Chapter 290 - 168: The Second Phase Ends
Far to the southwest of the Western Plains battlefield, in a large, remote basin.
Xiong Liang led his Cavalry, galloping across the vast plains.
"Pick up the pace! Whether or not I’m still your lord after today all depends on this move," he shouted, boosting their morale and urging the Cavalry to ride even faster.
In addition to this cavalry troop, he had also dispatched several other cavalry troops and Hero Squads, each now heading toward a different lord’s territory.
Behind him lay Mei Yuan’s territory. It was currently a total mess, a result of his men ransacking it in search of resources. Unfortunately, they hadn’t found anything useful.
Inside Mei Yuan’s territory were two buildings well-protected by a Magic Array. One was the Lord’s Mansion, and the other was an unknown, massive structure. His attempt to destroy Mei Yuan’s Territory Core had failed.
He had no choice but to move on to the territories of other lords—those who had joined the Northern Expedition Legion and taken their armies with them.
Unbeknownst to him, one of the Hero Squads he had dispatched successfully broke through layers of traps, entered a Lord’s Mansion, and destroyed its Territory Core.
At that very moment, just as Ah Pu and the others were about to enter the Teleportation Gate, a lord lost their qualifications and was expelled from the competition.
Across the entire basin, Xiong Liang’s troops would periodically invade a territory and destroy its Territory Core. Each time, a corresponding parasitized Core Lord from the Northern Expedition Legion would lose their lord qualifications and be expelled from the competition.
(Although they lost their lord qualifications, they still gained the status of free Eye Demons, becoming official citizens of the Eye Demon Empire instead of cannon fodder on the battlefield.)
Watching the lords disappear one after another in flashes of light, along with their parasitized heroes, Ah Pu felt a knot of anxiety tighten in his chest.
But there was nothing he could do to stop it. He could only mutter to himself, ’I told them all to protect their Territory Cores! Why wouldn’t any of them listen? I even gave them those powerful Protective Arrays I risked my life to secretly obtain. If they had all just set them up, none of this would be happening!’
Those weren’t just lords disappearing—that was his reward vanishing before his eyes!
The remaining lords mentally rolled their eyes. ’As if he doesn’t know how many resources his Protective Array requires. If we had that much, we obviously would have set it up. But didn’t he take all our resources already?’
Seeing their companions continuously losing their lord status and being expelled, a panic set in. It is unclear who started it, but the remaining lords suddenly charged toward the Teleportation Array and swarmed through the Teleportation Gate.
In the blink of an eye, all the lords and heroes near the Teleportation Gate had passed through, as if simply crossing the threshold could save them from the fate of having their Territory Core destroyed and losing their lord status.
Unfortunately, that was nothing but a pipe dream.
The Territory Core was deeply bound to its lord. No matter where the lord went, once the core was destroyed, the lord would be expelled from the competition.
Seeing that everyone had passed through the Teleportation Gate, Ah Pu led his several dozen heroes toward the gate as well.
Standing before the Teleportation Gate, he looked back with a pang of longing at the soldiers still fighting. ’Once I leave, it’ll be hard to command such a powerful army again.’
"Sigh..."
He heaved a long sigh and turned to Bess, who was floating in the air. "Master Bess, you aren’t returning?"
"I have to stay behind and clean up. Someone has to shut down this Teleportation Array. Otherwise, what if the Sniper Corps finds it? Wouldn’t that just cause trouble for the lords?"
"Thank you for your trouble, Master!"
Bess’s words made perfect sense, so Ah Pu said no more. He led his subordinates swiftly through the Teleportation Gate.
Seeing that no one else needed the Teleportation Gate, Bess immediately flew down to the ground and closed it.
’I hope those folks make it safely,’ he prayed inwardly. ’This Teleportation Array was set up too hastily. I’m not confident enough in it to use it myself.’
After dismantling all the salvageable materials, Bess took out the partially consumed Space Stone, stored it away carefully, and flew into the sky.
On the other side of the Teleportation Gate—the Eye Demon Continent.
After passing through the Teleportation Gate, the scent of blood floating in the air and the familiar surroundings told Ah Pu that he had returned to the continent of the Eye Demons. The familiar smell quickly eased his tense nerves; he was safe here.
In the future, he would participate in the lord competition as a new lord. Having already gone through it once as an "intern," he was confident he could achieve great results.
The sound of the Teleportation Gate disappearing behind him snapped Ah Pu out of his daydream. He composed himself, ready to greet the companions who had already come through.
However, when he saw the large group where the gate had been, his mood soured again. The number of lords and heroes who had come through was much smaller than before, and people were still occasionally turning into motes of light and vanishing.
When people finally stopped disappearing, the number of lords present had dwindled even further. Only a little over thirty parasitized lords remained. Ah Pu took a closer look and realized that the lords who had vanished were all from the same region as his own territory. Only a few had survived.
’It must have been those other lords. Damn it! I thought it was too much trouble to wipe them out back then, and now it’s led to this disaster.’
Ah Pu was certain: this was the "good work" of those few lords who were also in the basin but hadn’t joined the Northern Expedition Legion.
Still, there was no use in regrets. He could only organize the remaining lords and heroes and wait for the second stage of the competition to end.