Chapter 206: Chapter 197: After the Public Humiliation Parade, Is It the Autumn Execution?

Shopkeepers and customers from the streetside shops all gathered under the willow trees by the road.

A few people who knew the inside story pointed at the criminals being paraded by the constables, boasting about what little they knew.

"Do you all know what crimes these people being paraded have committed?" a portly man in a Landlord Hat asked the surrounding onlookers, feigning an air of mystery.

"So what did they do? To be paraded through the streets by the constables like this," someone asked, playing along.

"If you know, then stop keeping us in suspense and just tell us!" an impatient onlooker urged the man in the Landlord Hat.

Lin Li, wearing his bamboo hat, stood in the crowd. He had become just another curious onlooker, gazing at the portly man who seemed to know all the details.

"AHEM..." The man in the Landlord Hat coughed twice to clear his throat, then began to regale the surrounding crowd.

"I have a friend who works at the magistrate’s office. We were having drinks yesterday, and he told me all about these criminals.

You see, these fierce-looking men are a gang of bandits.

A while back, they had the audacity to ambush Miss Zhu’s carriage. They planned to kidnap her and demand a ransom from the head of the Zhu Family."

The crowd gasped in shock, but Lin Li’s expression remained calm.

"When you say the Zhu Family, you don’t mean the one on Fugui Road, do you?" someone asked.

"That’s right. The very same Zhu Family that lives on Fugui Road. They’re one of the wealthiest families in our Dongwu City," the man in the Landlord Hat confirmed with a nod.

"The head of the Zhu Family and Miss Zhu are always helping the elderly and the poor. They’re truly kind-hearted people!

For those wretched bandits to try and kidnap Miss Zhu to extort her father... It’s despicable! They deserve to die."

Once the crowd understood the gist of the story, they were all filled with righteous indignation.

"Exactly. When my friend at the magistrate’s office first told me about it, I was furious too.

But as they say, good deeds are rewarded. The bandits failed, and Miss Zhu’s carriage managed to escape.

After she got away, Miss Zhu returned home and told her father what had happened. When the head of the Zhu Family heard, he flew into a rage and immediately put out a bounty for the bandits who tried to kidnap Miss Zhu.

With such a hefty bounty, it wasn’t long before the entire gang of would-be kidnappers was caught.

And here we are. Even after they were caught, the head of the Zhu Family’s anger hadn’t cooled. He sent word to the magistrate’s office.

He told the constables to drag these despicable bandits out at high noon, during the hottest part of the day, and parade them through the streets," the man in the Landlord Hat finished with a grin.

"Serves them right! It’s so hot today, I hope they all bake to death out here."

The onlookers, who despised highway robbers and kidnappers, all clapped and cheered in approval.

Standing in the crowd, Lin Li listened as those in the know pieced the story together, and he gradually got a clearer picture of what had happened.

’I had no idea the Miss Zhu I saved came from such a wealthy family! And her father actually put a public bounty on those bandits... I’ve only ever seen stuff like that in TV dramas before.’

Lin Li was a little surprised to learn these details about Zhu Xinru’s family from the gossiping crowd.

’If someone else had saved Zhu Xinru,’ he thought, ’they’d probably be rushing over to the Zhu estate right now, playing the part of the life-saving hero to get a handsome reward from the family.’

But Lin Li wasn’t that kind of person. Even after learning about her family’s wealth, he had no such intentions.

He then turned his attention back to the paraded bandits, who were now approaching.

The bandits in the prison carts were all injured to some degree. Their conditions were already poor, but under the scorching sun, they grew even worse.

’Back on Blue Star, you could never treat captured criminals this way,’ he mused. ’But here in Dongwu City, in the feudal Chu Kingdom of the Earth Spirit Realm, it’s apparently perfectly normal.’

The reactions from the onlookers lining the streets made that clear. Everyone was vocally supportive of the constables parading the bandits under the blazing sun.

"Water... give me some water... I’m dying of thirst," the scar-faced man in the first prison cart rasped to the gray-robed constable on horseback beside him.

The gray-robed constable had just taken the waterskin from his waist and removed the stopper, preparing to quench his own thirst.

When he heard the scar-faced man begging for water, he paused and turned to look at the prisoner with a smile.

"You want a drink?"

The scar-faced man licked his dry, cracked lips. His eyes, filled with longing, were fixed on the waterskin in the constable’s hand. At the question, he immediately nodded.

"You want a drink? Go ask the people you killed if they agree to it! Pah..."

The gray-robed constable’s smile vanished the moment he saw the prisoner’s desperate gaze and his frantic, pleading nods for the waterskin. His expression turned cold as he spat out the curse.