Five days had passed since the army swore its oath and marched out of Anping County.
The blizzards of Southern Qingzhou seemed endless. White blanketed heaven and earth, while howling winds swept shards of ice along like razor blades, slicing through every trace of life in their path.
In such brutal weather, an ordinary Qi Refining early-stage cultivator without an elder's spell power to protect him would have his meridians frozen stiff after merely half a day in the wilderness.
Yet through this deathly expanse of ice and snow, an army like a torrent of black steel silently advanced toward [Soul-Severing Valley] on the border of Lingchang Prefecture at a steady, terrifying pace.
There was no clamor, no complaining. Only eight hundred pairs of boots crushing ice and snow, and armor plates clashing in perfect time with their steps, rumbling like muffled thunder.
This was the army of Anping County, marching to war under orders.
Throughout five days of forced marches, the eight hundred Black-Armored Guards had not removed their high-grade Qi Refining [Gold-Averting Mystic Armor] for even a moment.
Each day, they subsisted solely on dry rations of "great harvest bloodfang rice," rich with immense blood vitality, and Demon Beast jerky dried through secret methods.
Amid cold and exhaustion severe enough to drive men mad, this army had not collapsed. Instead, like raw iron hammered again and again upon a merciless anvil, it had shed its last trace of restlessness and been tempered into pure, chilling murderous intent.
"Your Majesty, beyond that snowy hill lies the main mustering camp of the Great Wall Prefecture Left Route Army."
At the head of the army, Hu Hao, deputy chief of the Demon-Suppression Office, rested his hand on the Horse-Slaying Saber at his waist, its fuller stained dark red. Through the wind