Proofreader: M_W Miss Fierce

After sleeping for a few hours, Leo and the others finally recovered a lot of their lost energy and stamina.

Energy and stamina are very important for Mages since that is what they use every time they are casting any Magic spells, especially when combining together casting Magic spells and fighting.

They then left their tent as Leo called out for Mayor Jong to quickly begin forming a team to scout the situation ahead.

After a few minutes, the team was finally formed, specifically a total of 20 people, including Leo, Cassandra, Elizabeth, Angel, Veronica, Ash, and Charlotte.

The team was composed of 15 Mages, specifically five 1 Star Mages, five 2 Star Mages, one 3 Star Mage, two 4 Star Mages, two 5 Star Mages. While there were 5 Magical Knights, four of them were 3 Star Magical Knight while the last was a 9 Star Battle Mage.

"Let's go," Leo said before leaving the 5th outpost.

All the outposts were just similar in layout. They only have 3 pathways to get in and out, and the one that Leo had to choose was the left path. This was in order to inconspicuously leave the outpost.

If they just simply go through the middle and walk straight, then they would surely be fighting against a hundred or so of Sandstone Spiders every now then.

It would have been alright if there are hundreds of them, but right now there are only 20 of them to scout the situation at the Sandstone Mother Spider's nest. They would certainly be easily exhausted if they keep on fighting.

That's why they choose to be inconspicuous and also careful. It would be alright to still attract Sandstone Spiders, but they should try their best to minimize them as much as possible while moving.

Because of that plan, along their way, Leo and the others only encountered a few tens or so of Sandstone Spiders.

They quickly and silently killed all of those Sandstone Spiders before swiftly leaving the place incase that it had attracted the nearby Sandstone Spiders' attention.

After more than an hour of traveling, they arrived at a place almost covered with webs. This place was clearly the last line of defense before finally arriving at the Sandstone Mother Spider's nest.

In order for Leo and the others to travel, they have to always cut the webs using their weapons as silent and careful as possible while at the same time prepared in any case of Sandstone Spiders attacking them.

This place was obviously where the Sandstone Spiders are best at when it comes to fighting, or even any other Magical Beast Spiders, so they can't afford to be careless.

Whish!

Charlotte cut a web with an earth dagger as she was the one leading their front, while in their right and their rear were the 4 to 5 Star Mages and 4 Star Magical Knights, and in the middle were those weaker ones.

"Most of the possible situation in this place will definitely have a high chance of turning for the worst, so everyone should be prepared to fight an extremely hard battle," Leo reminded everyone. He then added, "If such situation really comes, prepare to retreat while sticking closely in formation. I don't recommend you trying to leave alone as that would just be suicide and not to mention would cost everyone from Sandy Town to die. You know what I meant about that last part, right?"

He didn't forget to discourage everyone, in particular, the people from Sandy Town, from thinking of abandoning the others if ever the situation really turns out for the worst. Like for example, hundreds or even thousands of Sandstone Spiders had noticed them and hence right after attacked them. Or maybe a group of Sandstone Knight Spiders or worst a Sandstone Mother Spider had attacked them.

It's very obvious already that almost everyone would feel afraid for their lives once such a situation indeed happened, and it's not strange for someone to think of abandoning everyone for the sake of their very own life.

So, to counter that, he threw a threat right away that if they indeed do that their entire Sandy Town would be destroyed.

Obviously, by the Lionheart Kingdom.

With Lex and Virgil stationed at the Sandy Town at this moment, once they received a report that he had died or something bad had happened to him, they would definitely not hesitate to return to Lionheart Kingdom and report it to his Master Olivia. In no time, she would come and investigate it personally. Once she discovers that someone had purposely caused them to fall into such a situation, Sandy Town would right after suffering from the consequences.

If the Sandy Town was really what Mayor Jong had said it was, then every Earthen Spirit race living in the Sandy Town wouldn't want for such a situation to become a reality, because once that happened it would further lessen the few remaining High Spirit races hiding in secret, which would, in turn, lessen their chances of making a comeback as well.

Of course, they can also choose to evacuate and go somewhere else, but that would still not guarantee their safety since Queen Olivia, and not to mention his older brother Reinhart, would definitely hunt all of them down.

Hearing Leo's words, everyone that was personally assigned by Mayor Jong gulped down a mouthful of saliva before turning extremely serious and high alert.

Seeing their reaction, Leo can't help smiling mischievously as this was the same as what he had expected.

"This should somewhat confirm that they are people of the Earthen Spirit race," Leo thought to himself as he now has a clue to confirm that what Mayor Jong had said before was really the truth. After all, if these people were not really from the Earthen Spirit race, of course aside from Mayor Jong only as he had already confirmed it through the scene he had just seen before, then they wouldn't be reacting in such a way, since using the Sandy Town as a threat wouldn't be very effective.

They continued their journey deep inside the web-covered place, moving extremely carefully and silently at the same time. Occasionally, they would encounter and fight against a Sandstone Spider, but they always end it as fast as they possibly could.

During their travel, they finally confirmed the existence of the Sandstone Knight Spiders, as they have slain a few of them already.

However, that discovery just made the situation even stranger as they have soon after noticed that this place actually only has a few Sandstone Knight Spiders while the rest of the Sandstone Spiders were just similar to what was attacking their 5th outpost, specifically ordinary Sandstone Spiders and Sandstone Soldier Spiders.

So far, they have only encountered 5 Sandstone Knight Spiders, which shouldn't be possible considering that this is the last line of defense before entering the Sandstone Mother Spider's nest.

"I'm now one hundred percent sure that something unfortunate had indeed happened in the Sandstone Mother Spider's nest, causing them to not pay that much attention to us," Cassandra confidently confirmed her assumptions a while ago. At first, she only thought about such an assumption as she really found it strange why only the weak Sandstone Spiders were attacking their 5th outpost. But personally seeing the ratio of Sandstone Knight Spiders actually being low in numbers despite this place being a nest with a lot of Sandstone Mother Spiders, she could finally confirm with confidence that her assumption was correct, that something unfortunate had indeed happened to the Sandstone Mother Spider's nest.

"That might indeed just be the case," Elizabeth, Angel, Veronica, Ash, and Charlotte also agreed with Cassandra's assumption.

"If that's indeed the case right now, then it would be very fortunate for our part as it decreases the difficulty of our mission," Cassandra said in delight.

What Cassandra had meant with her words was that; if an unfortunate event has really befallen the Sandstone Mother Spider's nest, causing their numbers to decrease, then it would also decrease the difficulty of their mission as well since fewer Sandstone Spiders meant that there would only be a few Sandstone Spiders that would post a problem for their mission.

However, on the side, Leo secretly disagreed with Cassandra's claim. There only exist one reason, or otherwise the unfortunate event that had befallen the Sandstone Spiders that had caused their numbers to decrease, and that is another Magical Beast tribe had attacked the Sandstone Mother Spider's nest, causing their numbers to decrease in the fight.

What does that mean? Well, it simply meant another problem has appeared in their mission right now.

The Sandstone Mother Spider's nest is already a very big problem, not to mention the Magical Beast tribe of the Beast Lord Sandpit Worm that would be lured by Ethan's group in the Sandstone Mother Spider's nest. But with now a potential 3rd Magical Beast tribe, then it would mean that they would be fighting against three Magical Beast tribes in order to successfully take away the water source from the hands of the Magical Beast.

One Magical Beast tribe against another Magical Beast tribe would be easy to handle because once one of them is defeated, his group can simply jump in to eliminate the winner. But if there indeed exists another one, then that third Magical Beast tribe would be the one to jump in and become the final winner, while his group can only stay at the side and prepare to fight against that third Magical Beast tribe.

Of course, it would have been fine if the third Magical Beast tribe had also received a significant decrease in numbers as well before finally winning, meaning the three Magical Beast tribes had fought at the same time, or even at almost the same time.

But the thing is, if what Cassandra had said was indeed what is currently happening right now, then the two Magical Beast tribes had already started the fight long ago and have even lost a lot of their soldiers. While on the other hand, the Magical Beast tribe of the Beast Lord Sandpit Worm, specifically the 3rd Magical Beast tribe, is going to be lured by Ethan's group in this location unaware of what is currently going on, which would most likely result in the 3rd Magical Beast tribe ripping all the benefits for themselves while only losing a small fraction of their Magical Beast tribe.

Because of that, Leo's group would certainly be fighting against a Magical Beast tribe that is still in its topmost condition.