Iron Palm Stirs

Luda was very surprised when he heard the news. The Blazing Fire Tribe had just sent him to investigate the situation, so why was the Iron Palm Tribe already preparing for war? Could it be that the Blazing Fire Tribe was planning to take action without waiting for intelligence feedback?

"Lord Xita, may I ask who the Iron Palm Tribe intends to wage war against? We hope our caravan can stay far away to avoid being affected."

"They're just a bunch of bandits who came from the west. It'll be over soon, so you should leave as soon as possible."

Seeing that Xita had no intention of telling him the details, Luda had no choice but to sell the weapons to the Iron Palm Tribe and try to obtain information through others.

Unexpectedly, the warriors from the Iron Palm Tribe who came to collect weapons were all tight-lipped and none of them were willing to talk to the caravan.

After the Iron Palm Tribe warriors took the weapons, they were distributed directly to the men of the tribe. It was clear that the Iron Palm Tribe was indeed mobilizing its men; all men who could ride horses were given weapons, regardless of age.

After the transaction was completed, the Iron Palm Tribe sent people to urge the caravan to leave quickly. With no other option, Luda could only lead his people to leave the Iron Palm Tribe's Pastureland along the original route. The Iron Palm Tribe had people following the caravan and monitoring their departure.

It wasn't until evening that the Iron Palm Tribe finally left. Luda was very unwilling to give up. He first arranged for the caravan to set up camp on the spot, while he, along with a few trusted men and a scout, rode a fast horse back to the vicinity of the Iron Palm Tribe's camp under the cover of night.

Luda looked at the camp in the distance, which was brightly lit and bustling with people, clearly not in a normal state.

Small groups of Cavalry kept leaving the camp and heading east. Luda judged that the bandits they were talking about should be in the east, and most likely they had already been discovered by the Iron Palm Tribe's troops. The Iron Palm Tribe was mobilizing troops to send reinforcements.

"This Xita is really cunning. The bandits were clearly in the east, but this afternoon they said they were in the west. And they still want to drive us away. It seems that these 'bandits' are quite extraordinary."

Luda made a firm decision, sent one of his men back to the camp, and led his men straight east. Something big must have happened in the Iron Palm Tribe, otherwise they wouldn't be deliberately blocking the news and mobilizing the tribe's able-bodied men.

The group followed the Iron Palm Tribe's Cavalry eastward and found the location of the main Iron Palm Tribe force by a river.

Luda had previously thought that the Iron Palm Tribe was not much larger than the Horseshoe Tribe when he came here, but now he saw that the Iron Palm Tribe had mobilized at least three thousand people. Even if there were some old and weak people mixed in, it proved that the entire Iron Palm Tribe must have a scale of at least nearly ten thousand people, which was much stronger than the Horseshoe Tribe.

By the firelight, Luda also spotted a Cavalry force of two to three hundred men, clad in bronze armor and bearing the emblem of the Iron Bone Tribe on their banners. It seemed that the Iron Palm Tribe's operation was indeed not so simple, as it involved the Iron Bone Tribe's army. Perhaps the Iron Palm Tribe was cooperating with the Ironbone Tribe's actions.

These troops surrounded an open space by the river. In the center of the open space was a Cavalry unit of three or four hundred men, all dressed in black, whose identities were not discernible.

The Iron Palm Tribe surrounded the open space on three sides, seemingly without launching an attack yet. They had been trying to communicate with the group of men in black, but apparently without success.

Luda and his group found a small hill, far from Ironfist's main force. They could only barely see the situation by the light of the fire and could not hear the conversation between the two sides.

But Ironfist's main force was there, Luda dared not approach. He could only observe from the hilltop, trying to glean some useful information.

After more than an hour, the Iron Bone Tribe must have grown impatient. Several Cavalry stepped out of the ranks and spoke with the Iron Palm Tribe's commander.

Luda recognized Xita among the people he was talking to. Xita was the younger brother of the Iron Palm Tribe chief and the only Legion Commander in the Iron Palm Tribe. He was the undisputed leader in the Iron Palm Tribe's military system. He hadn't said a word and had just stood aside. The person talking to the Iron Bone people was his brother, the chief of the Iron Palm Tribe.

The group talked quickly, then returned to their respective groups. Soon, the Iron Palm Tribe's group began to move. A large number of able-bodied men dismounted and were driven forward by the warriors, seemingly attempting to break through the black-clad men's formation.

The men in black showed no mercy, immediately drawing their bows and shooting dozens of the Iron Palm Tribe strongmen who had surrounded them. Soon, the strongmen began to hesitate and retreat, which angered the Iron Palm Tribe warriors, who shouted at them loudly.

Xita finally stepped forward. He gathered his Thousand-man squad and engaged the men in black in a direct exchange of fire across the ranks of able-bodied men. The men in black had not expected the Iron Palm Tribe to be so decisive and were caught off guard. After three volleys of arrows, nearly half of them were killed or wounded.

The men in black attempted to retaliate, but because the strong men of the Iron Palm Tribe blocked their view, they were unable to accurately locate the archers of the Iron Palm Tribe, and their counterattack did not cause much damage to the archers of the Iron Palm Tribe.

The men in black quickly learned their lesson and used horses as a barrier, which alleviated the casualties. However, the Iron Palm Tribe soon changed its approach. The able-bodied men were driven away and their ranks were dispersed, while the Iron Bone Tribe's Cavalry began to mount their horses and prepare.

Half of the Iron Palm Tribe's Thousand-man squad mounted their horses, while the rest continued to suppress the enemy with arrows. Once the able-bodied men's formation had completely dispersed, the Iron Bone Tribe's bronze Cavalry took the lead, with the Iron Palm Tribe's Cavalry following closely behind.

The men in black had no time to adjust their formation before they were completely torn apart by the two Cavalry units. Although some tried to fight back, Luda could tell that a few of the men in black were quite skilled, but they were quickly overwhelmed by the army formation and the Cavalry charge.

Soon, the sounds of fighting gradually subsided, and the battlefield in the open space became mostly calm, with only the cries of the wounded Iron Palm Tribe who had been injured in the battle being heard.

Luda had been watching from the sidelines, and to be honest, he was a little surprised. The army of the Iron Palm Tribe was far more well-trained than that of ordinary small and medium-sized tribes. With such strength, it would be easy for them to wipe out the Horseshoe Tribe at its peak.

The army's obedience was particularly striking. Considering that most small and medium-sized tribes only have a few thousand people who are related by blood, it would be impossible for an army to treat ordinary herders so coldly and ruthlessly; it would even cause a mutiny. Yet, the Iron Palm Tribe's army could drive herders to use as human shields without hesitation, which was truly terrifying.

While Luda was still pondering why the Iron Palm Tribe would possess such an army, he saw that the Iron Bone Tribe Cavalry seemed to have clashed with the Iron Palm Tribe. Both sides were searching for the corpses of the men in black, as if looking for someone, but they had not found them. The two sides had a standoff over a trivial matter.

The soldiers on both sides kept arguing, and the situation gradually became tense. At this time, Xita and the commander of the Iron Bone Tribe arrived. After some negotiation, the two sides reached an agreement to separate. The Iron Bone Tribe continued to search downstream, while Xita led the Iron Palm Tribe's troops back to camp.