Even though they were miles apart, Xu Luo still felt a chilling sensation, as if he were being targeted by a venomous snake.
Then, the white-robed, white-haired man reached out, made a sweeping motion toward the ground, and grabbed at the empty air. A medicinal herb, over half a foot tall, was plucked from the ground, a large clump of soil still clinging to its roots.
Afterward, the medicinal herb vanished into thin air.
At that same moment, the Shaking Light Star Soul within Xu Luo ceased its pulsing.
The white-robed, white-haired man didn't spare another glance in Xu Luo's direction. With a slight flicker of his form, he abruptly vanished.
The invisible pressure suddenly lifted. Only then did Xu Luo let out a long sigh of relief, feeling his entire back drenched in cold sweat.
He muttered, "A major sectā¦ Qiushuiduan. Truly formidable! With just two words, he made a group of powerful warriors cough up blood and fleeā¦"
'Those men called the one in black 'General,' and he mentioned a 'Grand General'ā¦ Could they be Cao Tianyi's subordinates?' Xu Luo mused. Just then, he heard Miaomiao's voice in his ear.
"That scared Master Mao half to death! That man is horrifying! I didn't even dare to take a breath!"
"What? You're a Tier Nine Spirit Beast, and even you're afraid of him?" Xu Luo didn't know exactly how powerful a Tier Nine Spirit Beast was, but he knew that experts at the Great Sword Master Realm were nothing more than pushovers in Miaomiao's eyes.
'What kind of power must someone possess to frighten even Miaomiao?'
"Hmph! I'm a juvenile Tier Nine Spirit Beast, got it? If I were a full-grown, powerful Adult Heaven-Swallowing Fox, that human would be no match for me! I could crush him with a single swipe of my claw!"
"Alright, I believe you," Xu Luo said, distractedly placating Miaomiao. He thought to himself, 'No matter how strong that man is, it has nothing to do with me. That group that was just scared away, however, most likely has a direct connection to Cao Tianyi. I can't let this clue go.'
With this in mind, Xu Luo leaped down from the great tree, executed the Shaking Light Step, and sped back the way he came.
"What? You found a trace of the enemy?" Little Fatty Liu Feng said excitedly. "That's great! Doesn't that mean we can complete our mission soon?"
The others were also visibly excited, not having expected to find a clue so easily.
What young person doesn't dream of glory and high office?
If they actually managed to complete this mission, a significant amount of military merit was guaranteed.
"Don't get your hopes up just yet," Xu Luo said, throwing a damper on their excitement. "Let's not even talk about whether they're connected to Cao Tianyi. None of those men were pushovers. Their auras were no weaker than any of ours! The slightest mistake, and they'll spot us!"
"Then what should we do?" Liang Ziyi said through gritted teeth. "Those damn bastardsā¦ I just want to hunt them down and kill them!"
"Right now, we're not necessarily a match for them. If we tip them offā¦" Xu Luo looked at Liang Ziyi and said, "Have you forgotten what I told you earlier?"
Liang Ziyi scratched his head, looking a bit sheepish. "It's justā¦ whenever I think about the village massacre, I can't keep my anger in checkā¦"
Xu Luo's gaze deepened. "Regarding this 'village massacre'," he said softly, "we've only heard Instructor Zhou mention it. We didn't see it for ourselves, and we can't be sure it was done by the Cao Kingdomā¦"
"What?"
Hearing this, the others were all taken aback and stared at him in confusion.
Huangfu Chongzhi knew Xu Luo well; he wasn't one to make baseless claims. He looked up and asked, "Why do you say that?"
Xu Luo shook his head with a wry smile. "I don't have any evidence. It's just a feeling."
Thinking back on the black-clad General and his subordinates, Xu Luo found it hard to believe they were the kind of people who would slaughter unarmed civilians.
Ever since witnessing their skills, Xu Luo knew that if they were really to do such a thing, they wouldn't have needed many people. The black-clad General and his subordinates would have been more than enough.
And yet, Instructor Zhou's orders were to locate the main army of Cao Tianyi, the Prince and Grand General of the Cao Kingdomā¦
A bold hypothesis formed in Xu Luo's mind.
"Could it be," Li Hong began, his brow furrowed, "that Instructor Zhou isn't sure who's responsible either, butā¦ he, or our Military Department, needs a pretext?"
"Thisā¦" The others all fell into deep thought.
Although the members of the Martial Soul Squad were young, they were no ordinary children. They had received the finest martial and scholarly education in the entire Cangqiong Kingdom and were accustomed to forming their own opinions.
"You know, now that you put it that way, it does make some sense," said Xu Jie. "The villagers were definitely massacredāthat part can't be fake. But as for who the real culprit is, that's hard to say."
"That's right," Huangfu Chongzhi said. "The Cao Kingdom is weak. Even with the Great Yan Empire backing them, they're still just trying to survive, caught in the middle. There seems to be absolutely no benefit for them to provoke us so brazenly!"
Xu Luo suddenly spoke up. "That pile of deeply buried charcoal we foundā¦ it might not have been left by soldiers from the Cao Kingdom. I can't shake the feeling that someone is deliberately leading us toward their army."
"Could it have beenā¦ the Great Yan Empire?" Li Hong analyzed. "To provoke a war between us and the Cao Kingdom and escalate the conflict?"
"That's a real possibility," Ling Luoxi added. "It's very likely that even Instructor Zhou has been misled!"
"Let's go over this whole affair from the beginning," Xu Luo said, a thoughtful light flickering in his clear eyes.
"Our group set out from the Imperial Capital and endured hellish training along the way. The objective was to disperse us into the army's lower ranks. We were meant to bolster the army's overall combat quality and complement the battle-hardened veterans."
"Then Instructor Zhou suddenly received news that a village bordering the Cao Kingdom had been massacred. The natural reaction would be to point the finger directly at the Cao Kingdom, especially since they have a Prince Grand General who is famous for his unpredictable movements and blitzkrieg tacticsā¦"
"All the enemy had to do was 'carelessly' leave a few standard-issue Cao Kingdom military weapons in the village. Then, like a lantern in the dark, the culprit would seem obvious. Everyone would assume the Cao Kingdom's army did it!"
"Driven by instinctual rage, our side would frantically search for any trace of Cao Tianyi. Once he's found, a great battle would be inevitable. Butā¦ Cao Tianyi is no pushover. The Cao Kingdom might be small, but his army is strong! A conflict like that would drain a significant amount of our resourcesā¦"
"Instructor Zhou is not a foolish man. He must have his own suspicions. That's why he didn't dispatch a single true military Reconnoitre. Instead, he chose a few dozen of us students on the spot to do this job."
"This is a true life-or-death trial, and a form of training for us! If we do manage to locate Cao Tianyi's army and report back, our superiors will decide what to do next. If we failā¦ well, for the entire Military Department of the Cangqiong Kingdom, it's not a huge loss!"
When Xu Luo finished, he looked at the thoughtful expressions on everyone's faces and continued, "So, at this point, I don't think we can treat this as a simple reconnaissance mission anymore. My proposal isā¦ we get to the bottom of this!"
"Exactly," Li Hong said in a low, serious tone. "I want to get to the bottom of this now, too. Whatever the Military Department decides is their business, but the thousands of villagers who died can't have died without justice!"
ā¦
ćMore than four hundred li away.ć
In a vast valley devoid of trees, foot-high green grass carpeted the land. A great river flowed silently through its center.
One bank of the great river was covered in tents, an endless sea of them stretching to the horizon.
Inside the Central Army Tent, a man in his forties sat in the main seat. He had a square, solemn face, with hints of gray at his temples, but his eyes were incredibly sharp.
Standing before him was a man dressed in black. His features were resolute, though his face was a little pale.
If Xu Luo had been there, he would have recognized him at a glance as the man who had confronted the one with white robes and white hair.
"My Lord, this subordinate has failed. I was unable to retrieve the Nine Profound Celestial Heart. I ask that you mete out punishment," the man in black said, dropping to one knee and lowering his head.
"Was it Qiushuiduan?" the middle-aged man in the main seat asked, raising a single eyebrow. "If it was him, we couldn't have stopped him even with ten times the men. Never mind. You are not to blame for this. Rise and speak."
"Thank you, My Lord." The man in black rose to his feet. "My Lord, regarding the other matter you assigned me, I have a lead. There are indeed people from the Great Yan Empire operating within the Endless Forest Sea. The massacre of that village in the Cangqiong Kingdom was most likely their work. Unfortunately, they are extremely cunning, and this subordinate was unable to capture them."
As he spoke, the man in black suddenly gritted his teeth. "But for this to happen, there must have been insiders helping them! Otherwise, those people from the Great Yan Empire could never have crossed the Endless Forest Sea to find that village in the Cangqiong Kingdom!
Damn it! We're stationed in this godforsaken place year-round, training soldiers for the kingdom, yet there are always people in the court trying to undermine usā¦
Now they've gone so far as to collude with foreign enemies, committing such a monstrous act just to direct the Cangqiong Kingdom's fury toward us. Thisā¦ this is fucking treason!
If the Cangqiong Kingdom actually attacks, our Cao Kingdom will be on the verge of collapse! Damn those short-sighted foolsā¦ They don't even see it. They think they can sleep soundly just because they've latched onto the Great Yan Empire!
The wolf to the east devours men, so do they think the wolf to the west is a vegetarian? All those useless parasites in officeā¦ they should all be put to death!"
The man in the main seat sighed and said softly, "Jiang Han, you don't understand. In my Brother Huang's eyes, I, his younger brother, am far more terrifying than the Great Yan or Cangqiong Kingdoms. I've been training soldiers here for over ten years. How many things do you think my dear Brother Huang has done behind my back during that time? Heh. Wasn't it his own army corps that earned me the moniker of the 'Lightning General, who comes without a shadow and leaves without a trace'?"
"My Lord, if that's the caseā¦ then why don't we justā¦" A sharp, dangerous light glinted in Jiang Han's eyes.
"That's enough!" the middle-aged man snapped, cutting him off. He then waved a hand, as if drained of energy. "I'll pretend I heard nothing. Go and tend to your injuries."
A flash of reluctance crossed Jiang Han's eyes, but he simply nodded, bowed to the middle-aged man, and withdrew from the tent.