opened her eyes.

At once, she said, “Honorable warriors of the Yamato race, I have a way to help you make amends for your failures.”

Just now, from the two pirates’ conversation, Wei Ruo had caught a few Chinese words and guessed that they had learned some Chinese during their time on the eastern coast.

Wei Ruo’s words left Wei Yilin dumbfounded, and then he looked at her with open contempt. Did she even know what she was saying? She was telling two pirates that she could help them make up for their failures?

But the pirate in front of her actually stopped and asked in rather unpracticed Chinese, “You mean what?”

“You lost the battle. Although a few of you survived by luck, neither dying in battle nor being captured, according to the customs of your Yamato people, those who fall in battle ought to commit seppuku and apologize to your emperor,” Wei Ruo analyzed at an unhurried pace.

“You know us?” The pirate’s expression changed to one of great surprise.

Wei Yilin was also stunned, staring at Wei Ruo suspiciously. How did Wei Qingruo know so much?

“I know a little,” Wei Ruo replied. “Just now I said I could help you make amends for your failures. You understand what that idiom means, don’t you? It means that when you go back this time, you can avoid punishment and even earn merit.”