Volume 5, Chapter 78 – Scouts

Meanwhile, in the thickets, the advance squad from the Zhennan Circuit had already finished its first interrogation.

“The Qingyun Army is taking half-demonized people alive from the villages along the road. That’s highly suspicious.”

Drawing his sword from the sheep demon’s skull, Xu Shu casually wiped the stinking demon blood from the blade with his sleeve and spoke to the others with a grave expression.

“I intend to keep exploring ahead in two teams like this. Along the way, we may encounter enemies equivalent to the Golden Core stage, or even above it. You all need to understand that.”

There was no need to worry about Liu Yong’s trio, and Bai Changze had military experience, so that was not an issue either. This was mainly directed at Guo Feng.

“Don’t worry, Senior Brother!” Guo Feng pressed his lips together and thumped his chest. “The word fear doesn’t exist in my dictionary!”

He said that, but everyone noticed that the left hand holding his sword sheath was trembling slightly.

In the end, he was still inexperienced. Being able to perform like this was already not bad. Xu Shu nodded and did not press further.

He sent Dongzi to approach the flying vessel behind them and contact it once the cell signal was less severely disturbed by the tidal forces, informing them of the discoveries here. He also told Chen Jing and the others to keep piloting the flying vessel behind the squad, ready at all times to pick them up and cover their retreat.

As for Xu Shu himself, he kept leading the team onward. Following the intelligence the sheep demon had provided, they headed toward that demon village, intending to investigate whether the Qingyun Army had left behind any further traces.

Originally, they had not planned to make too much noise. They meant to investigate and then slip away quietly. But the moment they pushed aside the brush ahead and saw what lay before them, every one of them froze.

They were standing on relatively high ground, something that just barely counted as a slope of earth. Looking ahead from that rise, they saw a broad stretch of specially cultivated farmland and irrigation channels.

Some sheep demons and deer demons dressed like villagers stood upright in the fields with farm tools in hand, tilling the soil. Every so often, they would even pull out towels to wipe their sweat. At first glance, it had an almost pastoral charm.

But if one saw clearly what the “seedlings” they were planting in the fields actually were, no one would think that.

They were remains.

Human remains.

Some were hands, severed human hands.

Some were legs and feet, torn-off legs and feet.

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Thin ones, fat ones.

Ones still bearing flesh, half-ruined ones, ones reduced to bare skeletons.

No matter what kind, they had all been planted upside down in the mud like rice seedlings. Once the soil was packed over them and a scoop of foul-smelling blood was poured on top, clusters of slender blood-red vines would naturally spread up from below and bore into the flesh of those remains, as if they were merging with them to become some kind of special plant.

“…This is a village that practices flesh-farming.”

Xu Shu’s expression darkened at once, and the tip of his sword pointed at a sheep demon that had turned to look.

“Kill…”

“Kill them all!”

The battle ended very quickly.

Xu Shu and Liu Yong, two Golden Core cultivators, were among the six-man squad. The sword qi coating their weapons was incomparably sharp, and no armor or spellwork could withstand it. In short order, they slaughtered the entire demon village of nearly a hundred inhabitants, making sure not a single demon escaped.

When it was more or less over, Xu Shu, Liu Yong, and the others cleaned up the aftermath, gathering together the chopped and blasted demon corpses with the intention of burning them all.

The weather would be turning hot soon. They could not leave the bodies exposed in the wilderness.

A plague would be the lesser problem. If lingering spirits clinging to flesh formed some sort of aggregate Demon Pool, that would be real trouble.

“Blegh…!”

While they worked, the young Guo Feng was bent over on the edge of the field, vomiting wildly.

At first, he had been able to hold it in. A scene of this level alone was not enough to trigger a physical reaction from him.

But once they began searching deeper through the village, once he barged into the demon huts and saw piles of stored human brains there, and even some that had already been fully cooked, he could no longer suppress the nausea. The moment he came back out, he began retching violently.

“You all right?”

Bai Changze crouched beside him and patted his back. Rare traces of a smile appeared on his usually cold face.

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“Flesh-farming is a very common custom in demon settlements.”

“They combine mutated seeds with the flesh of prey to cultivate a special kind of crop. The fruit it produces contains flesh components, which can replace human flesh and blood and satisfy that particular need.”

“Stop talking…” Guo Feng’s face turned even paler. He hurriedly waved at Bai Changze and groaned in bafflement, “Why… why is none of this reported on TV or online…”

“This isn’t the sort of thing that can be openly discussed and left in public view.” Bai Changze shook his head. “Those who have lost loved ones are already suffering badly enough. If they learned that their relatives might have ended up like this…”

“They would definitely demand even harsher revenge, right?” Guo Feng picked up the words for him, his raised eyes bloodshot. “I don’t think they’d be wrong.”

“These beasts all deserve to die.”

Once he had finished vomiting, the nausea passed.

Now, when Guo Feng thought back on it all, only one emotion remained in his heart: anger.

He still wanted to kill.

He wanted to kill every last demon creature.

Bai Changze could understand how he felt. He patted his shoulder twice as a form of comfort.

“Give him some water and pills.”

As Liu Yong passed by, he tossed over a waterskin and a bottle of pills.

“There are plenty of villages like this. If he keeps vomiting every time, he won’t last.”

Smack.

Bai Changze caught the items, opened his mouth as if to say something, and in the end said nothing.

During the fighting just now, Liu Yong had been the most frenzied of all. The broad-bladed war sword in his hands had been like a meat grinder, and he alone had killed half the demons.

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Bai Changze was beginning to revise his opinion of Liu Yong.

For Bai Changze, the Zhennan Bai clan was unquestionably the family’s main line now. His own branch, including Bai Tingyun, was merely a side branch.

Even so, he too had grown up listening to the legends of the High Emperor. To say he felt no admiration for that bearing would have been a lie.

And precisely because of that, like many of his peers, he had once despised Liu Yong after hearing certain rumors. He had felt that, as the only direct disciple the High Emperor had left behind, Liu Yong was disgracing him.

Defeat was not frightening.

Other than the High Emperor, who in all the world dared claim never to have been defeated?

What was frightening was collapsing after defeat, no longer fighting, no longer seeking revenge, simply accepting the fact that one had become crippled and lying around in the circuit wasting away.

He had once believed Liu Yong was that kind of coward.

But now, whether the rumors were true or not, it seemed clear that Liu Yong had already pulled himself back together and reclaimed the spirit that belonged to a cultivator.

Liu Yong paid no mind to the way others looked at him. His face and body were streaked with dried demon blood. He looked filthy from head to toe, yet his mood was exceptionally buoyant.

He knew what people outside said about him, and he too believed he had been a coward.

But ever since receiving Bai Xiang’s acknowledgment, ever since Bai Xiang judged that he was still capable of carrying out this most dangerous kind of mission abroad, he had come alive again at once. His mind held only one thought: completing the mission.

Slay demons and eradicate evil.

Blade cutting flesh.

The feeling of the sword edge biting into bone was so vividly real.

Bathed in the evening sunlight, he closed his eyes and quietly savored it with deep enjoyment.

“Captain!”

Just then, from the houses behind them, Zhu Sheng popped his head out with a beaming face.

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“Get over here!”

“You’ll never guess what I found!”

How is it that your expression is always so completely out of place with whatever scene you’re in…?

Xu Shu braced himself and walked over. A short while later, he came back out holding a letter, his own brows and eyes full of delight.

“So that’s it. The reason these villages are carrying out flesh-farming on such a large scale is to hand over flesh grain to the Qingyun Army and to serve as its eyes and ears.”

“And this letter says they observed a scout unit from the Tingyun Army passing through here, just half a day ago. They can’t be far from us!”

“The Tingyun Army?”

“A scout unit?”

At his words, everyone’s eyes lit up.

Bai Changze in particular, since he had served in it for a short time before.

“That makes sense,” Liu Yong said. “The Qingyun Army pulled back for no reason. Given General Bai’s style, he’d definitely send people to follow up and investigate.”

“Then we have a chance to catch up to that unit.” Xu Shu was still staring at the letter. “…According to this, they were moving in a hurry and didn’t bother with these demon villages.”

“The demons know they exist, so they could run into an interception.”

“Now that we’ve uncovered this information too, let’s leave those villages alone for now.”

At that, Xu Shu lowered the letter and narrowed his eyes.

“First, we catch up to them.”

“As for this filth… killing it can wait until we come back.”