Twin moons hung high in the sky, with a bright moon and sparse stars. A large squadron of Winged Devil knights—more than a hundred strong—flew overhead like a ghostly shadow. Within just two hours, they had circled and patrolled the skies above this mountain range twice.
Beneath the path of that squadron of Winged Devil knights, atop an ancient, gnarled pine stubbornly growing from a cliff face, a small black beetle crouched amid a cluster of pine needles, looking up at the sky.
That little black beetle was naturally Zhang Tie's external incarnation.
This was precisely Elephant Mountain County in Martial Prefecture, where Zhang Tie had emerged from underground and killed Devil Race knights that day. By the waterlike moonlight, Zhang Tie could even see Elephant Mountain City in the distance.
In merely a few months, everything here had changed.
By the end of January, all soldiers and civilians in the areas of Martial Prefecture, Blessing Province, and Silver Province within the Western Pacification Protectorate war zone that remained outside Devil Race-occupied territory had completed their evacuation. Only Great Xia's knights remained, holding the region west of the Helan Mountains with Xuanyuan Fortress as their core. Now, aside from Great Xia's civilians in the fallen territories, there were basically no longer any Great Xia soldiers or civilians to be seen in Martial Prefecture, Blessing Province, or Silver Province.
The clash between Great Xia and the Devil Race in the Western Pacification Protectorate war zone was gradually intensifying, slowly reaching a white-hot stage. This could be seen simply from the number of scouts and vanguard units the Devil Race was sending out.
When Zhang Tie had first arrived in the Western Theater, the Devil Race's scouts and vanguards had consisted of one or two lone Devil Race knights.
Three months ago,