Before that terrifying Flame Immortal and her party had even sailed within fifty li, the Demonflame Sect and Ghost Spirit Sect—the two sects of the six demonic sects—had received word in advance. Without a word, they boarded their ships and led their people away from Yellow Maple Valley, fleeing north toward the Tianluo Kingdom without looking back.
Clearly, the two sides had tacitly agreed to leave the still-bewildered disciples of the Thousand Illusions Sect, Spirit Controlling Sect, Heavenly Fiend Sect, and Joyful Union Sect behind at Yellow Maple Valley's stronghold.
Perhaps they were thinking that it was better for others to die than themselves, and wanted people from those four sects to serve as targets and buy them more time?
However...
No one knew who had let the news slip first, but less than a quarter of an hour after the Demonflame Sect and Ghost Spirit Sect left, the people of the Spirit Controlling Sect were the first to hear about it.
Then the entire former Yellow Maple Valley stronghold erupted into chaos.
The remaining disciples of the four demonic sects, who had never been numerous to begin with, along with the demonic cultivators who had planned to guard Yellow Maple Valley, help the Ghost Spirit Sect clear out the Xu Kingdom, and await further orders to purge the area, hastily boarded ships or simply flew off on their swords. They fled north, east, and west without looking back, scattering in an instant and abandoning many spoils of war and important supplies they had brought with them.
In the blink of an eye, Yellow Maple Valley became a chaotic, unclaimed place, piled high with all manner of supplies but utterly deserted.
However...
The people of the former Yellow Maple Valley knew nothing about it.
Far to the southwest of Yellow