Woof! Woof!

Qin Hua instantly recognized the ice spears and dashed over to Lu Chen.

"There you are!" He leaned forward to pat her, but he froze seeing the numerous scars lining her body.

[Woof! I should be the one using puppy dog eyes. Why is he staring at me like this?]

[There. There. It will be alright!] Qin Hua gave the guy a few licks and then leaped back into the battle.

Lu Chen chuckled softly and then once again started assisting her, no longer allowing even a single attack to graze her figure.

Guan Ye, meanwhile, had Lu Chen's back and made sure nothing unexpected happened.

The three of them slowly moved around the place searching for Alex. 

Finally, at the eastern corner of the acidic battlefield pool, there were massive flames raging and they could see the familiar silhouette moving amidst those flames with relatively comfortable ease.

All three of them were stunned to see just how much Alex had improved in such a short time. Qin Hua dashed forward and started helping her and the other two as well joined the fight.

With the four of them pulling down one centipede after another, the numbers started dwindling down a lot faster. On the other side, the military camp team was fighting with almost equal speed.

Just after a few minutes, the entire area was almost completely stripped clean with no more beasts left standing. Only a few spots were still engulfed in loudly roaring flames and smoke fumes.

Taking this opportunity, Lu Chen leaned closer to the dog and whispered. "Hide yourself."

[Woof? Something happened at that camp?] Qin Hua did not fuss and quickly complied. As her figure blurred in the darkness of the night, a group of fifteen men appeared near them.

"Are you guys alright? Is anyone injured?" One of the men stepped forward and muttered.

Lu Chen smiled politely and answered him. "Thank you, sir. We are all fine here. We didn't suffer any severe injuries."

"Yes. Thank you for your concern and help." Alex as well wiped the sweat off of her face and replied.

"Alright then. Everything is good." The man nodded and turned around to wave at his troops. The group of people immediately started moving around and digging through the beast corpses lying scattered all over the area.

Both Alex and Guan Ye looked at Lu Chen with weird expressions. Clearly, these people were crossing a boundary. 

Lu Chen also did not intend to let this slip by just like that. "Sir, I think we killed these beasts. You are mistaken. Your team was fighting on the other side."

"Oh?" The leader looked puzzled. "What do you mean? How does it matter where we fought and which beast we killed? Isn't it all the same?"

One of their men seemed to have come across a mana core still within the beast and he quickly blew a whistle.

"Duyi, go ahead and absorb that. You haven't eaten one in a while right?" 

The leader did not even pay attention to what Lu Chen was talking about and went back to overseeing the clean up that was happening.

However, before the man named Duyi could touch the mana core, a sharp icicle flew out and pinned his hand or rather his shirt to the beast's corpse.

"Ahh!" Duyi yelped in surprise.

Both he and the leader looked at Lu Chen in alarm as the attack had clearly come from his direction and his hand had moved. So who else could it be?

And also, Lu Chen did little to nothing to hide the fact.

The leader looked shocked and hurriedly muttered. "What are you doing?"

"Did I not tell you? We killed these beasts so the mana cores belong to us."

"Heh? Are you sure you want to talk to me like this? Didn't we just now save you guys? Is this the gratitude you show?" The leader sneered.

"Duyi! You go ahead and absorb that core. Let me see what this person here is doing. This is why we should not help everyone while risking our own lives. Hmph. Ungrateful little shits."

Lu Chen chuckled. "Are you trying to intimidate us, sir?" He was about to send another attack when suddenly the mana core was no longer there.

"You! What did you do?" The leader and the man were both shocked. They assumed that Lu Chen had done something.

Lu Chen, on the other hand, smiled helplessly and shook his head. He had no doubt who the culprit was. 

He knew that the said culprit would probably take care of the other mana cores as well, so he didn't see any point in prolonging this fight.

"What did I do? I am standing right here in front of you? Your guy should have absorbed it already and now you are trying to put the blame on me?"

"Ya. Ya. That's right. You keep calling yourself military and you are trying to cheat us, civilians." Alex angrily added. 

She was too tired to pay close attention so she really thought that the other party had absorbed the fruits of their hard work and was furious.

The leader looked at both of them and found himself speechless. He knew that it was dangerous to continue lingering at the site of a battle. So he as well didn't press the issue.

"Just remember to not take any mana cores in the future. They are all government property now and the only way to receive them is by enlisting."

He then scoffed and turned around to leave haughtily. 'Ungrateful youngsters. Wait till you ask me to join our camp. I will make you beg and show you your place.'

A few more minutes passed and something weird started to happen. The leader almost couldn't believe his eyes. 

They had searched the entire place thoroughly and combed it from top to bottom and yet they were still to find even a single mana core. What the hell was happening?