"Or should we withdraw after all? Since that Dog Emperor has already withdrawn his troops and gathered them around the area to defend against us, and the Shangqing Sect led by Sun Chongyang has also been relieved, there's no need for us to fight them to the death, Xia Huang..." Ruan Qiushui's gaze remained fixed on the sand table as she looked at me, and for a moment, she couldn't make up her mind.
The area around the Little Heavenly Court on the sand table was covered with yellow flags. These all represented the Emperor's army, with each flag almost representing ten thousand of his troops. More than three hundred of them were stuck there in such an eye-catching display that no one could help feeling shaken.
It had to be said that the elite forces guarding the Little Heavenly Court were truly astonishing. Centuries of burning, killing, looting, and plundering had given the Dog Emperor an immeasurable fortune in immortal crystals. Countless people had also joined his command for the sake of immortal crystals and authority. Thus, even after years of warfare, his military strength still remained astonishingly large.
Along the way, we had indeed occupied many prefectures and counties. But a true increase in military strength wasn't something that meant the troops could take the field immediately after being accepted. If you expected soldiers from pig farms to stand against the Emperor's elites, that would simply be a failure of intelligence. Thus, most of the soldiers from the various prefectures and counties had remained behind to garrison those places, with only a small number of elites following us here. So although our forces had increased greatly along the way, they amounted to only around 1.8 million—slightly insufficient to face the Emperor's all-elite army.
"Don't fight. We can't win