Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios
The large, fluorescent wings of the butterflies shimmered as they fluttered in the forest, causing the green lights to fluctuate up and down.
It was supposed to be a beautiful and romantic scene.
However, the human faces on the heads of the butterflies sent a chill right through the bones of the empress.
Ren Baqian also looked solemn.
There could be thousands or tens of thousands of butterflies in the forest.
This represented the lives of thousands or tens of thousands of people.
Several thousand or up to tens of thousands of lives had disappeared silently in the Sixty Thousand Mountains.
“Your Majesty, they don’t just have human faces,” Ren Baqian suddenly said as he looked at the swarm of butterflies. “In that direction, the heads of the butterflies display the faces of beasts such as saber-toothed tigers and apes.”
This amount should be around one-third of the total.
Nevertheless, most of the butterflies carried human faces.
At this moment, the fluttering butterflies seemed to have startled something in the forest.
A dreary melody filled with despair rang out, and the butterflies were instantly attracted by it.
“Let’s go and take a look.” The empress suppressed her breath and moved tens of meters to follow the butterflies.
Ren Baqian took a few steps to overtake the empress and reached out to catch a butterfly just so he could figure out what the butterfly carrying the human face was about.
“Don’t move!” the empress blurted out as she grabbed his hand.
“Your Majesty?”
“Look at the places where they have flown past!” the empress said.
Ren Baqian put aside his suspicions, looked ahead, and discovered something.
These butterflies seldom encountered plants, but when they ran into them, leaves and foliage would cascade down.
Ren Baqian went forward to check and discovered that the fallen leaves looked like they had been cut.
“The wings of these demonic butterflies are like blades,” the empress said with a frown.
Ren Baqian was bewildered by how different they were. They looked like normal butterflies, but were a bit bigger and about the size of two palms each.
The other difference was the eerie faces that they carried.
However, the wings of these butterflies, which didn’t look that special, were as sharp as blades and indeed scary.
Yet, thinking of the effort put in by the other party since each butterfly represented a life, it was normal to be different.
He originally intended to see what abilities these strange butterflies had, but if the two of them charged in, these demonic butterflies could really pose a danger.
Therefore, after the reminder from the empress, he abandoned the idea of catching a butterfly to avoid alerting the enemy.
The two of them trailed after the butterflies through the forest before coming to a mountainside. Here, they saw a tall, thin man standing in front of a cave. The sound of the music, which sounded like a flute, was coming from a white bone held in his hands.
As he pointed with the white bone, those butterflies flew into the cave.
“No wonder the winged cavalry couldn’t find this location despite the distance being so close. There’s a hidden place,” Ren Baqian said from behind the empress.
With steely resolve, the empress coldly and silently advanced toward that man.
For nearly two months, anger had been brewing inside her. Her anger would rise especially when she received the news of yet another village being discovered.
Every time she issued a decree, lives would be extinguished, which was heart-rending for her. This pain became a raging inferno that was ready to engulf everything, not to mention that the demonic butterflies that she had just seen represented a few thousand lives.
Unexpectedly, the perpetrator was found under such circumstances that gave her the chance to vent her anger. However, it was more important to catch him and get to the bottom of the whole story.
The empress had already prepared 1,080 ways to kill him later on.
Nevertheless, the two of them stopped 70 meters away from him and looked at him with shock.
From this distance, they were able to see him clearly under the evening light.
However, no matter how they looked at him, his appearance wasn’t like a human’s.
His skin was green in color, his ears were slanted, his round nose was abnormally large, four tusks protruded from his lips, and most importantly—his eyes.
The eye sockets, the whites of the eyes, and the pupils weren’t like a human’s.
Two things that looked like sunglasses were fastened over his eyes. However, upon looking carefully, one could see that these were his eyes and that they were filled with indifference and ruthlessness.
After further observation, it could be seen that the objects that resembled sunglasses were made up of hexagonal tiles.
When Ren Baqian saw the eyes of the other party, he instantly recognized them as the compound eyes of insects.
This thin guy was more than two meters tall and had four long, slender limbs. It looked like a breeze would blow him away.
Before the two could speak, the other party spoke in a surprisingly pleasant voice that was crisp, melodious, and sounded like a young girl speaking. He said, “You have followed my jade-waisted slaves here!”
“You call them jade-waisted slaves? What are you?” the empress asked coldly.
“You can call me Bor!” the other person said.
“I noticed a group of aboriginals that came near here before. Originally, I already had sufficient jade-waisted slaves, so even if you guys wanted to leave, I wouldn’t have stopped you. However, since you found your way here, I will not let you two go.”
“Are you alone or do you have other partners? Ren Baqian asked.
“I’m the only one here!” The other person didn’t mind revealing this at all. “This place belongs to me and is used by my jade-waisted slaves for grazing.”
“Very well!” the empress said icily. It looked like the disasters in the villages around here were the result of his handiwork.
“What kind of thing are you?” Ren Baqian asked.
“I have already told you my name, so you should tell me your names. Isn’t that basic courtesy among humans?” the other guy asked.
Ren Baqian simply couldn’t see any expressions on this guy’s face.
In particular, that pair of eyes constantly changed colors, which gave Ren Baqian goosebumps.
“I’m Chen Ergou and she is Chen Fugui!” Ren Baqian subconsciously gave him two fictitious names.
The empress felt that this name sounded horrible, but she couldn’t worry about it in this situation.
“What kind of thing are you?” This time, it was the empress who asked.
This was the third time this question had been asked.
“We are Na souls, and we specialize in putting living things to pasture.”
“Where are you from? How many compatriots do you have? Where are they?”
“We originate from very far away, and I don’t know exactly where. As for the number of my compatriots, there are 34 in this area, and their positions are like mine. Everyone has his own grazing area.” Bor told them what he knew and didn’t attempt to hide anything.
There was most likely one reason why he was acting this way: because he was very sure of the outcome.
To him, these two were as good as dead.
“Well, are you done asking questions?” Bor asked.
“One last question. What’s a jade-waisted slave?” Ren Baqian inquired once more.
“As you can see, they are my possessions. They are beautiful and tasty!” Bor was giving out praise, but there was no emotion in his voice.
The empress couldn’t bear it any longer when she heard this and was like a volcano that was about to erupt. A huge mountain that was invisible to physical sight appeared in the twinkling of an eye.
“Impressive power,” Bor praised before suddenly calling out, “Chen Fugui!”
The color of his compound eyes turned green like the wings of those jade-waisted slaves. In the center of this green color, there was an infinite darkness that seemed to be trying to absorb their souls.
Ren Baqian suddenly gasped and collapsed to the ground.
This change took the empress by surprise as she asked, “What’s wrong with you?”
Bor was also confused as the response wasn’t what should have happened.
Ren Baqian wasn’t responding correctly and shouldn’t have fallen down. Bor felt that there was a problem somewhere. After a moment of confusion, he asked, “You are actually Chen Fugui? So she should be Chen Ergou.”
Subsequently, his eyes intensely emitted a green radiance as he looked at the empress and shouted, “Chen Ergou!”
“You are Chen Ergou, not me!” The empress saw Ren Baqian winking at her and knew that he was playing a trick. She turned to shout at Bor and leaped across at him.
