Daqin Zhentiansi

Eagle Beak Cliff Recruit Camp.

At the foot of Eagle's Beak Cliff.

This training ground, deliberately preserved with scorched earth, monster remains, and dried black blood, is no longer an ordinary drill ground, but a living infernal furnace.

The air was filled with a pungent mixture of sulfur, blood, sweat, and the bitterness of herbs, and every breath burned your lungs.

The deafening battle cries, the howls of demons, the clash of weapons, and the cracking of bones, like a relentless tidal wave, assaulted the nerves of everyone caught in the midst of it.

"Form ranks! Turtle! Hold the line!"

Pan Yue's roar was like rolling thunder, drowning out all the noise.

The last surviving veteran of the Panshi Battalion had a fresh claw mark on his face that ran diagonally from his brow bone to his jaw, which looked even more ferocious under the stains of sweat and blood.

He was no longer just an instructor, but more like an enraged, prehistoric beast surveying its territory, rampaging through the massive shield formation composed of hundreds of new recruits.

His dark black light armor was covered with new and old scratches.

Those were medals for countless brushes with death, and now they trembled slightly with each of his roars.

The new recruits were clad in heavy training armor.

This armor is not made of ordinary iron, but rather a simplified version of the "rock-solid" rune-enhanced heavy armor hastily made by the weapon-refining workshop.

Although it lacks the full power of actual combat armor, it is enough to let these fledglings entering the battlefield for the first time experience what it means to "carry mountains on their backs".

They gritted their teeth, their arms trembling violently from the sustained effort, forming a seemingly impenetrable shield wall.

Beyond the shield wall were dozens of inferior demons and carrion hounds, their power deliberately weakened but their ferocity amplified by hunger and demonic nature.

They were not scattered soldiers, but were driven by several veterans of the Rock Camp with cold eyes and special whips in their hands. Like an enraged tide, they charged at the shield formation wave after wave in a suicidal manner!

"boom--!"

A dull thud that made your teeth ache!

A slightly weaker recruit was slammed into the center of the shield by an exceptionally strong carrion dog.

The immense impact sent his feet off the ground, and he staggered backward, his tower shield tilting instantly, revealing a fatal gap!

"Useless!" Pan Yue's figure appeared beside him like a ghost. Without any pity, he kicked him hard in the waist, forcing him back to his original position. The new recruit next to him also groaned.

At the same time, the unsharpened training demon-slaying cone in Pan Yue's hand, which was infused with some of his own qi, swept out like a black lightning bolt!

"Crack!"

Precision!

Ruthless!

The demon that lunged into the crevice, its fangs about to touch the recruit's neck, had its head smashed to pieces like a rotten watermelon, its foul-smelling demonic blood and brain matter splattering all over the faces of the surrounding recruits.

Pan Yue's voice was as cold as iron, piercing through all noise and striking deep into the souls of every new recruit: "Remember! One breach, and the whole team will perish!"

Even if your bones are broken, you'll still have to bite down on the shield and hold it up for me!

"Think of the Starfall Platform! Think of those old brothers who gave their lives to buy time for you fledglings, to ignite the altar, and to awaken the will of the barrier!"

"Their blood isn't even cold yet! You can't even bear this little bit of pain?!"

Not far away, on a towering black rock that seemed to be soaked in demonic blood, Yuezhen Mountain stood majestically.

He wore the same dark black light armor as Zhang Yuan, his aura was as deep and solid as a mountain, and his eyes were as sharp as a hawk, coldly looking down at the bloody "dance" below.

Beside him, several experienced elite instructors from different human guardian halls were holding specially made "array pattern jade plates".

The jade disc reflected the shifting light and shadows, providing real-time feedback on data such as the aura, true energy flow, movement deviations, and pressure endured by each squad and even each new recruit below.

Their lips moved, their voices ringing out coldly above the corresponding squads through a small amplification array: "Third Squad! Right flank advance delayed by three breaths! Are you waiting for the monsters to make way for you?!"

"Coordinate with the gaps in the simulated coverage by the archers in the Rift Abyss! Rhythm! Battlefield rhythm is life! Let's start again! Captain, add ten rounds of 'Rock Solid' penalty!"

"Seventh Squad! Idiots! The entire process for dealing with demonic energy corruption is wrong! Did you waste your time practicing the 'Qi-Drawing Exorcism Technique'?"

"Purification talismans are not a last resort to be used when demonic energy enters the body and erodes the meridians! They are the last line of defense!"

"The moment demonic energy approaches the body, release your true essence to form a repulsive membrane, combined with the purification talisman's light screen! Each person should practice 'Guiding Qi to Expel Demons' one hundred times! Practice until it becomes second nature!"

"Ninth Squad! Shield formation has shifted to 'Wedge Attack' and the formation is scattered! Are you turtles in a shell? You need to learn to find opportunities to counterattack while defending!"

"Remember what Marshal Fire said: 'The best defense is to prevent the enemy from ever launching an effective attack!'"

"Start over!"

At the edge of the training ground, the makeshift medical area resembled another small battlefield.

Low-ranking medical monks and pharmacist apprentices moved about busily, carrying down stretchers of new recruits who were either pale-faced, unconscious, or groaning in pain.

Some arms were bent at bizarre angles, clearly indicating fractures.

Some had charred wounds on their faces and arms from the demonic energy, which sizzled as they were corroded.

Some were so badly injured that their internal organs trembled and they coughed up blood.

The pungent smell of wound medicine, disinfectant, and purifying ointment mixed with the stench of blood, creating a nauseating odor.

Screams and suppressed groans filled the air.

However, there was no tender comfort here, only efficient to the point of being ruthless.

The broken bone was set roughly but precisely, and a special "bone-setting ointment" with a slight tissue-regenerating effect was applied.

The rotten flesh of the demonic wound was scraped away, the bleeding was stopped by burning, and a talisman cloth soaked in purifying liquid was applied.

Those with internal injuries were given a bitter but potent "Rejuvenation Powder" to drink.

Under the combined effect of elixirs, magic arrays, and cultivators' true essence, as long as the injuries are not fatal, these new recruits are usually sent back to the training ground by equally exhausted medical cultivators within half an hour to face the next round of even more brutal torture.

"Get up! Stop playing dead! This injury is nothing compared to the real demonic tide!"

"Think about why you came here! Think about the homes you left behind!"

The roars of the medical monks also bore the mark of the Rock Camp.

The air was filled with the smells of rust, sweat, herbs, and the stench of monsters.

The unique atmosphere of the Eagle's Beak Cliff training ground is a mixture of the desperate and struggling roars of monsters.

There is no tender growth here, only the cruel law of elimination of blood and fire, life and death.

Those who are cowardly or weak-willed will be crushed and sieved out by the furnace-like pressure on the first day, leaving in despair.

What remains is the bewilderment and fear in the eyes of a new recruit, which has been replaced by a rock-solid determination, a wolf-like ruthlessness from the blood-soaked battlefield, and an extreme desire for power and survival.

Every parry, every roar, every time they rose from the ashes, was etching Zhang Yuan's ten years of accumulated strength into their very bones and veins. This was not merely training; Zhang Yuan was using the entire front line as a furnace, veterans as hammers, and the flames of war as an anvil, to forge the foundations of the "Primordial Iron Wall" in large quantities!

------------

Edge of the Black Wind Rift Valley.

The night was as dark as ink, so thick it was impossible to see through.

Black Wind Rift Valley is like a huge wound torn open by the claws of a demon, its depths unfathomable.

From the depths of the valley came the chilling howls of demons, the echoes of countless twisted creatures struggling and gnawing in the filthy demonic energy, accompanied by the ceaseless howling of the eerie winds that seemed to come from the deepest hell.

A ten-person team, like the most experienced geckos, clung tightly to the cold, slippery, and damp cliff face.

Their auras were suppressed to the extreme; their heartbeats and blood flow seemed to be forcibly suppressed by some secret technique, blending into the jagged rocks and mottled moss.

Each person was covered by a specially made "Shadow Cloak," on which runes flowed, not only distorting light but also subtly interfering with the perception of low-level monsters.

The leader was Zhao San, a seasoned veteran with a deep scar on his face and sharp, hawk-like eyes.

He was once one of the best scouts in the Rock Camp, escaping death countless times in the early stages of the "Blood Millstone". Now he is one of the elites among the countless "shadow tentacles" that Zhang Yuan has sent into the depths of the Demon Realm.

"Boss," a slender and agile team member codenamed "Night Owl" whispered in a "telepathic communication technique" that barely caused any air vibration, "'The Vein-Seeking Stone' is reacting. Three hundred feet ahead, in the lower right groove, the concentration of demonic energy is abnormal, more than three times the average level of the surrounding area!"

"The fluctuations of the remaining primordial barrier are faint, but very clear!"

"It matches the characteristics of a 'beacon tower node'! However, it has been taken over by a group of 'swamp worms' as their lair, and there are no fewer than a hundred of them!"

"Two of them possessed exceptionally powerful auras, their carapaces gleaming with dark gold patterns; they were definitely 'leaders' on the verge of breaking through to the Demon General level!"

Zhao San licked his lips, which were chapped from holding his breath for so long. There was no fear in his eyes, but rather a green gleam of excitement, like a wolf spotting its prey.

On his wrist, on the surface of a simple magical artifact, several tiny runes corresponded to the direction and intensity described by the night owl, flickering with a faint light.

"Take it head-on? Or mark it and retreat?" the burly team member codenamed "Anvil" asked in a deep voice.

He carried a miniature "Demon-Slaying Cone Tower Shield" on his back. Although it was smaller, the sense of weight emanating from the flowing runes was in no way diminished.

Zhao San squinted, scrutinizing the terrain, monster distribution, and airflow direction ahead like a highly sophisticated scanner.

A moment later, he decisively pointed to a narrow, wind-eroded crack overhead, almost completely swallowed by shadow and barely wide enough for one person to pass through: "See that 'ghost crack'? Go around it!"

"Go up from above, avoiding the main force of those disgusting slugs below. Same as always, Xiao Liu, get your 'Silence Dust' ready, cover the area we're going through, even suppress the air vibrations!"

“Dog, turn your ‘Stealth Charm’ to maximum power, make sure we don’t leave a trace when we pass by! Pillar,” he looked at a young archer in the group with a calm look on his face and carrying a specially made “Abyss Shortbow”, “load your ‘Star-Shattering Arrow’ and lock onto those two leaders and any other small fry who might discover us.”

"Remember, we are the eyes and ears of the Fire Commander, not his fists! What the Fire Commander wants is accurate 'maps' and 'intelligence,' not his damn list of martyrs! Our lives must be saved to send the intelligence back!"

The orders were clear and the division of labor was well-defined.

The team members nodded silently, their movements swift and coordinated.

Xiao Liuzi plucked a small pinch of shimmering dust from the leather pouch at his waist.

He gently exhaled his true essence, and the dust silently dispersed, merging into the surrounding air.

In an instant, the sounds within a few feet of the team seemed to be completely swallowed up, and even breathing became barely audible.

The dog quickly activated several talismans with intricate patterns and affixed them to its teammates and itself.

Their figures became even more blurred, almost transparent, in the shadows.

Zhu Zi took a deep breath, his eyes sharp as an eagle's. He slightly drew his short bow, and an arrow wreathed in faint arcs of electricity was quietly nocked onto the bowstring.

The arrows subtly locked onto the two largest shadows among the monsters below.

Like true shadows, the team silently climbed and moved upwards along the narrow, slippery, and dangerous crack.

Every step is carefully crafted, precisely avoiding loose pebbles and moss that might make a sound.

Below, the nauseating wriggling sounds, dripping slime, and gnawing of the swamp worms could be clearly heard, and the foul-smelling demonic energy almost solidified, constantly surging upwards.

suddenly!

At the corner ahead of the crack, a smaller crawler, seemingly on "lookout" unexpectedly began to wriggle upwards!
Zhao San, who was at the very front of the squad, was less than five feet away!
A foul, fishy stench hit me!

"laugh--!"

A barely audible whooshing sound as it cut through the air!

Almost the instant the worm's murky compound eyes turned toward the crack, the arrow in the pillar's hand had already left the bowstring!
There was no dazzling lightning, only a shadowy figure that almost blended into the darkness!

It pierced the worm's relatively vulnerable compound eye with perfect precision, instantly destroying its weak magic core!

The worm didn't even utter a whimper before its massive body stiffened abruptly and then slid limply downwards.

"Catch!"

Zhao San's mind raced.

The anvil reacted extremely quickly, leaping out like a nimble cat and cleverly using the edge of its shield to catch the falling monster's corpse, gently laying it flat on the narrow rock shelf, thus preventing the huge noise of the corpse falling.

The entire process happened in the blink of an eye, silently and seamlessly.

The team members' heart rates didn't even quicken, and they continued forward.

Half an hour later, the team successfully circled around to the top of the target groove.

Zhao San hung upside down on the rock top like a gecko, his sharp eyes piercing through the filthy demonic energy below, taking in the scene inside the groove.

A dilapidated altar base covered with ancient runes.

Densely packed, wriggling swamp worms, resembling giant slugs, exuding a foul stench.

And the two leaders, which resembled small hills with dark gold patterns flowing on their shells and exuding a dangerous aura.

He quickly pulled out a specially made "image-recording jade talisman" and a piece of extremely tough animal hide from his pocket.

They used jade talismans to record key images and energy fluctuations.

While using a charcoal pencil, he quickly sketched precise locations, terrain, monster distribution, leader characteristics, possible patrol routes, and weak points on the animal hide.

Every stroke embodies the experience honed through countless brushes with death.

"withdraw!"

Having gathered all the information, Zhao San decisively gave the order.

The squad once again retreated silently along the path they had come from, like ghosts, without disturbing any of the monsters below.

Only on the cold rock wall above the groove, a few faint, almost imperceptible traces of human presence remained.

And the faint trace of "silent dust" remaining in the air was quickly and completely dispersed by the relentless, eerie winds of the valley. (End of Chapter)