Scourge Messenger

Chapter 271 Single-handedly overthrowing the entire Qi Kingdom

"The Tombstone Mountain Secret Realm was destroyed by the Disaster Legacy!?"

When she learned of this news, even though there was no more specific information or evidence, Ying Rushi recalled the figure standing on a pile of corpses in the Pingcheng Secret Realm.

Covered in blood, he sheathed his sword. He probably didn't recognize me then, but his eyes revealed clear goodwill. As I was leaving, he even worried about whether I would be punished upon my return... Or perhaps it wasn't concern, but rather an attempt to probe my relationship with His Majesty?

There are only a handful of strong people in the Central Plains. The strong all rise from weakness to strength, from gravel to mountains. For example, Black Wolf and Red Serpent, the former was born into a noble family in the Zhou Kingdom, and the latter was a noblewoman from a prominent family in the Liang Kingdom. It is possible to narrow down the candidates to within five people, but there is no need to continue the investigation.

The only exception is the 'yellow dog'.

He and his men seemed to spring from the ground up: 'Yan San', 'Ye Si', 'Jiang Shi', 'Bunny Heroine', and 'Rat Monk' who saved Shang Xuanwen's life—each one was a genius, and each one had an unknown origin.

Therefore, whenever a powerful figure of unknown origin appears, one should immediately assume that he is one of their people.

But why did he destroy the secret realm?

This idea is actually quite strange. Ying Rushi is not unaware of the information about the Disaster Successor. Just as a thief will steal and a dog will eat excrement, the Disaster Successor's destruction of the secret realm is naturally out of selfishness. In pursuit of power, he is willing to destroy the secret realm resources on which hundreds of thousands of people depend for their livelihood.

With so many secret realms in the world, why choose the most heavily guarded Tombstone Garrison, which is directly under His Majesty's control? Shouldn't the descendants of the Calamity be very discreet when they are developing, like mosquitoes, starting by sucking blood from inconspicuous places like the ankles? But now the Yellow Dog is practically flying to His Majesty's nose, sucking blood and dancing at the same time, as if trying to entice His Majesty to slap him.

It was as if destroying the secret realm was just a side effect; his main purpose was... provocation?
As more detailed information is conveyed, one should have even more confidence in one's judgment—because the descendants of the natural disaster have not fled, but are actively approaching the City of Never-Sleeping!
Six days ago, he broke out of Tombstone Military Town in the early morning and escaped safely amidst a hail of arrows.
Five days ago, he directly confronted a 50-man squad of cavalry and killed 23 of them.

Four days ago, they charged wildly through the encirclement of the army, breaking through left and right, occasionally retreating into the jungle to rest, but quickly returning to fight back. They fought fiercely for three hours, leaving more than three hundred corpses behind, and the morale of the Shanwen Camp collapsed.

Three days ago, he fought and killed Dugu Hun, the third-rank messenger and commander of the Shanwen Camp cavalry!

He actually charged step by step from Tombstone Military Town to Never-Sleeping City, crossing seventeen cities in five days and traversing eight hundred miles in one battle!

There was no attempt to conceal anything; it was as if he wanted to overthrow the entire State of Qi single-handedly!
This madman!

Despite his slaughter of the Qi army and provocation of the Ying royal family, Ying Rushi felt no resentment towards him, because the only thing he had uttered during these days of fighting was:
"Ying Le, not everyone will let you do whatever you want."

How arrogant, how disdainful, how invincible!
Ying Rushi could easily imagine the scene where he said those words: standing amidst the corpses, he sheathed his sword, leaving only the youngest-looking soldier behind, and casually said, "Go back and tell Ying Le," and the soldier vaguely remembered it and went back to tell him the truth, because he had no idea what the emperor's name was.

The increasing frequency of messages meant that the Calamity Heir was getting closer to Nightless City. Ordinary soldiers could no longer stop him; no matter how many they sent, they would only be defeated. However, the Calamity Heir did not simply rely on brute force to defeat the army. Rather, he was omniscient, able to detect ambushes from afar and never fall into fatal traps. Instead, he could wear down the army through constant guerrilla warfare.

What's even more terrifying is that he seems to need no rest. For five days and five nights, he has been either killing or hiding. Any normal third-tier soldier would have been exhausted and depleted of reserves after being chased by a large army for five days and five nights, or at least his condition would have declined. But he became more and more ferocious as he fought. In the end, he didn't even need many tactics to deal with the army.

One man can form an army! One man can rival a nation!
But how dare he?

Ying Le is a Foundation Establishment True Person who reigns supreme over the world. He can single-handedly fight against a million soldiers and traverse three thousand miles alone. The gap between a True Person and a mortal is like an insurmountable chasm. No normal person with a brain could possibly think that they can fight against Ying Le.

What does he want to do?
What was his motive?
It wasn't just Ying Rushi; these past few days, everyone had been speculating about the intentions of the Disaster Successor. They suspected he was sent by an enemy state to provoke His Majesty, that he wanted to make a name for himself, or that he was using this as a pledge of allegiance to gain the favor of the Zhou and Liang states... But as the Disaster Successor drew closer to the City of Never-Night and became deeply entrenched in the heart of the Qi state, even distant military towns sent troops to encircle him, forming a net of nearly 100,000 soldiers. Now, unless the Disaster Successor established his foundation on the spot, it was only a matter of time before he was captured.

Even a third-level messenger cannot withstand a large messenger army; defensive tokens have their limits.

Even if Ying Le didn't intervene, his fate was already sealed.

At this moment, Ying Rushi finally understood why the descendants of the natural disaster wanted to destroy the Tombstone Mountain Secret Realm.

Only by destroying the secret realm would the Qi Kingdom focus its attention on him, allowing him to make such a 'grand' trip to the City of Never-Night.

It wasn't for profit, it wasn't for fame, and I didn't even intend to survive.

Even if he dies, countless people will know that not everyone on this land will tolerate Ying Le's tyranny.

He came to punish the tyrant Ying Le!

……

...

In the Thieves' Hall, the Pharmacist stood before Yan Qing's door, raising her hand but not knocking for a long time. She turned to look at the stone table, on which were three plaques: [Yellow Dog], [Black Wolf], and [Red Serpent]. All three plaques were currently covered, indicating that they would not participate in tomorrow's gathering. The plaque for [Yellow Dog] had not been turned over for five days.

Upon learning that the descendant of the natural disaster was causing trouble in the State of Qi, Yaoshiyuan immediately thought of Yan Qing, after all, he had mentioned at their last gathering five days ago that he was going to do something "terrible". But Yaoshiyuan waited and waited, and Yan Qing never appeared.

In the end, the pharmacist did not knock on the door. In her perception, although [Immortal Travel] would occasionally go into cooldown, [Love Lock] had never been activated, indicating that Yan Qing had not encountered any life-threatening danger these days and there was no need to worry.

And for some reason, after the third mission, Yao Shiyuan became increasingly reserved around Yan Qing. Even occasional physical contact during training would make her nervous, despite her previous willingness to stab him. Taking the initiative to seek out Yan Qing was clearly a small thing, but Yao Shiyuan felt extremely awkward, as if she had lost.

Although I don't know where I lost, I wonder if the pharmacist wanted to lose!
However, at the same time, she felt that if Red Serpent knew about this, he would definitely knock on Yan Qing's door without hesitation, and thinking of this, she felt inexplicably discouraged.

Back at the military town of Taibai Mountain, the apothecary called in a maid to help her change into her armor, preparing for the afternoon's dungeon raid. As Shi Dong helped her put on her armor, she casually asked, "Hasn't he come to see you yet?"

"Um... what are you saying?"

“Our son-in-law,” Shi Dong pursed his lips, a slightly lewd smile appearing on his cute face, “haven’t we seen each other these past few days?”

"Don't talk nonsense!" Wu Qiu slapped Shi Dong hard on the head: "How dare you make fun of the young lady? You have no manners!"

The pharmacist was at a loss for words, and after a long pause, she finally asked, "Why do you think I haven't met with anyone?"

"Because you haven't drunk any alcohol these past few days, Miss," Shi Dong said. "You only abstain from alcohol when you're in a bad mood."

"I abstained from alcohol because I wanted to focus on conquering the secret realm!" Yaoshi Yuan said irritably. "Don't overthink it!" With that, she quickly left, looking like she was fleeing with her tail between her legs.

……

...

The Prince of Lanling's Mansion.

The servants looked worried, glancing at Jinzhan Garden every now and then. Compared to the other masters in Nevernight City, Prince Lanling was undoubtedly a kind and benevolent master. He cared about the servants in the palace and punished stewards who acted unfairly. All the servants respected and loved His Highness from the bottom of their hearts. Since His Highness had not left his room for two days, everyone couldn't help but worry.

Inside the room, Ying Rushi was pale and had a blank, unfocused gaze. She had been in a daze for the past two days, unable to distinguish between day and night. She hid in the corner of the room, hugging her knees, like a doll that had been abandoned for a thousand years.

Ying Ru didn't know what was wrong with her. When she learned that the successor of the natural disaster had raised the banner of rebellion to resist Ying Le's tyranny, she felt as if her spine had been pulled out, her body lost its strength, and she became limp. She just wanted to hide in a corner and avoid everyone's gaze.

No, she actually knew what she was running away from... she was running away from the whispers of the dead.

"Did you hear that? Not everyone will let Ying Le do whatever she wants!"

"You think you have a conscience, but you're nothing but an accomplice to evil and a stand idly by while someone is dying!"

"Why did you send me the red spider lily... If you hadn't, Ying Le wouldn't have killed me! I hate you so much!"

"It's too late, too late! If someone had resisted earlier, my Yuan family of twenty-five might not have died!"

"Your Highness," a servant called cautiously from outside, "a messenger has arrived... a message you instructed us to keep an eye on."

Ying Rushi trembled, overwhelmed by immense anxiety. She couldn't tell whether she was expectant or fearful: "Speak."

"The descendants of the natural disaster severely damaged the troops of 'Bow Marquis' Huang Yan, and were less than thirty miles away from the City of Never Sleeps."

Yingrushi's eyes, which seemed to be covered in dust, slowly began to shine, and then turned into determination.

"Someone, help me change my clothes, I want to go out."

But before Ying Rushi could leave, the imperial decree arrived at the Prince's residence first: His Majesty is personally leading an expedition to punish the 'Yaksha,' the descendant of the Heavenly Calamity, and the Prince of Lanling is accompanying him.

(End of this chapter)