Volume 5, Chapter 76 – Reconnaissance

With the tasks assigned, Xu Shu quickly led the others into action.

Following the information Bai Changze had provided, they went around the two hills standing ahead of them. After passing through another stretch of woods, they indeed found a river.

Xu Shu had Chen Jing stay behind with Chang Ling, Lu Zheng, and Dai Jichang, four people in total, to guard the flying vessel and conceal it in a clearing within the forest. He himself took the other five and followed the river to investigate, searching all the way for demon villages.

The demon race naturally had villages.

Long before the Zhengyuan Era began, back in the previous dynasty, those hidden demon kingdoms had already learned to imitate human techniques. Many lesser demons, led by demon kings, withdrew from the world and lived in seclusion, even developing places of prosperity close to the scale of human towns.

And now, with the world returning to a more primal state, the power of Loss of Order had grown stronger than before. On top of that, the demon race had already gained enormous benefits from the tides of the Void Tribulation. At last, this race had truly broken free from the enslavement of the various sects and the Demon Court alike, and was beginning to grow wildly across the desolate land.

“Junior Brother Changze.”

As they traveled, Zhu Sheng turned back and asked Bai Changze, “From the way you were talking, Bai Tingyun is actually your uncle?”

“He is my father’s elder brother.” Bai Changze nodded and began explaining the background. “My branch of the family is very large, and I wasn’t anyone special. Before I was sent here to learn swordsmanship, I spent one year serving in the army at the Tianji Circuit for experience. So don’t expect me to know much about the general. We’ve only met and spoken a handful of times.”

“But he still taught you quite a few things, didn’t he?” Dongzi, meaning Zhang Donglai, said with a smile. “Looks like he really does care about you all. He’s not as cold and distant as the rumors say.”

Bai Changze’s brow twitched, and he frowned instinctively.

But for some reason, as if he had remembered something, his expression quickly relaxed again.

“Don’t pry into other people’s family matters!” Liu Yong came up and put some distance between Dongzi and Bai Changze, lowering his voice as he warned him. “That’s very rude!”

“No… it’s all right.” In a rare break from his usual manner, Bai Changze actually spoke up in Dongzi’s defense. “He’s right, actually. We used to think the general was iron-blooded and unfeeling too, but looking back on it now, everything he did was for our own good.”

Hm?

At first glance, that statement was a little hard to understand, but the others quickly realized what it meant. Bai Tingyun’s so-called iron-blooded ruthlessness might have been to avoid implicating the relatives around him.

He was the Watchman and commander of the Tianji Circuit. The Tingyun Army under his command had fought the Qingyun Army there for many years and had never retreated, no matter how terrible the casualties. That inevitably made him a thorn in the demon race’s side. It was certain that they not only tried to assassinate him, but also attempted to threaten him through the safety of the people around him, his kin, his lovers, and so on.

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In that case, of course he had to be “iron-blooded and unfeeling.”

He himself was stationed in the Tianji Circuit, in the Tingyun Army’s main camp. There was no way the protection he received there could be evenly extended to everyone around him.

If he dared show “special regard” for any particular person, woman, or soldier, they would certainly become targets of demon assassinations in the days that followed.

Promoting aides was one thing. He did not have to worry about that, since those people had cultivation of their own.

But children sent from home to gain experience… he could not ignore the risks involved.

“I heard the cultivation method General Bai practices was one he comprehended himself from military formations?”

Having found Bai Changze’s weak point, Zhu Sheng used the topic as an opening to deepen the conversation. “It was a self-created method derived from the Shenming Qi-Refining Art, right? Is that true?”

“It is.” Bai Changze nodded firmly again. “That isn’t a secret… it’s called the Tingyun Art, and that’s what I’m practicing right now.”

“Is it different from our cultivation method?”

“It is… and the difference isn’t small. They’re both qi-refining methods, and both can refine qi-power, but the Tingyun Art is more efficient and much more forceful. It raises your strength faster in the short term, but it also puts a pretty heavy burden on the body. It’s not as balanced and steady as the basic qi methods…”

This exchange really did not count as a secret, because over the years, the idea that derivative methods had been created on the foundation of the Shenming Qi-Refining Art had gradually become widely accepted.

Life always found its own way forward.

The same method produced different results in different people. Many talented individuals therefore modified it according to different needs, creating new foundational methods better suited to themselves.

For example, Xiajing University’s secret qi art, Gather Form and Scatter Qi. Among cultivators, that art also had another name: the Bai Clan Sword Pellet. It had separate training methods and combat methods. Compared to the way of the sword pellet ten years ago, it could now truly be called a complete system.

In fact, for many people, they could not even be bothered to say the full name Shenming Qi-Refining Art anymore. They simply called it the Qi-Refining Art or the basic qi method.

It was like a kaleidoscope, the original point of origin from which more dazzling branches had emerged.

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This Zhu Sheng really was skilled at handling relationships.

Watching the atmosphere among them grow harmonious so quickly, to the point that even Guo Feng could not help joining the discussion, Xu Shu found it rather amusing from the back.

They were not as good as he was, of course, but after ten years of tempering, the little group of Liu Yong, Zhu Sheng, and Zhang Donglai had become much more mature than before. Boys like Bai Changze and Guo Feng were simply no match for their scheming.

Still, good relations were a good thing.

Once they became familiar with one another, they would coordinate better in danger. Xu Shu had no intention of exposing it or stopping it.

After traveling on for some distance, Dongzi, who was walking in front, suddenly twitched his nose.

“Something stinks.”

“Stop.”

He thrust out an arm, and everyone behind him immediately halted. Each of them gripped their weapons and looked around with taut expressions.

Dongzi pushed aside the brush.

“It’s demon-beast droppings.”

“This is the outermost edge of their activity range. We picked the right direction.”

Demon beasts.

Guo Feng began recalling what he knew.

Demon beasts were also part of the demon race, and together with demonfolk, they counted as one of its mainstream branches.

The upper and lower limits within that branch varied enormously. Some looked much like demonfolk and could speak human language, while others had only just awakened demonic transformation, with muddled minds, pissing everywhere like wild animals.

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The demon race was omnivorous. They did not only eat humans. Demon villages also farmed and domesticated demon beasts to assist with labor, just like the human race.

“Wait here.”

Xu Shu began acting as the senior brother, ordering everyone to stay where they were. Carrying his sword on his back, he stepped out through the thicket and disappeared into the trees ahead.

He did not make them wait long.

After only about half an hour, he returned carrying an unconscious sheep demon and casually threw it to the ground.

“Ah!”

The sheep demon woke with a start. It scrambled upright, glaring with its distinctive rectangular pupils, and cried out, “Humans? You dare cross the border and trespass here? Are you tired of living?”

It had long limbs and could stand upright like a person. It wore simple leather armor and had a belt tied around its waist.

A demon beast like this actually wasn’t especially weak. It was roughly at the level of five Body Tribulations, equivalent to the fifth layer of Qi Refining for human cultivators. It had already risen above the lower ranks of the demon race.

But in front of Xu Shu, who was in the Golden Core stage, it was nothing at all. Its key points had been sealed by infused qi-power, and at the moment it was no more threatening than an ordinary mountain goat.

“Enough nonsense.”

Xu Shu pressed the edge of his sword against its neck. “I ask. You answer.”

“…This little one will tell you everything I know!”

Realizing the gap in strength, the sheep demon surrendered immediately.

“Where is your village?” Xu Shu asked.

“Back there. Once you get through this patch of woods, you’ll see it.”

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“How many people are there?”

“You mean how many demons, right…? Counting me, there’s a hundred-something… but if you keep going farther back, there are lots more villages like ours…”

“Don’t tell me what I didn’t ask. Do you know the Qingyun Army?”

“Of course! That’s the Qingyun Demon Saint’s army. How could we not know them?”

“Did the Qingyun Army just pass through here recently?”

“Uh, yeah!”

“Do they often come here to camp and rest?”

“As far as I remember, yeah.”

“Compared with before, what was different this time when they passed through?”

“Different…”

The sheep demon narrowed its eyes.

“If I had to say what was different, it’d be that they brought a whole lot of people,” it answered.

“Not demons. Humans. Lots of them. Lots and lots of humans.”

As if afraid Xu Shu and the others would not understand, it even gestured with its two front hooves.

“I don’t know what they were for either.”

“Back then, I asked some pointy-mouthed, monkey-faced hairy monster, and it told me they were all rations prepared for a ‘god.'”