Lü Heng crouched, picked up a piece of branch, and began drawing in the powdery gray dirt.
"The ore veins at Blackstone Ridge are a tangled mess. They run from beneath the town all the way to North Mountain. Three main tunnels lead down, with more than a dozen inclined shafts branching off along the way, not to mention old workings no one's entered in decades."
"We've been here over a month."
"Every time we go into the mine, we run into it, almost like it's waiting specifically for us. But the moment we attack, it burrows into the earth, then pops up somewhere else."
"We've sealed every opening we can and posted men outside, but it just won't come out."
"What if we blew up the mine?" Yang Xiao asked.
Lü Heng shook his head. "The black iron mined here goes to the military arsenal. Collapse this vein, and it's ruined. More importantly, the tunnels run beneath the town. Set off an explosion, and the mountain will shift too. There are three hundred-odd people up there. Where would they run?"
He jabbed the branch into the dirt and looked up at Yang Xiao, then hesitated with the words on his lips.
"Since General Pei assigned you the Blackstone Ridge job..."
"Why don't we... have the men prepare some beast-luring incense and get some fresh bloody meat to lure it out?"
Even he sounded far from confident.
That Stone Kui was exceedingly cunning. Whether it emerged depended entirely on whether it felt like showing itself.
Yang Xiao did not answer.
He unstrapped the Army-Breaking Spear from his back and walked straight through the camp toward the mine entrance. Along the way, the Demon Suppression Guards instinctively stepped aside.
Stopping at the entrance, Yang Xiao glanced inside.
The smell of rusty