Chapter 259: The Haunted Hollow
Chapter 259: The Haunted Hollow
Translator: Panda_Penn Editor: Chrissy
The Thousand-island Lake Army pressed on like a bunch of locusts flying by. Everywhere they went, they would loot all the Families, big or small alike.
Three or four days later, the Families along the route learned from the experience. They would leave the counties early on with their wealth and Mystical Materials and return after the army left.
However!
When the Thousand-island Lake Army failed to get any stuff from two counties, they changed their route. They divided into 10 teams and rushed on their way toward the Yu Emperor City like 10 sharp swords.
More Families were suffering. The coverage of the 10 teams were so wide there were practically no place to hide. Many counties didn't have the luxury of owning a Teleportation Formation.
The three Royal Families remained silent. There were scouts lurking around in the three Royal Cities. Once the powerful warriors of the three Royal Families made a move, the scouts would find out.
Time passed on day by day. The army was getting closer and closer to the Yu Emperor City. The Thousand-island Lake were getting more and more boisterous. Many people started putting on bets on whether the Yu Family would fight back, and how many hours would they be able to hold on and if how many warriors of the Eternal Realm would die with Yu Huashen...
Madam Yan became as busy as bees. Bai Qiuxue was helping her out and they could only sleep for six hours a day. There were so much information sending back that needed to be analyzed and collected. The information then was passed on to Bai Xi and the others. There were on 10,000 warriors on the Thousand-island Lake Army but the number of scouts sent by the Bai Family reached tens of thousands...
Intelligence was everything!
The Heaven Martial Kingdom was other's territory. Without the intelligence, even the Old Man of Heaven Prison would be blind there. If they wanted to win the war beautifully, they must master all the intelligence of the entire Northern Desert.
Fortunately, everything was going well. The Yu Family didn't escape. The Fifth-rank Families and the three Royal Families of the Northern Desert didn't do anything. If it went on smoothly, the Yu Emperor City could be leveled to the ground in a matter of days.
On the 12th day, the Thousand-island Lake Army went into the region controlled by the Yu Family. The 10 teams reunited. After all, the region belonged to the Yu Family and all the counties there were affiliated to the Yu Family. Fights might break out at any time.
As they expected...
When the army arrived at a county, the fight broke out immediately. When the Thousand-island Lake was about to loot the county when they met with resistance. The Thousand-island Lake Army didn't go easy on the county. They killed all the warriors of the Family at the cost of more than a dozen warriors on the army being injured or killed.
It was a good thing that somebody was fighting back now!
If there were none resistance, there must be something wrong. Bai Xi ordered the army to press on toward the Yu Emperor City and ransack all the counties along the way.
However...
When they arrived at the next county, all the Families, big and small, fled. The scouts from the Thousand-island Lake that were hiding around were all murdered.
Bai Xi was enraged. He allocated hundreds of warriors to pursue the fleeing Families while the army moved on. It was the same situation in the next county. This time, not only did the Families run away, there were even people hiding to assassinate warriors of the army. The number of hitmen were actually quite large. They would escape at once if they could not kill their targets within one move.
When dozens men were allocated from the army to hunt down the hitmen, another accident happened. The dozens men were attacked and they were all killed. By the time Bai Xi sent someone to investigate, that lurking powerful warrior disappeared mysteriously.
On their way forward, there were warriors hiding and killing everywhere, as if the enemies were all over the mountains and plains. It seemed the Yu Family wanted to have the warriors of the Thousand-island Lake buried with them and wanted to fight a desperate fight.
Bai Xi was more relived to see the Yu Family act in this fashion.
What else would the Yu Family be capable of now that they even resorted to assassin? The Yu Family was just fighting back before their impending death. Having some warriors at the Soul Pond Realm killed was nothing. The Bai Family sent out warriors of at least the Fate Wheel Realm. Bai Xi didn't worry about it too much since it was not Bai Family warriors that were dying.
But warriors from other Families in the army were angered. They sent out patrolling teams led by Fate Wheel Realm warriors. They would go and hunt for hiding warriors in the wild and kill anyone that they could find.
Fights were going on at all places since the hitmen were everywhere. Mountains and rivers were tainted red with blood. Clearly, these hitmen were not just from the Yu Family. It was possible that many Big Families affiliated with the Yu Family also sent out hitmen. There were so many of them that Bai Xi felt like the more they killed, the more hitmen there were.
"Ignore the hitmen. Press on at the top of your speed to the Yu Emperor City."
Bai Xi sensed something was not right. Was the Yu Family stalling? Sending out the hitmen was not too useful as they could not kill too many warriors. The only thing the hitmen could do was to stall.
Once the army started running at the top of their speed, they encountered so many more hitmen that if they didn't clear the hitmen out, it was impossible to go on at the maximum speed.
"Leave someone behind to clear out the hitmen. The others, go on, as fast as you can!"
Bai Xi made a decision to split the army up. The Soul Pond Realm warriors wouldn't do him any assistance anyways. The main forces of the army were on the Iron-armored Ships.
As long as they main forces were not split up, it was okay. Bai Xi didn't think too highly of the powerful warriors of the Yu Family. Even if the Old Man of Heaven Prison was not here, they could still level the Yu Emperor City to the ground.
"Report!"
An hour later, a scout boarded the ship and provided a piece of important information – all the powerful warriors of the Yu Family left the city toward the northeast. Their destinations should be an unfrequented place.
"The Haunted Hollow?"
Bai Xi took a look at the map and frowned. The Haunted Hollow was one of the most dangerous places of the Heaven Martial Kingdom. It was said that this was once a region city with several tens of millions of people living there. They were all slaughtered by some powerful warrior and he even made the ground collapse. Millions were buried there. The deceased all transformed to ghosts and all that went in could not leave alive.
Bai Xi of course would not believe this kind of bullshit. The story could be used to deceive the public. This clearly was a secret base for the Yu Family and they were spreading the rumor to prevent people from getting closer.
Why would the powerful warriors of the Yu Family and why would they go to the Haunted Hollow?
Bai Xi could not figure it out. The scouts could not enter the Haunted Hollow so Bai Xi knew nothing about it. He thought about it and reported the matter to the Old Man of Heaven Prison and asked him to make a decision.
"Go to the Haunted Hollow!"
Without and hesitation, the Old Man of Heaven Prison ordered. Then he explained, "The Haunted Hollow was connected to the small world. The Yu Family want to the small world and cut off from the outside world."
"Small world?"
Bai Xi directly ordered the Iron-armor Ships to fly toward the Haunted Hollow while the army on the ground moved on toward the Yu Emperor City. Bai Xi commanded to kill anyone dared to fight back in the Yu Emperor City.
All the Thousand-island Lake powerful warriors were on the Iron-armored Ships and these men were the main forces. The army on the ground were just here to loot and rob.
The Yu Family people were rushing toward the Haunted Hollow to enter the small world. Recalling all the assassins to stall time, Bai Xi was certain that the Yu Family was running away and they were about to enter the small world to sever any connection with the outside world.
Small worlds could be transformed and those that were transformed were called Secret Regions.
Of course, only really powerful warriors could transform small worlds. The Yu Family must have other means, means that the Bai Family also knew.
The Yu Family probably already started arranging the transformation of the small world as soon as the Thousand-island Lake declared war. The transformation must be almost done now so they were running toward the Haunted Hollow.
The Iron-armored Ships were fast and the distance was not long. In more than a dozen hours, they had reached the Haunted Hollow. According to the information given by a scout, all the Yu Family powerful warriors entered just two hours ago.
The Haunted Hollow seemed to be very scary.
It was covered with a black fog so nothing could be seen from the outside. Before they got any close, a spooky air came their way which made many warriors of the Fate Wheel Realm felt chills on their spines.
"Enter!"
Bai Xi didn't worry about it. This was clearly some Inhibition Formation to fool people. They had the Old Man of Heaven Prison with them so what was there to be afraid of?
The more than a dozen Iron-armored Ships rushed on with everyone on the deck ready to fight. In a blink, the Iron-armored Ships ran through the black fog and disappeared as if they were devoured by some beasts.
...
"Report –"
At the same time, there came an emergency report at the Bai Emperor Mountain.
A scout ran to the outdoor pavilion, knelt to Madam Yan and Bai Qiuxue and said, "Report from the Heaven Cold Kingdom and Heaven Frigid Kingdom. Two Royal Family Patriarchs and all their Eternal Realm Patriarchs were teleported to the Heaven Martial City."
Madam Yan and Bai Qiuxue's expressions changed. They had a bad feeling. Something was about to go wrong.