Chapter 67

Chapter 67

“Jin Bao! Hao’er! Yu’er!”

Jin Bao was cupping her little face in both hands and staring blankly at the huge tiger when Xiao Che’s voice rang out from the forest.

She hurried to her feet.

“Third Brother, it’s Daddy! Daddy came to find us!”

Jin Bao craned her neck to look around, then cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted back, “Daddy, Baby’s here! Baby’s here!”

Following her voice, Xiao Che rushed over. Beads of sweat covered his forehead, and anxiety was written all over his face.

At a glance, he saw the ferocious tiger lying on the ground beside three children-one older, two younger. The scene looked both frightening and strangely harmonious.

When it was not moving, the tiger resembled an oversized cat and did not seem quite so terrifying.

“My good girl, Yu’er, are you all right?”

Xiao Che checked the two younger children first. Aside from Xiao Jingyu wetting his pants, neither had suffered any serious injury. Xiao Jingyu’s wrist was slightly dislocated, though. In his excitement, he had even clapped for Jin Bao, only to burst into tears from the pain.

Xiao Che did not dare move the wrist carelessly. Lu Shuangshuang would arrive soon, and she could set it then.

Only after that did he turn to Xiao Jinghao.

“Hao’er, what about you? Are you hurt?”

Xiao Jinghao shook his head. “I’m fine, Father. But I was too weak and hadn’t trained hard enough. We nearly died in the tiger’s jaws. If Little Sister hadn’t killed it, Yu’er and I would have been devoured.”

Xiao Che had known the tiger’s death must be connected to Jin Bao. With Xiao Jinghao’s martial arts, he could only narrowly defeat a wolf, much less the king of the forest.

Once he knew everyone was unharmed, Xiao Che crouched and rolled the tiger over. There was not a single wound on its body, yet all its bones were shattered. Its internal organs were probably in no better shape.

He looked around and finally spotted the clue. So many trees had been broken. His daughter’s divine strength was truly terrifying.

As a thought struck him, Xiao Che turned to Jin Bao.

“My good girl, the Xiao Family has an ancestral spear technique. Would you like to learn it?”

Jin Bao had awakened divine strength, but she knew no techniques and fought without any discipline. If he taught her some basic martial arts along with the Xiao Family spear technique, given time, Jin Bao alone could stand against an army of ten thousand. Then he could die without worry.

Jin Bao tilted her head in confusion. “Spear technique? What’s that? Can Baby eat it?”

Xiao Che burst out laughing. “No. It can make my daughter even stronger. If you’d known our family’s spear technique when you met the tiger today, you could have taken any branch and gutted it without putting yourself in danger up close.”

“Really? That sounds amazing! Then Baby wants to learn. Baby wants to get even stronger and protect Mommy.”

Xiao Che laughed heartily. “Good. Daddy will teach you himself.”

The Shadow Guards in the forest looked on with admiration when they saw that a little girl had beaten a ferocious tiger to death.

They might be the Xiao Family’s Shadow Guards, but they respected the strong above all. In their eyes, Jin Bao was one of the strong now.

Lu Shuangshuang and Xiao Jingmo finally arrived after hurrying as fast as they could.

The sight before them first left them stunned, followed by overwhelming relief at finding the children alive.

Lu Shuangshuang’s heart ached for her son. She rushed over and set his dislocated wrist.

“Third Young Master, weren’t you gathering herbs nearby? How did you end up so far away?”

Xiao Jinghao was already twelve and old enough to know better. Their road into exile was fraught with danger, and Lu Shuangshuang thought he should have learned to be careful by now. Yet the instant no one was watching, he had taken the two little ones so far away that they were nearly eaten by a tiger.

She had barely spoken up throughout the journey, but nothing like this could ever happen again. She had to warn him now.

Xiao Jinghao knew he had been reckless this time.

“Aunt Lu, I’m sorry. It was all my fault for being careless. It won’t happen again.”

“Mommy, don’t blame Third Brother. When the tiger was going to bite Yu’er, Third Brother lay on top of Yu’er to protect him. Mommy, please don’t blame Third Brother, okay?”

Lu Shuangshuang had not known about that. She had intended to teach them all a lesson, but now she curtsied deeply instead.

“Third Young Master, I misunderstood you. Thank you for saving Yu’er. Otherwise…”

Her voice choked with emotion. She had been far too anxious.

Xiao Jinghao jumped in alarm and quickly helped her upright.

“Aunt, it’s all right. You only wanted what was best for us. I was too careless. Otherwise, Yu’er would never have been placed in such danger.”

“Auntie, there’s ginseng over there. Don’t cry, Auntie. Let’s go dig it up.”

Jin Bao gently tugged Lu Shuangshuang’s hem. She flashed two rows of tiny teeth in a brilliant smile.

“That’s right, Aunt Lu. We came here to dig up ginseng. Little Sister said the medicinal herb you needed was here, so we came. We didn’t expect to run into a tiger.”
Xiao Jinghao explained from beside them.

At last, everyone understood that the children had come all this way for the ginseng.

Lu Shuangshuang did not know whether to be angry or touched. These children truly were something else…

Jin Bao pulled her over to the ginseng plant.

Lu Shuangshuang’s eyes instantly lit up. All her reproach, regret, and guilt vanished as the Thousand-Year Ginseng claimed her full attention.

“Good heavens! I never imagined I’d see Thousand-Year Ginseng in my lifetime. Jin Bao, you truly are our Little Lucky Star!”

Overcome with excitement, Lu Shuangshuang swept Jin Bao into her arms and planted a loud kiss on her little cheek.

Jin Bao smiled shyly. So Auntie liked Thousand-Year Ginseng. Then Baby would find lots more for Auntie in the future.

Xiao Che finally understood why the three children had been “lucky enough” to encounter a tiger.

“As the saying goes, wherever a spiritual treasure appears, a ferocious beast is bound to guard it. No wonder you ran into a tiger.”

Xiao Jinghao took the lesson to heart as well. From now on, he would have to rein in his little sister.

It took Lu Shuangshuang nearly an hour to carefully dig out the ginseng plant.

While she worked, Xiao Che and the Shadow Guards carried the tiger’s corpse down the mountain.

The tiger weighed at least five or six hundred catties, and every part of it was valuable. They could not waste any of it.

Xiao Che left two Shadow Guards to protect Lu Shuangshuang while everyone else headed down.

Zhu Laosan circled the tiger’s corpse several times, clicking his tongue in amazement.

“Officers, give us a hand and let’s butcher this tiger. The farther north we go, the harsher the environment will be. We need to stockpile more supplies.”

“Why don’t we stop here for half a day? This area should be the tiger’s territory, and now that it’s dead, no other wild beasts should appear for the time being. It ought to be safe.”

“We can smoke the tiger meat into jerky and take it with us. We should cure the hide too. I want to make tiger-skin coats for the children.”

Zhu Laosan naturally would not refuse. Now that the Xiao Family could even kill a tiger, he was sure he would reach the Northern Frontier safely with them.

Every year, fewer than one in ten prisoners and constables sent to the Northern Frontier arrived alive. He was one of the luckiest among them. Surviving his last return trip to the capital had already been no easy feat.

If he reached the Northern Frontier alive this time, he would never take another prisoner-escort job again.

When Pei Wanqing saw the children return unharmed, she checked every one of them over before settling accounts.

First, she gave Xiao Jinghao a thorough scolding. Back at the Marquis’s Mansion, he had always been the most mischievous of the children and had been reprimanded more than anyone else. Today marked the first time since their exile that his mother twisted his ear.

Pei Wanqing chased Xiao Jinghao around the carriage with a small stick. Afraid of tiring her out, he deliberately slowed down until one strike landed, then howled dramatically in pain.

Jin Bao happily watched the commotion grow. Holding a strip of meat and eating a toasted bun, she cheered her mother on from the side.

Xiao Jinghao looked utterly miserable. “Mother, Little Sister was the real culprit! She was the one who said-”

“You still dare drag your little sister into this? It seems I didn’t hit you hard enough. How old is she, and how old are you? Aren’t you ashamed to blame your little sister?”

Pei Wanqing was furious that he had failed to live up to her expectations. She had just paused to catch her breath when the brat hit her sore spot again, so she chased him down and gave him another round of smacks.

Xiao Che processed the tiger meat alongside the constables, glancing over from time to time. The lively chaos brought a smile to his eyes. Their road into exile was not made solely of hardship.

At last, Lu Shuangshuang returned with the ginseng.

With it, the injured man they had rescued could be saved.

After preparing part of the ginseng, she added it to his medicine. She processed the rest and handed it all to Jin Bao.

After all, Jin Bao was the one who had discovered it.

“Auntie, Baby doesn’t want it. Baby wanted to give it to Auntie.”

Lu Shuangshuang could not possibly accept. Such a precious medicinal herb was priceless and impossible to buy. Jin Bao was too young to understand its value, and Lu Shuangshuang would never take advantage of a child.

In the end, Pei Wanqing stepped in to persuade her.

“Shuangshuang, keep it. Illness and medicine are unavoidable on this journey. Whatever herbs we find should be entrusted to you for safekeeping. We don’t know how to preserve them. If we ruined their medicinal properties, wouldn’t they go to waste?”

Old Madam Xiao added, “Exactly. Niece-in-law, listen to your sister-in-law.”

Only after everyone agreed did Lu Shuangshuang accept it.

By the time they finished dinner, they had processed only half the tiger. They salted the other half to preserve it until it could be smoked dry.

But then Xiao Jingmo came hurrying over to find Lu Shuangshuang.

“Aunt Lu, come take a look. That man is awake.”