As the carriage sped along, the horses grew tired. Noticing this, the chief asked the convoy to slow down, instructing them not to exhaust the horses. He apologized to the others for the unnecessary attempt to catch up with the convoy ahead.
Soon, they reached a dense tree area, and everyone unconsciously became alert for possible attacks. As they traveled through the area without any anomaly, they let their guard down as they saw the exit with a few trees.
As soon as they reached the exit, an arrow flew towards a guard from the distance. The guard immediately defended himself from the arrows while warning the others of the attack.
With a thud, the arrow lodged onto the wooden shield the guards used to protect themselves. Everyone quickly gathered and formed a shield around the carriage, stopping the rain of arrows from reaching it. The children in the carriage held their heads down and lay flat to protect themselves from any stray arrows that might pass through the gaps and hit them.
Soon, a few bandits, knowing their arrows wouldn't work on the convoy, started running towards them with swords in hand.
In response, the guards dismounted their horses, as the path ahead was unsuitable for fighting on horseback, and drew their swords, readying their stance to defend. The bandits quickly reached the guards, and their swords clashed. The once-silent forest area was soon filled with the sound of clashing swords.
Ryan watched the battle with interest, without any tension, as he saw the bandits were just a ragtag bunch, losing ground against the guards from the start of their clash.
Ryan then saw the leader of the bandits fuming with his anger, slowly making his way towards the carriage, bypassing the guards and trying to take the children as hostages.
Ryan then alerted the chief, who was watching the battle leisurely. The chief saw the bandit leader approaching and asked Ryan if he had fought anyone, and Ryan slowly shook his head in denial.
The chief smiled and asked if he wanted to experience fighting a martial artist, noticing the sword at his hips.
Ryan then denied the chief's claim and said he only bought the sword to defend himself, not to duel with bandits.
The chief then angrily asked what was wrong with dueling bandits. You have to use your resources wisely, or else, how will you learn to fight? Or you have thought of not fighting your entire life just by spending in the village or towns by doing business.
Ryan dodged the question, and the chief, in anger at his lack of response, showed the bandit and shouted at Ryan to fight him with only a sword.
Then, Ryan saw the bandit getting near and felt the chief was serious and, with a wry smile, took out the sword from his hips and got down the carriage to intercept the bandit.
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Bandit's leader Pov
Today seems a lucky day; many carriages are passing through the forest. If we can intercept one weak convoy, it will be enough for us to survive for a year by robbing the weapons and money they have.
While he was caught up in his fantasy of an easy robbery, one of his gang members approached him and mentioned that he had spotted a small convoy traveling through the forest with only about ten guards and a single large carriage.
As the leader of the group, he promptly instructed them to intercept the others and seize all their belongings.
As usual, the bandits hid to attack the guards with arrows first, then charged down with swords to finish.
But the guards showed resilience by resisting the attacks and stopping their charge.
The leader saw the situation turn bad, so he bypassed the fight area and slowly crept towards the carriage after seeing a young man and an old man guarding the carriage.
He thought he could easily take control, but as he came closer, his eyes met with the young man, and he immediately sensed that the young man would alert the guards. But instead of alerting the guards who were fighting, He pointed him out to the old man, who slowly began scolding the youth for something. Then, he saw the young man getting down from the carriage with his sword drawn and a cramped smile on his face.
With a ferocious smile like a tiger hunting a young deer, the leader went to fight the young man.
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As Ryan got down the carriage and saw the bandit expression turn into a ferocious smile and he drew his sword and ran towards him.
Ryan got ready to defend first as he hasn't learned any proper sword stances.
The bandit got near him and slashed down at him forcefully to which Ryan slowly held his sword with his both hands and placed it the path of the sword slash trajectory and effectively blocking it.
As soon as the sword attack was blocked Ryan felt his hand numb from the force of the opponent.
The numbness soon receded as he circulated some of his spirit energy in his body and he got ready to stop the second attack.
As attack rained on him by the bandit with vigorous slashes at him Ryan slowly got used to the pace from awkward movement to effectively blocking them without feeling his hand numb.
As Ryan got used to the attack, he started to find the gap in the bandit attack to return attack the bandit.
As he tried a few times and to which the bandit responded timely and nullified his attack.
Ryan slowly took the pace out the bandits attack and slowly added his attacks which made the bandit seat uncontrollably.
As they were dueling, the guards who had been fighting the other bandits defeated them, tied them up properly, and sat on the ground to enjoy the duel.
The chief also asked the children to come down and watch the duel, as they wouldn't get to see fights often.
Everyone started cheering for Ryan, and the bandit leader, seeing his comrades get captured, immediately tried to escape, but all his attempts were thwarted. Frustrated, he gathered all his strength and fought more fiercely, trying to defeat Ryan and escape while they were tending to the injured, which put Ryan in a tough spot.
After a few minutes of attacking and defending, the bandit lost all hope of escaping, threw down his sword, and surrendered, pleading for his life.
Ryan sheathed his sword and promised not to kill them if they agreed to stop banditry and work for him in the village.
The bandit leader thought for a second, then consulted his fellow comrades and agreed to Ryan's demand.
They took them to their den where they usually stayed. The chief found the place suitable for their night stay and asked everyone to get down from the carriage and set up tents to rest for the night, as the attack from the bandits had delayed their journey and it was already evening with the sun about to set in a few minutes.