Chapter 478: Inspection Before Entering the Village

They could not help but feel lingering fear; if it hadn't been for the experienced Village Priest of Lanse-Qingting Village, who knew that in these extraordinary times, the goods of visiting merchants had to be inspected in advance, their entire village would likely have been killed or captured by those utterly wicked Defeated Soldiers long ago.

When that time came, what would have awaited them would be the same long-term torment as the villagers of Changmai Village are suffering now.

No one wanted that; just thinking about it was a painful torment.

"Thank goodness, thank goodness, it was fortunate that we saw through those bad guys' conspiracy in advance!"

"Indeed, if it weren't for the Old Priest, our village would have been in trouble." Two villagers breathed a sigh of relief, feeling fortunate.

Jier, however, was somewhat curious about the Village Priest of Lanse-Qingting Village; he knew that Bataer must be familiar with the man, so he asked Bataer directly about him.

"Oh, old Mr. Ruiduokasi, he is very capable. When he was young, he even served as the Village Priest for several surrounding villages simultaneously. He can be considered the main contributor to the development of believers for the Agricultural God Church in the southern part of Sasi County."

Bataer said, but he clearly had more to add: "But he is too old, over eighty. Although his skills are not inferior to when he was young, his energy can no longer keep up. Now he rarely leaves the Nongshen Church in Lanse-Qingting Village, and sometimes he even has to have me step in to handle matters that require physical activity. For example, for the annual reporting, I am the one who represents Changmai Village and Lanse-Qingting Village to explain the situation to the church in Yemei Town."

The two young villagers from Lanse-Qingting Village felt great respect for their village's Old Priest and immediately added: "If old Grandpa Ruiduokasi weren't so old and unable to walk, there would be no chance for those Defeated Soldiers to act so violently. His heroic stories from a lifetime could not be finished even if told for a day and a night."

"Anyway, if those bad guys break into the village, we will just guard the church and fight them to the death! Hmph, it's hard to say who would win in the end! Grandpa Priest can destroy a house with a wave of his hand; no matter how many people they have, they can't win."

Seeing the two speak so earnestly, Jier became curious about the Old Priest's abilities. These Priests of the church seemed to have varying strengths due to the favor of the gods, and the older they were, the more powerful they seemed to be.

Regarding Jier's speculation, Bataer could only shrug: "That's not entirely wrong. Because the Old Priest stays in the church all day, there is no place for him to consume the Divine Power of the Agricultural God, so isn't the Divine Power he has accumulated over a lifetime very formidable? It's just that at their age, the maintenance of their bodies mostly relies on the support of their internal Divine Power. Without that Divine Power, a life that could have lasted another twenty years would probably fail in a year or two."

As they were talking, Jier also signaled for the Caravan to set off southward toward Lanse-Qingting Village. He arranged for the two villagers to sit in the driver's position of the carriage behind, sitting with the drivers.

The two young villagers twisted around curiously in the carriage seats, grabbing here and touching there, which made the drivers steering the carriages extremely annoyed.

After the Caravan started moving, Jier and Bataer rode their horses side by side, talking.

"Priest, you have already told the village about our Caravan's situation, right?"

The Priest nodded: "The first thing I did when I arrived was to explain about the Caravan. Sigh, I originally thought I would bring people to welcome the Caravan after finishing, but then some people told me about the villagers who were captured and escaped, and I was so emotionally agitated that I, I delayed for some time."

Jier also sighed: "I didn't expect those soldiers to have fallen so deeply after doing evil things. The villagers captured later have all suffered such insults and torture; I don't know the current situation of the Changmai Village villagers who were captured earlier."

Seeing that Bataer's mood was becoming unstable again because of his words, he hurriedly added: "But fortunately, those soldiers surely didn't capture people just for fun. It seems they need the captives to do something? Building a camp on the edge of the Shulin? Needing a large number of people to chop wood? Or did those soldiers take Changmai Village and want to repair it? Or perhaps they discovered some benefit and need enough people to dig?"

Although Jier's guesses were far-fetched, they fortunately helped Bataer pull himself together.

The Priest whispered to Jier: "Warrior, those soldiers only ambushed and captured two villagers who ventured out at noon today. They must have arranged long-term Scout personnel in the surrounding area. You are so capable, can you find a way to find them and rescue the villagers who were just captured?"

Seeing that Jier did not reply immediately, he hurriedly said: "I know this is not easy, because such a large area outside the village—small hills, Shulin, streams, and even holes dug by animals—it must be hard to find them. But I think no matter what, we must take out this small group of Scouts who are capturing people outside Lanse-Qingting Village."

"We can't let those Defeated Soldiers know we are coming, right?" Jier said.

"Yes, yes."

"Hmm, indeed. Although we are moving by carriage, our speed will definitely be faster than theirs, as they rely on walking. By the time we reach Changmai Village, even if they sent someone to notify others immediately, they would have only been walking for a day and would still be on the road. But we cannot leave them alone. Although there are few of them, their intentions and behaviors are very malicious. It's hard to say whether these few guys will just turn into a group of cruel, wandering Bandits once we destroy most of the Defeated Soldiers and rescue the Changmai Village villagers."

Jier said hesitantly: "They don't stay in one place; they wander between one village after another, specifically targeting lone individuals or farmers working in the fields outside the village, tying people up, torturing them, and then extorting the villagers. If no one takes them out, they could cause significant loss of life and property in the coming years."

Because if Jier were one of those Defeated Soldier Scouts, he would do exactly that. With the Defeated Soldier organization behind him gone, and a group of villagers everywhere in front of him ready to be plundered and attacked, he would certainly do whatever was most enjoyable, easiest, and most indulgent.

Perhaps, after ravaging the southern part of Sasi County for several years, they could save up a large sum of extorted money and go to other places, or even return to their hometowns, transforming into a farm or manor owner who has bought a lot of land!

And after hearing Jier's analysis, Bataer became even more determined to wipe out all these wicked Defeated Soldiers along the way.

"Those people must be monitoring Lanse-Qingting Village, so they must have a Temporary Yingdi nearby. Although I don't know in which direction, it must be in the vicinity. Let's enter the village first, and after we get in, we can discuss it with Old Priest Ruiduokasi. Relying on his experience and familiarity with the surroundings, we should be able to roughly judge the location of the Temporary Yingdi where those people are hiding."

Bataer said this, and Jier nodded, adding: "If there were hunting dogs in the village, that would be great. Relying on my horses, and perhaps with the help of hunting dogs, we might be able to intercept the liaison personnel notifying the south halfway. This way, unless we appear, the other Defeated Soldiers in the south will have no way of knowing of our existence. We can catch them by surprise!"

Bataer thought carefully, but still felt discouraged: "There are no special hunting dogs in Lanse-Qingting Village, only some guard dogs kept by farmers. They probably won't be of any use, right?"

Jier pursed his lips, looked down at his chest, and wondered if this Divine Art bestowed upon him by the god was ready to be put to use?

The Caravan soon approached Lanse-Qingting Village along the road.

From a distance, he saw that the Village was quite large, and now that he was close, he realized this Village was truly big.

The wall alone stretched in a long arc, extending irregularly from one end to the other. Just a rough estimate, Lanse-Qingting Village, which encompasses that Pond, is several times larger than Big Tree Village. It is about the same size as Duoen Town, where he stayed for a few days before.

But Duoen Town has thousands or tens of thousands of people, while Lanse-Qingting Village has fewer than a thousand.

"This wall is also built too large. I estimate that all the people in the village wouldn't even be able to fill their own village wall, right?" Jier joked.

Bataer shook his head: "There's no way around it. To control the only water source that can be considered a small lake in the surrounding area, one must build such a large wall. Actually, this wall is not for dealing with current Human enemies. Look at their wall, it's not high, right? A low layer three meters high; if the enemy takes a tree trunk, they can use it to climb over."

Jier looked and it was true; the Village wall was only about three meters high. He didn't even need a tree trunk to help; he could jump over it with a light leap. And his Warriors, if they helped each other, could also climb up without other auxiliary tools by forming a human ladder.

"So, this wall is for defending against the Siege Fish?" Jier guessed, though it was a tone of certainty.

The Priest nodded. He walked at the very front of the Caravan, waving to the Villagers on the village gate ahead, and said at the same time: "Yes, to prevent the Siege Fish from rushing in, they built the wall not high, but very thick, because those Monster fish, after failing to get in, would use their sturdy fish heads to ram the wall. After the villagers learned from experience many times, they thickened the wall again and again, reaching its current state."

The gate facing the north of the Village slowly opened a crack from the inside. Although the people inside confirmed that the visitors were Bataer and the helpers he had found, after what happened before, the inspection outside the village could not be skipped at all.

"Caravan, stop! Accept the inspection by the villagers! Weier, show them our supplies when they inspect. Also, remind them that the Wooden Box on the last carriage contains our foreign mercenary Warriors; don't be too surprised."

After Jier finished speaking, the people in the Caravan all laughed. Basically, anyone who sees the Long-haired Lynx Beast for the first time will involuntarily show surprise, and because of the small size of the Mao Maos, they will underestimate their abilities.

In fact, it is quite the opposite; many of Jier's Warriors probably couldn't beat any single Mao Mao at night. These foreign Warriors are also one of the important combat forces under Jier's command at this time.

As long as they are let out at night, they can silently kill several times their own number of enemies.

Even in a frontal battle, Human Warriors fewer in number than them are no match for them at all, especially when their protection is insufficient.

The Caravan stopped slowly, and the Warriors on the carriages looked up at the many Villagers gathered on the village wall, while the Villagers above also looked at them cautiously.

However, unlike the previous Defeated Soldiers who pretended to be a Caravan to attack the village, Jier's Warriors were sitting directly in the open carriage, and how many people there were and how many lethal weapons they carried were clear at a glance.

"There are more than twenty people! Look at the metal reflection in their hands; they are all Warriors holding weapons! The person riding alongside Bataer at the very front, his horse even has armor!"

"There are even more carriages carrying supplies behind. If they are packed with people, we won't be able to stop them here, right? I think it's a bit dangerous."

"Bullshit, Bataer is right there below. If you don't recognize the helpers he brought, you don't recognize him? Old Grandpa Ruiduokasi doesn't like to leave the Church for activities; don't many things in the village get handled by Bataer?"

"That's true."

On the wall and the gate, the Villagers were discussing heatedly.

From the gate that had opened a crack, several elderly Villagers squeezed out. They were all volunteers who risked leaving the village to inspect; even if they were really captured, they were not afraid of death at all.

At worst, they would just lie on the ground, kick their legs, and let the Defeated Soldiers insult them; if they moved even an inch, they would consider themselves the losers.

"Priest!"

"Priest, we are going to inspect now, please understand!"

"Understand, understand! Please inspect the carriages one by one. But be careful, on the last carriage, those boxes contain the foreign Warriors hired by the Jier Warrior beside me, called Long-haired Lynx Beast. Please don't be too surprised when you see them!"

The Priest nodded, jumped directly off his horse, and took three elderly Villagers to start checking from Jier's carriage.

"These are Knight Jier's personal belongings inside; you may look, but do not touch." Xueya Site, who was driving the carriage, did not care about the few people inspecting it; he spoke the ugly truth upfront, guarding against anyone with sticky fingers taking Jier's things.

He lifted the carriage curtain behind him, went inside himself, and then let one elderly Villager climb in as well, simply opening the various boxes and bundles in the carriage to show that no one was hidden inside.

As for the two Villagers outside, they simply checked the bottom of the carriage and the rear of the carriage body, confirming there were no extra places to hide people.

Next were the two open-top carriages carrying the Warriors; because the Warriors on the carriages were staring at them, the three Villagers only briefly checked the undercarriages before hurrying toward the back.

"Please check carefully; I will open the Wooden Boxes of supplies and the tied Rope for you." The Swordsman Weier jumped down from the carriage and said to the three Villagers in an indifferent tone.

This was the focus of the inspection, so the three elderly Villagers perked up, pointing out one by one the Wooden Boxes they found suspicious, while Weier, along with the carriage drivers and Bata'er Jiaoshi, opened and moved the Wooden Boxes to reveal the supply boxes underneath.

The Wooden Boxes containing grain were opened for inspection, and the wooden barrels containing fresh water were shaken vigorously to confirm they were full of liquid.

The Villagers could not help but be careful, as Defeated Soldiers had used this trick before; fortunately, the Old Priest in the village had been cautious at the time and demanded that personnel be sent to inspect the Caravan's goods, so the exposed Defeated Soldiers only ended up capturing a few of the inspecting Villagers.

For an individual or a family, this was naturally a sky-collapsing disaster, but for the entire Cunzi, it was a chance at survival exchanged for a minor loss.

There were no issues with the Caravan's supplies either; when the inspecting Villagers reached the last carriage, they had basically set their minds at ease, knowing the Caravan was indeed the reinforcements Bata'er Jiaoshi had brought, so they were instead curious about the so-called "alien race" in the last carriage.

The vast majority of people had never traveled further in their lives than the largest town in the local prefecture, which was Yemei Town, and had basically never seen what a so-called alien race looked like.

When they opened the Wooden Box and saw the Mao Maos curled up into a ball, lying on scattered metal, they could not help but be greatly disappointed: "Isn't this just a bigger cat!"

"How can this be considered an alien race?"

But the Yongqi Maomao, whose rest had been disturbed, raised its head; after seeing the faces of these Humans it had never met, it suddenly darted out of the Wooden Box. Seeing Jier riding on horseback at the front of the Caravan, it breathed a sigh of relief and said discontentedly to the three elderly Villagers staring at it: "Staring, Mao Mao, what, matter? Disturb, sleep, bad."

Upon hearing this cat standing on its hind legs speak, the three immediately shouted in surprise: "This cat can talk!"

"Hey, how strange!"

"Is this an alien race? Truly magical!"

Their words, along with the Mao Mao standing on the Wooden Box, drew other Villagers on the gate and walls of the Cunzi to look over curiously.

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