38_ Zhuo Fan .

"Enough Jun! " Zhuo Fan spoke authoritatively and his servant immediately stopped his brutish torture once he heard the echoed Silence that reigned.

He opened up the casket and Hikaru fell to his knees ,a heavy mess of blood surrounded him.

He could not believe it. The Bandit King was dressed in an elaborately ornamented long outer garment, the color of blood. Emblemed into the robe were diagrams of phoenix and dragons and other heavenly constituents, a robe magnificent for the likes of Zhuo Fan to obtain without the use of thievery.

As he came in all his subordinates, lowered their heads to avoid looking at him directly in his eyes. Trailing him were Four ferocious Wolves , with black fur and on stripes of white over their eyes. They bared their teeth and growled incessantly, heads bent in command of their much feared master.

He towered above Lucian who stared back at him impudently. On seeing this , the man delivering him blows earlier , forced his head down but the Bandit King stopped him in a surprisingly genteel voice.

"Leave him be."

The man immediately obeyed and moved away. Blood dripped down from Lucian's nose. His left eye was swollen shut, his face bruised and Zhuo Fan gave him a hard , cold stare.

"Who are you?"

Lucian said nothing but went on groaning in distress as his brain continued to hammer inside of his head. Zhuo Fan wrinkled the brows on his face and frowned ; his face a clear expression of displeasure.

"Who are you?! A spy?!"

He asked once again in a civil manner,but his countenance had begun to betray him as he was getting infuriated with this insolent being below him.

Zhuo Fan glanced towards Hikaru who was sprawled on the floor , laying in a pool of his own blood and the girl kneeling beside him , desperately trying to rouse him to life.

He sighed and with one great force , drew back his fist. Lucian caught his hand in mid -air breathing heavily as he mustered enough strength to get on one knee. "We have done you no harm." He coughed out.

"Maybe not yet." He replied sinsterly . "And I intend to prevent that from happening".

Zhuo Fan took out his other hand and slammed it into Lucian's abdomen , as he spultered blood over his adorned robe.

"Lucian!" Kaya cried

He curled up, groaning from the impact of the blow and Zhuo Fan withdrawn his hand. "Who are you and where are you from? Are you spies sent to monitor my activities?"

The bleeding man said nothing but kept groaning in pain.

Zhuo Fan scowled . Picking him up , he slammed the other man head on into the pillar nearby and he shouted in agony.

Kaya gasped as she saw Lucian on the ground. "Please...Leave him be. He is half dead..."

She shuddered as he turned her gaze to her and smiled with evil in his eyes. Zhuo Fan held her chin forcefully as he regarded her beautiful face. He placed a string of her hair behind her ear as he ran his finger over her full lips.

"You will suffice as payment enough."

Inadvertently, he was surprised when he felt a blow catch him on his jaw. Momentarily stunned , Zhuo Fan flexed his jaw and turned back.

"Do not touch her."

He scoffed and punched his fist into Lucian's face and he crumpled backwards. The Bandit King grabbed the man below him by his dark hair , already sodden wet with his own blood

They were led down to a large space , where they was a length , extended stump of a tree that had been cut down. Traces of dried blood , were splattered around the trunk as the grass around the area where stained with the same.

Zhuo Fan nodded as the large man dragged Lucian by the hair and bound his two hands to the stump , him being unable to resist as he was already weakened. He was stripped of his clothes on the upper part of his body and Kaya and Hikaru where forced down on their knees to watch the gruesome scene as The Bandit King took up a whip that had been set aside and stroked it in his hands as he spoke, his fierce wolves towered around him , baring their teeth and snarling angrily.

Zhuo Fan rose the strap in the air and set it down heavily on the Prince's back. Lucian gritted his teeth as the hide tore into his flesh.

"Lucian..." Kaya gasped as she bowed her head to the floor. A tear slid down her cheek as she dug her fingers into the sand and gripped the dust. He was getting whipped for her sake.

It was all her fault. All of it was.

Kaya's breaths began getting raspy and hardened as she gripped her abdomen , trying to holding in strange painful feeling she was having, boiling her insides.

Zhuo Fan repeated this action ovet and over again but Lucian kept silent , only groaning and gasping to relief the burning pain. blood leaking from the stripes on his back.

Suddenly Kaya could take no more. It killed her seeing him like this. It hurt too much her soul to bear.

"Stop..." She gasped and Zhuo stopped as he looked at her , almost sympathetically.

"What did you say?"

"I said Stop!" Kaya screamed , her voice deafening, issuing out of her throat as

her eyes went blank...