The Peril of Yellow Wind Ridge! Carving a Bloody Path!

A moment later, Wang Meng arrived at the summit of Fire Cloud Peak.

"Hm? Why has it gone quiet?"

"Could it be... already over?"

Wang Meng's heart jolted as an unbelievable possibility came to mind, sweat seeping into his palms.

Even if the battle was over, now that he had reached Five Sect Mountain, he had to see the living or find the dead, no matter what.

But he was only an ordinary Eighth Rank Great Training practitioner, while Fire Cloud Sect had at least five or six of them.

He had to be careful—more careful than ever. Otherwise, he might end up dying here as well!

With that thought, he drew a deep breath and cautiously felt his way toward the plaza ahead.

Along the way, he suppressed his aura to the utmost limit.

Very soon, a thick stench of blood washed over him, making his mind tremble.

He slowly poked his head out from behind the wall and carefully looked ahead.

The sight before him was horrifying, as though he had been struck by lightning!

The plaza was littered with corpses, blood flowing like a river!

As far as the eye could see, there were only the bodies of Fire Cloud Sect disciples and Barbarians!

"That's—!"

Before long, he spotted several familiar corpses lying miserably mangled in the distance.

If those corpses were not the heads of the five great sects, then who else could they be?!

And now, they were all dead!

Not a single one had survived!

Unable to believe it, he stepped into the plaza, his gaze sweeping about like lightning as he searched for Jiang Bei.

Yet there was nothing. Absolutely nothing!

"How... how is this possible...?"

Wang Meng's body trembled, his mind roaring.

He simply could not believe what lay before his eyes.

The heads of the five great sects had actually been... slaughtered by Jiang Bei alone!

Other than Jiang Bei, he could not think of anyone else. If someone had come to Five Sect Mountain, they would certainly have reported to Lord Jiang first.

If reinforcements had come from another camp, the first thing they would have done would be to inform Lord Jiang, allowing Ren-Rank Camp to owe them a favor, rather than acting first and reporting afterward.

The only person who could act first and report afterward was Jiang Bei, who had already come to Five Sect Mountain!

Only he could have done this!

"I... I need to hurry back to the Eight Desolations Mountain Range and report this to Lord Jiang!"

Without hesitation, Wang Meng immediately raced down the mountain.

But as he thought of this, he clenched his fists, worry filling his heart.

By his calculations, the final battle Lord Jiang had spoken of had most likely already ended.

To stop Batu Feng from breaking through to the Sixth Rank, Lord Jiang had to launch one final charge.

He wondered what the outcome was now...

Yellow Wind Ridge, Broken Spear Slope.

Dark clouds hung low, nearly pressing down upon their heads. Raindrops as large as beans pounded down, splashing muddy water mixed with blood across the scorched black earth.

The wind howled, carrying the savage roars of Barbarians and the piercing clang of weapons through the narrow mountain hollow again and again.

This place was called Broken Spear Slope because it had once been an ancient battlefield where the ancestors of the Dry People had held back the Barbarians.

But now, it had become the graveyard of Ren-Rank Camp's Third Battalion.

From every direction, a ring of Barbarians closed in like a giant mouth, trapping Xu Qi and the remaining twenty-odd soldiers amid the piled rocks atop the slope.

They had long since run out of ammunition and supplies, their arrows exhausted, every one of them wounded. Blood mixed with rainwater streamed down endlessly, and every face was filled with despair.

Xu Qi leaned against a massive boulder, bracing himself with a chipped war saber as he gasped heavily.

Every breath pulled at the bone-deep wounds across his body. A barbed Barbarian arrow was lodged in each of his left shoulder and right leg, blood gushing out and dyeing his tattered armor crimson.

"Battalion Commander! The east... the east won't hold!"

Ma Yun, his face smeared with blood and grime, shouted hoarsely, his voice already ragged.

"Hold the line! If you want to live, smash them with rocks!"

Xu Qi suddenly raised his head. Bloodshot veins filled his eyes as he roared.

Ignoring his injuries, he grabbed a sharp stone with his still-mobile right hand and hurled it with all his strength at the head of a Barbarian trying to climb over the pile of rocks.

"Pfft!"

A dull thud rang out alongside the sound of a skull cracking. The Barbarian screamed and tumbled down, temporarily blocking that gap.

But even more Barbarians continued surging upward with howls, like a plague of locusts sweeping through—utterly impossible to stop!

"Battalion Commander, you... you should retreat first. We brothers will cover the rear..."

A badly wounded Squad Leader threw himself at Xu Qi's feet and spoke with difficulty.

"Bullshit!"

Xu Qi cut him off sharply. His gaze swept over every young face around him, each one covered in wounds. "If Yellow Wind Ridge falls, we'll be sinners for all eternity! Behind us are the lights of countless homes... Whoever speaks of retreat again, I'll be the first to cut him down!"

He forced his nearly collapsing body upright, intending to swing his saber again, but a sharp pain between his ribs made him stagger. He nearly fell before a soldier beside him hurriedly caught him.

Seeing their Battalion Commander in such a miserable state, the men could no longer hold back their tears. They rolled down their faces with the cold rain.

They roared, erupting like trapped beasts, and crashed fiercely into the charging Barbarians. When their weapons broke, they bit with their teeth and used their bodies to block the enemy!

Xu Qi had little strength left. Leaning against the icy boulder, blood foam spilled from his mouth, and his vision gradually blurred. Even the Barbarians' cries of battle and slaughter seemed to drift farther and farther away...

Yet even at this point, he felt little fear of death. Instead, there was only... a deep concern.

"Jiang Bei... that kid... did he really go to Five Sect Mountain?" Xu Qi's thoughts drifted uncontrollably into the distance.

The last figure that surfaced in his mind was Jiang Bei.

The leaders of the five major sects were five Eighth Rank Great Training martial artists, not to mention the Barbarian chieftain.

He knew Jiang Bei was a monster, but going there alone was far too reckless!

He also had no idea whether the Eight Desolations Mountain Range had sent reinforcements. Otherwise, he truly did not dare imagine how this would end!

He had given Jiang Bei the Mystic Cloud Saber and the Mysterious Iron Dragon Scale Body in the hope that this promising sapling would grow into a towering tree that could shelter Great Qian—not die young in the treacherous martial world and on the battlefield.

He could only hope he would be safe.

He just did not know whether he would ever get to see him again...

At that thought, he could not help reaching for the jade pendant in his pocket, clutching it tighter and tighter...

Just then, the clamor of the Barbarians below the slope abruptly fell silent for a moment.

A particularly burly Barbarian emerged from the crowd, clad in black beast-hide armor with a string of enormous bones hanging around his neck.

This man was the Barbarian leader in this assault on Yellow Wind Ridge—Klie Yuan.

"Xu Qi—!" Klie Yuan's voice boomed like rolling thunder, crashing clearly into the ears of every Dry People soldier. "Look at you stray dogs! Huddling like rats in the cracks of these rotten rocks! Hahahaha!"

As he spoke, he raised the massive bloodstained battle-axe in his hand and pointed it at the top of the slope. "Aren't you supposed to be the toughest Battalion Commander in the Ren-Rank Camp? Think your bones are hard? Pah! Now you're lying there like a dead dog, waiting to die! Your soldiers are nearly all dead! What the hell are you tough with?!"

"Surrender! Crawl down here, kneel before me, and lick the mud off my boots! I might consider letting you watch as your last few brothers are skinned and their tendons pulled out one by one, then ground up and fed to wolves! That way, you might even... live for another cup of tea's time? Hahahaha!"

As Klie Yuan's undisguised mockery fell—

The Barbarians behind him burst into raucous laughter as well.

"Your savior Jiang Qingfeng is getting crushed like a bug by Lord Batu Feng in the Eight Desolations right now!"

"The Ren-Rank Camp? It's finished already!"

"Hey, Xu Qi, I heard your wife and daughter died early? Good. At least they won't have to see what a pathetic coward you are!"

"Old Man! Crawl down here!"

"This time, no one can save you!"

The filthy insults were like poisoned arrows, stabbing viciously into the hearts of every Dry People soldier.

Their eyes turned bloodshot, their teeth ground audibly, and the knuckles of the hands gripping their weapons went white from the force.

Humiliation and rage churned in their chests, nearly ready to explode.

Yet the top of the slope was deathly silent.

Xu Qi leaned against the boulder, his eyes half-closed. There was no expression on his face—no anger, no fear, not even a trace of humiliation.

There was only boundless exhaustion and a stillness that was nearly frozen solid.

It was indifference toward an inevitable death.

When Klie Yuan saw no reaction from the slope—especially Xu Qi's detached manner, as though he had run out of oil and his lamp was about to go out, too lazy even to respond—it stirred the savage brutality within him even further.

Contempt!

To him, this was the greatest contempt of all!

"You Qian dogs who don't know what's good for you! Die!"

Klie Yuan flew into a rage. He swung his massive battle-axe forward and let out a roar signaling the full assault. "Charge up! Leave no one alive! Chop that bastard Xu into minced meat!"

"Kill!!"

Klie Yuan's roar was like a powder keg being lit.

The Barbarians surrounding the foot of the slope unleashed earth-shaking howls, turning into a black flood as they launched their final charge at Xu Qi and the others atop the slope!

At the top of the slope.

Xu Qi closed his eyes in despair. Seeing this, the other soldiers, no matter how unwilling they were, sensed an unprecedented aura of death.

Today, they truly feared they would die here.

The enemy far outnumbered them. Most importantly, they had Klie Yuan, a genuinely formidable Seventh Rank Lesser Training expert!

If they had not moved quickly and fled to the top of this slope in time, they would have died long ago.

But now that the enemy was launching their final charge, what could they use to stop them?

However, just as the barbarians were about to rush up the slope, at this critical moment—

"Whoosh—"

"Boom!!"

A blinding blade light, like lightning tearing through dark clouds, suddenly erupted from the rear flank where the barbarians were most densely gathered!

Accompanying that blade light were the shrill, warped screams of the barbarians!

Like droplets of water thrown into boiling oil, the barbarian tide of charging troops was instantly torn open by an incomparably violent force, leaving a massive gap!

Blade energy crisscrossed, flesh and blood flew!

A blood-soaked figure radiating nearly tangible killing intent charged into the enemy ranks like a crazed tiger!

He moved with incredible speed, like a ghost. Everywhere he passed, only a scarlet afterimage remained.

The barbarians fell in swaths like wheat being harvested.

Wherever the blade flashed, severed limbs and scalding blood flew through the air!

And that figure was none other than Jiang Bei!