The Great Xia army did not expect their deployment to be exposed. They also did not expect that there would be something like the drone in this world. As such, they were still painfully waiting for the winged cavalry to charge into the forest.

After all, when the drone was four hundred meters above the ground, it was too small to be seen. Furthermore, it did not exude any sort of aura either. Therefore, it was very difficult for it to be detected. Even though it made a buzzing sound, they couldn't hear it as it was too far away from the ground. The Great Xia soldiers still thought that the sound was made by mosquitoes.

Ren Baqian and the captains stood in a circle. If it weren't for the images that the drone took, they would have jumped straight into the enemy's trap and into the point of no return.

Aboriginals never cared about what was in front of them or what was beneath their feet, all they knew was to charge forward blindly.

There was a reason why the population of aboriginals had not increase much even though Dayao had been founded for 70 years.

Their confidence in their strength made them fearless, but many a time, it also became their weakness that their enemies exploited.

Take this situation as an example. If they charged into the forest, even if they managed to annihilate the enemy forces, all of their mounts would be killed. They would also suffer some casualties. By the time they walked to Falling Moon Gorge, they would be utterly exhausted. And when they faced the interception at Falling Moon Gorge, they wouldn't be able to put up any resistance.

Fortunately, the Great Xia army's plot was discovered. The science and technology of Earth had won today's battle—the drone had won today's battle.

"Your Majesty, let me lead 50 men to kill the archers at the front. Meanwhile, the rest can launch a flanking attack on the enemies in the forest. As long as we can kill the people who are starting the fire, their plan will be foiled. Even if they manage to start a fire, we will still have enough time to retreat," Zheng Hu volunteered.

"Then? Everywhere in the forest is covered with fallen leaves. If they manage to start a fire, the fire can't be put out within a short period of time," Ren Baqian interjected.

"What can we do then?" Zheng Hu stared at Ren Baqian and asked. His eyes resembled two bronze bells.

"Staring at me won't solve the issue, we should think of a solution now," Ren Baqian casually waved his hand and said. When he just arrived in Dayao, he was easily frightened by aboriginals' formidable physique and aura. After having been here for so long, he was used to their physique and behavior. He wasn't scared of them anymore.

"We can bypa.s.s them and it will take roughly half a day to do so. However, our mounts can't last that long, and they will need to rest. If that's the case, I'm afraid that we will have to take an extra day to reach Falling Moon Gorge. Since we have delayed our journey by one day, the enemy forces at Falling Moon Gorge will have one additional day to make preparations," Li Tanhua added.

While using the drone to scout out the enemy's defensive arrangements, Ren Baqian discovered that there were two precipitous mountains on both sides of the mountain pa.s.s. If they wanted to proceed on with their journey, they had to pa.s.s through the mountain pa.s.s. This was also probably why the enemy forces set up a blockage there.

"Can't we take another path?" Ren Baqian asked after thinking about it. He wasn't too sure about Great Xia's geography.

If they could avoid the ambush here and steer clear of Falling Moon Gorge by switching to another route, it was worth delaying their journey by a few days. Why go head-to-head with the enemy? With the enemy forces setting up ambushes along their planned route, even if they could pa.s.s through this area, it wouldn't be easy for them to pa.s.s through Falling Moon Gorge.

"The other route is through Broken Dragon Canyon, that route is even harder," Teng Ji shook his head and said.

Following which, a strong-willed voice interrupted them, "The winged cavalry will press forward and destroy anything that is blocking Her Majesty's path!"

Ren Baqian looked at him with a slanted gaze. He only had one solution now. With this solution, the enemy wouldn't even have the chance to start a fire.

"Your Majesty, why not we use the sarin gas? We can shoot the sarin gas cans over to the enemy side," Ren Baqian told the empress. All they needed to do was to clear the archers in the forest and shoot an arrow with the sarin gas cans tied to it at the mountain pa.s.s. He reckoned that the Great Xia soldiers wouldn't start a fire if they did not see the winged cavalry charging into the forest. If everything proceeded smoothly, they should be able to strut through Falling Moon Gorge after half an hour.

The only thing was he couldn't bear to part with the sarin gas. There were twenty sarin gas canisters left, which totaled to ten kilograms of sarin gas. According to the images obtained from the drone, they would need at least six cans to engulf a huge part of the area in sarin gas.

Sitting on the back of the kirin, the empress listened to what everyone had to say. Finally, she nodded her head and said, "We will do what Imperial Deputy Prefect Ren said. Split up into three groups with fifty men each. After you have killed every Great Xia soldier in the forest, pa.s.s me a bow."

"Yes, Your Majesty." The three captains immediately acknowledged the empress's command. Following which, they pa.s.sed the best bow they had to the empress. It was a cowhorn bow. It was made up of a bamboo, cow horns, and a tendon from an unknown beast. They also provided her with a quiver of metal-tipped arrows.

Bone arrows were commonly used in Dayao as the materials to make them were easily obtainable. On the contrary, metal-tipped arrows were seldomly used. The bow and arrows belonged to Li Tanhua. He himself was not willing to use these metal-tipped arrows during peacetime.

The empress placed an arrow on the bow, pulled the bowstring and aimed at the sky. Her aura intensified and lessened all of a sudden. Following which, everyone heard a tw.a.n.g and a bird fell from the sky the next second. Someone went to pick up the bird and bring it back. There was a b.l.o.o.d.y hole on the body of the bird, but the arrow had vanished into thin air.

Subsequently, the three men each led fifty men with an extra fifty men behind them to a position 500 meters away from the forest. The Great Xia archers, who were at the level of Man Wheel, had a shooting range of only 800 steps. 800 hundred steps was roughly equivalent to 400 meters. Before they entered the shooting range of the Great Xia archers, they got down from their mounts and dashed into the forest while unsheathing their swords and letting out a weird cry.

The extra fifty men behind them were in charge of looking after everyone's mount.

When the one hundred and fifty winged cavalry warriors pulled within 350 meters of the forest, hundreds of gleaming arrows shot out from the forest with a deafening sound.

Teng Ji took the lead and cut down the arrows flying towards him. Then, he jumped twenty meters forward.

Even though the winged cavalry warriors held weapons, wore heavy armor, and ran 100 meters in less than 9 seconds, they still had some energy left to spare.

After shooting two volleys of arrows, the enemy soldiers quickly fled towards the mountain pa.s.s.

When the one hundred and fifty winged cavalry warriors reached the forest, they immediately split up into three groups. Two groups headed for the archers that hid on top of the trees waiting to start a fire. Only one group chased the archers that were fleeing towards the mountain pa.s.s. However, before they reached the border of the forest, they stopped in their tracks.

The Great Xia soldiers hiding at the mountain pa.s.s were prepared to shoot their arrows. However, when they realized no one was coming out of the forest, they remained stationary.

"Sir, only roughly over one hundred of them entered the forest, the rest are still outside," Liu Canjun ran up to a lieutenant standing on the midpoint of the mountain and reported to him. The lieutenant had a one-meter-long beard, looking more like a scholar than a general.

Even though this lieutenant looked like a scholar, Liu Canjun did not dare to look down upon him. One had to know that this lieutenant had reached the advanced level of Earth Wheel, which meant he had the strength of Earth Embryo Realm. He was considered a powerful expert in Great Xia.

The lieutenant furrowed his eyebrows. He did not expect that the enemy would give them such a difficult problem. With only some one hundred winged cavalry warriors in the forest, he did not know whether or not he should set fire to the forest.

After thinking about it, he said, "Be more alert! Once they appear, use the huge rocks and logs to halt them first. We have four thousand men in a favorable position, why can't we take on less than two hundred enemy soldiers. Once we obstruct them with the rocks and logs, the rest of their men will enter the forest, and we can start the fire then."

However, the moment that he was waiting for did not arrive. Instead, an arrow that had a few cans fastened to it arrived.

As the cans shattered upon hitting the ground, a colorless, transparent liquid splashed all over his surroundings. The liquid then released a gas that engulfed his surroundings. As the wind in the mountain blew, the gas was spread to other areas.

Meanwhile, Ren Baqian and the empress were using binoculars to watch the enemy soldiers at the mountain pa.s.s. Waiting behind them was a huge number of winged cavalry warriors.

After a long while, using the binoculars, Ren Baqian saw the enemy soldiers collapsing to the ground while clenching their throats. Those who had yet to collapse to the ground began to flee in panic. However, after a few steps, they dropped to the ground as well.

At this moment, the commander's facial expression changed drastically. However, by the time he discovered that something wasn't right, it was already too late. He jumped and appeared ten meters above his original position. Then, he jumped to higher ground again. It appeared that he was trying to escape the poisonous gas by jumping to higher ground. However, while making his next jump, he dropped to the ground as well.

Some time had pa.s.sed. After the winged cavalry drank the preemptive antidotes to sarin gas and fed them to their mounts, they strutted through the mountain pa.s.s. Both sides of the mountain pa.s.s were filled with huge rocks, logs, and dead bodies.

Someone opened up the wooden buckets hidden in the forest. Indeed, they contained animal fats. The defensive arrangements set up by the Great Xia army were indeed vicious, it was a pity that they weren't put to use. Within such a short period of time, thousands of Great Xia soldiers were completely slaughtered.

At this moment, everyone gazed at Ren Baqian with a weird look upon their faces.

Previously, they felt that Ren Baqian had many interesting gadgets. Now, they realized that he also had many deadly gadgets.

Ren Baqian was able to poison thousands of men to death without any signs. Even their commander, who was on the advanced level of Earth Wheel, died at his hands. All of the Earth Wheel pract.i.tioners in his surroundings were poisoned to death as well.

Upon witnessing this scene with their own eyes, they gained a new form of reverence for Ren Baqian. They told themselves that, if one day they became enemies with Ren Baqian, they would shoot him to death with an arrow no matter what.

Out of the four thousand elite soldiers at the mountain pa.s.s, only about a hunded men made it out alive. These survivors pa.s.sed the news back to Yucheng, which eventually caused the news to spread throughout Great Xia.

As such, Great Xia began to investigate who was the one that poisoned the soldiers to death.

One had to know that, after coming into conflicting with Dayao, Great Xia had never encountered such an incident. The aboriginals always resorted to individual strength to overcome their opponents. They had never resorted to poisoning their enemies to death and then strutting across their corpses.

Previously, Great Xia's imperial family did not believe the news that Qi Zixiao had annihilated the Nine Pavilions. That was because they understood their enemy very well. Qi Zixiao did not know how to use poisons. Destroying the Nine Pavilions wasn't a feat that could not be done single-handedly by someone who did not know how to use poisons.

It wasn't just hundreds of men, but rather, thousands of men that were geared up to fight. Even the weakest individual among them was on the level of Man Wheel. Furthermore, there were Spirit Wheel experts in the eight pavilion masters.

And this time around, four thousand elite soldiers waiting in ambush at the mountain pa.s.s were poisoned to death.

The number of people killed in these two incidents was immensely huge. Similarly, this time around, the soldiers were poisoned to death without any signs while they were fully conscious in a s.p.a.cious area.

She definitely had a poison expert by her side! This was everyone's conjecture.

Very soon, Ren Baqian, who was considered a lucky basta*rd by many people, appeared on everyone's radar. Out of all the empress's subordinates, he was the most suspicious one. He also was the only one that the empress brought along with to the Nine Pavilions. And when the empress was at the Nine Pavilions, he went missing.

Ren Baqian unknowingly bore the blame for everything.

Poison Warrior.

A Poison Warrior that could kill thousands of men without any signs.