,
"They're here!"
"Kill!"
The Northern Frontier of the Southern Wilds was also the region known in the Central Province as the Southern Frontier.
In a narrow valley, a small force from the Central Province had been advancing covertly when it happened upon a Southern Wilds garrison encamped there. Battle erupted at once.
Three days earlier, the Spirit Taming Sect had ordered the Yin Family to launch a surprise attack on the Northern Frontier. Specialized messenger spirit creatures had already carried the news throughout the front lines, and these defenders were on high alert. Although the battle came suddenly, they had made extensive preparations.
Arrows, mechanical weapons, and hidden projectiles rained down, while divine abilities and spells collided ferociously. In mere moments, both walls of the valley collapsed, and dozens of Spirit Tamers and spirit creatures were killed or wounded. Light blazed across the battlefield, and shouts rose one after another.
This was real combat, utterly unlike the usual contests on a dueling platform. Its most striking feature was the deployment of large numbers of manifested spirit creatures, along with lethal mechanical weapons such as Locust Crossbows and ingenious mechanical crossbows.
A group of roughly a dozen rogue cultivators lurked on a nearby hillside. Watching the gruesome fighting in the valley, they swallowed hard, all of them dumbstruck.
"So this is real war..."
"They're fighting with money!"
Indeed, in their eyes, everything both sides threw into the battle was money!
Manifested spirit creatures, mechanical weapons, hidden projectiles, arrows, explosives, even talismans and spiritual pills-all were spent like flowing water. Once those things were exhausted, only human lives could fill the gap!
The greatest difference between aristocratic powers and ordinary rogue cultivators was that the former controlled resources and possessed vast wealth. Naturally, their battles were nothing like the penny-pinching fights