“One should rather understand enemies rather than exaggerate their motives.”

Unknown to Guan Yijiang and Lin Feng, Qai had something different going on in his mind.

As soon as they appeared on the surface of the crevice, the Queen Ant already made Qai known of its intention to go down by itself—in short, the Spirit Beast wanted to stay behind.

According to what Qai understood from his contracted Queen Ant, it was as if there was a strong unknown force that was calling for his Spirit Beast.

Resonance!

So it wanted to explore the depths of the crevice.

He knew it might take a while. However, the Queen Ant guaranteed Qai that it would secretly follow him after in Scarlet Feather Sect camp as soon as it finished its goal.

Qai agreed and thus went together with his seniors towards the exit on the other side of Death Valley. But as soon as the 3 got out, they were amazed to find out that it was dark as well.

The only difference was that there was no longer any presence of black spiritual Qi energy.

“So it was already evening. Inside the Death Valley, it felt like time stopped.”

However, the 3 of them were soon surprised to find out that from their current location, they could sense that the Scarlet Feather Sect camp was just some miles away.

Guan Yijian suddenly took a deep breath.

“This was indeed the shortest route. But it also means that once the enemy realizes this, it will only be a matter of time before they reach our Precious Tree Sect.”

Guan Yijian then flicked his hands and soon 4 formation Flags appeared. He quickly arranged an illusion array formation to hide the entrance to the valley.

“This won't be enough but it’s better than nothing. Let’s just report about this place later to Elder Li so he can set up better restrictions.”

Qai, on the other hand, said nothing and simply nodded in agreement.

Once again, the 3 of them summoned their beast mounts and resumed their journey. And after a few hours, they finally arrived at the camp.

Their first action was, as instructed, to report to Scarlet Feather Sect and report the details of the Precious Tree Sect reinforcements who would be coming to their aid.

They also mentioned about the ambush that they encountered along the way—a fact that no longer surprised the elders in the camp.

Conversely, the 3 were briefed about the current situation on the battlefield and gave them individual cabins to stay while in the camp.

Although there was no large-scale conflict that occurred so far, the small skirmishes here and there proved that the Broken Moon Sect was dead serious with their goal.

At any rate, the Scarlet Feather Sect elders were generous enough not to restrict their movements and gave them the freedom to roam around within the vicinity of the camp.

With that, the first thing that Qai did was to look for the Crag Brothers.

He sent them earlier there, together with 2 Ant Soldiers, in order to set up their shop. But now that the Queen Ant stayed behind, he had no way to contact the two.

Qai asked around and learned that a couple of miles south of the camp, there was a makeshift market set up by merchants that catered more or less a hundred small shops. Mostly, those shops did some buy-and-sell business with the spoils from various cultivators.

Qai did not loiter around any further and immediately left for the said market place. Soon enough, he found the two in a remote location of the market.

Thinking about it, he did not find the ‘location’ of his shop discriminating since most of the other shops around came from established names—and there was no way, he could compete with them in terms of authority and connections.

“Young Master, even if our poor shop does not stand out, our business is doing fine. We have mostly cheap but necessary items here. So it's no wonder many would come looking for a thing or two.”

“Then that's good to hear. But you two should work hard with your cultivation as well, this war might be a long one, and there could be danger everywhere so you best keep yourself safe.”

Qai was not worried about the safety of his 2 followers—they were in the Foundation Establishment stage and were capable of fighting themselves. Besides, with the pair of giant Ants hiding in the shadows, anyone who would cause them some trouble would be surely in a surprise.

“Here, take these Spirit Stones. I need you to look for Foundation Establishment Pills for me. Probably I would need a set of 3. My cultivation technique is quite glutton so I might need more than one.”

While Qai was still far from the great circle of the Qi Condensation stage, he was just looking ahead.

He knew quite well that Foundation Establishment Pills were not easy to acquire. But with plenty of loots from dead cultivators, he was certain that such pills would appear more regularly in this makeshift market than in the cities.

“You don't have to worry, Young Master. There is a regular small-scale auction held on the west side of this place. We would just have to bribe the keeper a bit to keep us posted of the items they have in possession.”

Overall, Qai was satisfied with how the shop was being run by the two.

“By the way, don't forget to enhance your skills in talisman refinement and pill alchemy. If you see some treasures and Jade slips that would help the both of you advance, don't hesitate to use our resources to purchase them.”

“Thank you, Young Master.”

Qai then went back to his cabin and decided to enter into seclusion.

He had taken 3 storage pouches from the enemies, and he was already excited about what he would find in them.

By this time, Qai already possessed much stronger Spiritual Sense and his proficiency in the Array formations and branding method were way better than before. As such, he easily removed the restrictions placed in the storage pouches.

Aside from the banner and the large cauldron he encountered from the fights, he also found the enemies’ flying swords, a bunch of refining materials, precious herbs, medicinal pills, talismans, formation Flags, and thousands of Spirit Stones.

The banner was the treasure that stalled his Spirit Beast Eland in their fight.

Although Qai was not fond of poisons, he knew that the banner would be more efficient when used together with Array formations.

On the other hand, the large cauldron which Qai took from the Broken Moon Sect disciple was a defensive treasure since it can absorb the spiritual Qi energy from an attack.

‘Foundation Establishment stage cultivators are indeed wealthy.’

Qai sighed at the realization of how poor he was—something that he never thought he would see in himself back in his aristocratic life.

However, the best haul that he got from the storage pouches came from the one belonging to the late Foundation Establishment stage Devil Dao cultivator that he killed in one shot.

Unexpectedly, the storage pouch contained a thing that he only saw from the Jade slips in the Treasury Hall when he was studying array formations.

Formation Plate!

Array formation Plates were those that no longer required to be set up because they can be activated in an instant. One only had to throw the plate in the desired position and the Array formation would immediately operate.

‘A truly amazing treasure! Luckily, I killed that cultivator first, otherwise, he could have used this against us.’

In a fight, an enemy might get caught off-guard by just a flick of the hand with such treasure at one’s disposal.

Qai took a deep breath and cherished that moment of killing the Devil Dao cultivators in which he acted decisively.

After inspecting all his gains, he immediately refined and branded the formation plates, the banner, and the large cauldron.

In his mind, those treasures would surely come in handy in the upcoming war.