[Year 802]
[In this year, Sunreach Prefecture was lost. The general guarding the border of the Endless Forest was negligent. The Prefecture Lord and hidden factions concealed the news of the Wu Tribe's attack, allowing the Wu Tribe to drive straight into the Azure Imperial Dynasty.
The Wu Tribe advanced with ferocious momentum; the Shadowfell Prefecture was pinned down by Wu Tribe forces.
The Imperial Dynasty was unable to respond in time, allowing the Wu Tribe to drive straight into the Central Plains of the dynasty.]
In the Shadowfell Prefecture, a colossally vast city came into view.
Spirit Boats filled both the sky and the ground. Armored soldiers of the dynasty and cultivators arriving from all corners of the Azure Imperial Dynasty hurried to and fro.
The entire city resembled a machine in full operation.
Yet, within this military city, there stood a temple. Several soldiers dressed as generals entered the temple, and in the blink of an eye, they arrived within the Combat Grotto-Heaven.
In the spacious courtyard of the Combat Grotto-Heaven.
Li Tianyue and Li Kuanghua were gazing ahead, where a map of the Imperial Dynasty formed from Spiritual power was displayed before their eyes.
With a casual wave of Li Tianyue's hand, a long crimson line appeared across the center of the Dynasty's thirty-six prefectures, cleaving the entire realm into North and South.
Then, like the spreading roots of a tree, that crimson line began to branch out in all directions across the Dynasty.
It was the route map of the Wu Tribe's movements since breaching the Imperial Dynasty!
"The Wu Tribe broke in, but why are their forces so scattered?!!" Li Kuanghua stared at the map in disbelief.
Those blood-red patterns represented the marching routes taken by the Wu Tribe since their invasion a year ago!
In the span of just one short year, Li Kuanghua had experienced so much within the Shadowfell Prefecture.
Having fought the Wu Tribe for over a century, she had never felt as despairing as she did on that specific day.
Sunreach Prefecture had been completely defenseless. She clearly remembered when the Wu Tribe broke through last year; they came like a tidal wave, utterly unstoppable.
By the time Crown Prince Fei Heng attempted to lead his troops to intercept them, it was already too late.
Li Tianyue's brows knit together tightly.
"The Wu Tribe has a master strategist behind them.
By invading the Central Plains, they have certainly caused us trouble, but they also cut themselves off from their supply lines, and their battlefront is overextended.
If they continued to fight in large army corps, sooner or later, they would be worn down by us. However, if they blend into the Imperial Dynasty, scattering their forces to gradually encroach upon our territory, they can reverse their disadvantageous position."
"Their objective is to let scattered soldiers sow chaos within our Azure Dynasty, while their main tribes pin down our grand army.
Those dispersed Wu Tribe forces will disrupt our supply lines and slaughter our commoners, causing us immense trouble."
Li Kuanghua frowned. The Wu Tribe looked no different from the Human Race.
Veterans like them, who had fought the Wu Tribes for years, could naturally identify them, but what about the rest of the Azure Dynasty?
Although she was situated at the main battlefield in Shadowfell Prefecture, Li Kuanghua could already imagine just how chaotic the entire Azure Dynasty had become.
As the two were conversing, a hurried figure was seen approaching them.
The Patriarch of the Sunreach Prefecture Zhangsun Clan, Zhangsun Buhuo.
Her complexion was pale, and her aura was chaotic. Li Kuanghua could sense that Zhangsun Buhuo had just come from a battle on her way here.
This stirred a trace of pity in Li Kuanghua's heart.
Just last year, Zhangsun Buhuo had come to pledge her loyalty to Crown Prince Fei Heng, but at the very moment of her pledge, she received the news that the Wu Tribe had invaded.
Sunreach Prefecture was the territory of the Zhangsun family.
This calamity had dealt a devastating blow to them; even the Integration realm ancestor of the Zhangsun family had been injured by a Wu Tribe Venerable.
The Zhangsun Clan resisted with their lives, losing thirty percent of their clansmen in that single battle.
If not for the rescue efforts of over a dozen Void Refining cultivators and hundreds of other cultivators from the Azure Cloud Prefecture, the Heavenly Monarch Dao Sanctuary, and the Eternal Immortal Sect, the Zhangsun Clan might have been completely wiped out.
"General Li."
Zhangsun Buhuo handed a jade talisman to Li Tianyue.
"Over the past half-year, my clan has transferred all our foundations out of Sunreach Prefecture and has already found a new location to establish a Grotto-Heaven.
We also conducted a thorough investigation within Sunreach Prefecture; everyone who was negligent in their duties on that day has been recorded in this register."
Li Tianyue accepted the jade talisman. Recorded within were names after names—these were the very people who had allowed the Wu Tribe to enter Sunreach Prefecture.
Without exception, they... had vanished!
"It is just like what happened at the Mountain of Esoteric Stratagems back then. They betrayed us without any warning, and afterwards, no trace of them could be found."
The eyes of this beautiful woman, Zhangsun Buhuo, were filled with hatred.
"It is the people of the Peerless Hall. It is Min Tiange. It must be them!"
Hearing this, Li Tianyue and Li Kuanghua both frowned.
Within their clan, there was a consensus that Min Tiange was the perpetrator.
However, as to Min Tiange's actual whereabouts or the location of the Peerless Hall—never mind them, even Min Youguo did not know.
"Patriarch Zhangsun," Li Tianyue said gently,
"I will report the intelligence you gathered from Sunreach Prefecture to the Crown Prince.
The news will also be sent back to the imperial court.
I believe Wu Neng of the Immortal Suppression Department is even more anxious about this than you are. We simply need to do our part."
"Mn."
Zhangsun Buhuo's jaw clenched tight.
No one knew what tomorrow would hold—just like that day when the Wu Tribe broke into Sunreach Prefecture, leaving her completely at a loss.
She could only hurriedly seek reinforcements, return to her family, and face the ceaseless stream of Wu Tribe tribesmen charging into Sunreach Prefecture.
Then came the flight with her clansmen, forcing them to adapt bit by bit to the torrential changes of the era.
And now, where did she have the time to concern herself with Min Tiange? The Zhangsun Clan could only select a new place to settle and continue their loyal service under the Crown Prince.
They would wield the authority of the Immortal Suppression Department, monitoring the various powers across the prefectures now that the Wu Tribe had entered the Azure Imperial Dynasty, ensuring that cultivators did not take advantage of the chaos to do as they pleased.
"I truly do not know how your Azure Cloud Li Clan managed to adapt and survive back when the Wu Tribe invaded the Azure Cloud Prefecture."
Zhangsun Buhuo's face was filled with bitterness.
Everyone in the entire Azure Imperial Dynasty had heard the story of the Wu Tribe's invasion of the Azure Cloud Prefecture.
For hundreds of years, people had said that the Wu Tribe, who invaded the Azure Cloud Prefecture back then, were nothing special—that they didn't even have a single Void Refining cultivator among them.
It was said that any major power within the Azure Imperial Dynasty, if casually dispatched, could have slaughtered those Wu Tribe tribesmen to the last man.
At that time, even Zhangsun Buhuo had believed this.
But when the Wu Tribe actually invaded Sunreach Prefecture, only then did she truly understand the terror of the Wu Tribe
"Back when the Wu Tribe invaded the Azure Cloud Prefecture..."
Li Kuanghua's expression suddenly became distant.
She recalled the day the Wu Tribe slaughtered their way into the Azure Cloud Prefecture—the despair of all its people.
She remembered the years her family spent clinging to life in the face of the Wu Tribe, the sounding of the horn for the counterattack, and the sight of her Great-Grandfather standing alone atop the city walls... it all played out vividly before her eyes.
Now, the entire Azure Imperial Dynasty was undergoing what the Li family had once endured.
They should be thankful that they still had the means to respond, unlike the Li Clan of the past, who had been isolated and without aid.