Chapter 155: Undercurrents Surging

"This is bad, this is terrible!" Before Lai Wu could even give an order, a figure stumbled through the collapsed courtyard gate behind him, panting heavily as he shouted at the top of his lungs, "Master Wu! People are coming! Many people, dozens, hundreds of them! Run! They are coming for you!"

Lai Wu's body instantly shuddered. A flash of surprise crossed his eyes as he looked back at Ding Li, but a moment later, he dismissed the thought that this was Ding Li's scheme. Right after that, Lai Wu no longer needed to guess whose men were outside, because the voice echoing through the air was all too familiar to him.

"Don't let a damn single one of them go! Dead or alive, Lai Wu must be captured! A reward of a thousand strings of cash for him alive, eight hundred for him dead!"

It was Cao Chen's command. Not only was Lai Wu familiar with the voice, but Ding Li, who had crossed paths with Cao Chen a few times, recognized it instantly as well. Seizing the right moment, Ding Li suddenly moved. He flicked his wrist and hurled a short dagger straight at the stunned Lai Wu, shouting in a deep, booming voice, "Fall back!"

Caught off guard by Ding Li's sneak attack, Lai Wu was forced to dodge to the side, thereby missing the prime opportunity to shoot down Ding Li and his men. Furthermore, the footsteps outside the courtyard gate were growing clearer by the second. Lai Wu had no desire to be trapped inside this residence by Cao Chen's forces. He glared viciously in the direction where Ding Li and his company had scattered to flee, waved his hand, and rushed out of the courtyard in a hurry.

"Release the arrows!" Once outside the courtyard and standing in the alley, Lai Wu unhesitatingly ordered his men, who were holding bows and crossbows, to attack Cao Chen's approaching force at the end of the alley. Meanwhile, Lai Wu himself spun around and sprinted swiftly in the opposite direction.

"It really is Lai Wu! Pursue him, do not let him escape!" Cao Chen, with his sharp eyes, spotted Lai Wu immediately. He whipped his Tang dao out of its scabbard and charged forward with several of his most trusted subordinates. Lai Wu's archers and crossbowmen had no time to mount a second volley; in the blink of an eye, Cao Chen's men hacked them to pieces. The quick-witted ones turned tail early to follow Lai Wu, while the slow-reacting ones were cut down on the spot amidst the night shadows.

"Secure the courtyard, and bring some men with me to chase Lai Wu!" Cao Chen glanced at the damaged courtyard gate and frowned. He had no way of knowing whether Lai Wu had already rescued Liu Fu before he arrived. He jerked his chin at one of his confidants, issued a grim instruction, and took off running.

Cao Chen's appearance not only plucked Ding Li and his men from sudden peril, but also created an opportunity for them to slip away. By the time Cao Chen's trusted guards searched the secret chamber inside and discovered that Liu Fu was already gone, Ding Li and his men had long since escaped over the walls with Liu Fu, vanishing into the night.

Guided and paved the way by Heizi along the route, both Liu Fu and Jin Sanpang were temporarily hidden away inside Saiyigarde's home. Given the current circumstances, openly leaving the foreign quarters would make exposure all too easy, and Ding Li had not the slightest doubt that the entire perimeter of the foreign quarters was swarming with the Cao Commercial House's informants.

Fortunately, nothing untoward affected Ding Li and his group that night. However, the news of Lai Wu's appearance in the foreign quarters of Guangzhou Prefecture spread rapidly. After all, the Cao Commercial House's move this time was simply too grand. Leaving aside the men stationed outside the foreign quarters, the sheer number of people who followed Cao Chen inside reached a full hundred, nearly turning the foreign quarters upside down in their clash with Lai Wu's twenty or thirty men.

Yet the final outcome was somewhat pathetic for the Cao Commercial House: despite such a massive encirclement, Lai Wu still managed to slip away. Moreover, the commotion raised by Cao Chen and his men had alarmed the magistrate of the foreign quarters. The foreign quarter magistrate summoned hundreds of young men from various foreign lands on the spot, flooding the streets through the night and nearly sparking a direct armed conflict with Cao Chen's forces.

Although the magistrate ultimately made a temporary concession, allowing Cao Chen and his men to leave the foreign quarters safely, he also dropped a harsh warning right then and there: at daybreak, he would proceed directly to the Regional Command and report every single action of Cao Chen and his men to the Military Commissioner. To Cao Chen, an issue like this could be big or small, but currently, he was so blinded by rage over Lai Wu's escape that he paid no heed to the magistrate's threats and intimidation. He immediately hurled back his own fierce warning, challenging the magistrate to report Grand Inspector Lord Cao as well, preferably all the way up to the imperial court in the capital of Chang'an.

This remark infuriated the magistrate to no small degree. One had to understand that the foreign quarters of Guangzhou Prefecture occupied a special status throughout the entire Great Tang dynasty, and any matter concerning them could escalate into a diplomatic affair at a moment's notice. Yet for the present, that was merely a theoretical perspective. Looking at the practical reality, the current Great Tang was plagued by frequent warfare. Even if the magistrate genuinely wanted to file a formal complaint, which high-ranking officials in the imperial court would bother to care about such a matter? In truth, the magistrate knew very well that even Military Commissioner Li Tiao probably wouldn't intervene or handle the affair to any great extent; after all, Guangzhou Prefecture was already facing impending warfare and was chaotic enough as it was. Hadn't the port of Guangzhou been closed for over half a month already?

None of these concerns fell within the scope of Ding Li's considerations; he only learned of these developments through the two brothers sent by Saiyigarde. During this interval, Ding Li held a private, detailed discussion with Liu Fu, and subsequently called Jin Sanpang in as well. Ding Li assured the two of them that come daybreak, Liu Fu would be reunited with his family immediately, while Jin Sanpang would be taken along and placed in a position of absolute safety. Of course, they could never have imagined that the safe place Ding Li spoke of was actually the residence of Yang Hongwen, the commanding general of the Bandit Suppression Army. Yet as far as the entire Guangzhou Prefecture was concerned, General Yang's residence was indeed among the safest places money and power could buy.

Just two hours before Ding Li rescued Liu Fu, Cao Chen, who had been escorting a cargo shipment from Fuxu Town, finally rushed back to Guangzhou Prefecture. Before he could even fully hand over the goods to Cao Si, a flustered Cao Chen sought out his young master, Cao Xiangming. Presenting him with the jade token belonging to the Xunzhou Gang, Cao Chen recounted in meticulous detail everything that had transpired midway before noon.

Cao Xiangming was immediately struck with astonishment. Long before this, he had heard Third Master Liu of the Chaozhou Gang mention that Lai Wu had departed abruptly without a word, leaving behind even the severance compensation offered to him without taking a single penny. However, Third Master Liu had also remarked that over the many years, the wealth Lai Wu had accumulated for himself in secret was certainly substantial, so rebuilding a band of followers probably wouldn't be too difficult a task.

Not only had Lai Wu resurfaced, but he had even sent men to raid their own caravan. This thoroughly infuriated Cao Xiangming. Yet amidst his anger, Cao Xiangming suddenly thought of Liu Fu. If Lai Wu had rescued Liu Fu, the Cao Commercial House would find itself in an extremely passive and vulnerable position regarding the smuggling operation. Yet despite dispatching Cao Chen to the foreign quarters, they had ultimately failed to capture Lai Wu, and up to this moment, both Cao Xiangming and Cao Chen had concluded that Liu Fu had indeed been rescued by Lai Wu.

The actual truth was known to only Lai Wu and Ding Li. Furthermore, Lai Wu did not dare to show his face lightly at the moment, because as early as that afternoon, Third Master Liu of the Chaozhou Gang had already begun casting a net of informants throughout the city, quietly hunting for Lai Wu's whereabouts. Guangzhou Prefecture at this moment could be described as a churning undercurrent of hidden perils; any single faction making a rash move was bound to trigger a chain reaction of subsequent responses, and could even result in one or more of those factions being ruthlessly wiped out.

Relatively speaking, Ding Li's side was still in a somewhat relaxed state. However, this condition did not last long. How could a rat scurrying across the street like Lai Wu allow Ding Li to sit back and watch the tigers fight from a mountain vantage point? Before noon the next day, word spread through the city that the previous night's skirmish in the foreign quarters had also involved members of the Nanhai Gang, and that Liu Fu had ultimately been rescued by Ding Li and his Nanhai Gang associates, though his current hiding place remained unknown.

Yet it was evident that this rumor, deliberately leaked by Lai Wu, did not receive much serious attention. It merely caused the Chaozhou Gang and the Cao Commercial House to pay slightly more heed to Ding Li. After all, Lai Wu's sudden reappearance was the paramount issue in Guangzhou Prefecture right now. Even the official yamen of Bandit Suppression Army commander Yang Hongwen had posted wanted notices for the capture of Lai Wu. The charges stated that Lai Wu had set up an ambush along the road from Fuxu Town to Guangzhou Prefecture, attacking the Cao Commercial House's caravan and causing nearly a hundred casualties—a heinous crime of extreme audacity. For this, the government had even put up a reward bounty of five hundred strings of cash.

While these civilian factions fought openly and covertly, the government and military forces were hardly idle. Uncle Xiang had returned to Guangzhou Prefecture from Fuxu Port, and on that very day, Zhang Kang, accompanied by Uncle Xiang, first went to the Yang residence to visit Yang Ru. After a brief meeting, the two of them boarded a carriage together and headed to the Regional Command to seek out Li Tiao.

From the afternoon until well past dinnertime, Zhang Kang and Yang Ru departed the Regional Command with expressions of satisfaction. Although Li Tiao harbored certain anxieties, in order to stabilize the current situation, he had no choice but to agree to his two old friends' proposal. Moreover, to steady the increasingly perilous state of affairs, Li Tiao was forced to take a gamble.

"Brother Yang, I never imagined that within a mere few days, you would actually manage to persuade Brother Li over there!" Inside the carriage, Zhang Kang cast an admiring glance toward Yang Ru, his tone tinged with a slight trace of playful teasing, seemingly done on purpose.

"This matter is of extraordinary consequence. Whether it concerns you, me, or Brother Li, we had to help Brother Li make his decision!" Yang Ru slowly shook his head, sighed with a faint smile, and then continued to shake his head as he sighed again, "Two local militias—I truly have no idea what kind of reaction this news will cause once it is made public!"

"A sensation is guaranteed. But right now, I am more worried about that young lad Ding Li!" Zhang Kang nodded thoughtfully, turning his gaze toward the twilight outside the carriage window, and shook his head with a sigh once more. "From what I understand, that young fellow is by no means simple! Now that we are suddenly converting the Nanhai Gang into a local militia, the stakes and implications are abundantly clear: it's a blatant surface maneuver to use the Nanhai Gang to keep the Chaozhou Gang in check. That is precisely why I worry most—will that young lad Ding Li accept this?"

"He has no choice left in the matter! Things have reached this stage. If we fail to take action ourselves, the Cao clan will soon push even further!" Yang Ru clearly shared Zhang Kang's misgivings, but his stance was far more resolute than Zhang Kang's. Furthermore, regarding the current overall situation, Yang Ru evidently possessed a much deeper understanding than Zhang Kang. "You know as well as I do, Brother Zhang, that the garrison at Fuxu Town is divided into eastern and southern camps; our Regional Command does not hold much of an advantage there! As for the city garrison of Guangzhou Prefecture, although it is nominally under the command of the Military Commissioner, apart from the personal guards and elite retainers of the Regional Command itself, mobilizing the city garrison is no simple task—especially with the Grand Inspector watching closely from the sidelines! Right now, the only military force capable of being mobilized at a moment's notice is the Bandit Suppression Army, which has not yet been fully formed into a formal establishment. Therefore, we must firmly grasp the reserve power represented by these local militias. Otherwise, once the flames of war spread, it is entirely possible that before the enemy forces even arrive, Guangzhou Prefecture will have already plunged into internal chaos!"