Douluo Continent: Tonight, a Fairy Tale Descends

His face didn't reveal much expression, but the fingers gripping the edge of the battle report tightened slightly, causing a few small creases to form on the paper's edges.

He had anticipated that the war might be somewhat difficult, but he had not expected it to be this difficult.

The Spirit Hall dispatched four Title Douluos to the southern front, among whom the Serpent Spear Douluo She Long was particularly formidable in combat.

His spear seemed to come alive, each time it appeared precisely piercing the weak points of the Star Luo Empire's formation, cutting through one elite unit after another.

What troubled Dai Tianfeng even more was that the Spirit Hall not only dispatched a Title Douluo, but also deployed a large number of highly trained high-level Soul Masters.

Although those Soul Masters were not of high rank, mostly between Soul Master and Soul King, their teamwork was extremely smooth, their tactics were executed precisely, and their fighting spirit far surpassed that of the troops temporarily conscripted by the Star Luo Empire.

The Star Luo Empire's advantage lies in the sheer number of its troops, particularly its well-trained regular army.

However, in the face of high-level Soul Master battles and the suppression of Title Douluo-level opponents, the advantage of numbers is greatly weakened, and even becomes a burden to some extent.

The large number of low-ranking soldiers were powerless against the aftershocks of the Title Douluo's soul skill; a single area-of-effect attack was enough to destroy the morale of the entire formation.

Dai Tianfeng put down the battle report, turned around, and looked at the map spread out on the table. He was silent for a moment, then said, "Pass down the order: all troops are to temporarily retreat to the second line of defense. Do not rush to counterattack. We will make plans after we have determined the Spirit Hall's subsequent deployment."

At this moment, the situation in the North presents a completely different picture.

While smoke did exist over the northern front, it was nowhere near as thick as in the south, obscuring the sun.

The armies of the Northern Territory and the Spirit Hall did indeed have several encounters, but they were all small in scale. It was like two boxers deliberately controlling their strength, tentatively touching each other's fists, and then each taking half a step back to widen the distance again.

Occasionally, scouts would encounter each other in the border area, engage in a brief skirmish, resulting in a few casualties, before retreating to their respective defensive lines.

Occasionally, there would be small-scale sieges. The Northern Allied Forces would attempt to attack several border towns occupied by the Spirit Hall. The Spirit Hall's defenders would put up a resistance for a while, then retreat on their own initiative, handing over those towns to the enemy.

But if we push any further forward, the Spirit Hall's defenses become exceptionally strong, as if an invisible boundary exists there, and both sides tacitly agree not to cross it.

On the Iron Gate Pass city wall, Eva stood behind the crenellations, the night breeze gently lifting the stray hairs on her forehead.

Her gaze fell upon the plain shrouded in twilight, where she saw the lights of the Spirit Hall's military camp lighting up one after another in the distance, echoing the flames on her city walls.

She knew that the Spirit Hall had mobilized a large number of troops on the southern front.

She was well aware that the three-way alliance on the western front was struggling to survive. But she was even more aware that Bibi Dong's attitude towards her side was completely different from that towards the other sides.

Eva didn't delve into the reasons behind it; she simply took advantage of the situation.

Chapter 561 Emotions and Therapy

Eva needs time to rest, time to digest the results of that great victory, and time to fully integrate the newly surrendered troops into the Northern system.

Therefore, she was willing to maintain this tacit standoff, and as long as the Spirit Hall did not launch a large-scale attack on the northern border, she would not be in a hurry to advance south.

Moreover, she did intend for other forces to weaken their and the Spirit Hall's strength first.

The greater the pressure on the Star Luo Empire and the Three Sects Alliance's armies on the main battlefield, the more the Spirit Hall's forces will be tied down. Only when the other fronts are exhausted will the well-preserved Northern Force become the decisive piece in the game.

It was on this battlefield, which was neither intense nor peaceful, that Xiao Wu truly experienced the weight of war for the first time.

That evening, she accompanied a scout squad of the Northern Allied Forces on a border patrol mission.

The mission itself wasn't complicated; it simply involved identifying an area along the border suspected of being frequented by Spirit Hall scouts. However, on their return journey, they encountered a Spirit Hall patrol team.

The battle was short-lived, and neither side brought heavy troops; both were equipped with lightly armed scouts.

Xiao Wu defeated two opponents in her usual way during the battle, with clean and efficient movements that could even be described as effortless.

But when the battle ended, as she stood on the land dyed dark red by the setting sun, looking at the several motionless figures on the ground, she suddenly felt something was wrong.

She stood there, the short blade in her hand still dripping blood, which fell onto the mud at her feet, leaving a small, dark, damp stain.

The wind blew across the plains, carrying the smell of gunpowder and blood, and brought to her ears the faint sounds coming from the direction of the Spirit Hall's military camp in the distance.

She looked down at her hands, at the bloodstains between her fingers that were still wet, and at the young faces on the ground.

The faces were about her age, some even looking younger. They lay there, eyes half-open, as if they had lost the chance to react forever before they even had a chance to understand what had happened.

Xiao Wu suddenly felt a little lost.

She thought she would feel pleased, after all, those people were soldiers of the Spirit Hall, people from the opposing camp.

But she found that she didn't feel that way at all; the vengeful pleasure she had expected didn't arise in her mind.

She just felt empty. It was as if something had been taken from her body, leaving a void that was neither too big nor too small, yet impossible to ignore.

That night, after returning to the camp, Xiao Wu did not go straight back to her own barracks.

She walked to a relatively secluded spot at the edge of the camp, sat under a dead shrub, placed the short blade at her feet, clasped her hands on her knees, lowered her head, and remained silent for a long time.

Not far away, the campfire in the camp was still flickering, and the soldiers sat together talking in hushed tones, occasionally letting out a few suppressed laughs, which mingled with the sound of the watchman's drum coming from the distant city wall, like an ordinary night in peacetime.

But Xiao Wu knew it was just an illusion.

She sat there, her mind filled with questions she had never seriously considered before.

Those Spirit Hall soldiers she killed also had families, things they cared about, and people waiting for them to return somewhere.

They, too, once stood in their own ranks, just like her, waiting for the day they would go to the battlefield.

But the outcome they received was different from hers.

A cool night breeze blew across the plains, gently lifting the strands of Xiao Wu's hair that fell over her shoulders.

She raised her hand and rubbed her cheek with the back of her hand; her fingers could feel a slight stickiness when they touched her skin.

That was blood that had splattered on her face during the day. She hadn't had time to wipe it off then, and now it had dried and formed a thin scab.

She rubbed it vigorously twice, removing the dried scab and revealing the slightly reddened skin underneath.

Then she lowered her head again and remained silent.

I don't know how much time had passed, but then a very light footstep came from behind.

Xiao Wu didn't turn around, but she knew who it was.

Zhu Zhuqing sat down on the ground next to her, very quietly, brushing past her shoulder, with about an arm's length between them.

Neither of them spoke; they simply sat quietly, gazing at the camp shrouded in twilight and the distant outline of the city walls.

After a long while, Zhu Zhuqing finally spoke, her voice low and her clear, cold tone sounding somewhat muffled in the night wind: "First time on the battlefield?"

Xiao Wu didn't answer, but she loosened her grip on her knees slightly.

Zhu Zhuqing didn't press further. She simply sat there quietly, her gaze fixed on the campsite shrouded in twilight ahead, as if waiting for Xiao Wu to speak.

After a while, Xiao Wu's voice finally came through, a little hoarse, as if something was stuck in her throat:

"I thought I would feel something when I killed them... I thought I would be happy, after all, they were people from the Spirit Hall, enemies... but when I actually killed them, I felt nothing."

Zhu Zhuqing didn't respond; she just listened quietly.

Xiao Wu lowered her head and looked at her hands.

Her fingers were long and slender, and she had wiped away the bloodstains that had been splattered on her during the day, but she still felt that there was a sticky feeling between her fingers.

“Those people were all very young, some of them looked even younger than me.”

“They are all just ordinary soldiers,” Zhu Zhuqing’s voice came from the side.

"Not every enemy is someone you hate. Most people go to war not because they want to fight, but simply because of their different positions and circumstances. They are just like you, pawns in this game."

A night breeze blew in from outside the camp, causing the banners on the distant city walls to flutter in the wind.

Zhu Zhuqing was silent for a moment, as if considering her next words, then her voice was slightly softer than before, but still steady:

“When I killed someone for the first time, I sat up all night like you. I was thinking, were there people waiting for those I killed to go back to them?”

Xiao Wu turned her head to look at her. Zhu Zhuqing's profile appeared particularly cold in the twilight, as if covered with a thin layer of frost.

"Later I figured it out." Zhu Zhuqing's voice remained cold and indifferent, revealing no emotional fluctuations.

“War is never clean. Whether you kill them or they kill you, it doesn’t change anything. But you’re already here, you’re already on this line, and you either keep going or stop and get trampled over by the people behind you.”

Xiao Wu was silent for a moment: "And you? Have you gotten used to it by now?"

Zhu Zhuqing did not answer immediately.

She also lowered her head and looked at her hands, those slender, well-defined hands, with clean and neat fingertips, showing no trace of blood.

"No," she said softly, "I just don't think about it the way I did the first time."

Moonlight filtered through the gaps in the clouds, casting a long, thin shadow on the ground between the two women, dividing their faces into two halves of light and shadow.

Xiao Wu lowered her head and looked at her outstretched palms. Her hands were slender and fair, just like Zhu Zhuqing's hands, without any visible marks.

But only she knew that the feeling of that touch from the daytime still lingered in her memory—warm, sticky, and with a rusty smell.

She took a deep breath and then slowly exhaled, as if expelling the invisible stone from her chest: "I'm fine. You can go back now, you don't need to stay with me."

Zhu Zhuqing stood up, patted the dirt off her robes, said nothing, and turned to walk deeper into the camp.

Her footsteps faded into the distance, eventually swallowed by the night wind and the crackling of the distant campfire, like a drop of ink dissolving into a river, leaving no trace.

Xiao Wu sat alone under that withered tree for a long time, so long that the lights in the camp went out one by one, and so long that even the sound of the watchman's drum on the distant city wall became sparse.

She looked at the camp that was becoming quiet, then sheathed her short blade, stood up, brushed the dust off her skirt, and walked toward her barracks.

The next morning, the sky over the North was still gray, with a thin layer of chill in the air.

Xiao Wu appeared on the training ground on time, lining up, practicing, and carrying out tasks as usual, showing no signs of anything amiss.

Only occasionally, during breaks, would she unconsciously glance at her hands, then quickly look away.

Days passed by like this.

The northern front remained in a delicate balance; the allied forces did not advance on a large scale, and the Spirit Hall did not launch a counterattack.

Small-scale skirmishes continued, with injuries and deaths, but the overall battle situation did not experience drastic fluctuations.

Xiao Wu, in this seemingly calm tug-of-war, gradually adjusted her inner rhythm, slowly reconciling those once idealized fantasies with the reality before her.

She came to the North to kill Bibidon and avenge her mother; that thought remained, like a flame buried deep in her heart.

But now she is beginning to understand that war is not the kind of quick revenge she imagined; it is a long and tortuous road.

She is still walking on this road, far from reaching the end.

……

Starry Sky Forest.

The morning light slowly spreads across the eastern horizon, filtering through layers of tree canopy and casting dappled shadows on the damp forest floor.