The only thing the Bizarre Tree hadn't expected was that the berserk warriors it had created weren't nearly as tough as it had imagined. Their combat abilities had fallen far short of its expectations.
They'd barely met the humans before the aggressive Human Faction had already taken down several of them.
The battle that followed became an astonishing one-sided slaughter.
The twenty Reserve Members had been brainwashed by the Bizarre Tree. Their blood was up, and each was filled with a sense of duty. They believed they were Lord Tree Ancestor's last seeds of hope, destined to earn his favor just like Wizard and receive the same level of cultivation.
They never would have guessed that, from the very beginning, the Bizarre Tree's plan had marked them as expendable pawns.
Their fate was all too easy to imagine.
It wasn't just the pawns themselves who hadn't expected it. Even He Jin and San Gou found the battle's smooth progress hard to believe.
After a sustained pursuit, few of the twenty Reserve Members remained. Once they'd counted them up, they found that thirteen had been killed.
"Old He, these so-called berserk warriors are all there is? The Bizarre Tree's a complete pushover! Looks like it's got no tricks left. We might even be able to kill it right there inside Kan Gate!"
The battle's easy progress sent San Gou's confidence soaring. He couldn't wait to drag the Bizarre Tree out and wipe it out for good.
He Jin, however, wasn't reckless. On the contrary, he was extremely perceptive.
Even amid the furious fighting, he hadn't lost his head. The smoother things went, the more he felt something was off.
It wasn't that he was surprised by how weak the berserk warriors were. It was that they showed no semblance of discipline.