522 Red Across the Map! (1/2)

Translated by XephiZ

Edited by Aelryinth

”Hello, Brother Fan...”

”You're asking about Boss Zhan Kong? I don't know either, I had completely forgotten about him if you hadn't mentioned him. I haven't heard from him for a long time!”

”I'm in the middle of a mission, so I won't be able to contact him for some time, but I heard that he went missing after returning to Bo City with the Darkwing Wolf's head.”

”Alright, I'll call you immediately if I hear anything from him, but I will be on a mission for some time, I don't know when I'll be back at headquarters.”

”How's the Flame Belle doing?”

”I'm fine, I'm the best at running in the whole team. How could I possibly not outrun my enemy if I can't beat them in a fight? We're all soldiers, so none of us will desert the others. Those who manage to make it back safely will report on the situation back to headquarters. Even if the others are dead, I'll still be fine.”

Zhang Xiaohou was talking to Mo Fan with his earpiece. They had not arrived at the area around Xianchi yet, thus they were not required to stay on high alert.

After hanging up on the call, Wang Tong glanced at him with a gloomy look and blurted out unpleasantly, ”Who were you cursing to be dead? I can guarantee that if someone's going to lose their life on this mission, it will be you for sure!”

”Hehe, I was just using it as an example,” said Zhang Xiaohou, scratching his head.

”You can't even use it as an example… who's the guy on the phone, I heard you call him brother. Didn't you say you're an only child?” Wang Tong continued on with the conversation in boredom.

”We grew up on the same street. He's just like my brother, looking after me since I was little, even now,” said Zhang Xiaohou.

”You're a soldier, talented among the Intermediate Magicians. Why do you sound like you're still a kid, being looked after?” said Wang Tong.

”He's a lot stronger than me.”

”Alright, alright, we've got plenty of those talented maniacs in the army, yet none of them were able to clean up these filthy things...”

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The nine-man team gradually made their way toward Xianchi.

Xianchi was merely the name of a place where there were rarely any plants on the surface. The soil was soft, and usually covered in thin white sand...

The white sand was in fact the dust from corpses that had undergone long exposure to the sun and wind. It looked exactly the same as salt sprinkled over the ground. The locals did not call it salt literally, but referred to the place as the salty land.

{TL Note: Xianchi in Chinese means 'salty pond'. Apparently, in some Chinese poems, it refers to a pond where beautiful girls bathed during ancient times.}

Xianchi was the land between the Qinling Mountains and Xi'an Territory. Since the place was slightly sunken, it looked like a pond on the map, hence it was called Xianchi (Salty Pond).

A lengthy safe zone was constructed along the northeast border of Xianchi. Usually, the safe zone mostly consisted of boundaries set up with fortresses, depots, watchtowers, and supply stations, with cooperation between the army, Hunters, and Magic Association guarding the boundary.

However, the demon beasts in the vicinity of the Ancient Capital were fairly different, so the safe zone of the Ancient Capital was not very stable, only consisting of a long wall around the boundary area.

The wall, constructed by Earth Magicians, served as a layer of defense. As the walls were moved around quite often according to the activity of the undead, some of the villages that were initially within the safe zone would suddenly be excluded from it at times.

If a village was located along the coastline in the south or north, it was extremely dangerous to be outside of the safe zone. The village would be trampled to ashes within a few years, leaving not a single survivor behind.

Meanwhile, the villages located on the edge around the Ancient Capital had their unique methods of avoiding the undead. Hence, there were still villages outside of the safe zone… quite a lot of them, actually. These villages were commonly referred to as the Villages of Miracles by the Magic Associations in other countries, since the villagers were utterly fearless, living outside of the safe zone!

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