"Don't worry, everyone." Fortunately, Long Haochen stood up in time to smooth things over for Yue Chen, saving him the trouble of explaining himself.
"I didn't want everyone to worry, so I only told you that I was forced to inherit that Necromancer's Eternal Tower. I left out Brother Yue's involvement." As Long Haochen explained, he pulled back his right sleeve, showing everyone the brown mark left by the Eternal Melody merging into his body.
Seeing this, Yue Chen followed his example and showed everyone his own Eternal Melody mark.
Once everyone present had visibly relaxed, Yue Chen sat down among them without standing on ceremony.
"What happened to you?" Yue Chen asked. "Why do you all look so nervous? And you're all injured, too. Did you run into a powerful enemy?"
"Brother Yue, you know that the Exploration Mission our squad accepted for this independent operation was to explore the Dark Swamp in Andu Province, on the demons' border, right?" Long Haochen first motioned for everyone to rest and tend to their injuries, then shifted over to sit beside Yue Chen.
"Yes." Yue Chen nodded. Naturally, he knew their movements better than anyone. "Did you run into demons? Quite a few of them, by the look of it. Otherwise, you wouldn't be in such a sorry state." He asked the question tentatively.
"No, this had little to do with the demons..." Long Haochen gave a wry smile. Without keeping him in suspense, he quickly explained, "Since Andu Province lies on the demons' border, we encountered very few demons along the way, let alone any Demon Hunt Extermination squads."
"And even if we were unlucky enough to run into Demon Hunt Extermination squads or demon troops, we have Demon Masks and identity tokens that let us disguise ourselves as members