Everyone perked up at those words.
"Exactly. Brother Chen is a Sword Cultivator, and Miss Wen Meng's mechanical puppets are immensely powerful too. The rest of us aren't pushovers either."
Wu Jun pumped his fist in excitement. "We'll make sure that Fierce Demon comes here and never leaves!"
"Haha, that Fierce Demon might not even come!" the man named Gao Yan said with a laugh. "Besides, Brother Chen and Miss Wen Meng are the strongest among us. You and I had better stick to waving the banners and cheering them on."
As the two joked, the group's nervousness eased.
"Then let's set off now!"
Wen Meng was also a little excited. She took out the Zhuge Flying Carriage. "Let's go. We'll find somewhere to compose poems and exchange couplets while we quietly await that Fierce Demon's arrival."
"As it happens, I know a few good places."
Lin Ke took out his map.
They filed into the carriage, then hurried toward the location marked on the map.
But after traveling some distance, they lost their enthusiasm again.
Along the way, the villages and fields scattered everywhere were devoid of people, empty and desolate.
Though little time had passed, weeds had already begun to sprout in some places.
Without people living in them, old houses aged faster. Some unoccupied old houses would even collapse before long.
For now, these places still looked habitable, but without the smoke and bustle of human life, they seemed utterly barren.
And so, a somber atmosphere filled the Zhuge Flying Carriage as it traveled to a small mountain.
Though it was winter, the mountain was lush and green. A clear spring flowed down its slopes and into a nearby stream. Halfway up, a pavilion stood beside the water, making for a genuinely picturesque, poetic scene.
"This mountain