"E-envoy..."
"These are today's offerings!"
A vicious-looking, one-eyed, bald rogue cultivator of the tenth transformation spoke cautiously, his voice trembling.
"Didn't I tell you to gather a hundred virgin boys and girls? Why are there so many village wenches and coarse brutes? And what are these? You even dragged in old men already buried up to their necks in the grave. Do you think I'm blind?"
Han Tianzuo cursed furiously, strode forward, and kicked the one-eyed bald man to the ground.
The bald man's mouth twitched, but he dared not harbor the slightest defiance. He dropped into a prostrate kneel and said in terror, "Please understand, Envoy! We've swept almost all the nearby villages and towns clean. Everyone else has been moved to larger cities and placed under protection. With our strength, we simply can't breach their walls!"
"These are the commoners we caught in the last mountain village within a hundred li. We even fought a Heavenly Dao Alliance pursuit squad for them and lost five brothers!"
"I couldn't care less if you die! If you haven't gathered enough by sunset tomorrow, you'll become the offerings yourselves!" A trace of savagery flashed through Han Tianzuo's eyes as he snarled, "Now get the hell out!"
Only after some time, once the bandits had fled as though mourning their parents, did Han Tianzuo's fury finally subside a little.
He glanced at the captives left behind: roughly thirty commoners tied together like grasshoppers strung on a single cord.
Han Tianzuo pointed, and an enormous demon centipede clad in golden armor, its entire body blazing with fierce light, manifested before him.
"Ah! A m-monster!"
"Mother of mercy! What a huge centipede!"
The commoners were terrified. Some collapsed on the spot, their faces drained of blood, while others sprang up with a jolt and