Phoniex Requiem
Chapter 37: On What Basis?

Chapter 37: On What Basis?

"A half of the animal's carcass is gone?" The crowd was shocked after hearing Zhuo Yifeng's exclamation.

"How is it possible? Where will they disappear to?” Lin Qingxue opened her eyes wide as she looked towards Zhuo Yifeng.

"You'll be able to see it for yourself if you follow me." Zhuo Yifeng did not try to explain the situation, because he did not know how.

As the others walked into the open valley, they saw that the path, which was filled with carcasses last night, now left no more than a third of that number!

"Quick, look!" Lin Qingchen knelt down and examined the particular carcass. "There's a bite here."

Yun Ruoyan recognized the beast as a long-horned goat, which she saw on the record list. It was a mid-level beast whose regular diet was all sorts of spiritual herbs. Lin Qingchen pointed at the wound on his leg and said, “These bites are definitely not the result of being trampled. Some carnivorous animals must be here!”

Upon closer inspection, Zhuo Yifeng confirmed that this was indeed the case. Since most of the beasts had been trampled and had wounds all over their bodies, none of them had realized this before.

But Lin Qingchen was careful, attentive, and used to bandaging the wounds of patients, so she realized this relatively quickly.

Others checked the carcass nearby and found there were a few bite marks everywhere. Could this carcass have been consumed by another beast?!

“Qiuqiu,” Yun Ruoyan called out to Qiuqiu mentally.

"Yes madam?" Qiuqiu.

"Did you hear anything last night?"

"Hmm?" Qiuqiu was a little embarrassed. "I'm sorry, I slept last night too."

Although Qiuqiu was indeed a mystical beast, his seal had just been opened recently, and was not strong enough to leave his bracelet. In addition, just like humans, it needs adequate rest. As a result, whenever Yun Ruoyan did not call out to him, it meant cultivating or resting.

"Don't worry about this for now." Yun Ruoyan decided not to continue this reason any further and focus on the important matters. "Let's extract the beast core as much as we can and leave before the others get here."

Everyone nodded.

After quickly preparing and eating, everyone went straight to work. Although most of the beasts were low-level beasts, there were so many of them, even after more than half had disappeared, there was still a lot of work for each of them.

While they were quickly clearing the corpses, a loud voice suddenly sounded. "Someone got here before us ?!"

The cry was so loud that it echoed around the valley, echoing once and again.

Everyone turned their heads towards the voice and saw a group of shadows appear at the other end of the valley.

Yun Ruoyan's brows frowned, once again looking at the familiar enemy.

There were about ten people in the group. When they saw Yun Ruoyan's group, they began to walk even faster, trying to intimidate his group with an amount of force.

“Why are they again?! To be honest, isn't this region big enough for us to avoid it completely?” Once they were close enough and Lin Qingxue managed to see their faces clearly, her expression turned into disgust.

As Yun Ruoyao, Pei Ziao, and the others looked at the group, they were both shocked.

They could not imagine that Yun Ruoyan and the others could actually escape from the snake nest. More surprisingly, after escaping, they somehow arrived at the center of the territory before them!

Yun Ruoyan's gaze swept over Yun Ruoyao and Pei Ziao before landing on a young man dressed in deep blue.

He was the braggart who had just spoken. His physique did not appear any weaker than Zhuo Yifeng, and his rough face was filled with ruthlessness. One glance was enough for Yun Ruoyan to mark her as someone to look out for.

Based on his shout, Yun Ruoyan was able to tell that he might be stronger than everyone present. Without borrowing the strength of his bracelet, he was certainly no match for it.

“Pei Ziao, didn't you say that you are the only one who knows where the valley of a thousand plants is?” The young man asked critically as he walked towards Yun Ruoyan's group.

“I promise not to deceive you. I'm really the only one who knows the way here, but some other group might find their way into this valley by accident.” As Pei Ziao answered him, his gaze was fixed on Yun Ruoyan's body once again, his frown deepening.

Pei Ziao's father was only a tier five forgetful, not very important in the grand scheme of things in the Li kingdom. However, while forging weapons for nobles, he could obtain quite a number of useful secrets.

Once, after being entrusted to forge a weapon for one of the chief guards in charge of the region, he invited the guards to dinner, making him drunk, and then he was, and managed to get interesting secrets about the region, deep in the area there is a hidden location, a valley of a thousand plants.

A large number of valuable plants grew there, supported by a high density of spiritual energy, and the plant attracted a large number of herbivorous animals.

Due to the large number of ferocious beasts, during the early summer, there would always be a stampede that annihilated a large number of weaker ferocious beasts, he said, and the carcass of the beast would then attract a large group of carnivorous beasts. This is why the valley of a thousand plants is also called the valley of a thousand animals.

But its location was secret enough that almost no one could enter the valley by accident looking for it. Among the crowd that entered the territory, no one knew of this secret.

This was a secret kept by the Li royal family. Every three years, they would send someone to the valley of a thousand potions to gather natural treasures, and this was the most important reason why they were stronger than the imperial family of the other three kingdoms.

Of course, once Pei Yingxiong learned of this secret, he was wholeheartedly sorry that he did not know of its existence when he was also given the opportunity to enter the imperial world. Otherwise, he would risk his life to bring back the spiritual herbs and beast cores for himself to advance his cultivation.

He had been stuck as a fifth rank forgemaster for over three years. If he stopped advancing, the status of the Pei family in the capital would only drop.

This was why he revealed this secret to his son, Pei Ziao, after advising once and again that he should give his father a high-grade animal core or spiritual herb for his cultivation.

If the imperial family knew that it was he who spread this secret, they would definitely not let go.

"Don't worry! We swear brother, don't we? You shared this secret with me, so I won't hurt you. Rest assured, I won't say a word".

“Which family are you from? How can you get into this area?” The other skinny youth, Liu Sheng, spoke arrogantly while pointing at Yun Ruoyan and his group.

The remaining youth also looked at Yun Ruoyan's group arrogantly.

Brother Yun, however, is invisible. They hid behind the group of strangers, both of them were burdened by guilt for deliberately trying to harm them and were happy to see a group of young men from the Yue kingdom guarding Yun Ruoyan's group.

“We are from the Yun and Lin families of the Li kingdom. Who're you?" Yun Ruoyan was naturally not afraid of this motley group. Even if they looked strong, Yun Ruoyan's calm demeanor had been consumed by age and time.

Moreover, Yun Ruoyan clearly realized that the most frightening person was an intelligent planner like Yi Qianying, and this crowd was clearly brainless.

"You're from the Yun Family ?!" Liu Sheng opened his eyes wide as he glanced at Yun Ruoyan and then Yun Ruoyao. "You're from the same family?"

"That's right, we're one big family." Only then did Yun Ruoyao's three-man group walk out from behind, saying to Liu Sheng, "She is the sister I have told you about, the second daughter of the Yun family, Yun Ruoyan."

“Saudari Ruoyan, you're alive! I'm so happy!" Yi Qianying cheered in excitement, the almost crying expression on her tiny face was so realistic that Yun Ruoyan almost believed it.

"Oh, so she's that ugly girl ." The other girl from the group, also in red, stuttered.

These past few days, they had heard quite a lot about Yun Ruoyan while in the capital, and were then influenced by Yun Ruoyao's group during the expedition.

“Ah, Sister Fei'er, look at the birthmark on her cheek! Bloody, what disgusting!” Another girl added.

His birthmark was emitting a lot of pus lately, and he wasn't too worried about his appearance in front of his party. In the morning, in order to avoid the hassles of having to clean her hair after coming into contact with the leaking pus, Yun Ruoyan tied her hair back and exposed her birthmark and scar.

"Those with evil hearts are really ugly!" The red-clothed girl, Jin Fei'er, frowned her nose as she spoke.

"What did you say?!" Lin Qingxue jumped furiously. Ever since he was a child, he had always held high regard for his cousin, who was considered a genius in cultivation. Even when this cousin fell out of grace and became useless, getting away from him, it did not dim his good impression of him.

And now that this cousin had reappeared and was slowly getting closer to them, showing his incredible intelligence and strength, he had once again become Lin Qingxue's idol.

How dare someone curse his idol before his face?!

"Tell me what you mean by that, or I won't leave you." Lin Qingxue brandished her dagger, still covered in ferocious beast blood and entrails.

“And who are you? I was just talking about Yun Ruoyan. What does this have to do with you?” Jin Fei'er did not retreat, clearly accustomed to such a crime.

"Listen carefully." Lin Qingxue placed her hands behind her back as she introduced herself. “I'm Lin Qingxue, miss second from the Lin family. Lin Zainan is my grandfather, and this is my older sister, Lin Qingchen.”

Lin Qingchen nodded coldly.

Lin Zainan was a name known throughout the Chenyuan continent, and Jin Fei'er was clearly no stranger to that name. His tone was somewhat calmer and respectful as he said, "Oh, grandson of Master Lin."

"That's right! Yun Ruoyan is my cousin and grandson of Master Lin. How dare you suddenly disrespect her?”

“I only quote the words of others.” Jin Fei'er pretended to check her nails as her eyes floated towards Yun Ruoyao. “It was her sister, Yun Ruoyao, who said those words, that she did not work for the benefit of her family but turned to outsiders and her group had perished from overconfidence. By the way, how are you all still alive?”

Lin Qingxue's head started to steam up as she heard those words. Yun Ruoyao was not only trying to scheme against them, she was even planning to ruin their reputation!

Yun Ruoyan started laughing in anger, her eyes staring straight at Yun Ruoyao. “Sister, you didn't suddenly become amnesiac, did you? Don't you know exactly who's trying to hurt who?"

Yun Ruoyao defended herself calmly. “Sister, I don't want to argue with you. Since you are healthy and fine, once we all get out of this place, I'm sure Dad will handle our disputes.”

"Is that so?" Yun Ruoyan's eyes scoffed. Ever since she lost her talent.—no, maybe even earlier, her father had never been fair to her!

"Ah, this is something good!" As the tension in the air increased, Liu Sheng suddenly shouted from a distance.

The crowd all turned to him: he bowed before the corpse of the fire horse, the fiery red core in his hand, smiling so wide that his teeth were visible.

A flamesteed was a medium-level beast, and although its core was less valuable compared to a sharp-fingered tiger, it was still worth a penny enough.

Wang Kuang immediately walked over and hit Liu Sheng on the head.

“I told you not to move by yourself, right! Put again! Without their cores, these carcasses would not be fragrant, then how would we lure a high-level savage beast?

"Ah? Ah, I forgot as soon as I saw the treasure. Liu Sheng glanced at Wang Kuang innocently before putting the core back into the horse body with a grin on his face.

“You're right, brother, but how do you know about a good place to start? Not only can we get all of these cores for free, we can even catch high-level monsters!”

"Oh, I have a way!" As Wang Kuang laughed, he glanced at Pei Ziao before hitting Liu Sheng once more. “But what do you care? you just need to listen to my orders!"

Then, he turned towards Yun Ruoyan. “You can maintain the core you have dug, but from now on, this area is off limits. You can all leave now.”

Yun Ruoyan raised an eyebrow. "Oh? Go, on what basis?”