Chapter 120: An Unintentional Gain

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At midnight, all was silent, the chirping of insects blending with the sound of the wind.

Whoosh~

A sudden noise startled Zhang Tianfeng awake.

He opened his eyes, tiptoed off the bed, and had just cracked the door open when he spotted Xiang Chen hiding behind a stone pillar. Zhang Tianfeng made a shushing gesture and slipped quietly out of the room.

"Pretty sharp instincts."

"I've always been like this, boss. Why are you out here?"

"They want to mess with me, and I want to catch a couple of thugs to make an example of them. So I haven't slept."

Xiang Chen nodded and pointed toward the back of the house. Zhang Tianfeng understood at once.

He definitely wasn't leaving the area, after all, Gao Ran was still asleep inside. If those troublemakers tried anything and something went wrong, he'd never forgive himself.

Soon, Xiang Chen returned and held up two fingers at the corner, signaling that two people had climbed over the wall into the yard. Zhang Tianfeng nodded, paused for a moment, then pointed at the white cloth strip hanging nearby. Xiang Chen immediately caught on, removed the cloth, and tiptoed back.

Before long, voices drifted over from behind the house.

"Pockmarked Wang, are you sure this will work?"

"I told you, don't call me Pockmarked Wang, call me Brother Ma! Of course it'll work. With the two of us working together, there's nothing we can't do. When we scare them awake, we run. Don't do anything stupid."

"Ah, but didn't you say you wanted to grope that girl?"

"Grope my ass. I was just talking big in front of Widow Liu to shut her up, so she'd stop stabbing me in the back all day. I said I'm not interested in women. Enough talk—let's move."

"..."

"Hey, what the hell? Why did this snake slither back on its own? It hung around me for an hour—did it decide I'm its master or something?"

"Brother Ma, I just saw a white shadow flash by."

"Bullshit! Don't you try to scare me."

"I'm serious! Just now, a white shadow whooshed right past."

Another half-minute of silence followed, punctuated by several heavy breaths.

Not long after, a shrill scream pierced the night sky.

"Ghost!"

In an instant, dogs across the village began barking wildly, and curses followed close behind.

Zhang Tianfeng clapped his hands together and returned to his room.

So that's all the fight they had in them, trying to scare people? He'd overestimated them.

Time to sleep. Tonight would be quiet, and tomorrow was sure to be entertaining.

The night passed without incident, gone in the blink of an eye.

Early the next morning, just as dawn was breaking, Yun Qian was still rinsing her mouth in the yard when she saw Zhang Tianfeng approaching.

"Big brother, why didn't you sleep a little longer?"

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"Can't sleep anymore. Might as well get up early."

Catching the scent of burning firewood, Zhang Tianfeng's internal alarm clock automatically reset from 8:00 to 6:30. He'd sprung up with a carp leap, called out for a while, but Gao Ran wouldn't get out of bed, so he'd simply come out on his own.

"Right. Dad always says early to bed and early to rise makes you healthy. Look at me—I'm only eight, and I'm already half your height."

"Mhm, impressive. But don't do too much exercise either."

"Why?" Yun Qian tilted her head. "Dad said exercising a lot helps you grow."

"Growth is a process of breaking through muscle tissue. If you build your muscles up too hard and tough, you won't grow tall later."

The little girl's jaw dropped in shock. She stood there dumbfounded for a long moment before running back into the room in tears, shouting as she went, "Daddy is a big liar!"

This... had he inadvertently stirred up trouble in someone else's family?

Zhang Tianfeng rubbed his nose, pulled out his toothbrush and toothpaste from his pocket, and started brushing his teeth.

Before long, Gao Ran also got up. Judging by her appearance, she must have woken and gotten ready shortly after Zhang Tianfeng left.

After washing up, they burned firewood to cook breakfast, and Gao Ran used the time to tutor Yun Qian on her lessons. As for Xiang Chen, he practiced boxing in the yard to stay fit.

The three of them had quietly blended into this household.

But the good times didn't last. Soon, a miserable scream shattered the village's peace.

"Come save us! The black boar demon is going to eat people!"

The "black boar demon" was a wild boar from the mountain. Because of the unique location of Twin Gods Village, wild animals frequently roamed the area, and none more often than the boars.

True wild boars grow tusks and are extremely aggressive. According to Yun Tianhe, one massive male boar was so tough that even the village's blunderbuss couldn't kill it.

Relying on that male boar, the herd often came down the mountain to ransack the villagers' crops.

"Xiang Chen, grab your gear and let's check it out!"

The incident was on a slope outside the village, where the crops lay trampled and scattered.

When Zhang Tianfeng and the others arrived, they saw a middle-aged man roaring and swinging a wooden stick as he chased the scattering piglets.

Before they could even ask what had happened, there was a thunderous crash—a massive male boar burst out from the bushes, its snow-white tusks gleaming in the rising sun.

As the crowd gasped, the man narrowly dodged the head-on charge, but the boar caught him with a kick from its hind leg, sending him crashing to the ground.

After a few seconds of stunned silence came a wailing cry.

"Someone, please save him! Help my husband!"

Help? How? This boar was over a meter tall and three meters long, capable of tearing through the entire village of Twin Gods if it ran wild. Who would dare go near it?

Seeking advantage and avoiding harm—that's human nature, and no one could be blamed.

But years of military service had stripped away such habits from Xiang Chen.

"Boss, stay here. Just stand still. I'll go save him."

"How do you plan to do it? Maybe I can help."

"Find an opening and kill it!"

Time was short, and Zhang Tianfeng didn't ask for details. He trusted this apex special forces soldier who walked among the common folk.

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"I'll draw its attention and create an opening for you. Move fast—I won't be able to hold out long."

"Got it. Have that man hold on for half a minute. I'm going to find something."

Zhang Tianfeng nodded, dashed forward, and began leaping around like a monkey, hollering in the Hakka dialect for the man to hold on and never turn his back to the beast.

The tension was at its peak. Everyone in the crowd clenched their fists.

A dozen or so seconds later, Xiang Chen returned, clutching a sharpened wooden stake and creeping up to the boar's flank.

Seizing the moment when the male boar was distracted by Zhang Tianfeng, he burst into a sprint—the stake in his hands shot forward like an arrow loosed from a bow, tearing through the air toward the beast.

Whoosh~

The sound was piercing and caught the boar's attention.

As the undisputed tyrant of the mountains, this beast had honed its danger sense through years of bloody fighting, and it twisted aside just in time—the stake only pierced its left ear.

With a furious howl, Zhang Tianfeng charged straight at it, and the others surged forward behind him. The sheer momentum of the onslaught frightened off the boar herd, and they fled in disgrace back into the mountains.

Half an hour later, on the threshing ground in the middle of the village, the rescued man lay on the ground. In the instant the boar had flipped him over, its hoof had raked a long gash down his thigh.

"Brother, thank you so much. If it weren't for you today, this old Chen would have been done for in that field."

Zhang Tianfeng gave a wry smile. This was already the thirty-sixth time he'd been thanked. From initially accepting the gratitude to now politely declining it, he'd grown numb to it all.

"Don't mention it, brother. Go home and rest up, and don't forget to disinfect that wound."

"Will do! Come over to my place tonight—I'll cook you something good."

"Sure, I'll definitely drop by!"

Old Chen's family left, and Zhang Tianfeng returned to Yun Tianhe's home for breakfast.

"Brother, that throw of yours was incredibly accurate." Yun Tianhe took the initiative to hand Xiang Chen a bowl of rice.

"I was the top thrower in the army. I trained for over a decade. I'm still a little rusty today."

"If that's rusty, then the rest of us might as well stop living."

"Come on, it was just luck."

Yun Tianhe nodded with a smile, sat down, and turned to Zhang Tianfeng. "Zhang boss, the village chief just said he wants you to come see him after breakfast."

"Finally decided to give me a chance?"

"It should be because you saved Old Chen just now. You've earned his approval."

Yun Tianhe let out a sigh and added, "Don't blame the old chief for being cold-hearted. Last time, he was swindled by some unscrupulous boss."

"I understand. Let's eat quickly, and after breakfast we'll go see the chief."

Truth be told, this time Zhang Tianfeng hadn't done it deliberately. Regardless, at least he could finally get in contact with the village chief.

As long as he could make contact, everything from here on out would fall within Zhang Tianfeng's control. He had the confidence, and he had the ability.