Dungeons of the Divine (Blue Phoenix Book 2)

by Tinalynge

  Without waiting for the two Kings, who Hui Yue knew were following behind him the young white-haired man instantly went through the city and paid the fee to enter the tunnels.

  Although Hui Yue was getting low on demon cores, he still had enough to pay for his entrance fee. He started yet another journey into the dark tunnels connecting the caves.

  All the tunnels were very similar to one another. The only thing which was visible was the lit up path. Sometimes packs of beasts would appear even in the lit areas, but the main thing one encountered while traveling this path was other humans.

  At the start of the tunnels, right after entering, the first thing one would find was humans who were hunting for demon cores. These humans were all more or less mercenaries and when they entered the dark tunnels they attacked humans and beasts alike, anything which would provide them a profit.

  As Hui Yue entered the tunnels his speed slowed down as he became more alert. Without speaking, Xu Piao and Xie Lan both appeared on either side of him their eyes staring vigilantly at their surroundings. They were prepared to protect the younger man should anyone decide to make him their target.

  A faint smile was on Hui Yue’s lips as he realized how the two King ranked experts looked after him. They both had a worried look in their eyes, but right now, with his three friends captured by the Dragon Corps, Hui Yue had no time to worry about them. Whether or not these two were true friends was something he would not think about until after he regained his lost friends.

  Sighing deeply, Hui Yue pinched the bridge of his nose as the face of Wang Ju Long appeared behind his closed eyelids, and an unexplainable longing caused him to hurt from the inside.

  Closing his eyes for some time, Hui Yue took a few deep breaths and as he opened his eyes a new determination was visible; a determination that shone from his eyes as he picked up speed and started running through the tunnels in front of him.

  Chapter 82 – Important Cargo

  Moving through the tunnels, the trip was like the others Hui Yue had experienced so far. Although beasts would occasionally leave the safety of the unlit tunnels and attack the caravans, multiple mercenaries who were present would almost fight one another to be the ones to battle the beasts.

  The reason they wanted to battle the beasts was obviously for the sake of claiming their corpse and demon core, earning them some extra money while managing the boring missions they had undertaken.

  As Hui Yue rushed through the tunnels he came to see more and more caravans along the way; however, after having run for three days and three nights without pause Lan Feng suddenly took over his body and moved towards the side, gesturing for Xie Lan and Xu Piao to follow.

  While Lan Feng was still in control, three cloaks appeared from within the young man’s storage stone and two of them were tossed to Xie Lan and Xu Piao. Neither of them waited to hear what was happening, instantly putting on the cloaks with Lan Feng doing the same.

  Hui Yue said nothing as Lan Feng took over his body. The phoenix said that he would not help throughout the trip since Hui Yue needed to practice on his own, but the bird had done just that.

  A few of the passersby looked curiously at the three and their actions, though none had the time to stay around and actually observe what was happening. Soon no one in the vicinity was able to recognize them as the group which had rushed through the tunnels earlier.

  ‘See that caravan?’ Lan Feng’s voice suddenly rang out in the consciousness of Hui Yue, and the young man nodded his head as he watched the three carriages surrounded by Dragon Corps soldiers. Looking inside one of the windows from where he was, Hui Yue saw Deng Wu, Sha Yun, and Wang Ju Long.

  Seeing the caravan, both excitement and worry grew within him, his face filled with mixed expressions.

  ‘Do you remember what Scarface did to your team while you were traveling?’ Lan Feng asked with a smirk on his face. Hui Yue could only smile in return. How could he forget such a dangerous man.

  ‘I think it is time for us to follow his example. Let us see if Piao and Lan are kind enough to help out, or if I have to deal with this on my own.’ Hui Yue answered Lan Feng and suddenly felt in control of his body once again.

  “That is…?” Xu Piao’s voice was low but hope was evident within. The older man hoped that he could make up for his mistakes by helping the three escape the Dragon Corps.

  Hui Yue nodded his head as an answer to the question; his eyes deep in thought. “We will be Scarface,” He said a sinister smile appeared on his lips.

  Understanding his intentions, Xu Piao turned slightly pale as he thought about the consequences it would have, but in less than a moment his eyes were determined and a nod of his head said that he agreed.

  Seeing Xu Piao agree, Hui Yue felt grateful. He knew he could use the King ranked experts to save him, but saving him and helping him save Wang Ju Long and the two others were two different matters. Seeing Xu Piao agree to his plan would make things much easier for him.

  Watching the caravan pass by, the group of three stayed back until they had around a kilometer of a head start and then Hui Yue finally started following behind. It was possible for Hui Yue to start weeding out Dragon Corps members during the day, however, he knew that it was not possible for him to do so without attracting too much attention. Due to this, he did nothing apart from slowly following behind. Waiting for the caravan to set up camp.

  Being within the tunnels where there was no sun nor moon made it hard for travelers to say whether or not it was day or night. Due to this, rests were usually taken whenever it suited the party which would usually not last more than a few hours at a time.

  Seeing the Dragon Corps team stop, Hui Yue also made his team stop and set up a campfire within five hundred meters of the carriage.

  It was not uncommon that people were this close to each other since the tunnels were lit It was possible for the Dragon Corps men to look at Hui Yue, however, none of them paid any attention to the group of three cloaked men. They had only three while the Dragon Corps was filled with experts.

  Hui Yue was in no rush any longer to start attacking. He wanted to get a good feel for the people in front of him. How was their camp set up? How many experts were there and which rank were they? What was within each and every one of the carriages? And what risks would they be taking?

  Soon, Hui Yue found out that the guards were split into groups of around ten. These groups each made a campfire and one of these campsites would have the watch every break.

  The carriage where Hui Yue had seen Deng Wu and Sha Yun in was constantly closed and surrounded by four guards. While the other carriage, the one without windows constantly had ten guards around it. The final carriage belonged to the four King ranked experts who lived within so that they did not have to sleep on the ground. Their rank was far above that.

  Waiting until the majority had fallen asleep, Hui Yue merged with the shadows as he slowly made his way towards the campsite reaching one where ten were standing guard. One could say his cloak was crafted just for this mission, as when he put it on it fully hid his aura; while wearing the cloak and hiding in the shadows, like he was, he was completely undetectable. . Hui Yue merged with the Earth and pushed some of the Qi in his body to his eyes. He could now more clearly see the group of sleeping guards who were located slightly away from the rest.

  Focusing completely, Hui Yue bit his lip as he summoned ten earthen spears. These spears were very different from the usual ones. They were only five centimeters in diameter but were incredibly sharp. They were a different variety of the Earthen Spear; they were Earthen Needles!

  These needles were all aimed at the temple of each of the guards. With a clench of Hui Yue’s hand the ten sharp needles all quietly sprung to life instantly slaying all ten guards.

  Instead of being greedy, Hui Yue rushed back to the campfire which was being looked after by Xie Lan and Xu Piao.

  According to Hui Yue’s calculations, no one should be capable of seeing that it was him who k
illed the ten men due to his cloak. If it came to a battle then he knew that he could forcefully withdraw Lan Feng’s Wu Wei. Doing so, however, meant that they would have to pause within a cave for a minimum of a year, maybe even longer.

  Although Hui Yue did not know why Lan Feng insisted on having quite a lot of Wu Wei refined by the time they reached the Dragon Core, he did not question the bird. He knew that he could not use the Wu Wei unless there was really no other way to survive.

  Having opened his Yin and Yang Qiao Mai meridians Hui Yue no longer needed sleep. As long as he was in a place where there was the essence of the heavens and the earth his body would naturally be replenished. This was something which greatly benefited him as he spent the time meditating.

  It was challenging for Hui Yue to sit still and meditate. Pretending that he knew nothing of what happened at the front of the caravan. Even harder was that he could not just go straight into their camp and free his friends.

  The tunnels were calm c for a long time and then suddenly after around five hours passed, Hui Yue opened his eyes and noticed hectic activity going on within the camp next to him.

  At first, he waited to see them rush towards him, Xu Piao, and Xie Lan; however surprisingly enough, nothing happened apart from the caravan rushing to once more get ready to leave. Smoke wafted into the stale air of the tunnels bringing with it the scent of burnt flesh, something which made Hui Yue astonished.

  Hui Yue and his two followers, got up as soon as the scent of burnt flesh made it their way and they moved forward overtaking the caravan, behaving as though the scent had scared them silly, something which would be completely understandable.

  ….

  “Captain we need to at least question the cultivators who were camped around us!” One of the Dragon Corps soldiers said with an indignant voice as he looked at the burning corpses on the ground. One of the guards who lost his life the previous night was his good friend and his silent death caused great fear and anger to rise within all the other guards. In a team where so many guards were travelling together to have ten men dead just like that, with no sound and no chance of even moving, this caused irrational fear to plant its seed within the hearts of the majority of the Dragon Corps’ soldiers.

  They all wanted to return and find the culprits because no one knew what might happen the next night, however, their captain was looking behind with a troubled expression on his face. After slamming his fist down on the table, his eyes gleamed dangerously in the dim tunnel lights.

  “I have already said it once,” His voice was dangerously low, similar to that like a growling sound, and the guard in front of him felt a shiver run down his spine, “We will not pursue the ones who caused these killings. From now on we will not sleep while resting. While the majority of you Duke and Grandmaster experts have not opened your Yin and Yang Qiao Mai meridians, you should still be able to survive without sleep if you spend the evenings cultivating. While cultivating you can sense the energy ripples around you and another sneak attack should not be possible.”

  Having said that, the captain said nothing else. With dark eyes, he started moving towards the carriage in which his three King ranked companions were seated. Entering the carriage, a sigh escaped his lips and he allowed for his body to slump onto a silken cushion which was placed on the floor in the carriage. It was to give them some comfort on this long journey.

  “Does this have anything to do with the B ranked prisoners we acquired?” One of the Kings asked. A tall but very lean man, his nose sharp and his eyes and hair dark. His voice was very melodious as it floated towards the captain. The captain gritted his teeth as he nodded his head.

  “I think those three men are following us, getting ready to get rid of us in order to release their friends.” He said while being reminded ofabout the three cloaked men he had been unable to detect earlier that morning. Being unable to detect their strength clearly meant that they were stronger than him and intentionally withdrawing their aura. If they were to start a battle against such esteemed experts it was likely that they would not just lose ten of their guards, but the entire squad not to mention their very important cargo.

  Thinking this, he knew that the cargo within the second carriage was so important that the captain was ready to sacrifice every single middle dantian expert within his group.

  Chapter 83 – Escape Plans

  Hui Yue frowned slightly as he noticed that there was no one from the caravan in front of them who came to question Hui Yue’s group. No one came over to ask them if they knew anything about the murders that occurred late into night.

  Instead, it seemed as though they decided to just accept the deaths and then rush forward. Although the white-haired young man was fairly surprised by the turn of events he clearly was not unhappy. As soon as the caravan started moving, they too packed up their campsite and the three of them once more moved set out towards the next cave, staying only a few kilometers behind the big caravan.

  It was quite normal for small groups to travel behind big caravans and it did not take long time before quite a few groups were following a few kilometers behind the powerful caravan.

  There are many reason for this. Firstly, if a demon beast horde were to attack the big caravan was likely to repel them, and secondly, there was safety in numbers.

  Bandits had never proven to be a large problem within the earlier caves. Although there were some bandit groups it was not as though they met them often, however, the further into the Dungeons of the Divine that they travelled, the more bandits they came across.

  Travelling behind a massive caravan ensured that the bandit groups would flee. Even if they wished to attack one of the groups walking behind the caravan it was likely that the energy ripples from the battle would bring trouble for the main caravan then they would return to make the fighting stop. Usually by slaughtering them all.

  The only ones who dared attack a large caravan was a large bandit group with high ranked members. These bandit groups would focus on the major caravans as that was the most profitable. If attacked, the followers would use the chance to run away Escaping to all sides in the hope that they would not be caught by the bandit groups.

  Masquerading as one of these groups Hui Yue, Xu Piao, and Xie Lan kept traveling behind the major caravan, each one of them slightly hesitant.

  Hui Yue expected to be questioned this morning as soon as the dead soldiers were found, but nothing happened. The group just rushed away from their previous location not paying any attention to the dead guards.

  This took Hui Yue by surprise. After a while he finally realized that the leader of the caravan in front of him was on an important mission which he put above the life of his guards. A smile appeared on Hui Yue’s face as he came to this conclusion.

  At first he expected he would needed to rush and kill as many as fast as possible. But seeing that the captain paid no attention to the deaths, Hui Yue knew he could take his time and in a safe way remove the middle dantian experts one after another.

  Although he decided to go slowly, his heart quivered as the image of Wang Ju Long appeared before his eyes once more. Previously he had seen both Deng Wu and Sha Yun, and neither of them seemed to be injured, however, he did not manage to see Wang Ju Long. Though he assumed that she was within the same carriage and fine it was impossible for him to know for sure.

  While thinking about this his flame of anger from within grew. This caused the blood red mist from within his dantian cave to start roiling in response.

  At the last moment, Hui Yue calmed himself down and allowed for the tranquil cloud to push back the red mist. He sighed deeply as he wished that the two phenomena would be as easy to handle as the golden wings and the green pearl.

  The caravan and its many followers kept traveling further and further into the tunnels, they were running unceasingly and one group after another fell behind. These followers were unable to keep up with the quick pace that the caravan set. Only Hui Yue and his group along with two other groups ma
naged to keep up. After running for half a day, they finally took a break.

  Just like the night before, Hui Yue set up a bonfire and waited for the caravan to settle down. It seemed that, unlike last night, they would not be sleeping tonight. Everyone was looking around alertly; perhaps even more alert now than they were during the day when bandits were likely to attack.

  Seeing this a sneer appeared on Hui Yue’s face as he slipped into the shadows while watching both sides. Xu Piao and Xie Lan stood up as well and merged with the shadows. They closed in on the caravan. Not saying a word nor releasing even the smallest bit of their aura.

  Unlike the previous night the guards on watch did not stay behind at the campfires any longer, instead they were patrolling the area in groups of two.

  Standing in the shadow Hui Yue felt the two experts appeared by his side. All three were standing completely still, holding their breath as two guards walked their way.