Battles erupted one after another elsewhere in the forest.
The Expeditionary Corps was not always invincible. In this distant, unfamiliar world of the Outer Domains, far too many powerful foes and unforeseen dangers awaited.
Although they had spent several months scouting beforehand and made every preparation, the forces they could deploy here were limited. Their highest cultivation was only the tenth turn of the human rank, the half-step earth rank. Even with the reinforcement of the warrior path and Dharma Lineages, they still fell short of true earth-rank strength. Once they encountered an opponent they could not withstand, their army collapsed like a mountainside, with no room left to turn things around.
Fortunately, such cases were rare. After several dozen casualties, the other battalions took notice and made full use of their strengths while avoiding their weaknesses, swiftly redeploying troops and concentrating elite forces from several directions to encircle and destroy the enemy.
Though those powerful demons possessed genuine earth-rank strength, they ultimately proved no match and fell beneath the Spirit Tamers' feet, one after another.
What everyone relied upon was nothing more than powerful battle formations and methods of warrior reinforcement. Besides these, they also had all manner of divine abilities, spells, magical artifacts, pills, and talismanic scripts at their disposal.
More importantly, however, they had the backing of the Spirit-Taming World's many great sects and aristocratic clans. Its mighty powerhouses each displayed their divine abilities, using the Star Map and the connection between Fang Qianyuan and the Dao Markers to swiftly sense developments and command the entire operation.
Individual battles might bring casualties, or even devastating defeats, but the course of the war was already firmly under their control.
On the enormous map hanging at the head of the Council Hall on Cloud Summit Peak, several bright red