This time, the newly appointed warrior chief, Chi the Fourteenth, led the Half-Dragonfolk Vassals on their expedition. An army of ten thousand Half-Dragonfolk crossed the Star Gate and entered an unfamiliar land.
Beneath their feet stretched a barren wasteland. There was no grass or vegetation, no sign of life. The sky held no air, no sun or moon—only countless stars scattered across the darkness.
The Demon Cave lay within a black hole's domain, hardly a place suited to the emergence of life. Even if a star had once teemed with life, after being captured by a black hole, it was certain to become a dead zone in the cosmic expanse.
In such a place, low- and even mid-tier human cultivators couldn't enter or survive without special preparations and equipment, let alone fight there.
But the Vassals of Star Lords, such as the Half-Dragonfolk, needed only a brief period of weakness after entering this Demon Cave star before rapidly adapting to the environment.
At that moment, the bloodline of the Void Demon Race within them played a crucial role. It let them survive and fight in the void, upon the star's surface, without Spirit Veins, air, sunlight, or moonlight, sustaining themselves with the star's power.
Of course, the void, dead stars, and even black holes couldn't have no effect on them at all.
After all, these Star Lord Vassals were only half-demons, not true members of the Void Demon Race.
The warrior chief, Chi the Fourteenth, led his warriors into this strange environment but didn't rush into action. He waited until they had all adapted, then put them through a series of tests. This let them familiarize themselves with how to fight in unfamiliar surroundings and gauge their remaining strength.
Liang Ji watched the whole time. In the black hole Demon Cave, he saw that the Half-Dragonfolk Vassals had retained roughly half their strength.
The question was, how strong were the Void Demon Race in this Demon Cave?
Naturally, the senior Star Lord class covered all kinds of information and knowledge about the Void Demon Race. They were, after all, a major enemy Star Lords would often face in the future.
The vast sea of stars held countless kinds of Void Demons. The Star Alliance couldn't even fully count them, let alone give an exact number.
After all, the Star Alliance didn't control the entire sea of stars. As it expanded outwards into new star regions, it occasionally discovered new kinds of Void Demons.
Generally speaking, however, all Void Demons fed on starlight and lived by devouring the power of stars. They also shared many similarities.
The most common was that the higher their rank, the larger their bodies and the greater their strength.
According to the Star Alliance's records, first-order Void Demons were generally ten to fifty zhang long; second-order demons, fifty to a hundred zhang; third-order, a hundred to five hundred zhang; and fourth-order, five hundred to a thousand zhang, and so on.
There might be some variation between different kinds of Void Demons, but that was the general rule.
Judging from the information Liang Ji had found in notes left by previous students, the Void Demons chosen for Xiūshé City's Second Mock Exam were usually snake demons.
For one thing, the Demon Caves guarded by Sky Snake Star were dominated by snake-type Void Demons. For another, this choice was intended to benefit the Star Lord students taking the exam.
After all, any Demon Cores, materials, and other spoils gained by the students' Vassals from killing Void Demons during the Second Mock Exam belonged to the students themselves. Neither the school nor the City Education Bureau would take a single thing.
If a student had the means to slay a great many demons during the exam and collect a hundred Demon Cores, then half the work of cultivating their First-Order Star was already done.
Inside the Second Mock Exam's Star Demon Cave, the warrior chief, Chi the Fourteenth, had already led his warriors through familiarizing themselves with the environment and assessing their strength. But he still didn't hurry to set out.
Instead, he turned to look at another member of his kind beside him. This Half-Dragonfolk stood only about 1.9 meters tall, making him stand out among the warriors, who were generally over 2.2 meters tall.
Yet he stood right beside the warrior chief, Chi the Fourteenth, which showed that his status was no low one.
He was one of the Rune Masters trained among the Half-Dragonfolk Vassals. He had joined the army on this expedition partly to repair any Rune Artifact equipment damaged in battle.
But there was another reason... The Rune Master now held out a compass Rune Artifact. Special runes had been inscribed upon it, and as he operated it, it glimmered faintly, as though sensing and responding to something. After its needle spun for a while, it settled and pointed firmly in one direction.
Peng Yue had given Liang Ji the blueprint for this compass Rune Artifact, and he had his Half-Dragonfolk craftsmen and Rune Masters make it.
It had just one purpose: to point the way to Peng Yue's Ice Soul Serpentfolk team within the star chosen for the Second Mock Exam.
After all, he had made a deal with her to do everything he could to help her claim first place in the Ten-School Joint Exam. Naturally, he needed to reach her team as soon as possible and join forces with them.
"Chief Chi, this way!"
The Rune Master immediately pointed where the needle indicated and called out.
"Good." The warrior chief, Chi the Fourteenth, nodded. Then he turned to the warriors behind him and gave his orders. "Scouts, move out at once. Search the way ahead and locate the enemy!"
"The rest of you, follow me shortly. The rear guard, keep watch behind us and on both sides, in case we're ambushed."
"Yes, sir!"
The ten thousand Half-Dragonfolk Vassals split into several groups and took their orders. A thousand scouts divided into several teams and set out at once.
Compared with the Half-Dragonfolk Vassals during the First Mock Exam, the warriors now had the makings of a proper army. They had formations, distinct troop types, and tactical plans.
They no longer charged in like a hunting party, all rushing forward in a swarm with no formation or tactics, as they had during the First Mock Exam.
Over the past month, Liang Ji's Natal Star and Vassals had grown by leaps and bounds. He had also kept studying the Tactics Research course and passing what he learned on to the Half-Dragonfolk. Now, the results were beginning to show.
The army hadn't gone far before the sounds of battle came from ahead. The scouts had encountered the enemy: the Void Demon Race!
Chi the Fourteenth immediately led the army towards them. Soon, they saw the Void Demon fighting with the scouts.
It was a demon snake just over ten zhang long, its body covered in spots. This was the extremely common first-order Spotted Demon Snake, the source of the ordinary Demon Core known as the Spotted Snake Demon Core.
Of the thousand scouts, five hundred had scattered to search the surrounding area and watch for enemies. The other five hundred had formed up and stayed behind to engage the first-order Spotted Demon Snake, tangling with it in battle.
At last, Liang Ji got to see the fighting strength of these Void Demons for himself.
This ordinary first-order Spotted Demon Snake, just over ten zhang long, should have been about as weak as a snake-type first-order Void Demon could get. It fought with little more than its physical strength and a bit of venom.
Yet the five hundred Half-Serpentfolk warriors in Liang Ji's scout team, armed with rune weapons and fighting in formation, could only hold their own against it. Neither side could gain the upper hand.
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