The wheels rolled over dry dirt and stone, producing a monotonous rumble.
The immense caravan traveled through a narrow, slit-like gorge, with steep cliffs on either side as though carved by blades and axes, squeezing the sky into a long, narrow strip of light.
This was Black Wind Gorge, less than five hundred li from the Imperial Capital, a place notorious for bandits.
When the convoy reached the narrowest point of the gorge, the scout ahead suddenly reined in his horse and let out a piercing whistle.
The entire caravan immediately came to a halt.
Over a hundred guards spread out in an instant, forming a defensive formation that appeared loose outside but tight within. Cold blades left their sheaths, all pointed at the shadowed stretch ahead beneath the cliffs.
A group of men and horses had already blocked the road there.
There were not many of them, only thirty or forty, but every one rode a tall horse and wore matching dark leather armor. Embroidered upon their armor in silver thread was the pattern of an unusual medicinal herb.
They were clearly no ordinary bandits.
Their leader was a rough-featured middle-aged man. He wore no helmet, and his unruly red hair flew wildly in the gusts coursing through the gorge. He sat atop a ferocious second-tier magical beast, an Iron-Armored Rhino, while the formidable aura of a Dou Ling expert radiated from him without restraint, pressing down upon the entire Mite'er caravan like a heavy mountain.
The Mite'er caravan's captain, a seven-star Dou Shi, urged his horse forward, his expression grim to the extreme.
"I am Lin Tao, captain of the Mittel Family caravan guards. Might those ahead be friends from the Medicine Gang? We are merely passing through. I hope you can make way for us."
His voice