"The front line had suffered another defeat."
Li Xianghan sighed mournfully, spread her arms, and flopped flat on the fungus mat in the insect chamber.
Two mice stretched out their furry paws, rustled their way out of the insect jar, fetched the dried fruit they had hoarded in their nest, and pushed it toward their mistress as a small comfort.
Awei hugged an Azure Great Pill, curled into a ball, and gnawed away in utter absorption, scattering pill crumbs all over the table. Hearing this, it stopped its hooked mouthparts and spun once on the spot.
"Hmph, who else could it be but Liang Qu? The young and old in the village all say he's Da Shun's foremost Marquis, Southern Border's greatest calamity. He rides a winged Azure Dragon, summoning wind and rain wherever he goes, with lightning flashing and thunder roaring. Anyone drenched by his rain will drown, not even Grandmasters excepted. I'd say they've been frightened witless—telling stories, are they?"
Li Xianghan fed the dried fruit back to the mice and stroked their back fur. "I heard that over a hundred and ten True Images died this month. Nearly sixty of them were killed by him. Red Water Poison was captured, and Black Water Poison vanished.
"If not for him, the Ha Long Bay front could never have been pushed back. Tusi flew into a rage and wanted to gather the remaining Five Gu Nine Poisons to deal with Liang Qu once and for all. The village is in chaos. Several Elders refuse to keep holding out; they plan to demand compensation from Tusi and pull their own people back from the front.
"Sixty... tsk, tsk. Little Blue, tell me, could one person truly be that strong?"
Awei opened and closed its mouthparts.
Li Xianghan raised her head