Ahui La gathered all the plundered treasures and captive strangers together. After first distributing the grain and valuables, he studied the captives for a while, hauled over the woman with the finest looks, and pulled her into his embrace. Seeing her trembling with fear, he laughed uproariously.
"The stranger women really do have the best looks."
The tribesmen around him burst into raucous laughter. Ahui La chuckled along for a moment, then spat with venomous hatred, "If not for that hungry wolf Jianixi marching east, how could we have fallen to such a sorry state? Curse him! My Ahui tribe's great stronghold of three thousand people was completely ruined by his hands!"
At the mention of Jianixi's name, the laughter died instantly across the tribe. Their pattern-painted faces filled with terror and hatred, and someone murmured in a low voice:
"The people down south all say Jianixi was born to unite the Shanyue of the Northern Foothills as the Wolf King..."
"I even heard he was born of a human mating with a wolf! Savage as a wolf, cunning as a fox, marching east at the command of the ancestors..."
Ahui La shuddered, hastily cutting the speaker off with a loud bark:
"What bloody nonsense are you spouting?! Bad luck!"
With that, he raised his cup and shouted, "Drink! We just plundered this Li clan's tribe—why aren't we celebrating? Come! Every man gets a captive!"
The tribesmen immediately beamed, whooping and shouting in delight. Ahui La laughed heartily, cursing the Li clan for being weak and cowardly, yet he thought to himself, *That arrow came from someone with considerable cultivation. Tomorrow, after we pull off one more raid, we'll steer clear of this Li clan settlement so they don't strike back.*
"Wait."
A sudden dread struck Ahui La, and he roared at the top of his lungs, "How long has it been since a scout reported back?!"
The tribesmen burst out laughing and hollered back, "Rest easy, Great King! How could those strangers ever detect our scouts?"
Ahui La felt a prickling sting on his face. He jerked his head up, only for a streak of white light to slowly illuminate his vision. Terror turned his legs to jelly, and he collapsed onto his rear, scrambling backward on hands and knees. The arrow struck right before his eyes, plunging straight into the dirt, kicking up a spray of soil and leaving behind a narrow hole.
All around them, battle cries erupted. Pillars of firelight flared up across the surrounding mountain woods as Li clan soldiers brandishing blades and spears charged straight into the chaotic Shanyue ranks. The tribesmen who had been drinking were already riddled with arrows like sieves. Ahui La slowly climbed to his feet, muttering in disbelief, "How is this possible?"
Hoisting the heavy sledgehammers in his hands, Ahui La bellowed in fury, "Get up! Every last one of you, get up!"
The scattering Shanyue tribesmen rallied as if having found their backbone, rushing toward him in droves. Ahui La scanned the area, silently tallying the numbers—there were barely two or three hundred men around him. The entire Shanyue force had already been cut into four or five isolated pockets, thrashing desperately under the onslaught of cold steel.
*It's over.*
Ahui La's heart sank. Not far away, a middle-aged man walked slowly forward, clad in light armor, carrying an ash-white longsword in his hand. The blade radiated faint brilliance, sharp gray light flickering and pulsing from the steel, making Ahui La's eyelids twitch wildly.
"Dammit!"
With a light step, the middle-aged man closed the distance in an instant, thrusting his sword toward him.
Ahui La hastily raised a hammer to parry, but the impact nearly tore the weapon from his grip. A jolt of agonizing pain tore through his internal organs. Terror seized him—he knew at once that this man's cultivation was far superior to his own.
***
Li Xuanxuan cut down a Shanyue warrior before him. With his cultivation at the third layer of Embryonic Breathing, his presence amid this chaotic battlefield was like an adult armed to the teeth wading into a brawl between children. A single sweep of his blade felled three or four men, and a casual punch was enough to kill someone outright.
What was more, twelve clan soldiers followed him step for step to protect their young master. Each was an elite selected from the best, their eyes scanning the surroundings coldly.
Li Xuanxuan was fighting with fierce abandon, the innate ruthlessness in his bones seemingly awakened. His eyes were bloodshot. He hoisted an elderly Shanyue warrior, preparing to hurl him away, but was caught off guard when his eyes met the old man's gaze.
A head of white hair, deep wrinkles, eyes wide with terror—it felt like a stinging slap across Li Xuanxuan's face. His hands and feet went numb with shock. Looking at this man old enough to be his grandfather, he froze for a moment.
Yet the elderly Shanyue man, weeping tears and uttering a guttural groan, bit savagely into Li Xuanxuan's arm. Instead of puncturing flesh, the old man's rotten teeth shattered against his arm—striking Li Xuanxuan like yet another slap across the face. Startled, Li Xuanxuan slammed the man into the ground by pure reflex.
The old man crashed against the earth so hard his bones splintered. From his lower body spewed a slurry of blood and feces as he let out an inhuman screech. His eyes locked onto Li Xuanxuan with venomous hatred, piercing the youth so deeply that tears welled in Li Xuanxuan's eyes.
Dizzy and nauseated, Li Xuanxuan stood frozen for two breaths, feeling a chill seep from the crown of his skull all the way down his spine.
The world before him suddenly turned desolate and quiet; the clamor and shouting seemed to drift far away. For fifteen years, this world had veiled itself from him, and now a corner of that veil had finally been gently lifted.
"So that's... how it is..."
Slowly drawing the saber at his waist once more, Li Xuanxuan was no longer agitated. Calmly, without uttering a word, he went back to killing.
Not far away.
"Great King, let's retreat! Fall back, Great King!"
Several tribesmen were screaming in panic. Ahui La shook his head. Parrying another strike from Li Tongya's sword, the sledgehammer in his hand was knocked clean out of his grip. He could only curse in frustration, "How the hell can we retreat?! They've completely surrounded us! How are we supposed to run?!"
Watching his clansmen fall one after another, Ahui La cried out in agony and desperation, "Stop! Stop! I surrender! I yield!"
The gray light on Li Tongya's sword gradually faded. He stared at Ahui La in silence. Around them, the tribesmen practicedly squatted down with their hands behind their heads. The clan soldiers hesitated for a moment until an order rang out:
"Those who surrender will be spared! Those who surrender will be spared!"
Waves of tribesmen threw down their weapons and dropped to their knees. Ahui La sighed, tossed away his other sledgehammer, and knelt down dejectedly. Gradually, the shouts and clashes of battle across the field quieted.
One by one, the Shanyue tribesmen had their hands bound. The Li clan soldiers maintained relatively strict discipline, leading the captives away without a word. Moving from intense commotion to eerie silence made Ahui La's heart rise into his throat again. He pondered uneasily:
*Could these strangers be different from tribal folk—will they behead us even after we've surrendered? If that's the case, I've made a terrible mistake; I should have fought them to the bitter end...*
*How did this man bypass all my scouts in the mountains? Forget it, forget it. I've truly fallen into a trap this time.*
As he hung his head in wild speculation, Ahui La suddenly saw a pair of gray wolf-skin boots stop before him. Flashing a fawning smile, he hurried to look up, only to be struck by the sight of an angular face, narrow eyebrows, and a pair of ruthless eyes.
"Jianixi?!"
A sudden shock seized Ahui La's heart. His lips trembled uncontrollably, and he nearly leaped from the ground, the turmoil within him beyond words.
Looking closer, Ahui La discovered with trembling relief that the eyes were not that nightmarish, venomous brownish-yellow, but a calm, grayish black.
Chapter 80