Daqin Zhentiansi

Chapter 1111 Hunting in the Azure Wolf Plains, War Beasts Roar Across the Sky, Intimidating All Side

Everyone's breathing is unconsciously synchronized with that of their comrades.

When they exhale, three thousand people exhale simultaneously; when they swing their swords, three thousand people swing their swords simultaneously.

That mass of gray, malevolent energy surged and coalesced in the air above the training ground.

At first it was a blurry blob, then it slowly took shape.

Spine, limbs, skull, fangs.

A phantom image of a gray war beast, hundreds of feet long, stretched across the sky.

His mane billowed like flames in the wind, and his limbs trod in the void.

Each step sent a shiver through the training ground, raising a slight dust cloud.

The beast's head bowed, looking down at the three thousand men still wielding their swords at its feet.

Zhang Yuan recognized the appearance of the war beast.

That was the most classic manifestation of the Qin army's baleful aura.

Black Tiger.

The difference is that in the Nine Provinces, the battle beasts formed by the condensed evil energy were only ten feet in size, and were illusory and transparent, dissipating with a gust of wind.

The hundred-foot-tall war beast before them trembled, and the cold glint of its fangs was almost indistinguishable from the real thing.

That's a sight that only appears when the body's vital energy and blood are extremely abundant.

The spiritual energy here is hundreds of times richer than that of the Nine Provinces.

The hunters of the White Frost Clan grew up in the spiritually rich mountains and forests, and their vitality far surpassed that of the soldiers of the Nine Provinces.

The same battle formation, in this world, unleashed power more than ten times greater.

On the training ground, someone looked up and saw the war beast.

First, a few new recruits on the periphery stopped moving, and then more and more people stopped.

They looked up, mouths agape, at the enormous, sky-covering creature above them.

His hands, gripping the weapons, were trembling, not from fear, but from excitement.

Tuoba Gu stood on the sidelines, leaning on his cane, looking up at the hundred-foot-tall war beast. His lips moved for a long time before he finally managed to squeeze out a sentence.

“When I was young, I visited Shilei Fort once and saw the guards of the general’s mansion training.”

"Their battle formation's baleful aura condensed into a beast that's only fifty feet long, and it's not this solid; from a distance, it looks like a cloud of mist. This beast—"

He paused, tapped his cane on the ground, and turned to Tuoba Yan: "Brother Yan, the soldiers guarding the General's Mansion are probably not as strong as ours."

Tuoba Yan stood beside him, leaning on his cane, without saying a word.

But the knuckles of his fingers gripping the cane were turning slightly white.

He lived for over ninety years, witnessing both the most prosperous and the most desolate times of the Bai Shuang clan.

The year the tribe was driven out of their ancestral land by the monsters, forty percent of the able-bodied men in the tribe perished. He carried the wounded Tuoba Tie for seven days and seven nights before finally finding this mountain range.

At that time, he thought the Bai Shuang clan wouldn't survive that generation.

Now, looking at the hundred-foot-tall war beast above his head, he remained silent for a long time before uttering three words.

"Okay, okay."

Zhang Yuan stood beside Tuoba Yan.

The wind was strong on the stockade wall, making his robes flutter loudly.

He gazed at the training ground amidst the smoke and dust, and for a moment, it felt as if time had flowed backward a million years.

In the same era of war, armies from Qingyang Continent, Chixia Continent, and Baishuang Continent also marched out of the mountains and forests, their armor gleaming and their formations impeccable, rushing to the aid of Tianyuan City under the cover of night.

That was Xuan Jue's last battle, and also the last battle for countless heroic souls of Xuntian Continent.

Now, millions of years have passed, Xuntian Continent has long since collapsed, Tianyuan City has turned to dust, and even Xuanjue's name has been erased.

But in this forgotten Qing Song Realm, the descendants of those who died in battle still exist, the traditions, though incomplete, still remain, and the hundred-foot-tall war beast is still there. That night, Tuoba Yan came to find him.

The old clan chief, leaning on his cane, walked into Zhang Yuan's wooden house and sat down at the table.

He didn't beat around the bush and got straight to the point.

Recently, many unfamiliar faces have come to the village, attracting the attention of several large ethnic groups.

Scouts were lurking around the outskirts of the Jifeng Camp from Fufeng, the Liuyun Village from Liuyun, and the recently arrived Shilei Fortress.

The old clan chief said that according to the rules of the Qing Song Realm, large clans would not attack each other without cause, but it was common for them to test each other.

Send an elite force to your hunting grounds to hunt a few magical beasts that should rightfully belong to you, and see how you react.

If you're afraid to fight, it means you're weak.

If you are weak, you will be eaten up piece by piece.

“Shilei Fort is the strongest of the five generals’ mansions.” Tuoba Yan put down his teacup and lowered his voice. “Their ancestors were from the Dongbu Army, and they have the strongest foundation in battle formations.”

"Back when they established themselves in the Qingsong Realm, even the Gale Camp and the Flowing Cloud Village combined couldn't defeat them."

Stone Fortress now boasts 8,000 elite soldiers and dozens of generals; their battle formations are said to produce war beasts that can reach 70 zhang in length.

"If we are to hunt in Canglang Plains a month from now, and Shilei Fort sends troops to test us, we need to prepare in advance."

Zhang Yuan asked him what the Canglang Plains hunting was.

Tuoba Yan said that Canglang was originally a wasteland located at the junction of the five generals' mansions.

It is called Canglang Plain because a powerful and unfathomable magical beast, the Canglang King, dwells on this wasteland.

This wolf king's rank is almost at the Saint Realm, and its size is as large as a small mountain. It can swallow a whole team of hunters in one gulp.

The five generals' mansions spent countless years trying to kill it, but they still couldn't.

Later, the five families established a rule that once a year, each family would send its most elite hunting team to gather at Canglang Plain and join forces to hunt down the Canglang King.

This is both a deterrent and a covert contest.

Zhang Yuan was silent for a moment, then said a single word.

"go."

For the next twenty days or so, the entire village was mobilized.

The furnaces in the workshop burned day and night, and the sound of hammering echoed from dawn till dusk.

Tuoba Tie dug out all the animal bones that had been stored in the warehouse for several months, picked out the hardest leg bones and spine bones, and led a group of hunters to work day and night.

They used the leg bones of the demon-patterned leopard to sharpen arrowheads, used the spines of black-maned beasts to make bow arms, and went into the mountains to hunt a flock of iron-feathered eagles, plucking their tail feathers to make arrow shafts.

Arrowheads must be ground until they can stand upright on a fingernail to be considered acceptable, and bow arms must produce a metallic sound when struck to be considered finished.

Tuoba Gu and his six apprentices worked in three shifts, carving four battle patterns on each bow arm.

The old man had poor eyesight, so he used his hands to feel around, his fingertips slowly sliding along the engravings. If he felt something was wrong, he would ask his apprentices to bring carving knives to fix it.

He wore out three carving knives in half a month, and a thick layer of calluses formed on his fingertips, but every bow that came out of his hands was as if it had been carved from the same mold.

The four battle patterns are of uniform depth and flow smoothly, with no discrepancies found between the bone patterns and the battle patterns.

The clothing and armor shop was also extremely busy.

The women in the village skinned the black-maned beasts, scraped off the fat, soaked them in medicinal broth for three days and three nights, took them out and dried them until they were half-dry before kneading them.

The leather, after being repeatedly kneaded, is both light and tough; when cut with an ordinary iron knife, it only leaves a white mark.

Each piece of leather armor had a breastplate sewn onto its chest and back.

The breastplate is engraved with patterns of gathering power and controlling the wind.

The power-gathering pattern neutralizes the direct impact, while the wind-controlling pattern reduces the arrow's force. The two patterns combined are enough to block a direct hit from an armor-piercing arrow.

Tuoba Shan brought back more than a dozen Iron-Spineed Wild Bulls from deep in the mountains. (End of Chapter)