The Unrivaled Tang Sect

Previously, they had been harrassed by the enemy soul engineers. This had diverted too much of their attention, which diminished the effect of their soul tools on the enemy.

Suddenly, someone exclaimed in surprise, “Look! Our reinforcements have arrived!”

Ju Zi gazed into the distance, and indeed, troops drifted into her view from afar. They were closing in from all directions. The sounds of killing resonated and shook the skies. Her strategy – bait the enemy before ambushing them – had finally succeeded!

The enemy was caught at a loss, as they were surrounded by an even larger army of soldiers. However, a bright yellow flag was lifted high in the enemy’s camp at this moment.

A man leapt up and stood steadily on a huge steed. He waved the flag in the air, and his voice reverberated throughout the battlefield.

“Men under the Glorious Lord, listen up! I’m the eldest son of the Glorious Lord and the heir to his position, General Zhao Yang of the duchy. I’ll lead everyone out of this danger. The commander of the troops at the top of the mountain is the fiancée of the Sun Moon Empire’s Crown Prince. If we catch her, the enemy troops will immediately surrender; they won’t dare to touch us. This is our only way out!”

As he spoke, the man leapt onto another huge steed. Holding the bright yellow flag high, he burst straight towards the mountaintop.

This General Zhao Yang wasn’t supposed to command the troops in this expedition. His younger cousin was supposed to be commanding the troops. He specially came to hold the fort for his younger cousin. Seeing that the situation had gone awry, he had no choice but to personally attack. He quickly retrieved his golden helmet and armor from his storage-type soul tool. As he buckled his armor on and prepared to fight, he also used his actions and voice to boost his troops’ morale. He had the aura of a general. Of course, his sound-amplifying soul tool played a big part too.

The soul engineers on the mountaintop were cheering after they noticed that their reinforcements had arrived. However, they also heard the general’s words.

Everyone’s attention was drawn to Ju Zi.

They weren’t stunned right now, but they were in utter disbelief. They didn’t expect that the person commanding them and fighting alongside them at the frontline was the fiancée of the current Crown Prince.

Ju Zi had never revealed her identity to them. Ever since she had joined the military, she had worked her way up the ranks as a Class 6 soul engineer. She also didn’t know how this news was leaked, and how the other party knew her true identity.

She was the one who had devised the plan to trap the enemy! She had dared to take such a risk despite her status. These soul engineers felt that there was something choking their hearts.

Ju Zi’s eyes flashed with a cold light. She knew that there must be a spy close to the Crown Prince. Otherwise, her identity wouldn’t have been exposed so quickly.

She took a deep breath and looked at the soul engineers around her. She said in a deep voice, “He’s right. I’m the fiancée of the Crown Prince. However, I’m also a warrior of the empire. Today, I’ll live and die with all of you. The reinforcements are in front of us. We must fight for our survival. We must win, and we must hang on until our reinforcements arrive!”

As she spoke, she led the charge towards Zhao Yang.

Ke Ke shouted, “What are all of you doing? The enemy is here. Even the Crown Prince’s fiancée is willing to give her all for us. Are we going to let them hurt her?”

“Protect the Crown Prince’s wife with our lives!” One young soul engineer shouted with all his might as he lifted his soul cannon. His eyes spurted with fire as he fired the soul cannon towards the enemy troops.

Their morale was lifted to an unprecedented level. They were doing it for Ju Zi’s bravery and their hopes of survival.

It was just that none of them noticed that Wang Dong and Huo Yuhao had already opened their eyes at this point.

They looked at each other, and Wang Dong said softly, “Crown Prince’s fiancée?”

Huo Yuhao laughed bitterly. “I don’t know anything about that. However, this sort of explains why she’s so mysterious. No matter what, I owe her a favor today. As for the rest, let’s just wait until the future.”

Wang Dong nodded his head slightly. “Do whatever you want.”

Huo Yuhao laughed. Even though he was surrounded by enemy troops, he realized that he wasn’t nervous at all. It was because he had a brother and a partner that was willing to live and die with him beside him right now.

Under Zhao Yang’s call, the frantic rebel troops finally found their release. While the troops on the mountaintop needed to survive, so did they! They knew the consequences of being trapped by the empire’s troops. To survive, they needed to give their all.

The intensity of their attacks soared. The heavily-armored soldiers quickly reached the mountain slope with the help of steeds. They even gave up their weapons, instead choosing to lift giant shields that were each carried by two soldiers up the mountain slope.

After all, this mountain slope was less than two hundred meters high. The mountain didn’t have any particular geographical advantage either. The troops were about to completely surround the soul engineers on the mountaintop.

Although soul cannons were very powerful, they depleted one’s soul power greatly. A Class 4 Milk Bottle couldn’t last long. Moreover, Ju Zi and the others were also injured and fatigued! At this time, they relied on their will and courage to sustain themselves.

The giant shields couldn’t resist the attacks of Class 4 and above soul cannons. However, the destructiveness of the soul cannons was greatly reduced by the giant shields. The enemy troops were slowly making their way up the mountain.

“Move. I’ll do it.” Zhao Yang shouted. He was thirty-six this year. He was in the prime of his life. The Glorious Lord had rebelled and wanted to create a duchy because of Zhao Yang. If not for the fact that Zhao Yang was ambitious and the Glorious Lord’s territories were like fortresses, why would the aging Glorious Lord who wasn’t even a soul master make such a decisive call??

Zhao Yang was a genius. Although he was a part of the Sun Moon Empire, he had never liked soul tools. He was more interested in developing his own abilities. He had inherited his mother genes and possessed a rather strong martial soul, the Violent Goldbear. He was already a Soul Sage even though he was just thirty-six years old. In terms of abilities, he was always the strongest among everyone under the Glorious Lord.

The Glorious Lord was responsible for guarding the northern region of the Sun Moon Empire. His sudden uprising caused the empire to be caught at a loss. His explanation was also very simple. He just wanted to set up a duchy, and was even willing to double his tribute to the empire. He just hoped to receive its recognition.

The Sun Moon Empire’s Emperor was plagued with illness, and had lost the sharpness he had once had. He didn’t rush to use military force against the Glorious Lord, as he was afraid of the reactions such an action might provoke from the Heaven Dou Empire and Star Luo Empire.

However, the Crown Prince continued to take a hard stance, and labeled him as a rebel that needed to be killed. That was the only way to intimidate the empire’s nobility that had been conferred land in the empire.

Eventually, the Crown Prince managed to obtain the Emperor’s recognition with the help of Jing Hongchen and a branch of direct descendants. The military, mainly composed of his own troops, was also sent out to quell the rebellion. Ju Zi, who had been in many wars and even fought against the soul masters in the Western Sea, also joined in the fight against the rebels. She had earned enough merit to become the leader of a small group of soul engineers.

Her position couldn’t be underestimated. In the Sun Moon Empire’s military, there were four divisions of soul engineers. Each division consisted of roughly a thousand soul engineers. These four thousand soul engineers were the cornerstone of the Sun Moon Empire. To be able to command a hundred of these soul engineers, Ju Zi’s position was comparable to a leader of an infantry division. If the hundred soul engineers were suitably utilized, they could change the outcome of a war.

Ju Zi also realized why there was a group of soul engineers chasing them after listening to Zhao Yang. Those soul engineers were probably the final remaining trump card of the Glorious Lord. Now that they had been destroyed, they were likely to achieve victory if they could hold out. The rebel troops were unlikely to have any further chips that they could use.

Zhao Yang’s thinking was also very simple. After the empire adamantly rejected their tribute, labeled them as rebels and even brought the military in against them, he realized that setting up a duchy in the Sun Moon Empire was a foolish thing. The Glorious Lord’s camp was a mess now. The reason why they had gone all-out today and sent out their soul engineers as well as the entire army was because they wanted to capture Ju Zi, who they had discovered was the Crown Prince’s fiancée from insider information.

He had never thought of hurting Ju Zi. He just wanted to capture her alive and use her as a chip to negotiate with the Sun Moon Empire. He naturally knew that Xu Tianran was in charge. He had already thought of an escape plan for himself. His demands weren’t too unreasonable either. He was willing to surrender and give up his military power. All he asked for was to keep his land and wealth.

However, all this was only possible if he could capture Ju Zi. Otherwise, there wasn’t any way that he could negotiate with the empire.

The empire’s military had also discovered Zhao Yang’s intentions. The surrounding troops quickly rushed over to Ju Zi’s aid. Right now, it was a battle of time for both parties.

As Zhao Yang shouted, he stuck the bright yellow flag into the ground and exploited the reactionary elastic force of the flagpole to shoot himself forward to the top of the mountain.

As he burst forward, he snatched a spear from a soldier beside him and flung it forward. That long spear flew up towards the mountaintop like a bolt of lightning. It managed to restrain a large amount of the firepower that came from the top of the mountain.