"Strange, there are some scattered corpses here," said Hong Niao, who was relatively observant.

"It's normal, since the Giant Lizards always fight one another for territories or partners. Come, we're one step closer to our treasure. HAHAHA, we'll all be rich once we get our hands on the Flowing Mud!" Huang Zhuosi, who was rather insensitive, burst into laughter.

Everyone's expression turned weird when they heard his shout. They subconsciously glanced at the woman called Li Man.

"Idiot, you've exposed the Earth Element Soul Seed that we are looking for. The Flowing Mud is a high-quality Earth Element Soul Seed. The estimated market price is around thirty million RMB. I swear I'll skin you alive if you screw this up!" the captain, Liang Dachui, glared at Huang Zhuosi.

Huang Zhuosi let out an awkward smile. He cast a glance at Li Man and realized that she was only glancing at them indifferently. It seemed like she was not too interested in a Spirit-grade Soul Seed like the Flowing Mud.

------

As they arrived at the valley, they immediately saw its astonishing brilliance. The golden sunlight of the setting sun had laid a golden rug across the Giant Lizards, which were wriggling as they moved. Not only was half of the basin filled with them, even the slope of the mountain was crowded with the Giant Lizards. From afar, it looked like the entire place was covered in gold!

"Holy crap, how many Giant Lizards are there!" exclaimed Hong Niao when he witnessed the spectacular sight. Instead of admiring the view, he could feel his scalp going numb.

If they somehow ended up being surrounded in the valley, they would be like sheep entering a pack of wolves, with no chance of surviving.

"Captain, are you sure we're going in?" Huang Zhuosi felt like retreating when he saw these many Giant Lizards.

The treasure was important, but everything would be in vain if he lost his life here!

"I...I also think that it's too risky," the others agreed

"We've already come this far. Don't worry, Hong Niao's plan will surely work," said Liang Dachui with a deep breath, although he looked quite nervous too.

Luckily, the valley was fairly spacious, thus there were quite a few hiding spots for them. Otherwise, even a few extra lives would not be enough for them to barge into the demon beasts' valley.

------

Li Man split up with the Hunter Group when they arrived at the valley.

She was quite interested too, but it would not make sense if a Commander were to take advantage of them after they had invested great effort in collecting the information, coming up with a plan, and risking their lives to acquire the Earth Element Soul Seed.

Li Man followed the trails of the corpses. The Hunter Group agreed to split up, knowing that she was looking for something else.

They were more interested in the treasure, since what kind of woman would they not be able to find when they had the money?

However, soon after the group entered the valley, a nimble figure followed along their trail.

He glanced at the group of hunters and the female Magician who had split up, and quickly inspected the corpses on the ground. In the end, he chose to go after the female Magician.

The person was none other than Zhang Xiaohou, who had left the army to infiltrate Dongting Lake on his own.

As a matter of fact, he had followed Wang Dachui's group all the way from Biyi City. The experienced hunters had never noticed his existence along the journey.

Zhang Xiaohou was mainly in charge of tracking and spying in the army. He was considered a special forces soldier among the Battlemages, although it was closely related to the two Elements he had.

"Brother Fan, I'm very close to finding you!" Zhang Xiaohou felt even more confident when he saw the causes of death of the corpses nearby.

---

Li Man continued her search, following the corpses. She believed that she was very close to finding the Deathbringer of Dongting Lake.

The term had appeared in the Hunter Union when a large number of Giant Lizards were found dead close to Dongting Lake. When the hunters discovered the Giant Lizards all had similar wounds, they referred to their killer as the Deathbringer of Dongting Lake.

Li Man was the representative from the military sent to investigate the matter. Dongting Lake had been a sensitive and dangerous area for quite some time, so she was not willing to overlook any tiny detail, just in case it turned out to be a new Commander-level demon beast, or something even more dangerous. It would become a great threat to Biyi City!

"Strange, my legs feel heavy. I don't think my stamina should be this bad, even though it's been a while since I was last out on the field..." Li Man had no choice, but to find a dry spot to rest up after walking past a swampy area.

She quickly took off her boots to check her legs.

"Damn it, why was I so careless!" Li Man finally discovered the reason. Her feet were somehow poisoned by the swamp. Her jade-white feet were dyed purple.

Li Man was reallocated to Dongting Lake quite recently, thus she was not very familiar with the environment. As such, she did not put too much attention on her precautions toward poisonous substances.

"This doesn't make sense, I'm already following the advice given by my comrades. Besides, with my cultivation, there's no way I would be poisoned so easily. Could this be an unknown poison...Where did it come from, such a strong poison!" Li Man anxiously sat down on the rock.

She immediately applied all the antidotes she had brought with her, but she was surprised when none of them was effective against the poison, which continued to spread up her legs!

The swamp was a mix between Water and Earth Elements, thus she tried using the respective antidotes, but none of them worked.

This is bad!

Li Man was not afraid of demon beasts. She would not mind killing any of them that she stumbled into.

However, poison was definitely troublesome to deal with. She was clueless about it, and she was not well-prepared for this adventure. She had no idea what to do in her current situation.

"The hunters must have gone far away… Should I fire a signal to ask for help? The army would send someone over...but if they knew I failed to accomplish the mission just because I've been poisoned, everyone would laugh at me. Those old jerks never liked me intervening with their business at Biyi Headquarters to begin with!" Li Man clenched her teeth and gave up on the thought.

She tried other ways to cleanse the poison, but its strength totally surpassed her expectations.

When the purple poison made its way to Li Man's knees, she finally regretted her idiotic decision.

The poison was definitely nothing ordinary!

As the sky fell darker, Li Man began to feel dizzy. It would be rather difficult for her to send a signal now.

She would need to make some preparations before firing the signal. Otherwise, a normal signal would just expose her location to the demon beasts. Li Man leaned against the cold rock and panted heavily.

The poison continued to spread in her body. Li Man could no longer move. She could hear distant cries of the Giant Lizards around her as her eyelids fell heavily.

She had no idea if her spot was concealed enough. All she could do was to pray that the Giant Lizards would not notice her, otherwise...

Just as Li Man was falling unconscious, she felt a strong electric current passing in front of her. It struck a Giant Lizard crawling toward her, and instantly killed it.

Li Man's heart skipped a beat.

How bad exactly was her luck? Not only was she immobilized because of some strong poison, the Deathbringer of Dongting Lake just had to show itself now, too!

Most of the Giant Lizards had died after being punctured by lightning. Li Man was confident that the figure coming closer to her was the one she had been searching for!