Chapter 21 Thieves
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"I hate robbers the most," Yan Jin said coldly.
Amon suddenly remembered that she had said their village was attacked by thieves, and only a few of them were left alive.
"So, mister bandit, are you going to pay up or not?"
The coachman's expression was a little strange. Wasn't she doing the work of a bandit now, although the target was also a bandit...?
Seeming to notice his strange expression, Yan Jin explained, "I'm robbing on behalf of heaven."
"Careful."
Thunder roared, and Lei Yin's body was entwined with lightning. He flashed to Yan Jin's side, and a long sword made of lightning appeared in his hand.
His first soul ring was similar to Yan Jin's, both being "Martial Soul Solidification", which could arbitrarily change the shape of his martial soul and condense it into the shape he wanted.
Lei Yin swung his long sword, forcing back the short, black-clad man who had secretly approached Yan Jin and suddenly launched a sneak attack.
"Heh heh... there's even a Soul Grandmaster (20-30), I underestimated you," the black-clad man said in a hoarse and deep voice, "But, just two little kids."
He revealed his martial soul, a hairless rat with a lot of wrinkles on its skin.
White, yellow, and purple soul rings reflected each other, emitting a faint sense of oppression.
"Soul Elder (30-40)?" Lei Yin frowned.
In Frost Leaf City, Soul Elders were considered experts. He didn't expect to encounter a Soul Elder hidden among a group of robbers on the road.
"It's not like we haven't beaten one before," Yan Jin said nonchalantly.
The huge lava fist appeared again, smashing hard at the Soul Elder who had already activated his martial soul and turned into a "Rat Man".
Amon gently pinched his monocle and activated his soul skill.
Under the cover of the first soul ring, the changes in the martial soul, soul ring, and soul power that had not yet left his body quietly disappeared. Only a subtle, almost imperceptible soul power fluctuation, mixed with mental power, spread out from him like ripples.
The "Rat Man" saw the huge lava fist smashing towards him and was about to activate his skill to deal with it.
Suddenly, his thinking ability decreased and his mental activity slowed down.
"Who am I? What was I going to do?"
"What is that fist?"
"Oh, I have to dodge it!" The deadly sense of crisis made him suddenly wake up.
At this critical moment, a moment of mental stagnation was fatal.
He didn't have time to dodge, and the lava was close at hand.
The "Rat Man" Soul Elder could only let out a terrified and desperate scream of "No" before being swallowed by the lava.
The thieves who lost their leader fled in panic.
Lei Yin, who was usually gentle, showed unusual ruthlessness at this moment. He chased after them and cut off the heads of the thieves one by one with his lightning sword.
"Huh? That was too easy, right?" Yan Jin frowned, looked at Amon, who was smiling on top of the carriage, and asked suspiciously, "What did you do?"
"Do you want to experience it yourself?" Amon chuckled.
Saying that, he used "Deception" on Yan Jin, and then said softly:
"You don't need to know so much, we are partners, relax and trust me. In the future, when you encounter this kind of situation, just do it directly. Look, wasn't our cooperation very tacit this time? A Soul Elder was solved so simply."
This was the complete usage of the soul skill "Swindler". First, make the other party's thinking sluggish, make others unable to think, and add the passive effect to make the words spoken more convincing. The final result was that Amon's "talking skill" was outstanding in a short time.
Yan Jin subconsciously gave up thinking, gave up curiosity about Amon's soul skill, and nodded woodenly, "You're right."
After a while, the three returned to the carriage.
Amon looked at Yan Jin with surprise and suspicion. The interference of "Deception" on thinking could only last for a very short time. She should have come back to her senses already, but she shouldn't be so calm after coming back to her senses.
Wouldn't she be surprised, curious, or afraid of this ability to interfere with other people's thinking?
Based on Amon's understanding of Yan Jin, she wasn't the kind of person who could hide her feelings, she would definitely show something different.
"Unless... she wasn't thinking in the first place!
"Not only during the time she was affected by the 'Deception' effect, but also afterwards!
"Because she didn't think, she didn't realize that her thinking was interfered with, and she didn't notice my ability, that's why she's so calm!"
Amon felt that he had found the truth, which was surprising, but not so surprising.
Lei Yin looked at Amon and Yan Jin, and felt that something was not quite right in his heart.
He saw their interaction, and felt that something seemed to have been skipped in the middle.
He scratched his head in confusion, without going into it deeply.
The carriage drove south, and the temperature gradually increased.
The scenery on both sides of the road was also changing.
All kinds of plants and animals that had never been seen in Frost Leaf City opened Yan Jin and Lei Yin's eyes. They knew for the first time that there were so many different natural landscapes in the world.
The journey was not smooth sailing. In just a few days, they encountered two more groups of robbers.
The first wave was led by two Soul Elders, one with a Fire Bird martial soul and the other with a Lightning Turtle martial soul, with high resistance to high temperature and lightning. Amon didn't take action, and Yan Jin and Lei Yin spent a lot of effort to kill them.
The second wave was led by triplet brothers, all of whom were at the level of Soul Elders, with very tacit cooperation. One of them also had the characteristic of resisting mental interference, which made Amon's "Deception" effect very limited.
This forced Amon to take it a little more seriously. In addition to using the second soul skill, he also used "Air Bullets" several times to break up their cooperation. Yan Jin seized the opportunity to kill one of them, which laid the foundation for victory.
Amon noticed the abnormality, "Lei Yin, don't you think these three groups of robbers we encountered are a little strange?"
"Strange?" Lei Yin lowered his head and thought, then shook his head. He didn't think there was anything special.
The two of them tacitly didn't ask Yan Jin for her opinion.
Amon pinched his monocle and said in a low voice, "These three groups of thieves are a little more powerful each time than the last, it feels like some kind of level-breaking game. Every time you pass a level, the difficulty of the next level will increase by one point."
"It seems... that's true. Could it be because we are getting closer and closer to Northland City, and there are more powerful people in big cities, so even the entry threshold for robbers has increased accordingly?" Lei Yin said.
"Maybe..." Amon looked at the scenery outside the window, his expression slightly solemn.
"Hey, uncle, didn't you say that the road you chose was relatively safe? Why are there so many robbers?" Yan Jin took a gold bracelet inlaid with gems that she had snatched from a group of robbers and played with it.
The coachman wiped the cold sweat from his forehead and said with a smile, "I've been here a few times before. This road is the cargo route for several large chambers of commerce. The general thieves have been cleared by them. Maybe it's just bad luck."
"Thanks to your strength, Soul Masters, otherwise my little life would probably be lost here," he complimented.
Yan Jin just asked casually and didn't mean to blame him.
She climbed to the top of the carriage and lay down, crossing her legs and looking at the sky.
In the vast and boundless sky, the clouds moved with the wind, constantly changing shape.
She stretched out her right hand, making a grasping motion, as if to grab something.