Qianye had no real intention of letting Bloodbeard go. After leaving Southern Blue, he immediately circled around the city and chased after the fleeing werewolf. Although chances of catching up to him weren’t that high, he might be traveling slower due to his entourage.
Qianye ran at full speed, traveling even faster than most airs.h.i.+ps. He had soon circled around and was running toward the northeast.
After several dozen kilometers of chasing, the stench of werewolf blood a.s.saulted Qianye’s senses. He immediately turned in a different direction and followed the scent to arrive at a battlefield.
There was blood everywhere in the wilderness, so much so that they had acc.u.mulated into small puddles. Dozens of werewolf carca.s.ses were strewn across the place. They had been chopped up into bits and pieces without so much as a single intact corpse. Bloodbeard was on his knees at the center of this ma.s.sacre, gazing forward with dispirited eyes.
“Arachne, so it’s the arachne…” He muttered to himself before collapsing to the ground.
After his large body fell down, a young girl in a white dress came into view.
Compared to their last meeting, the girl’s hair was disheveled, and her dress was even dirtier. The wounds on her leg had healed completely, but there were a number of faint scars left behind.
She was holding a grotesquely shaped cleaver with blood dripping off its edges.
Little Zhuji was asleep, at first, but she suddenly opened her eyes and stared cautiously at the young girl, her gaze lingering a fair bit on the blade.
This time, Qianye finally noticed the cleaver. Upon careful observation, there was a faint wisp of black energy lingering around it. This black energy was soft and thread-like but almost tangible, apparently a form of high-level energy.
Qianye noticed that the black energy was characteristic of the arachne, and the cleaver itself was shaped from the tip of a high-ranking arachne’s forelimbs, a duke at the very least. The body of a dead arachne duke was a premium material for blacksmithing, but it wasn’t that easy to kill a duke-level expert—who knew where she had gotten that cleaver from?
No wonder Bloodbeard was muttering something about an arachne before his death. Arachne limbs were naturally good for breaking through darkness origin power defenses. Bloodbeard was already gravely injured, so he was even less likely to be able to block Bai Kongzhao’s lethal strike.
Qianye put little Zhuji down and pointed East Peak toward the ground in a guarded stance. “You again?”
“I’m robbing them because I have no money.”
The young girl’s excuse sounded as innocent as it was ridiculous. There were so many mercenaries in the neutral lands and so many merchants shuttling between cities. Robbing any of them would’ve been more profitable than robbing a squad of the Wolf King’s lineal descendants.
No matter how ridiculous an excuse this was, it was still an excuse, and Qianye had no intention of listening, regardless of how reasonable it was. Bai Kongzhao popping up around him was a disaster in the making. Qianye was confident about himself, but others around him would find it difficult to escape her cleaver. If she were to discover the existence of the Martyr’s Palace, she could slaughter the entire crew when Qianye wasn’t around.
Qianye was thus filled with killing intent. His blood energy was at its peak after several days of rest. He was pretty sure that he could kill her by using Spatial Flash and the Shot of Inception.
Seeing Qianye’s stern gaze, the young girl had no intention of escaping. She pointed at the corpses and said, “I’ll share half the spoils with you, let me go.”
Qianye was stunned, and the slash he was about to perform stopped midway. This feeling was inexplicably odd. He couldn’t put a finger on it, but it was definitely odd.
“In the future, I’ll share everything I have with you,” the young girl said seriously.
Qianye felt fairly distressed. He said subconsciously, “No need…”
“I want to live.”
This was an exceptionally simple yet important plea. It could be said that survival was the most important thing for every living being, and the way she said it was unquestionable.
She removed Bloodbeard’s pouch, poured half of its contents out, and turned to leave. She had her back toward Qianye along the way, leaving her vitals open—not unlike a submissive beast revealing its weakest parts.
Qianye felt that he couldn’t do it this time, either. If it wasn’t for Bai Kongzhao’s interception, Bloodbeard would’ve fled back to the Totemic Castle. His combat strength would be weakened in the future, but he would still remain a difficult opponent nonetheless. Qianye couldn’t claim he could defeat the werewolf without Spatial Flash and the Shot of Inception.
But the easiness of the ambush had to be attributed to Ji Rui. It was because Bloodbeard was in the city lord’s company that he was completely relaxed, allowing Zhuji’s green gas to strike him squarely in the face.
At the very least, this girl had removed a potential calamity for him, and she had even left half the spoils of war. Although it really wasn’t much, the most important part was that the latter half of what she had said.
Qianye really didn’t know whether he should take her word on that.
Regardless of how much he trusted her, the fact remained that he had twice failed to kill her in the neutral lands. He didn’t have that much of an interest in half her fortune. With her mysterious talents, she might be able to obtain some rare and priceless treasures, but he wanted to earn everything by himself.
While he was thinking, the girl’s silhouette had receded into the distance.
“Aren’t you going to chase her down?” Little Zhuji tugged on Qianye’s s.h.i.+rt.
This question woke him up from his reverie, but he could no longer find the girl’s figure when he looked out. Qianye rubbed little Zhuji’s hands and said, “Not now, maybe next time.”
“What if she splits half of her things with you again? What will you do?”
This little girl had become quite smart. This question went straight to the crux of the matter, and the startled Qianye didn’t know how to reply. After some thought, he replied with a wry smile, “Do you want me to chase after her or not?”
The little la.s.s gave it some thought before saying, “Wait one more day and then chase after her again.”
Qianye found this strange. “Why is that?”
“Because we can share more of her stuff after catching up to her.” The little fellow replied earnestly.
Qianye felt his vision turn dark—who would’ve thought young Zhuji would be showing signs of becoming a money-grubber at such an age?
“Who taught you that?” Qianye was discontent.
“Mama.”
“... I’ll beat him up once he comes back!”
No one knew whether Ji Rui had found out about how Bloodbeard had never returned to the Ancient Totemic Castle, but the transaction this time was exceptionally smooth. The four ballistae were duly delivered along with a batch of parts and maintenance materials.
As usual, Qianye had the Martyr’s Palace hover high above and sent an old cargo s.h.i.+p down to collect the equipment.
Throughout the entire process, those from Southern Blue worked obediently and didn’t dare play any tricks. Steward Liu busied himself running back and forth, making sure that everything was in appropriate order.
After the goods had been loaded onto the airs.h.i.+p, Steward Liu moved closer to Qianye and said with a smile, “Sire, should we dispatch some mechanics to perform the installation and adjustments?”
Qianye shook his head immediately. “No need.”
Steward Liu pointed to a group of people nearby. “This little one isn’t trying to pry into your matters. Those people were purchased by the city lord as slaves, and they used to work for an imperial s.h.i.+pyard. Their airs.h.i.+p was hijacked on their way to the neutral lands, and that was how they became slaves. They are a gift from the city lord, you can use them as you wish and there’s no need to send them back.”
Only then did Qianye give him a nod. Ji Rui was indeed quite thorough and considerate. Whoever this old fox wanted to curry favors with would feel as though they were bathing in the spring wind.
Qianye’s eyes turned blue as he scanned the group. Seeing that there wasn’t a single one with champion-level cultivation, Qianye said, “Since that’s the case, have them board the airs.h.i.+p.”
Steward Liu didn’t leave immediately after the transaction. Instead, he stood there and watched until the cargo s.h.i.+p vanished over the horizon before leading his men back.
At this time, there were leaden clouds hovering over the spires of Totemic Castle’s main building. The noon skies were gloomy and dark, almost as though it was dusk.
The waves grew taller and taller with each crash, producing sounds that made everyone restless. The wind was so cold and wet that there were water beads on the stone walls. This kind of weather was extremely uncomfortable for werewolves who preferred dryer weather.
All the higher-ranking werewolves would appear in their human forms, but the lower-ranking ones had no such luxury. They could only lick their fur from time to time like wargs, not that it was of any use in this kind of d.a.m.ned weather—their long fur would still stick together, dripping with water.
They were close to the sea, and the moisture in the sea wind would condense into water. It was both uncomfortable and salty. Be it the wargs or the werewolves, all of them were feeling helpless and agitated.
This kind of weather had gone on for several days, and it did nothing to help the Wolf King’s depressed mood. He had to try fairly hard to keep himself from las.h.i.+ng out at everyone.
He only walked into the castle hall at noon and a.s.sembled the important ministers for a meeting.
Once seated, the Wolf King could feel a wave of cold moisture from the water covering the throne. It was inexplicably uncomfortable. The entire hall was cold, gloomy, and scary—even the glow of the torches seemed fairly weak these days.
The Wolf King’s eyes erupted with a glint of origin power as he wiped away the water on the handrest. Apparently, he was extremely angry. But he came to his senses after seeing the trembling werewolves in the hall and gave up the idea of tossing the cleaners into the sea.
A ring of flames spread out from the Wolf King’s throne, engulfing the entire hall and sweeping away the moisture therein. The chamber was immediately filled with warmth and comfort.
However, this sensation would only last a short while. With the Wolf King’s strength, he still couldn’t go against heaven and earth to maintain this spring-like warmth.
He scanned the hall briefly and suddenly noticed one person missing. “Where’s Bloodbeard? Why hasn’t he returned?”