Fall of Big Stone Camp

"Ah... my leg, my leg..."

"Wuwuwu... my neck is broken, it hurts so much."

"Mom, don't die, please don't die..."

"Son, where is my son's head? Who saw my son's head..."

The weirdness fell, yet not a single trace of joy surfaced on Xia Hong's face.

Because the sounds ringing in his ears were nothing more than the painful, agonizing wails of the remaining survivors of Big Stone Camp.

The four characters of wails filling the land were truly materialized before his eyes at this moment.

Ah...

Xia Hong looked around at the tragic scene, and in the end, it only turned into a sigh.

"Chun Yu... Chun Yu..."

Shi Qing walked over tremblingly, staggering toward a corpse.

Though the silk threads on his body were untied, the wounds left by them piercing through his flesh remained. There were several bloody holes on his shoulder blades, lips, and even his limbs and torso, and blood was gurgling out of them.

That corpse had been severed from the waist by the weirdness, leaving only half a body. Judging from the clothing and the name Shi Qing shouted, it was clearly his wife.

Beside the corpse were a pair of fifteen or sixteen-year-old youths, crying bitterly and agonizingly.

"Mom, Father, save Mom! We can't live without her..."

The girl had clearly lost her mind. Seeing Shi Qing approach, she raised her head and pleaded with her father with tear-filled eyes.

The sorrowful weeping voice was heart-wrenching. Xia Chuan, Yuan Cheng, and the others who had already drawn close could not help turning their eyes red.

Shi Qing first picked up his wife's mutilated remains with trembling hands, then looked back at his younger brother Shi Dong's decapitated corpse. He opened his mouth as if he wanted to say something, yet could not say a word. In the end, he closed his eyes, his face filled with pain and remorse.

Seeing this scene, Xia Hong heaved a slight sigh in his heart.

Behind him, Xia Chuan, Yuan Cheng, and the other nine all turned their heads away in intolerance.

They could all understand Shi Qing.

Because previously, the weirdness had also controlled Xia Ding to slaughter the people of Great Xia.

The weirdness was able to kill so many people, to a large extent, precisely because it wore a face everyone was most familiar with.

Death was certainly terrifying, but this kind of horrific slaughter created by someone familiar and close to them—especially when both the killer and the killed were their own people—was all the more chilling and soul-crushing.

"Leader Shi... please mourn and restrain your grief!"

Xia Hong walked forward and patted Shi Qing's shoulder. He originally wanted to persuade him, but when the words reached his lips, they still turned into a sentence of comfort.

Seeing Shi Qing's dull expression, still immersed in grief, he sighed, looked around the surroundings, and continued, "Leader Shi, time is precious. That weirdness might come back at any time. There are still quite a few people alive in your camp. If you don't pull yourself together quickly, the tragedy might happen again!"

Clearly jolted awake by Xia Hong's words, Shi Qing snapped out of it abruptly, cast a look of gratitude toward Xia Hong, and then turned to look at his son and daughter.

"Ping, go tally how many people died and how many survivors there are. Search every corner of the cave; some people should be hiding in the lower levels, hurry and let them come out."

"Lu, go notify everyone to pack their things quickly. Once they're packed, gather here at the cave entrance. We're moving immediately."

"Yes, Father."

Although the two young people were still grieving, hearing their father's command and knowing the situation was critical, they quickly stood up to execute it.

After giving his instructions to the two, Shi Qing cast his gaze toward Xia Hong once more.

"Leader Xia..."

As Xia Hong met Shi Qing's gaze, he immediately knew what the other man was thinking.

Mainly because the look of entreaty in his eyes was simply too obvious.

Shi Qing's shoulder blades, limbs, and torso had just been pierced by the weirdness's white silk threads. Covered in blood all over at this moment, even moving a little was difficult; he was already practically a cripple.

Let alone leading the rest of the camp to live in an unknown place.

Whether he could lead the others to successfully complete this migration was an unknown variable.

Furthermore, losing their last Lumbering Realm combat power—and moreover, Shi Qing, the soul of the camp—meant that:

Big Stone Camp existed in name only.

The entreaty in Shi Qing's eyes clearly went beyond just wanting Xia Hong to help them move; his meaning was already extremely obvious.

He wanted to entrust the remaining people of Big Stone Camp to Xia Hong.

Shi Qing did not say it explicitly, which could be considered leaving Xia Hong room for refusal.

He also knew that rashly taking in a few hundred people was no simple matter.

Although judging from the fact that Xia Hong had just annihilated the weirdness, the situation at Great Xia Camp should be much better than before, Shi Qing still did not believe Xia Hong would accept so many people so easily.

What's more, everyone left in Big Stone Camp right now was just ordinary people.

Even he, their sole Lumbering Realm combatant, was already crippled.

Accompanied by Xia Hong's prolonged silence, the entreaty in Shi Qing's eyes gradually faded, and the hope in his heart extinguished bit by bit, replaced instead by despair.

"Come back to Great Xia Camp with us first. We can talk about subsequent matters later!"

Hearing Xia Hong's words, Shi Qing's body shook, and he abruptly raised his head to look at him.

Confirming that Xia Hong really agreed, Shi Qing was unable to speak for a moment in his excitement. He could only look at him with a gaze overflowing with extreme gratitude, and nodded heavily.

"Father, a total of 132 people died in the camp, and 187 remain. Eldest sister has already notified them to pack their things, it should be done very soon."

Shi Ping walked over at this moment, with Shi Lu following behind him, alongside several others who had already finished packing their belongings, all slowly gathering around.

"Chuan, you nine organize everyone. Have people go to the cave entrance later to assist and receive them. First pull all the children up, then lead them down the mountain first. Let the older folks climb down themselves so the speed will be a bit faster."

"Yes, Leader!"

Xia Chuan led the nine of them and began organizing everyone for an orderly evacuation.

During the previous relocation of Great Xia Camp, although Xia Hong had organized and led it, Xia Chuan had already been following by his side helping out back then, so he had accumulated a bit of experience. He led eight people over to help organize, and the efficiency immediately became much faster.

Before long, the little children were arranged at the very front. Led by Yuan Cheng and his men at the cave entrance, they were pulled up one by one with ropes, followed closely by the adults carrying their household goods and heavy loads.

Watching everyone in the camp evacuating in an orderly fashion, Shi Qing's emotions eased quite a bit as well.

"Leader Shi, come on. You're inconvenienced in your movements, I'll carry you on my back."

Seeing Xia Hong come over to carry him, a flash of astonishment first crossed Shi Qing's eyes, immediately followed by deep emotional stirring as he waved his hands repeatedly and smiled bitterly, "Leader, please don't joke around. I'm already a cripple, how could I trouble you? Just let Shi Ping carry me."

Hearing Shi Qing's address toward him, Xia Hong raised his brows slightly.

He naturally understood Shi Qing's little schemes; it was nothing more than worrying that he wouldn't care for these nearly two hundred people of Big Stone Camp, so he wanted to firmly establish his title as the leader first.

Although he hadn't planned on ignoring these people in the first place, seeing Shi Qing's cautious probing still made Xia Hong's heart feel inexplicably heavy.

From Shi Qing's reaction, one could tell just how difficult the plight of small camps was. Due to resource limitations, merging with each other was impossible, and wanting to merge into a camp stronger than oneself required one's own value to be sufficient in the first place, while the other side also needed to have a surplus of resources. Without satisfying these two prerequisites, people probably wouldn't take them in.

In fact, with Great Xia's current strength, taking in these nearly two hundred people was not quite sufficient. Yet leaving so many people to fend for themselves and letting them become food for weirdness and Frost Beasts was something Xia Hong couldn't bring himself to do. Coupled with Shi Qing's earlier expression of entreaty mixed with despair, he had forcefully taken them on.

"Rest assured, Leader Shi, I won't abandon them. Just come back to Great Xia Camp with me first."

Hearing Xia Hong's words, Shi Qing's complexion truly relaxed then. He even propped up his failing body and bowed down on one knee toward Xia Hong.

Of course, Xia Hong did not let him finish the kneel, reaching out to support him.

Just in time, Shi Ping came over. Xia Hong helped place Shi Qing onto his son's back, and while leading the two toward the cave entrance, he questioned Shi Qing:

"Leader Shi, when you guys ran into the weirdness over in Great Xia's territory earlier, how did you escape? At that time, aside from Wang Ming and the other three, did everyone else die?

How was Shi Dong swapped out? Didn't you notice at all?

Also, have you ever laid eyes on that weirdness yourself?"

Xia Hong asked several questions in succession. Of course, the most important one was still the very last question.

He wanted to understand more regarding that weirdness.

Clinging to his son's back, Shi Qing felt a trace of pain flash across his eyes upon hearing these questions, but he quickly adjusted his emotions and began answering Xia Hong.