This small body produced the roar of a big beast that resembled rumbling thunder. Leaves were sent flying into the air by the sound waves, leaving the birds and beasts in the forest s.h.i.+vering.

The roars from other animals in the distance seemed to be some kind of warning.

They were obviously Cardinal Heaven level animals and regarded the roaring emperor as being in the same cla.s.s as them.

When the team was taking a break, Ren Baqian held it by the nape and knocked its t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es. Suddenly, a thought came to his mind, Is this the deep part of the Sixty Thousand Mountains?

This place was about one and a half month's journey from the Ya Family village.

Although it was in the middle of the mountains, everyone was riding on a mount and traveling at a fast pace. They were crossing more than 30 kilometers per day, which equated to about 1,500 kilometers in one and a half months.

In China, the distance from the capital to Shanghai was around 1,200 kilometers.

"This should already be deep inside. The depths of the Sixty Thousand Mountains were just a description. Generally speaking, a journey of half a month inside is considered to be in the periphery, between half a month and two months is the middle region, and anything more than that is considered the depths of the Sixty Thousand Mountains."

The empress saw Ren Baqian using his hand to knock the t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es of the roaring emperor and then reach out to her with the same hand. She immediately used her fingers to hold his wrist and caused Ren Baqian to spin around like a gyro a few times.

"Don't use that hand to touch me!" the empress said disgustedly.

Ren Baqian conveniently threw the roaring emperor aside. It sat on the ground looking blankly at its t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es and then raised its head to roar at the sky.

Halfway through its roar, the crow general stepped on the ground with its foot. However, when the crow general raised its foot, only a hole could be seen in the ground.

Another hole suddenly appeared a dozen meters away as the roaring emperor poked its head out of this hole to roar again.

The crow general was annoyed by this noisy chap and tried to stomp it with a foot.

The roaring emperor poked his head out from five or six meters away again.

Without much effort, the ground was filled with a dozen holes.

Ren Baqian watched the two animals play Whack-Mole[1.Whack-Mole: A popular arcade redemption game invented in 1976 by Aaron Fechter of Creative Engineering] while asking the empress, "Could it be that there are countless Cardinal Heaven experts over here? And that the number of Kismet Heaven experts is as numerous as dogs on Earth?"

Along this stretch alone, at least four Cardinal Heaven beasts had been alarmed by the roars.

Furthermore, the distance covered was less than one day of travel.

"Even in the depths of the Sixty Thousand Mountains, Cardinal Heaven experts are scarce, but Cardinal Heaven level beasts are certainly a little more common than elsewhere."

This place was desolate and uninhabited, so it was unsurprising to find a few more Cardinal Heaven level animals.

In fact, most parts of the Sixty Thousand Mountains hadn't been explored.

The aboriginals only occupied a small area, and those Cardinal Heaven experts faced all kinds of crises.

As a result, nothing they encountered was surprising to them.

…

It wasn't until noon the next day that they reached the valley.

"Your Majesty, this is the place," announced the winged cavalry warrior who was leading the way.

The empress stood in front of the valley and remarked, "These fellows always like this type of lifeless place."

Even though they hadn't stepped inside, everyone felt that this valley was different from others.

There was a familiar air of lifelessness.

There weren't many trees in the valley and strange looking rocks were everywhere. Deep inside was a pool with an eerie forest around it.

Standing at the entrance of the valley, a person could almost see the whole valley.

When it was getting dark, everyone waited outside the valley for the jade-waisted slaves to appear.

They waited until the two moons intersected in the sky, but there was still no sign of them.

"It looks like the herdsman has left," Ren Baqian said calmly as he and the empress sat side by side on a stone.

Their quarry had escaped, but this didn't surprise them.

In fact, they were already prepared for this outcome.

Although these herdsmen had isolated themselves, they weren't fools. They wouldn't stay in their original place and wait to be destroyed when they knew that people were looking for them.

This confirmed that these herdsmen had left after receiving the news.

What the herdsmen were most likely to do was to gather in unexplored places and wait for these people to leave.

Alternatively, they could prepare for a counter-attack, which was the worst case scenario.

"If they hide, it will be hard to find them again," the empress said with a worried look.

Even if these herdsmen were to hide, their food source was still the aboriginals, which were the hosts for the jade-waisted slaves.

If only we could launch a satellite! This wild thought popped into his mind.

It was a pity that the ability to launch a satellite was too far in the future.

30 or 50 years might be required for this wish to come true.

After the two of them sat down for a while, the empress ordered two ladies from Mount Gongmu to check what was going on from the sky.

In less than a quarter of an hour, the two colorful birds were seen flying in a panic overhead.

"Help!" The two ladies from Mount Gongmu were yelling for help from the sky.

The two colorful birds seemed to be free-falling from the sky as hundreds of palm-sized black birds took turns pecking at the colorful birds.

When the colorful birds. .h.i.t the ground, there were 20 to 30 of these black birds that refused to let go and still had their beaks embedded in the bodies of the colorful birds.

In the darkness, everyone spent some time to repel these small birds and save the two colorful birds that were filled with cuts and bruises.

Ren Baqian picked up the dead black birds and found that they resembled bats and also somewhat looked like pterosaurs. Their beaks were short and full of small sharp teeth, they had a mammal-like tail, and their wings consisted of a thin membrane with small claws at the front.

This was again a case of animals that weren't strong, but were overpowering because of their quant.i.ty.

They were especially hard to handle in the darkness of the night sky.

With this type of animals lurking above, it was hard to survey from the sky.

They stayed for three days and cleared the forest in hopes of finding any traces left behind by the herdsman, but nothing was found.

Together with his subordinates, Qi Ziting also caught up from behind.

When Ren Baqian saw him, he also saw a ferocious beast that looked like a rhinoceros.

Ren Baqian spent a lot of effort to distinguish the original meat from the different types of meat brought by the winged cavalry.

After hearing that the herdsman had disappeared, Qi Ziting couldn't help but raise his eyebrows and say, "It seems like they have all escaped. This time, it's not going to be easy to find them! The area is so vast that it'll take more than a year to comb through the entire mountain. It's practically impossible to find someone here!"

"No matter the situation, we'll talk again after we head to the other two places." The empress didn't want to resign herself to fate.

Previously, she had hoped that these herdsmen wouldn't gather together, but now, she was hoping that they were gathered somewhere and waiting for the aboriginals to arrive.

This would certainly be better than the herdsmen disappearing into the vast and remote woods.