The bandit chief was waiting at his base for all the bandits to come and tell him of any new occurrences in the forest. Recently there had been very few occurrences they had not killed any people in over a month.
People started becoming vary of them and stopped coming towards them. They could go to a village a pillage but if the people of Darren were able to leave the town and tech hamshire city then he would be in deep trouble from the Duke. So they have been playing a waiting game with Darren.
The plan will be successful they had to just wait for it to be done. One by one all the groups returned and reported to the chief. But group 5(York's group) had yet to report to him. He waited for an hour more but no one had yet reached yet. When the chief was getting irritated York came running towards him.
"Where is your group leader why did he send you here and where is he?" the chief roared
"Chief the group was attacked and the leader told me to call you for reinforcements."
"How many people are there?"
"We don't know they were hiding in the bushes and attacked is with stones. They should not be a small number of people probably more than 40. They could be enough to take us all down if we don't go and attack them" York said thinking about seeing about the huge number of stones thrown at them.
The chief was having a headache thinking who this new enemy who was after his people. He decided to crush them at once and hence said " Leaders bring all your men we will go attack them at once and kill all of them and show our enemies no one can fight us."
All the bandits were gathered and the chief ordered them to come take out the enemies. The bandits were excited and ready to take them down at once.
In actuality the first bandit group had encountered Ethan when they were patrolling. When they went near him to take him down his friends attacked them with stones. Ethan had told them to throw the stones 2 at a time and not care whether they hit or not. That's what confused York into thinking there were more than 40 when I'm actuality there were less than 30 people in the group.
When all the bandits came towards the area where the bandits were previously present then saw 4 dead bodies which were deformed by stones. The chief got furious and was about to say something when they heard a whistle. When they turned to the direction they saw Ethan sitting on a horse mocking them to catch him.
The bandit chief laughed and said " young lad you have guts. Tell the grownups behind you to come and fight us we are more than 150 people here we will take them all down."
In response Ethan made a monkey face to mock him and started riding his horse. The chief got furious and told them to start following him. After they traveled a few kilometres the chief was angry at Ethan because he was not running away from them but giving them enough time to keep following them and he would mock them in different ways which made it impossible for his members to stop the pursuit.
Then suddenly Ethan stopped his horse and got down from it. The chief looked around him but could not find anyone around. he cautiously led his bandits forward then suddenly 8 children threw some barrels at them. The barrels broke as they fell on the bandits.
The chief smelled his collar and found it to be oil before he could think about what was happening he saw a 8 year old boy carrying a wooden torch. He was shocked when he finally understood what they were planning. Before he could warn them the boy threw the torch on the oil and it started burning the bandits. After some struggle more than 120 people had died in the fire.
The scene horrified the other bandits much less the children but the only one who didn't flinch was the 8 year old boy who had thrown the torch. He was willy a peasant from the town whose 4 sisters were raped and killed by the bandits and his parents beat to death. When he heard about the plan he insisted to be the one to burn the bandits. Ethan looking at his determined eyes had accepted to it.
After the death of the bandits the remaining 20-25 bandits were about to run away when Ethan had another boy there a barrel of oil at them.
A bandits said " Please spare my life I have children they cannot live without me." the other bandits also started crying.
Ethan took a sword and killed 3 people in the group they were one of the people who went to the town to rape women. The other bandits were frightened to no end by this action.
Ethan said" I will let you live under one condition. You have to follow me for the rest of your life. I will make sure you have enough to let your family have a comfortable life and your children are well fed. But you are not allowed to take advantage of any innocent people from now on." Then he picked up the torch and walked towards them and said in a low voice "Do you accept?"
The bandits one by one feel on their knees and said "I accept."