Chapter 1448: Joining Hands?
"Human being..."
Looking at East Peace County on the north horizon far away, which only had the flickering light left, Li Yao felt more and more uneasy.
After all, he had never intended to kill Mother White Lotus. He would not be content if he could not figure out the key to the confusing battle!
Li Yao's communication with the mental devil was merely conducted through the exchange of telepathic thoughts in the brain. In reality, only one moment had passed.
The next second, he let out an ear-splitting roar before darting into the forests in a streak of brightness, pretending to be chasing after Mother White Lotus.
But the moment he landed on the dense forests, he concealed his spiritual energy and took a large turn, heading back to East Peace County.
The area between East Peace County and the south hills was already a mess.
The Cultivators in the ancient times had rarely received any professional military training. Despite their formidable personal combat ability, they were essentially a bunch of super muscles of a gang. There was a huge gap between them and an organized, well-trained troop.
The greatest problem was that, when they were chasing after the enemy, they mostly acted on their own, with barely any communication with each other. The chasers lacked effective leadership as much as the escapers did. It was purely their personal valor that was being measured.
To some extent, it was an overstatement to describe the combat between Cultivators as a 'war'. It was essentially a street fight of a larger scale and a higher level.
Everybody was shouting, slaying, and charging without caring about anything and without any purpose. They simply attacked any wandering ghost, skeleton, or zombie in sight.
In such chaos, not a single human or ghost noticed Li Yao when he was sneaking.
He even took off the green robe that he had been wearing and covered himself in a few battle robes on the battlefield that were riddled with holes and stained with blood. He then concealed his face with mud and blood. Eventually, he slightly adjusted his joints and muscles, making his physique subtly change before he swaggered into East Peace City.
At that moment, the center of the battle had long drifted away from East Peace County. The only things related to the battle in the city were the wounded soldiers and dead bodies during the siege battle in the day. Many folks in the city had been organized to bury the bodies and treat the injured. They were walking in and out of the wide-open city gate nonstop. The defenses could not have been weaker.
Li Yao narrowed his eyes and looked at the city wall. He did not find many Cultivators who were guarding there. Even the Ocean Suppressing Ocean, which had been functioning at a high intensity for an entire day, had been paused, probably for urgent maintenance.
However, despite the weak defense of East Peace County, there was indeed not a single shadow of a ghost anywhere. There was nothing suspicious on the vast ocean that had been illuminated by the bright moon, either.
Confused and concerned, Li Yao entered East Peace County while pretending to be an injured soldier.
At this moment, the majority of the Cultivators and elite soldiers had marched out of the city to hunt the army of ghouls. So, the city was rather empty and quiet.
Only the disaster victims and the heavily wounded Cultivators were still walking on the street. Because the battle went rather smoothly, few of them were in panic. The general order in the city was maintained.
Li Yao watched the heavily wounded Cultivators receiving first aid. Many of them were carried into the headquarters of the thirty-three sects of East Peace County.
Right now, the city was seriously short of hands, and the Cultivators were mostly stained by smoke and blood after a day of fierce fighting. Many of them were even possessed by the evils, which caused their faces to be twisted. With all the fire burnt and the smoke, it was even less possible to distinguish their identity. Therefore, they had to be carried to the nearest sect for treatment.
With the battle coming to this point, the Cultivators showed a fundamental sense of unity after all.
However, the scene made Li Yao more and more worried. Something unpredictable was almost surfacing in his heart!
The Cultivators are no fools. Before they went after the army of ghouls, they must've scanned the entire city with their telepathic thoughts. It is impossible that any ghost was left out!
Also, they can totally ask the scouts to ride cranes or flying swords to watch over everything from the skies. Even if a large batch of ghosts intends to attack from the sea, they will still be discovered in advance, and the Ocean Suppressing Array will be activated again!
This place is not too far away from the center of battle where the main troops of the Cultivators are fighting the army of ghouls after all. As soon as they notice the anomaly of East Peace County, even if most of the Cultivators cannot return in time, the Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators such as Qi Zhongdao, Yan Liren, Ba Xiaoyu, and Master Bitter Cicada certainly can!
Therefore, there is absolutely no chance that the ghosts can cause any trouble.
Not ghosts... What about humans?
Li Yao was suddenly alarmed, with cold sweat popping up on his back.
Ever since the febrile typhoon landed and natural disasters took place everywhere, the news was always that the White Lotus Cult would take the opportunity to rally the army of ghouls and even attack East Peace County!
The main purpose of the Cultivators who reinforced the southeast was to execute Mother White Lotus, too!
Then, as a result, a lot of people, including Li Yao, were misled into thinking that their enemy consisted only of ghosts and that the living people could be allies or bystanders but certainly not foes!
However, was it really the case?
Li Yao had always believed that the living people were a hundred times more cunning and terrifying than ghosts. The evil Cultivators who enslaved the ghosts for their own interests in the Star Glory Federation more than a hundred years ago would be the first clue.
Did the 'Black Devil Cult', founded by the Roaring Tiger Hall in secret, not commit all kinds of crimes under the guise of the White Lotus Cult, too?
The living people. The living people. Of the many disaster victims here, is it possible that some are ill-intended living people?
However, it is still useless!
Even if there is indeed such a squad of living people with ill intentions, there can't be too many of them, or they wouldn't have been able to sneak into East Peace County!
But if their number is not large enough, it is impossible for them to control the whole of East Peace County quickly. The best they can do is raise some small-scale riots!
Moreover, even if they do have East Peace County under control, so what? Cultivators are everywhere outside. There's no escape for them at all. They will be fish in a water tank after they seize East Peace County, and it will be impossible for them to resist the bombardment of dozens of Nascent Soul Stage Cultivators for long. What's the point?
Yes. It will be a shocking event if East Peace County is breached, which will be a brutal kick in the crotch to the teetering Great Qian Dynasty, but the price will be the loss of a million ghost soldiers and an elite squad of living people which can sneak into the Cultivation sects without alarming anyone. The price seems too high!
On the other hand, if there is indeed such a plot, it means that the planner of the plot believes that a certain item in East Peace County is even more precious than a whole army of ghouls and an elite tactical squad!
While thinking, Li Yao glanced at the disaster victims nearby with his eyes as sharp as a hawk.
Suddenly, he felt that a few disaster victims squatting next to a wall were odd.
Although a lot of other disaster victims were also squatting next to the wall, shaking like the three of them, most of them slightly changed their posture every few seconds because their legs went numb when they squatted in a fixed posture for a long time.
However, for the three special disaster victims, although their upper bodies were trembling hard, their lower half bodies did not move at all after a whole minute, as if they were the roots of a tree that had extended deep into the ground!
There was no telling if it was his imagination, but Li Yao noticed the smell of iron and blood from them.
It was the special air of elite soldiers who had received professional training before.
Pondering for a moment, Li Yao strode toward the three disaster victims.
The three disaster victims noticed him immediately. Their eyes suddenly turned sharp.
Although their bodies did not move, Li Yao could feel that, below the broad cloth that they used to cover their backs, their spines were constricting inch after inch and conserving the strength, like three bows that were slowly stretched.
Li Yao smiled. He continued walking forward without any stop.
The eyes collided in midair brutally. The three 'disaster victims' were still hoping to continue pretending at first, but after sensing the obvious disdain in Li Yao's eyes, they knew that their identities had been seen through and further camouflage would be meaningless. Therefore, they were simply glaring at Li Yao without any disguise!
Right then...
Boom!
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!'
Everywhere in East Peace County, in the headquarters of more than ten Cultivation sects, deafening explosions broke out almost simultaneously. All the disaster victims that were sitting on the street were shocked to their feet!
Li Yao saw that dozens of houses and pavilions were consumed by fierce flames and soared into the sky, blossoming into countless burning stars that smashed down overwhelmingly!
The sound of fighting, explosions, and the collisions of weapons reached the loudest immediately after they began!
The headquarters of more than ten Cultivation sects were under attack at the same time!
Maybe, the enemies had snuck in together with the disaster victims. Maybe, the 'heavily wounded' Cultivators that had been delivered into the headquarters secretly cooperated with them!
"'Heaven Battering King' Qi Changsheng is here. Hand over your treasures and magical equipment! Those who surrender will be spared from death. Should there be any resistance, the entire East Peace County will drown in blood!"
From every burning corner of East Peace County, wild and disobedient roars were echoing.
It turned out to be the Heaven Battering Army, another rebellion force as famous as the White Lotus Cult that had always been active in the northwest before!
Had the two ferocious rebellion forces that were almost turning the Great Qian Dynasty upside down finally joined hands?
Li Yao had no time to think anymore. The three soldiers of the Heaven Batter Army who pretended to be disaster victims had already jumped up to different angles after a weird movement. Dozens of starry weapons darted from them toward Li Yao's critical parts all over his body at the same time!