Chapter 397

It seems that the border there is not very peaceful either.

The Second Master Shi whispered: "Lingxu City's control over the Twilight Plain is generally not strict, and forces from various countries walk back and forth."

At this time, Prime Minister Tang came out to say some polite words. The most indispensable part of every birthday celebration is the entertainment segment, so the open space in front of Bai Yun Abode was quickly cleared, and a whole team of people started to go up to perform juggling, magic, and other performances.

The Soul-Absorbing Mirror suddenly said: "Fushan!"

He Lingchuan immediately stepped back and hid behind the pillar before asking: "Where?"

"I mean Fushan... 's person!" The master's movements were too fast, the mirror said sheepishly, "In the crowd below, to the right of the one selling candied haws, the one wearing a black hat!"

He Lingchuan looked down and indeed saw a thirty-year-old strong man wearing a hat beside the small vendor selling candied haws.

At first glance, this man was no different from a commoner, and He Lingchuan might not have recognized the difference at first glance. But after the Soul-Absorbing Mirror called it out, He Lingchuan quickly remembered that this was Fushan's subordinate, whom he had seen in the noodle shop.

To talk about the ability to recognize people, it still has to be the Soul-Absorbing Mirror that is powerful.

This man stared straight at the stage.

He Lingchuan looked at him, then at the old tree man on the stage.

Interesting, is Fushan here for the spiritual seed?

The Soul-Absorbing Mirror felt the master's change and wondered: "Eh, what are you laughing at?"

"Nothing." He Lingchuan stared at the strong man, "I'm thinking, can I see the mantis stalking the cicada."

Soon, the Treasure Tree seed was put into a brocade box and collected by Prime Minister Tang.

The program performance on Bai Yun Mountain would last for three days and three nights; the common people were naturally happy, but the officials and envoy groups would leave first.

I don't know how the Second Master Shi found out the news, but he returned to He Lingchuan not long after and said: "Good news, good news, the team escorting the envoy group to the northern border is organizing, and they will set off in an hour. They will also escort the spiritual seed by the way; it would be best for us to follow!"

He Lingchuan smiled.

The trade routes of Beijia are usually relatively safe, but now that the Emperor's Flowing Pulp has passed only a few days ago, it is still somewhat dangerous for foreign caravans. This escort team is the elite sent by Fufeng City; with them opening the way, the caravan can be much safer on the road.

This is just like refugees moving and liking to follow behind the noble team; with the strong opening the way in front, they also have a safety guarantee.

Bai Yun Mountain is in the northern suburbs of Fufeng City, and the spiritual seed escort team set off directly from here after organizing.

Several clever caravans followed immediately.

The Shi Gate Caravan was one of them.

Before leaving this huge volcanic crater, He Lingchuan looked back one last time, sighing at the majestic figure of the Juluo Tree.

A tree ruling a kingdom, he couldn't imagine it at all before.

Demon nations are truly a magical place.

At this time, the black cat said goodbye to him.

Today's excitement was enough, and this employer was quite generous, giving enough silver and dried fish, but now it had to go back to take care of the children.

"Take the children with you and follow us; the caravan always encounters mice." It was actually the Second Master Shi who suggested to it, "Food and drink are enough."

The black cat was a little moved, and then refused him: "No. It's easy to find work in Fufeng City; my children must grow up in a big city. Who is willing to wander with you?"

"You heartless woman." He Lingchuan was dumbfounded and reached out to it, "Happy cooperation, thank you."

The cat stretched out its front paws like mountain bamboo to high-five him in farewell, then jumped off the sheep's back and left without any nostalgia.

He Lingchuan saw it looking for other humans again, a seven or eight-year-old little girl, and it rubbed against the person's hand to act spoiled, probably wanting to hitch a ride back to Fufeng City...

At this time, another acquaintance rode over from behind: Xu Dongdong.

This guy was also a guard of the Grand Tutor's Mansion who rushed out of the mirror world with He Lingchuan, and had been performing other tasks for the past few days.

He said to He Lingchuan: "Young Master Sha knows you are leaving soon, so he asked me to escort you for a while. Brother Wu can't walk away from the Grand Tutor's side, so he asked me to say goodbye for him."

He Lingchuan thanked him and then asked: "Has Fushan been caught?"

"Not yet, this guy has strong combat power and runs faster than a rabbit; he slips away at the slightest disturbance." Xu Dongdong whispered, "But we caught two of his companions, and after interrogation, we learned that their leader's real name is Fushan Yue."

"This group of people are mercenaries, doing everything from killing people and stealing goods to fighting for dignitaries. This time, the mission they received was to ambush the Shanyu Kingdom's envoy, Bai Zhu."

"Is that the white python?" How does it feel like a diversion? "Yes." Xu Dongdong scratched his head, "When they were collecting the Emperor's Flowing Pulp in Sanxin Plain, they mistakenly killed the deputy envoy of the Eling Kingdom as Bai Zhu. The mission was not completed, and they changed their plan, intending to take action after Bai Zhu left Fufeng City. As for who the employer is, only Fushan Yue knows; these subordinates of his just follow orders."

"Where did Fushan Yue come from?"

"Uh, I don't know." Xu Dongdong sighed, "I just heard these two sentences, and there was no follow-up, so I was sent to find you."

So it was himself who delayed him from listening to gossip? He Lingchuan coughed: "Does this envoy already know that he is on the death list?"

"We have already informed it." Xu Dongdong said, "We have also sent more people to protect it until the border line. I hope it will be safe and sound all the way." Don't lose the prestige of the Treasure Tree King.

He Lingchuan hummed: "An envoy sending gifts, what is the necessity of attacking? And risking offending the Treasure Tree King."

"How would I know?" Xu Dongdong shrugged, "Sometimes these demons are reckless and don't reason at all. The Shanyu Kingdom is in civil strife, and I heard that the court army is retreating steadily; maybe this time it was their opponent who sent someone to assassinate."

"That spiritual seed, can it grow into a guardian of the border just by planting it in the soil?"

"Pretty much." Xu Dongdong chuckled, "I don't know the specifics too well, but my King's incarnation is much more powerful than the mountain spirits. Where it is, there is no need to appoint mountain spirits. It's just that this spiritual seed is not easy to produce; I heard it takes thirty or forty years to gestate one."

"Then the Juluo incarnations guarding the whole territory of the Treasure Tree Kingdom are at most twenty-some?" What a simple arithmetic problem.

"Uh." Xu Dongdong felt he had made a slip of the tongue. How could he let outsiders know about this kind of thing? He Lingchuan observed his expression and knew that this question shouldn't be discussed more, so he changed the subject: "Is the spiritual seed escort team temporarily organized? I see they are all humans, and the mounts are just ordinary horses. At most, there are a dozen wolf demons in the team, this seems..."

Seems not very grand.

The Second Master Shi interrupted: "I thought Fufeng City would send a demon beast army to escort the spiritual seed to the northern border."

Xu Dongdong laughed: "Sounds very majestic, doesn't it?"

"Isn't it?"

"When the King's flag is erected, where are there any blind robbers who dare to come and rob?" Xu Dongdong said, "Besides, how much food does a demon beast army eat? Where can the post stations and towns along the way afford it? Ma Pi are the best, with stable temperaments and great endurance, and they eat grass."

He Lingchuan laughed: "It is indeed an economic account."

Demon beasts like tigers and wolves are all big gluttons; they have to eat meat when they go out, and each head can eat dozens of jin a day. What logistics can afford it? Even herbivorous demons have several times the food intake of ordinary horses.

After calculating, riding horses is the most trouble-saving.

Of course, He Lingchuan understood that this was also because the distance from Fufeng City to the northern border was a bit far; otherwise, sending a demon beast honor guard wouldn't be a big deal.

Furthermore, it was the Treasure Tree King's confidence: who dared to rob the King's army on his territory?

He Lingchuan also had a discovery: even in the Beijia nation, the number of demons was not as large as he imagined.

Taking Fufeng City as an example, after his observation for many days, the ratio of demons to humans was not even one to ten. Even in this capital of the Treasure Tree Kingdom where demons gathered, humans still won in number.

Not to mention the towns he passed along the way, the number of humans was at least thirty times that of demons. The most extreme small town he had been to had more than six hundred permanent residents, while it was said that there were only three demons.

Here, a concept must be distinguished: beasts and demons are two different things.

In the army of General Zhao Pan of the Yuan Kingdom, there was a savage bull assault team led by a savage bull demon; He Lingchuan had almost personally experienced its power at that time. But strictly speaking, among the three hundred bulls in this group, only seven were bull demons, which were generally larger and stronger, very easy to recognize, while the rest were ordinary savage bulls.

In addition, most of the members of the Rock Wolf clan were ordinary rock wolves, and only the truly great black wolves under He Lingchuan's Lu Xin and He Yue could be called demon wolves.

Zhu Erniang's descendants easily exceeded twenty or thirty thousand, but the elite spider guards that became demons were less than one hundred and eighty. When He Lingchuan stayed in the Demon Nest Swamp, he was bored and had counted them by hand.

Relying on so many spider guards, it could occupy the best piece of territory in the Demon Nest Swamp, and other great demons could only swallow their anger.

When He Lingchuan discussed this with Xu Dongdong, he laughed loudly: "How can demons compare with humans in number?"

"I thought Beijia was a demon nation, and demons could be the mainstream." He Lingchuan listened to plays and read storybooks in the Yuan Kingdom, all saying that the northern demon nation was full of demons, how powerful the demon army was, and how miserable the enslaved human commoners lived.

As a result, he came here to see with his own eyes, hehe.

"The demon kings are noble, and Beijia is not short of powerful demons. But if there were no humans, how could such a huge empire be maintained?"

The Second Master Shi also smiled: "Except for humans, who can manage, who can produce?"

He Lingchuan thought it was true. Those like Zhu Erniang who were good at managing agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry, sideline production, and fishing were already anomalies among demons.

Most demons follow their nature, are free and loose, neither as careful as humans, nor can they easily work in groups day after day like humans.

If production and management are not led by humans, grain cannot grow in the fields, mines cannot be mined by anyone, and business cannot be carried out at all; where does wealth come from?

At this time, the Heart-Protecting Mirror interrupted again: "The weakening of the spiritual energy of heaven and earth is the main reason why the number of demons does not grow. The early medieval period was still an era where demon beasts walked everywhere; you could shoot an arrow at random in the wild, and what you hit might be a rabbit demon. But humans are different... No matter how thin the spiritual energy of heaven and earth is, humans are still humans and won't turn into monkeys."

It is also because the demon race is weak that they have to hug together. In the ancient and medieval times, demon immortals were rampant, each occupying one side of the world as a hegemon; where were there demon nations like Beijia?

In the final analysis, it is nothing more than the product of the times.

That night, the team stayed in a small town on the side of the official road.

The escort team was about three hundred people, and the caravan behind had more than one thousand, with cars, horses, and goods; a town couldn't hold them at all.

Fortunately, there was a second town five miles away, and the Shi Gate Caravan went there to settle down.

Other merchants came over to chat, and He Lingchuan heard a piece of news: "Actually, it's not just the escort team staying in that town, there are also three foreign envoy groups, it seems to be Xuluo Kingdom, Chiyan Kingdom, and White Elephant Kingdom. The escort team invited them to stay with them."

January 1st-7th is also double points time, begging everyone to vote for the guaranteed monthly tickets, and vote them out when the time comes, thank you very much.

(End of chapter)