Chapter 68: Fighting Pirates With Pirates
Aboard the deck of the Barracuda, a large group of people knelt in front of Su Chen. It was the pirates who had surrendered.
“There’s 162 people in total, including one Yang Opening Realm cultivator, eighteen Blood Boiling Realm cultivators, and forty-one Origin Qi Scholars. The deceased include a Yang Opening Realm cultivator, five Blood Boiling Realm cultivators, and twelve Qi Drawing Realm cultivators,” Iron Cliff reported to Su Chen as he read off of the roster.
Su Chen’s gaze fell on the pirate who was kneeling the closest to him.
It was the blade-wielding Yang Opening Realm cultivator. He was called Jiao Yingguang and had the Stone Sickle Beast Bloodline. He was quite strong.
Su Chen already knew that the group of pirates they had annihilated was called the Third River Army. They were a mid-tier group of pirates within Lingyuan Marsh and had a certain amount of fame. Today, however, they had been bagged up all at once.
“How are you planning on dealing with this group of people? Are you going to kill them all, or are you going to hand them over to the authorities?” Tang Ming asked.
Tang Ming had always been prideful, but ever since the expedition to Goldwater Ruins, Su Chen had become someone that he at least respected. But if you were to listen to him, he would say that he only respected Su Chen’s way of dealing with things, not his strength…… Haha, now that everyone is in the Blood Boiling Realm, he can’t rely on his cultivation base alone to suppress me.
At this moment, he was asking Su Chen because he wanted to see how Su Chen was going to deal with them.
Su Chen replied, “Hand them over to the authorities? I am a government official. What need is there to hand them over to anyone? As for killing them……”
He purposefully stretched out his words. The pirates below him began to tense up, and some even began to cry out with fear, begging for mercy.
“So many people and so much combat power – it would be a waste to kill them. In addition, we already said that we wouldn’t kill them if they surrendered. Eating our own words like that wouldn’t be appropriate.”
Everyone sighed simultaneously with relief.
Only Jiang Hanfeng curled his lips. “You didn’t say that you were going to keep your word when you killed the head of the pirates earlier.”
Wu Xiao kicked him, reminding him that this was not the time for friends to b.u.t.t in, but Su Chen didn’t mind. He continued, “In fact, this kind of thing has a precedent. Wouldn’t you say so, Iron Cliff?”
Iron Cliff scratched his head, a bit embarra.s.sed. “Yes. Hand them over to me, and I can train them to adhere to you. Isn’t that where our guys came from?”
Su Chen’s current underlings were all former mountain bandits; adding in a group of pirates to the mix wouldn’t be that strange.
One of the mountain bandits said loudly, “You don’t need to fear, either. As long as you follow our master, nothing bad will happen to you. We used to be bandits in the Four Flats region, but we were captured by our master because we tried to rob him. Unexpectedly, we became his servants, and he has even bestowed mystical techniques on us. Did you see the Dragonfish Transformation from earlier? That was a blessing our master gave to us.”
“That’s right. As long as you follow along obediently and become useful to him, you’ll have an opportunity to continue living.”
“But if anyone tries to be two-faced and betray our master, I promise you that you will suffer a fate that is ten thousand times more painful than death.”
“Haha, actually, master really likes it when people try to betray him. He never thinks that he has enough research subjects.”
“That’s right, but becoming a research subject isn’t that bad either. If your luck is good, you might even be able to become like Old Second Chang and have your strength soar.”
“Hahahaha, that’s exactly right!”
The group of mountain bandits began to chuckle and laugh amongst each other.
Su Chen was always strict and firm. No one would believe that Su Chen hadn’t instructed this group of people to chuckle and laugh like this.
Those pirates, however, didn’t know this. When they heard those words, hope began to rise in their hearts. One after another, they began to yell, “We are willing to die for master!”
Su Chen said lazily, “As long as you’re willing to listen, that’s good enough. You don’t need to die for me. If you really weren’t afraid of dying, you wouldn’t have surrendered so easily. But now that you’re in my hands, I’m not worried that you won’t sell your lives to me. You don’t know some things right now, but you will know eventually. Just like those guys said, I am very happy when you make mistakes. Iron Cliff trained these b.a.s.t.a.r.ds too well, and now that they don’t make mistakes, I am always somewhat lacking in research subjects. If you aren’t afraid, then go ahead and try to challenge me.”
Those pirates felt their hearts tremble with fear. They had no idea what kind of person their master was, who would await day after day for his underlings to make mistakes. In addition, the former mountain bandits had been trained into a group of household guards. They originally should have been completely disorganized, but now each one of them was quite useful. This truly was somewhat inconceivable.
Su Chen didn’t want them to figure out the clues in what he had said. He then said, “Alright, go ahead and take them down. Once I’ve made some medicine for them to drink, you can bring them up again for training.”
“Yes, sir.” Some people stepped forward and led the captives down into the interior of the boat.
After they had all been taken away, Su Chen said to Tang Ming and the others, “I’m not planning on bringing these people back with me.”
“Didn’t you say that you wanted them to submit to you?” Jiang Hanfeng was confused.
Su Chen shook his head. “They should submit to me, but that doesn’t mean that I want to turn them into my household guards. Jiangfeng, Tang Ming, I have an idea, but I need your support for it to work out.”
“What?”
“I’m planning on rebuilding the Third River Army.”
“What?” Everyone present was stunned.
“Rebuild the Third River Army?”
“Yes! Rebuild the Third River Army,” Su Chen said confidently. “The issue of the Lingyuan pirates isn’t something that can be resolved with a single battle. The Third River Army is just a small component of all of the Lingyuan pirates, and they aren’t even that critical. Furthermore, they don’t belong to the Clear River City Bloodline n.o.bility Clans. If we want to attack the Clear River City Bloodline n.o.bility Clan Alliance and clear out the Lingyuan pirates, we cannot be constantly starting and stopping in our attempts to exterminate them; it needs to be a continuous fight.”
“Continuous fight……” Tang Ming was beginning to understand Su Chen’s intentions. “You want to……”
“Fight pirates with pirates!” Su Chen replied.
He would establish a group of pirates in Lingyuan Marsh belonging to himself, creating internal strife and using pirates to fight pirates while at the same time targeting the trade convoys belonging to the ten Bloodline n.o.bility Clans.
In these past few years, the ten Bloodline n.o.bility Clans had relied on their influence to control the waterways and monopolize the natural resources, obtaining ma.s.sive benefits from themselves.
Now, however, Su Chen had interfered with their resources, then dealt a serious blow to their transportation of those resources.
By this method, he could constantly weaken his opponents’ influence and keep their hands full with dealing with him.
Today, the ten Bloodline n.o.bility Clans’ conflict with the villagers in West River Forest was still ongoing. Now, with this disaster on the waterways, their attention would be further diverted, giving Su Chen a lot of time to work with.
And time was what Su Chen desperately needed.
Every day that went by, Su Chen would grow a bit stronger, and his opponents would grow a bit weaker.
Dealing with the ten Bloodline n.o.bility Clans was going to be a weighty and lengthy project. Su Chen was not in a hurry.
In addition, apart from the ten Bloodline n.o.bility Clans, there was an even more dangerous opponent waiting in hiding who hadn’t appeared yet.
Before dealing with that enemy, Su Chen couldn’t waste too much of his attention and resources on the Bloodline n.o.bility Clans.
Let them fight amongst themselves.
Tang Ming understood what he was thinking. “But if that’s the case, it is going to take quite a long time. After all, you still need to return to Clear River City to take care of the situation there.”
“That’s right. That’s why I’ll need to rely on you guys for what happens here.”