The bone glue had been valued at a minimum of a hundred thousand silver dollars. Since it had been harvested during the first excursion into the Guizu domain by Wu Youren and the other three, his share was bound to be substantial.
"As for the barbarians, I can just steer clear of them," the youth replied, consistent with his usual discreet, patient temperament. "And if I happen to run into a fallen knight or an ability master, I'll head right back and contact you."
"Fallen ones don't venture into Guizu domains often," Manna said, speaking with plenty of authority on the matter. "Their cultivation path is flawed, carrying an extremely high risk of transformation. Coming to places like that is far too dangerous for them to control."
"I'm just going to try my luck," Wu Youren said with a smile. "Besides, the Guizu aura along the perimeter is much thinner. Fortune favors the bold."
"Fortune..." Manna was visibly tempted. "Don't rush off just yet. Let me go ask Master."
More than twenty days had passed since the team returned from Tianjing. Their annual Guizu-slaying quotas were already fulfilled, leaving them far more freedom than before.
"There's no need. I can manage on my own," the youth said with a touch of persistence. "If I pick up any relevant news, I'll return and let you know."
Manna did not doubt his capability; she had heard from her master that he had entered the mountain pass alone multiple times to hunt Guizu.
Yet simply sitting back and waiting at Red Pine gave her the uneasy feeling that matters were slipping out of control. She told him to hold off for two days.
In the end, Chief Instructor Hong Da decided to dispatch trusted instructors to take turns accompanying the youth.
Those assigned to the first outing were Manna, Namuzha, the middle-aged knight Kenpa, and the female archer.
Xiao Ha perched on Wu Youren's shoulder drew far too much attention and could not be concealed at all.
That left the other four with no choice but to don disguises, doing their best to avoid drawing curious stares.
They drove a modified off-road vehicle capable of handling rough wilderness terrain, heading steadily toward the mountain pass.
Barbarians could be seen scattered in groups of two or three everywhere, alongside numerous military checkpoints.
After driving for a little over two hours, they detected a plume of leaking Guizu aura.
The aura was not particularly strong—merely at the knight level. The group pulled over and swiftly put an end to it.
To their mild surprise, two Guizu-transformed knights were mixed in. Slaying them yielded no Guizu relics, and their remains had to be thoroughly incinerated.
Had Wu Youren been alone, he would never have bothered—he was only out for a quick hunt, not guarding a post.
However, the other four were all Red Pine instructors and could not simply look the other way.
There was no need for grandiose moralizing; if Red Pine fell, they wouldn't even have homes left.
Namuzha could not help but curse angrily, "It must have been those barbarians. All they care about is harvesting relics, never bothering to clean up the mess behind them!"
He wasn't pinning false blame; the barbarians' conduct was notoriously abysmal.
The middle-aged knight Kenpa harbored a different concern. "Keep your eyes peeled. There might be corpse Guizu around."
The incineration could not be abandoned halfway, so they used the time to rest and regroup for three hours.
The group's primary objective for this outing was to clear out Guizu outside the mountains, hunting for relics while simultaneously keeping an eye out for fallen ones.
It was not urgent work, and they were not far from Red Pine, so there was no need to rely heavily on supplies; relying on their own strength as knights was sufficient.
Once the incineration was complete, everyone set out again to search for Guizu aura.
It was not until the afternoon that they encountered another trace, but more than a dozen barbarians were already besieging it.
The instructors disdained squabbling over scraps, so they paid it no mind and moved on.
Wu Youren felt as though they were out hunting game: spending far more time tracking prey than fighting, all while being barred from poaching anyone else's kill.
"Let's head toward the mountain pass," Kenpa suggested, feeling unsatisfied. "There should be more Guizu in that direction."
He was older and practical, figuring the odds of running into fallen ones were slim to none; it made more sense to aim for valuable Guizu relics instead.
Yet over the remainder of the day, they didn't encounter another wisp of Guizu aura, ending the day completely empty-handed.
As dusk fell, the five decided against turning back. Finding a gentle slope, they set up a temporary campsite around the off-road vehicle.
Many in the wilderness did the same; several campfires could be spotted in the distance, belonging to warriors stranded in the wilds overnight.
After all, this remained human-dominated territory. The Guizu had infiltrated the area, but they were by no means the prevailing force.
The five from Red Pine were fairly relaxed—the youth had set up numerous early-warning mechanisms, leaving little to worry about.
They even sat around the campfire chatting at length before turning in to rest.
The second day unfolded in much the same fashion. They wiped out three pockets of Guizu aura, but came away with nothing to show for it.
That night, their campsite lay close to the mountain ridge, less than twenty kilometers away in a straight line, with not a single campfire visible nearby.
"Mount Xuanling spoiled me," Manna sighed as she sat by the fire. "Going two days without landing a single Guizu relic actually has me feeling restless."
The female archer maintained a better mindset. "We haven't spent much, just a bit of elbow grease."
At that very moment, Wu Youren abruptly sprang to his feet and peered into the distance.
It was already deep into the night, and visibility was poor. The youth's sudden reaction brought everyone else to their feet in unison.
"What is it?" Manna hooked her toe under her pack on the ground and flipped it into her hands.
Chief Instructor Hong Da had equipped them with plenty of combat supplies for this trip. While they had held back during the day, there was no room for frugality at night.
"Can't be that much of a coincidence, can it?" Namuzha muttered, picking up his large-caliber shotgun and stealing an involuntary glance at Xiao Ha.
Everyone knew the odds of meeting fallen ones were low, but who didn't harbor a shred of wishful thinking?
The female archer's eyes bulged outward slightly, resembling a toad's stare.
This sight-enhancing sensory technique took a heavy toll on the eyes, but given the circumstances, she could afford no hesitation.
A moment later, she gave a cold snort. "People are sprinting this way, and there's a powerful Guizu aura right behind them!"
"Damn it," Kenpa cursed furiously. "What a wretched mess!"
Having fought Guizu countless times, this was the single most repulsive situation they could encounter.
"To the car," Namuzha said, stowing his gun and leaping onto the vehicle. "Let's get out of here first."
"Drive ahead on your own!" The female archer's figure blurred as she sprinted off on foot. "This is open wilderness; the vehicle takes too long to get up to speed!"
All of them were seasoned veterans. The other three dashed forward behind her, leaving Namuzha momentarily stunned before he hurriedly cranked the ignition.
His companions were far faster on foot than the car could accelerate, but they weren't abandoning him—they were shedding weight so the vehicle could pick up speed faster.
"Son of a..." Namuzha's mouth twitched as he muttered under his breath.
The approaching runners also noticed the figures by the campfire making a swift retreat.
"Speed up!" someone roared from behind. "Can a vehicle outrun us?"
Across the rough wilderness, an ordinary off-road vehicle could hardly match the short-burst speed of a knight, and even certain apprentice knights could outpace it over brief distances.
Hearing the shout, the dozen or so figures surged forward, sprinting frantically for their lives.
Namuzha drove hard, pushing the off-road vehicle to its absolute limit within two minutes—any faster, and it risked flipping at any moment.
Yet he remained nearly three hundred meters behind his four companions, with no sign of closing the gap.
Unable to hold back, he yelled, "Slow down, wait for me!"
"Step on it!" Manna shouted back, then added, "Ease up slightly... wait, is that a campfire up ahead?"
"We can't head that way," Kenpa said without hesitation. "We run our own course. Otherwise, the whole wilderness will erupt into chaos!"
The pursuers behind them were trying to drag them down. If they passed the buck to someone else, the resulting chain reaction would be catastrophic.
More crucially, all five hailed from Red Pine. Others might not care about such things, but they had a reputation to uphold!
"If we do that, how will people look at Red Pine?" The female archer reloaded her handgun on the run. "Send up a warning!"
The next instant, three red signal flares burst in the night sky, alerting any warriors who might be nearby that danger was approaching.
As the flares lit the sky, Namuzha's vehicle pulled alongside them, and the four leapt aboard.
Having agreed not to pass the danger onto others, the off-road vehicle could only swing into a wide circle across the wilderness.
The distant campfire was equally vigilant, extinguishing within seconds.
From the runners behind came the sound of fierce gunfire and agonized screams—someone had been overtaken by the Guizu aura.
A figure roared in fury, "A warning flare? Chase them down and kill them!"
Had the group ahead not fired the warning, the fleeing pack could have diverted toward the other campfire even if they couldn't catch the vehicle.
Their party had suffered devastating losses while fleeing, with three apprentice knights already claimed by the Guizu aura.
Now, shifting the blame onto others had become vastly more difficult.
In their blind rage, if only to vent their spite, they resolved to latch onto the group ahead and drag them down together!
After circling the wilderness for over ten minutes, Kenpa noticed the pursuers' stubborn pursuit. "Damn it... they're completely locked onto us?"
"Responsibility always comes at a price," the female archer said calmly, her eyes still bulging as she tracked the rear. She added evenly, "Under eight hundred meters."
"Get ready to return fire," Namuzha said from behind the wheel. "Once it drops below five hundred meters, it gets far too dangerous."
A knight's short burst of acceleration could easily overwhelm an off-road vehicle's speed; five hundred meters was well within striking distance.
The other party was relentlessly giving chase, hell-bent on dragging them under. Faced with such brazen malice, no measure was off-limits.
"Gunshots will draw other Guizu auras," Manna voiced her concern, which was precisely why they had held off shooting.
"Don't look at me," the female archer volunteered. "I won't waste my arrows on this sort of nonsense."
"We can't just use a ghost-destroying mine, can we?" Manna hesitated.
They had come well prepared and had plenty of options for handling such situations.
What pained her was the waste. "Two days, and we haven't found a single thing."
The female archer said with distaste, "Letting these barbarians join the fight was sheer foolishness from the start!"
"They're barbarians?" Namuzha gritted his teeth. "Get the grenades ready!"
Being pursued like this was already infuriating; hearing that their pursuers were barbarians made his temper boil over completely.
"Then that falls to Little Wu..." Manna turned toward the youth. "Do you have any objections?"
With seven to eight hundred meters between them, the youth who excelled in mechanical traps was the most suitable person among the five to act.
"Let's use an explosive pack. I'll rig a delayed fuse," Wu Youren answered without hesitation. "Should I mix in some ghost-dispelling powder?"
The explosive pack was meant to take out their pursuers; adding the powder would conveniently wipe out the trailing Guizu aura as well.
"How dangerous is it?" Kenpa asked. In the end, only the youth could provide that answer.
"If we're careful, it shouldn't be too big a problem," Wu Youren said after a moment's thought. "It isn't at the grand knight level."
Chapter 169