Ch. 22
Chapter 22: The Severed Dragon Vein
Luo Tong’s face changed drastically, and he roared himself hoarse.
Though no one knew exactly what was happening, the moment they saw Luo Tong’s expression—as though he were facing a mortal enemy—they immediately suppressed their resentment.
One after another, they swung back onto their horses, cracked their whips, and dragged the three heavy carriages after them. Following closely behind Chen Guan, they kicked up a long dragon of dust.
Luo Li finally came back to herself and was just about to struggle.
Then, from the corner of her eye, she caught sight of something strange—the dense grass on both sides of the road was rising and falling in eerie, wave-like ripples.
That was not the wind moving through the grass.
Something was moving alongside them.
Behind her, the other escort masters also noticed the strange waves rolling through the grass on both sides of the official road, accompanied by a heart-stopping rustling sound.
Their heartbeats sped up.
Only now did they realize that the country brat they had looked down on truly did have some skill.
Though they still felt dissatisfied with the way Chen Guan had behaved earlier, a dispute was a dispute, and annoyance was annoyance. They were all old hands of the jianghu. In the face of an unknown danger, the only thing to do was cast all grudges aside and first survive the crisis before them.
Luo Tong was, after all, the chief escort, and his reaction was the fastest. He lashed his fierce horse with his whip and spurred it onward, the battle-steed neighing as dust rose behind it. Very soon he caught up and rode side by side with Chen Guan.
As the wind roared in their ears, Luo Tong shouted at the top of his lungs, “Chen Guan! What in the world are these damned things?!”
“Grudge-Bearing Demon Apes!”
Chen Guan flung out the answer without turning his head, then clamped his legs harder around the horse’s belly, sending the white horse into yet another burst of speed.
At the same time, his six senses spread outward like an invisible net, locking onto every slightest movement in the surroundings.
This was an official mountain road, with steep and dangerous rock walls on both sides.
To them, this was treacherous terrain. But to the Grudge-Bearing Demon Apes, this was a natural hunting ground bestowed by heaven itself!
What most distinguished the Grudge-Bearing Demon Apes from ordinary demonic creatures was their mutated, powerfully thick hind legs.
With a single push off the ground, they could launch themselves like arrows from a bowstring, so fast that the naked eye could barely follow them.
Even more deadly still, these beasts had long since evolved beyond the primitive habits of low-tier fiends, which either fought alone or simply swarmed forward in a mob.
They understood tactics. They understood coordination!
The way they fought was through a species-specific coordinated assault formation.
Every demon ape had its own fixed position and function during the hunt: some lured the prey, some drove it into place, and some delivered the killing strike.
That meant the power of the entire pack was twisted into a single rope, enough to multiply their strength severalfold, or even dozens of times over.
If they were allowed to find suitable positions on the cliffs flanking this place, taking full advantage of their leaping power, then what awaited this convoy would be an utterly certain kill.
“Grudge-Bearing Demon Apes?!”
Luo Tong’s brows knotted into a lump.
He had walked the escort roads for decades, and yet he truly had never heard of such a name.
Otherwise, he would never have allowed Liu Shuo and the others to waste time arguing with Chen Guan.
But he also knew that now was not the time to get to the bottom of it.
He turned his head and glanced at the waves of grass closing in behind them, then savagely lashed his horse again and urged it up alongside Chen Guan, shouting anxiously once more,
“Chen Guan! Take a good look at the direction we’re going! Those demon apes are driving us straight toward the central region of the Qingcang Mountains!”
“Weren’t you the one who said we had to leave the Qingcang Mountains? Then why are we going deeper inside instead?!”
Chen Guan glanced back irritably at Luo Tong’s panicked old face.
Now you realize it?
Where was this insight earlier?
This old fellow actually did have experience, and he was steady enough, but he cared too much about face and could not bring himself to listen to Chen Guan.
He had allowed Liu Shuo, Li Fei, and the others to babble nonsense as much as they liked.
Otherwise, none of this trouble would have happened.
According to Chen Guan’s original plan, they should have turned back at once, taken the detour, and left the Qingcang Mountains, thereby avoiding this entire crisis.
But what he had not expected was that these Grudge-Bearing Demon Apes were even smarter than he had imagined. From the moment the convoy had paused at the entrance, they had somehow seen through their intention to reroute and escape the mountain range.
To prevent their prey from fleeing, they had launched their operation directly, deliberately driving the convoy deeper into the mountains.
At this point, if they tried to force a turn and charge back toward the outer mountains, the demon apes hidden in the grass all along would immediately launch a full assault.
On this narrow official road hemmed in by mountains on both sides, they were nothing but lambs waiting for slaughter, with no chance of victory whatsoever.
Now...
Their only path to survival was to temporarily follow the demon apes’ intentions and keep running forward, leaving behind this terrain that was disastrously unfavorable to them.
Only after finding an open position, easy to defend and difficult to assault, could they strike back and search for an opportunity.
“If you don’t want to die, then follow me properly and stop asking pointless questions!”
Chen Guan’s voice was low, yet carried an undeniable force that left Luo Tong no room to save face.
“You—!”
Luo Tong’s expression darkened, and his beard trembled in anger.
Clearly, he had been provoked by the contempt in Chen Guan’s tone.
He, Luo Tong, had dominated the jianghu for decades—when had he ever suffered such humiliation?
Yet he was still an old jianghu veteran. In the space of a single breath, he forced down the anger in his heart.
He knew nothing about Grudge-Bearing Demon Apes. Not only did he not know their habits, he had no sense at all of the depth of their strength.
At a moment like this, trying to show off would be the same as gambling with everyone’s lives.
Behind them, Liu Shuo, Li Fei, and the others were all on full alert, their riding whips leaving afterimages in the air as they lashed the horses so hard that bloody welts rose on their hindquarters.
Only with that much effort were their horses barely able to keep up with Chen Guan.
Only now did they understand why Chen Guan had chosen such an obedient-looking horse instead of a fierce one like theirs.
The advantage of a fierce horse was that it sensed danger sharply. The moment danger approached, it would become restless and warn its master.
But that very distraction would also affect the horse’s speed.
A placid horse—a so-called stupid horse—was different. Because it reacted slowly, once it started running, it barely sensed danger approaching at all.
Naturally, it simply lowered its head and ran forward without pause.
“Where in the world did this brat come from?”
From the very beginning, he had already prepared for every possible danger.
Chen Guan paid no attention at all to the reactions of those behind him, nor did he simply gallop forward blindly. He was constantly watching the condition of his horse, adjusting its breathing and rhythm.
He tried to keep the white horse beneath him at an extreme speed that was fast enough to shake off pursuit, but not so fast that it would collapse from exhaustion.
It was not that Chen Guan himself lacked greater speed. At a moment like this, any escort master who understood the trade knew that strength had to be conserved for the crucial moment.
Because no one knew what sort of demonic fiends they would face next.
One extra measure of strength was one extra chance to survive.
“This is the place!”
Chen Guan, still riding furiously ahead, barked a low shout and sharply reined in his horse at the edge of a cliff.
He quickly swept a glance over the surroundings.
Though there were green trees and dense shade on both sides here, compared to the towering ancient trees along the rest of the road, the trees here were obviously much lower, and the grass far more sparse.
That made it much harder for the Grudge-Bearing Demon Apes to hide themselves.
More importantly, this cliff was a true—Severed Dragon Vein!
A Severed Dragon Vein was where a mountain range had been abruptly cut through, forming a natural cliff wall and sheer precipice.
With one’s back to a broken cliff, there was nothing to fear from the rear.
Whether attacking or defending, one only needed to hold the front and the two flanks. This would undoubtedly save them an enormous amount of strength and effort.
For their present circumstances, this was unquestionably the best battlefield for a decisive fight.
By the time Luo Tong caught up, he saw that Chen Guan had not continued fleeing along the official road that veered away to the left. Instead, he had tightened the reins and stopped beside the cliff edge. At once, Luo Tong’s brows drew together as he asked anxiously,
“Chen Guan! What are you doing? Why have you stopped?”