The city gates are closed at night.
Night had fallen, and the guards at the gates of Red Fox Town were preparing to close them.
Just then, a few unfamiliar figures appeared outside the town.
The guards didn’t pay them much mind. Red Fox Town had so many people; it was impossible for them to recognize everyone.
But when they saw that it wasn’t just a few people emerging from the darkness, but dozens, and perhaps even more...
The color drained from the gate guards’ faces.
"Quick, close the gates!"
An older guard shouted frantically.
But it was too late. Several figures moved like ghosts, arriving in an instant. Before the gate guards could even mount a proper response, they were brutally killed.
"CLANG! CLANG! CLANG!!!"
On the town wall, a guard frantically beat the warning gong.
"What’s happening?"
Many people heard the gong and felt a sense of confusion.
Having lived in peace for so long, the people of Red Fox Town had almost forgotten what that sound meant.
It wasn’t until they saw flames erupting everywhere in the darkness that they realized something was terribly wrong.
The houses near the town gates were already a sea of fire.
"Hahaha! So satisfying! I’ve been waiting to go all out like this for ages! I was right to come along!"
"This house is mine! Go find your own, don’t fight me for it!"
"Hand over your money and we’ll let you live! Say one word of refusal, and you die!"
Two to three hundred bandits spread through Red Fox Town like a plague.
They broke into one home after another, demanding money. Anyone who dared to resist was beaten, and if they were unlucky, killed on the spot.
After looting the money, they would simply set the house on fire.
Many bandits didn’t even bother going inside, just setting fire to the houses from the outside.
"Vile fiends! Kill them! Show no mercy!"
Chief Lu arrived with a group of Government Officials, his face a mask of shock and fury as he stared at the spreading inferno.
These bandits... how dare they?
’Do they really think they can survive after pillaging Red Fox Town?’
But he had no time for such thoughts. All he could do was try his best to stop these bandits.
However, before Chief Lu and his Government Officials could do anything, a streak of fire descended from the sky.
In the next instant, they were engulfed, screaming as they perished in a sea of flames.
With the death of Chief Lu and his men, there was no one left in Red Fox Town who could stop the bandits.
High in the sky, Zhao Daonan watched with cold eyes as Red Fox Town was consumed by fire.
He was the one who had given the order to burn it all down. The bandits’ only command was to set fires.
Killing was secondary.
He wanted the entire Red Fox Town reduced to ashes.
He had already had the gates sealed. Sooner or later, the homeless townspeople would gather together. When they did, a small effort from him would be enough to eliminate most of them.
"Master, bandits have broken into the town! We have to go, quickly!"
"Right, right, let’s go! We can’t stay here! The gates are blocked, we can’t get out that way. Let’s go to the old house. There’s a cellar there, we can hide in it!"
The Xu Family, who had just bought Great Black, lived not far from the town gates. At this moment, their household was in a state of panic.
"Grandpa, the big black dog is still tied up! I’ll go get him!"
Master Xu’s grandson, a boy of about ten, saw the thirteenth-generation Great Black tied in a corner of the courtyard and rushed to untie him.
Although Jiang Zuo had said Great Black wouldn’t run away even without a leash,
the Xu Family clearly hadn’t been willing to risk it.
This was a dog that had cost them several thousand taels. If he ran away before they’d properly tamed him, they’d become a laughingstock, even if they managed to find him again.
Knowing how capable Great Black was, they had even used a very sturdy rope to tie him up.
"Don’t be a fool! If we bring him, what if he starts barking in the cellar when the bandits come looking!"
Master Xu snapped.
"Then let’s untie him and let him hide on his own?"
The grandson suggested, hesitating.
"No! Jiang Zuo is gone, so we’re the people he’s most familiar with now. When he’s cornered with nowhere to run, he’ll probably come looking for us! He’ll be the death of us!"
"Just forget about him. Leave him here. The bandits won’t have time to bother with a dog. He won’t be in any danger. We’ll come back for him when it’s safe!"
Master Xu declared, his tone final.
Master Xu’s grandson said no more. The group hastily gathered their valuables and fled toward the less populated rear of the town.
There, the Xu Family had their old ancestral home.
Hiding in the cellar of the ancestral home was far safer than staying here.
Great Black watched, bewildered, as the entire Xu Family, young and old, departed.
He heard waves of panicked noise from outside and sensed that something was wrong.
But he had received no commands. The rope was still tied around his neck, and he couldn’t go see what was happening.
’I... I’ve been abandoned?’
Listening to the frantic footsteps outside and staring at the now empty and silent Xu residence, Great Black gradually realized he had been abandoned.
Jiang Zuo had taught him the concept of abandonment, telling him that if he didn’t obey his master’s commands, he would be abandoned, forced to wander as a stray, and could be beaten to death by humans at any time.
’But I haven’t been disobedient. Why was I abandoned?’
Great Black felt a pang of despair, and his mood soured.
’No... maybe I’m overthinking it?’
’My new masters just had to go somewhere on urgent business and didn’t have time for me?’
He couldn’t help but wonder after a while.
But that thought was quickly extinguished.
Staring up at the roof burning fiercely above him, Great Black knew for certain: he had been abandoned.
His new masters had sensed danger and fled, leaving him behind.
Realizing the danger was upon him, Great Black stopped waiting foolishly.
He lowered his head and tried to chew through the rope tied to his collar, but it was too sturdy. With a powerful bite, he only managed to sever the outer layer.
To chew all the way through would take quite some time.
"WOOF! WOOF!"
Great Black grew anxious and bit down harder, but it wasn’t very effective.
The fire at the Xu residence grew larger, and Great Black could feel waves of heat washing over him.
The glow of the flames illuminated the surroundings, casting Great Black’s body in a fiery red light.
Great Black paced frantically, but with no other options, he could only keep biting desperately at the rope.
BANG!
A nearby building finally gave way, collapsing with a roar amidst the flames.
A still-burning log tumbled and rolled to a stop in front of Great Black.
Seeing it, Great Black quickly strained against the rope, stretching his neck toward it.
HISS!
After a long moment, with a muffled sound, the rope was finally burned through.
But Great Black hadn’t escaped unscathed. The fur on his neck had accidentally caught fire.
Now free, Great Black ignored the pain in his neck and frantically rubbed it against the ground, extinguishing the flames but leaving behind a large patch of scorched fur.
’My new masters abandoned me. Where should I go now?’
Great Black gazed up at the night sky, dyed crimson by the light of the fires, and felt lost for a moment.
’That’s right!’
’I’ll go find my master!’
’Master would never abandon me!’
Great Black’s spirits instantly lifted. With a burst of movement, he shot out of the Xu residence and through the flames.
Outside was a scene of chaos, filled with fire, panicked crowds, and laughing bandits looting and assaulting people.
But this didn’t stop Great Black from following a scent all the way to the town gates.
The gates were shut tight, forcing Great Black to a halt.
But he immediately turned around and ran back toward Jiang Zuo’s wooden cabin.
Reaching Jiang Zuo’s cabin, Great Black didn’t hide inside. Instead, he continued running past it, toward the town wall behind the house.
Soon, a tall poplar tree appeared before him.
Great Black sprinted toward it and, with a powerful burst, ran straight up the trunk.
Upon reaching a point slightly higher than the wall, Great Black kicked off hard, leaped back, and landed softly on the rampart.
’Everything Master taught me really is useful!’
Great Black thought to himself.
Jiang Zuo had taught him more than once in this very spot how to climb the tree, land on the wall, and then climb down the other side.
Lowering his body, Great Black descended the wall and landed outside the town.
...
As Great Black fled Red Fox Town, three figures ran, panting, to the front of Jiang Zuo’s wooden cabin.
"Jiang said he’d bury the key under the sycamore tree in front of the house, on the side facing the door, about a finger-length deep."
Blacksmith Li took out a dagger and began digging frantically under the sycamore tree.
"Found it!"
He unearthed a stone box with a key inside.
"Come on, get inside with me!"
Blacksmith Li urged his wife and Li Xiangtao.
He never imagined that just a few days after Jiang Zuo left, he would already be using the hiding place he’d mentioned.
Just moments ago, he had been getting ready for bed when he suddenly heard shouts that a large group of bandits had invaded.
Blacksmith Li quickly sent his apprentices home.
He tried to flee with his wife and Li Xiangtao, but they hadn’t gotten far before they heard that the town gates were blocked, leaving no escape.
In his panic, Blacksmith Li remembered the hiding place Jiang Zuo had told him about.
He didn’t have time to think. He rushed over with Li Xiangtao and his wife.
"Grandpa, does Jiang really have a hiding place here?"
Li Xiangtao was now over eleven years old, not a little child who understood nothing.
She found Blacksmith Li’s words hard to believe.
"If he said there is, there is!"
Blacksmith Li said decisively.
SPLASH!
Blacksmith Li found the well in the courtyard and jumped right in.
He plunged headfirst into the water and only resurfaced after a long moment.
"Quick! Xiangtao, you jump down first!"
Blacksmith Li shouted to Li Xiangtao.
Li Xiangtao no longer hesitated and jumped down from the edge of the well.
After a good while, the three of them were hidden in the hollow Jiang Zuo had dug out, squeezed into the cramped space.
"Grandpa, what kind of person is Jiang, really? How could he have dug a place like this in advance?"
Li Xiangtao couldn’t help but ask curiously.
"How should I know?"
Blacksmith Li said with a wry smile.
’What kind of person digs a hideout at the bottom of a well, anyway?!’