Chapter 75: Bloody Night
Night descended upon the two groups, and slowly tents were erected by the bigger group, the food was started to get cooked on a large bonfire. Chatter resounded through the silent forest and although many strong beasts were present close by, none of them wished to attack such a large group. Even the strongest six-star beast in the area knew that if they attacked such a large group, even if he managed to get rid of them all, then he would suffer quite some wounds.
this knowledge was known to the group and thus they were not too much on guard, the guards were busy chatting with their friends, and their friends were busy boasting about their power.
It was known to the group that the man stalking them was Xu Min and most of the fear many had felt had vanished. Xu Min was only a three-star Warrior and a warrior who just broke into the third star nonetheless. He was not truly a danger for them.
The fact that he had a powerful beast with him, although they knew about it, they could not help but wonder just how strong this beast could be. Beasts were usually stronger than experts of the same rank, and for Xu Min to tame this beast, it could only be a two or three-star beast at most. Although the survivor had sworn that the beast was much stronger, no one actually believed this. It made no sense that a three-star Warrior could tame such a beast.
The chatting went on for a long time, the half of the night was spent chatting and laughing, boasting about their powers and their abilities and people wishing for Xu Min to launch an attack so that they could prove their worth.
During all of this, Shen Yu said nothing. He was seated in a chair in front of the bonfire, and a smile was playing on his lips. He would converse with a few of the followers from time to time, but mostly he was just silent as he looked at the group around him.
"It seems that everyone is in high spirits," he mumbled to himself, surprised that no one was worried any longer. "Although he is only a three-star warrior he did manage to get the title Yanluo. He better not disappoints me. I doubt he will have the guts to attack us when we are all together so let us put up a trap for him tomorrow. If he enjoys attacking our small groups, then let us make a group that leaves the main group and use them as bait. I fail to believe that he will not make a move."
While speaking with himself, Shen Yu quickly planned what he was supposed to do the following day. Now that he was convinced that their stalker was Xu Min, he would do anything in his power to kill him. He could easily understand just how much fame he would gain in the snow mountain if he could prove that he was the one who had gotten rid of Xu Min, the young man who had left a stain on their name.
"Get some rest; we will be starting the hunt!" Shen Yu finally called out. He was not the least bit worried about Xu Min hearing him as he did not doubt his ability to hunt down and execute this young man. Giving him a warning was due to his pride simply not believing that he could fail.
While the words were called out, a smile was on Xu Min's face as he looked down upon the group below with a ruthless gleam in his eyes. He was seated on a large tree branch and looking straight down onto the many experts below, and observing how the majority of them were going to sleep, some were standing as guards, but the majority of the guards had gathered in one area where they were chatting with one another. Only two guards were standing on the eastern side of the camp and seeing this, Xu Min and Ye Ling together slipped down from the tree and snuck close to the experts.
"I'll leave the one on the left to you," Xu Min said with a very low voice and the lion nodded its head as it snuck closer. Its body was pressed against the ground, its ears constantly wavered in the air to catch any sound. The nostrils were vibrating as every scent entered the nose and the eyes were gleaming red in the night.
While the lion was sneaking forward, Xu Min was also advancing towards the second guard, but while the lion was advancing on the ground, Xu Min was advancing in the treetops and got ready to descend on the opponent in front of him.
A flash appeared in the black night, and a muffled boom sounded out. However, the sound and the flash were both so weak that no one noticed ad the guards were slowly being dragged into the darkness of the trees outside the camp. Only a faint trail of blood left behind told about their fate.
It was now possible to sneak into the camp itself and both man and lion split up; one moved south the other north. Both lion and human snuck into one tent after another. While one part of the camp was dying in their sleep, the another part was still busy with chatting experts and light from the bonfire.
One hour went by; another hour went by and by the time Ye Ling and Xu Min met up again, both of them had the stench of blood attached to their bodies. Looking at one another a toothy grin was shared before they both retreated into the forest, looking for a lake where they could get rid of the stench that followed in their wake.
As they moved through the forest, Ye Ling handed over a total of eight emblems he had managed to snatch from the people he had killed and Xu Min kept them together with the other ones he had gotten from his own killings that night. The majority of the emblems were four-star Warriors, but some of them belonged to three-star Warriors. Having all these emblems, Xu Min was quite excited.
By now a quarter of the year they were to spend within the valley had passed by, but Xu Min had already managed to get around hundred emblems stored in his storage stone. On top of that, he had a few beast cores as well, but it was clear that the majority of his rank was given on the back of the emblems.
Finding a pond did not take long, and both lion and man jumped into the cold, dark water and washed before they returned to the group they were stalking.
At the very start the group had consisted of almost thirty individuals, but by now more than half of them had been victim to Xu Min's schemes. Tonight alone a total of thirteen experts had lost their lives. None of them had had the ability to fight back, none of them had noticed the silent killers that had appeared. The Illusion Spirit Grass was truly more terrifying than what they had first assumed.
The night came to an end and slowly the day arrived. The moment Shen Yu awoke he felt that something was amiss. Standing up, he soon realized that the problem was a stench that had spread through his entire group, a stench of blood which was impossible to miss.
Dressing quickly, he left his tent and looked around only to find that at least half of his men had not left their tents. He then rushed into these tents in question. He found one dead person after another. As he saw this, his heart froze in fear and a vein started popping in his forehead in anger.
"Guards!" he called out with a voice filled with anger and the ones who had been on guard that night rushed to his side.
"What have you been doing last night?" he requested to know. Trying his hardest his voice was somewhat level, but a burning anger was smoldering within his eyes and his heart was filled with an unwillingness to accept what had happened.
"Why has none of you noticed that half of our camp had been butchered while we were sleeping?!" he called out angrily, and the guards suddenly turned pale. They had not noticed the scent of blood, as they had been too busy entertaining themselves, but now that their heads sobered up, they understood that they were, in fact, to blame for what had happened this night.
They instantly felt fear. It was not unlikely that they too had to give up their lives for their big mistake, but Shen Yu, who now had a large headache, could not afford to lose any more men, and thus he did nothing but shake his head.
"Fine. I never expected you to have the guts to directly attack my camp," he mumbled to himself as he gnawed on his finger, "if you can do this, then you have no limits to what you will do to get rid of us," he continued to mumble. He wondered if there was a way to get rid of Xu Min with the few men he had left.
In a tree upstairs and looking down, Xu Min knew that now the group only had around ten members left. Ten members sounded like a lot, but he had previously taken care of such sized groups.
"If you take care of all the small guys, I can deal with the one they call Shen Yu," Xu Min mused out loud to Ye Ling and the lion nodded his head, "I can easily deal with the others. The highest rank is a four-star Warrior, and since you gave me the medicinal pills, my body has been increasingly strong. Even that Shen Yu is no threat to me."
"That might be so," Xu Min said with a shrug, "but even so, he is mine. His family and I have quite a large enmity between us; it is only fair that I send him to see the true ruler of hell. I cannot wait to see how furious his family will get when that happens. Still, everything that happens in the valley stays in the valley. No one is allowed to come find me for revenge." Xu Min was quite smug as he thought about this fact. Being able to let go of his anger was truly a great feeling, and killing people who wished to kill him helped him becoming stronger time and time again.
"So we are going to have a full on battle with the group below?" Ye Ling asked to ensure that he had understood the thoughts of Xu Min correctly and the young man nodded his head with a smile on his face.
"We will be attacking them soon, but we need to find the right place first. I want to decide where we go and when we are there we will stop using our illusion spirit grass. I am sure they cannot wait but to attack us. Being in disarray will be of great assistance to us," he continued, and Ye Ling understood what he meant as he smiled and nodded his head.
"Well then, let us find the right place," he said, and the two slowly left the treetops looking for the group which they had been stalking for so long already. Moving through the forest they looked for somewhere where they had enough space to fight.
After searching for the majority of the day they reached the outskirts of the forest and in front of them as a large and beautiful Savannah. In this Savannah were a few beasts, but all of them rushed away the moment they noticed the five-star Golden-furred Blood Lion.
"This is the place," Xu Min said excitedly as he looked around, "this is the place for our final battle against Shen Yu and his followers!"