The Tired Villainess

Xu Qiang - 1.3

The men standing around the boys beaten on the floor looked at Xu Qiang, confused.

She actually agreed to have fun with us?

Clearly, they didn't think that a rich girl would know how to defend herself and that was true, the original Xu Qiang didn't know how to fight, but Lihua did.

After being shunned by her family, Lihua started to seek out things that could help fill the void in her. This led to her learning a lot of skills that she never thought she would need to use, until now.

She didn't need to have strength in order to knock someone out, she just had to know where to hit.

Xu Qiang casually started walking towards them, while the mens' eyes lit up. When she stopped in front of the leader, Xu Qiang raised her right leg and used some force as she kicked his calf. Her heels were useful as they added more pressure in the area where she hurt. The two men standing on the side were startled as they saw their leader fall to the floor.

They quickly became angry as they both came closer to her. One of them spoke up, "Little girl, it would be such a shame if you died in our hands, don't put up a fight, you can't win against us."

"We'll have to see about that." Xu Qiang looked at her nails and said nonchalantly.

A large, bulky arm swung in Xu Qiang's direction but she dodged it. She grabbed that arm and twisted it behind the person's back and kicked their left shin, making them fall to the ground in pain. She then grabbed onto their right leg and put her foot on their knee and kicked down hard, generating an interesting cracking noise.

The man howled in pain until Xu Qiang kicked his lower jaw, which shut him up. All this happened in a span of 2 minutes. The other man who was holding a gun didn't react till Xu Qiang was already in front of him. He held the gun and pointed it to her head and shouted, "Stay away or I'll shoot!"

Xu Qiang looked at him dead in the eye, "Do it, I dare you."

Life couldn't get any worse.

The man froze hearing her words. Does she really not care?

His fingers trembled as he pulled the safety trigger back and when he was about to shoot, Xu Qiang grabbed his wrist and twisted it, turning the direction of the gun as well. She then used the man's wrist to pull him closer and kicked the back of his knee making him lose balance and fall.

Around 3 more men came and saw the state of the others and immediately went to attack Xu Qiang. She, originally, tried to punch one of them but it resulted in a silent hiss from her as she looked down at her pale knuckles, now slowly turning red. Xu Qiang decided to not try and be a dramatic hero and swofavoided all their attacks and just used the butt of the gun to knock them out.

After she finished, she looked at the forgotten boys still on the ground in the corner, looking at her in a trance. She took a handkerchief from her jacket and wiped her slender white fingers.

Xu Qiang glanced at the boys once more and then pulled something out of her jacket. 

"Stand up."

The beaten and bruised boys all stood up, and from what they were wearing and after hearing what the men said from before, Xu Qiang could tell that these boys came from rich and probably powerful families. 

Xu Qiang shook her head and walked closer to the boys but when they saw her coming near them, they backed up a step. Xu Qiang paused when she saw this and threw something at the one furthest to the right.

"Patch yourselves up. I could only grab these bandages and a little first-aid kit." 

All the boys looked at her, suspiciously. 

"I heard you guys getting beat up a while ago when I was walking to the store. I thought you could use this."

Xu Qiang sighed loudly when they didn't talk so she asked them, "What are your names?"

"Li Cheng." One of the boys said. He had a cute face that still had some baby fat on it but he tried to look scary which made him look a bit funny.

"I'm Qiao Chonglin." Another boy said softly. His face was more chiselled than Li Cheng's and had some more definition to it. Like Li Cheng, he also tried to look scary and like a rebel, his hair was dyed platinum blonde which suited him quite well.

These two boys were standing closer to Xu Qiang so she heard them clearly, another boy who was standing beside Qiao Chonglin spoke up, "I'm Kang Donghai." 

The boy right at the end still hadn't spoken yet so Xu Qiang walked to him and saw he was still looking at the ground.

"And you?" She asked, trying to sound polite although it came out a bit awkward.

The boy stiffened up before he slowly replied.

"...He Shun." He whispered. His injuries were the worst out of all the boys but Xu Qiang could see that he was still standing upright.

"Right, well. You guys can help each other out now." Xu Qiang had a polite smile and nodded at them before she turned to leave.

"Wait!" The boy named Li Cheng yelled. He quickly closed his mouth when he saw that the woman turned around. 

Li Cheng looked at his friends and urged them to talk out loud. Xu Qiang was feeling a little out of place seeing the boys having a conversation amongst themselves with just their eyes. She looked around the alleyway and tried to think of other things.

Do I get paid for this? Maybe doing good things will happen to me now that I've helped these boys. 

"Um," The boy named Kang Donghai started to speak, "We don't know how to use these."

"...You don't know how to use a first-aid kit?" Xu Qiang slowly spoke, her astonishment present in her eyes.

The boys shook their heads and slowly grew red from embarrassment when they didn't hear anything more from the woman in front of them. Xu Qiang silently whispered to Arlo to 'send help' but there was no reply.

Sighing for the umpteenth time today, Xu Qiang gestured for them to come closer. She grabbed the first-aid kit and bandages from one of the boys and opened an alcohol wipe. Xu Qiang put her hand out for Li Cheng to grab it from. When he didn't take it, Xu Qiang looked at him strangely.

"Don't tell me you don't know what to do with this." 

Xu Qiang put the wipe on his face and put pressure on his cheek, where there was a cut. When the sting brought Li Cheng back to his senses, Xu Qiang apologised and told him to continue wiping his face. She opened the other alcohol wipes and handed them to the other boys.

Once they wiped their faces she made them form a line so that she could put a bit of ointment in their hands. They used the ointment on their cuts and now fewer bloody bruises.

When she was giving ointment to He Shun, Xu Qiang concluded that he was probably the 'leader' of the group with his cold and aloof face. Xu Qiang was busy thinking about what excuse she could come up with and leave so she didn't see the grateful look in the boys' eyes, or their red faces due to embarrassment.

"I'm not a professional, so I think you guys should go to the hospital and get ourselves checked out." Xu Qiang slowly started to walk backward in small steps.

"Also I was wondering why- oh! I forgot about my noodles!" Xu Qiang quickly came up with a reason to leave and ran to get to her precious meal.