Chapter 180: Rendezvous
Hiding in the shadows, Hui Yue waited for the four Kings to vanish into the distance before he heaved a heavy sigh of relief.
He never expected that the captain would be willing to let so many soldiers under his command die and then not avenging them. But after hearing the word ‘Law’, Hui Yue understood that their so called cargo was definitely a higher priority. As he watched them vanish into the distance mixed emotions washed over him.
Saving his friends was the main aim of his attack which succeeded; however, he was well aware that something had happened to him during the attack and he needed to spend some time to inspect his body and investigate the changes that occurred. Although he knew this, Hui Yue would do nothing until he was together with his friends again. With a final glance towards the dark tunnels where the King ranked experts vanished, Hui Yue turned around and started running towards his friends.
Hui Yue and Xu Piao previously agreed on meeting up at a predetermined side-tunnel, and while rushing towards this place, he came across other soldiers who were fleeing from the battle. None of them noticed the black cloaked man as they slowly inched closer to the battlezone, hoping to regroup with their allies.
Rushing past them, Hui Yue knew that the King ranked experts had already left and that these soldiers only had themselves to rely on. As such he paid them no heed as they no longer posed a threat towards him or his friends.
Traveling through the shadows Hui Yue managed to quickly single out the side tunnel where his friends should be waiting for him. The closer he came to his destination the more thrilled he became. His heartbeat rapidly increased and an uncontrollable smile appeared on his face.
The side tunnel was completely dark and stale air filled the surroundings. Walking into the tunnel, Hui Yue quickly picked up a light stone and after walking a couple of kilometers he finally saw his friends; everyone looked cheerful and excited as soon as they saw the white-haired boy advancing towards them.
Hui Yue too felt the same kind of excitement. His face was unable to control the smile which formed on his lips, his eyes were gleaming with happiness. He increased his speed as soon as he saw his friends in front of him.
Seeing all three of them, Hui Yue’s eyes landed on Wang Ju Long and the moment he saw her it felt as though a giant stone was lifted from his shoulders. His speed increased as he rushed towards the young woman and embraced her warmly. His ice blue eyes turned slightly moist, his heart was unable to settle down, and his hug was filled with emotions.
From the moment he found the caravan and Hui Yue managed to locate both Sha Yun and Deng Wu through the window but not Wang Ju Long he started feeling restless. Although he kept telling himself that she was safe, deep within doubt was slowly gnawing away his soul. Now that she was in front of him, safe and sound with no signs of being mistreated, his emotions overflowed; he could no longer restrain his happiness.
Seeing Hui Yue act this way caused the four observers to be surprised. Eyebrows were raised and snickers were seen as they saw how relieved the young white-haired boy was from his behavior.
Sha Yun too observed the hug which sank her heart. Her mood turned sour, but she did nothing to destroy the moment, instead she patiently waited to hear how much Hui Yue missed them all.
Wang Ju Long, who was currently being held in a firm embrace, was completely frozen, her mind went blank and her face was slowly turning beet red. She did not attempt to escape, but just stood there allowing for Hui Yue to release his feelings.
Only after a long time could a sigh be heard before Hui Yue released her, his face beaming happily to all his friends present. His next move was to give both Deng Wu and Sha Yun a hug as well. He was truly worried for the three of them, worried about e things they were going through, and only now did he feel that things would be okay.
“We need to go deeper into the tunnels,” Xu Piao said nervously. Although he was a King ranked expert and quite emotionally affected by the reunion, he was still clear headed and constantly looking towards the way they had come.
“The Dragon Corps has been ordered to bring these three to the capital. I am quite certain that they won’t just leave them behind.” He continued, constantly worried that suddenly the four King ranked experts would appear behind them. Although they managed to stall them for a short while, that was only due to the four Kings focus on protecting the carriage and their ‘cargo’. Even so, both Xu Piao and Xie Lan ended up with wounds, although not fatal they definitely caused the two some pain.
“Don’t worry,” Hui Yue said with a big smile on his face. “The four King ranked experts left with one of the carriages earlier,” He explained. “It seems that their initial mission was far more important than escorting my friends.” He continued. Being quiet and contemplating for a moment, he finally added, “Their important ‘cargo’ is a few Laws.”
Hearing this, Deng Wu, Sha Yun, and Wang Ju Long all looked at Hui Yue and the shock in their eyes quickly turned to regret. They all remembered the time they had spent at Cave’s End and how they managed to protect a few Laws. Unfortunately, it seemed that many others were in danger and they were unable to help them.
“No need to worry too much about it now,” Hui Yue said soothingly as he started flipping his hand, withdrawing corpses from his storage stone and placing them one after another on the ground.
Looking at them, he felt somewhat nauseous as there were some who died a clean death, but the majority were either missing half their body or smelling of burnt flesh, while others had their heads caved in. All this damage was inflicted by Hui Yue under the influence of the red mist.
Seeing all the corpses, his friends felt uncomfortable unable to tell why he saved them and for what purpose he was lining them up in front of them.
Having laid them all out, Hui Yue did a quick count and found that he managed to kill and store twenty-seven men. Looking at them for a moment, he heaved a heavy breath before he picked up one corpse and started to roam through their pockets looking for jewelry and items. He took every single storage stone he came across.
Seeing Hui Yue acting the way he did, it suddenly dawned on the three friends that their storage stones were held and kept by some of the Dragon Corps members who were in the same carriage as them. If they had escaped then their storage stones would be lost forever.
None of the friends wished for this to happen and without thinking all three quickly joined Hui Yue, picking up one storage stone after another.
Although many corpses were laid out, it did not take the four friends long before they managed to pick up every single storage stone.. The burnt flesh along with the scent of blood spread throughout the unlit tunnel calling forth one monster after another who wanted that delicious smelling meat.
While they were searching, Xu Piao and Xie Lan were waiting by their sides pushing back every beast who came too close, however, they still turned into a horde and the six friends quickly decided to withdraw. Finding all their storage stones they truly did not need to keep looking.
Retreating back to the part of the tunnels which were lit, Hui Yue and his friends quickly found another tunnel that headed downwards.
The side tunnels contained many small caves which were carved into the ground. These caves were either bandit lairs, or home to hordes of magical beasts. Currently Hui Yue wished to take over one of these lairs so that he could sit down and look through their spoils. Not to mention seeing if they were capable of finding anything of interest from the Dragon Corps’ items they obtained.
The tunnel they chose to enter was filled with magical beasts, a sign that no bandits were around. This was because usually they made sure to clear out the beasts near their turf, however, one could never be too careful. Thus the six friends moved forward slowly killing one beast after another, and storing the beast corpses within their storage stones.
Finally, after what felt like days of searching, the group managed to find a place where they could rest. As they entered the cave a loud howl could be heard, but when the beast got close enough to sense the aura of Xu Piao and Xie Lan, it wisely chose to escape; not betting its life for the sake of a simple cave.
Having set up a campfire within the cave, Hui Yue sat down and tossed some of the storage stones to Xu Piao and Xie Lan. All of them quickly binded the stones with Qi strand before they opened them and looked into them.
“Oh this one contains a thousand demon cores.” Xu Piao said surprised, “There is quite a lot of food as well, but he had no interesting weapons or scrolls.”
“This one has almost no money only about seventy demon cores.” Sha Yun said while wrinkling her nose, “Oh wait!” She suddenly said as she waved her hands and three memory stones appeared out of nowhere. Placing the memory stones to her forehead a bright blue light shone within the cave. After a moment the snake-woman removed the first of the stones before she tried the second and third memory stone.
“Don’t mind them,” She sighed, “They are just maps of the cave system. We already saw some similar to them back in Demon Dwelling Cave.”
Hearing this, everyone who held their breath, hoping for interesting news, all sighed as they shook their heads. Mocking smiles could be seen before they continued to search through the stones.
“It is here! I found it!” Deng Wu said excitedly as he found a storage stone containing multiple other storage stones. The ones on the ground were the stones which belonged to Deng Wu, Sha Yun, and Wang Ju Long.
Giving the stones to their original owners, Hui Yue and the rest combined all the loot they gained. There were only around two hundred and twenty thousand demon cores, however that was plenty for the group to continue their travels.
Apart from demon coins they found lots of food and wine, clearly these Dragon Corps members brought them along for their mission. Along with food and wine, Hui Yue found quite a few materials which were already refined, not to mention a large array of inscriptions. These were for their metal affinity cultivators to use.
Some of the bags contained weapons while others contained jewelry. After looking all the things over, Hui Yue evenly split all the items between the six of them. All the inscription patterns went to Deng Wu who was thoroughly excited as he sat down. He looked through each and every one of the inscription patterns trying to determine which ability each of them activated.