[Vol. 9] Chapter 54: Cicada, Mantis, and Yellow Bird
While thinking about all this, Veranica quickly made a decision.
“Here’s what we’ll do… Fourth Brother, you take the back route and lead the others back to our base. Tell everyone to raise the guard just in case. The rest of us will stay here and keep watching to see what they really want. We’ll meet up again later.”
“Got it, big sis!”
The one called Fourth Brother didn’t dare waste time. He agreed at once and quietly slipped away into the back.
Their main force of over two hundred people was not far away, busy scavenging in another area. They had arrived earlier than the [Bone Gang], just by taking a different path. If the [Bone Gang] hadn’t clashed with those mysterious outsiders first, it might have been the [Scavenger Gang] running into them instead.
Since they had spotted the danger in advance, Veranica naturally wanted to avoid a meaningless fight.
“Big sis, do you think those people have more companions?”
The one speaking was a young girl with snow-white hair. She looked about the same age as the leader, but her face was gentler and more delicate. Veranica turned to look at her. For once, her sharp eyes softened a little. She even nodded slightly and explained.
“It’s just to be safe. Their sudden appearance is strange. I’m afraid… Icefang Island is about to change.”
The girl’s name was Yiyi. She was a child Veranica had taken in long ago.
Because of crimes committed by her relatives, Yiyi’s whole family had their family name stripped away and were exiled to Icefang Island. By the time Veranica found her, her family had already died under the harsh environment of the island. Only Yiyi had survived, thanks to her small trace of Snow Tribe blood.
Veranica pitied her, and at the same time saw her toughness and talent. So she adopted Yiyi, gave her the name “Yiyi,” and raised her like a younger sister. Yiyi did not disappoint, she showed outstanding skills and talent in training, and now she was Veranica’s most trusted right hand.
If not for Yiyi’s suggestion, they wouldn’t have thought to scout from this outer hillside, let alone discover the situation here by chance.
After hearing her leader’s answer, Yiyi didn’t say more. She only nodded silently, though her clear eyes flickered with a strange light. The others didn’t mind, this was her usual personality. She was known as the Scavenger Queen’s cleverest adviser, and the only one who could influence her decisions.
With Fourth Brother gone, Veranica no longer worried about their main camp, so she relaxed a little and began carefully watching the battle below.
The fight lasted nearly half an hour. Because of the huge gap in strength, and the enemy’s careful planning, the [Bone Gang]’s one hundred plus members were almost all slaughtered. A few who tried to escape to report the news were intercepted and killed as well. In comparison, that mysterious army lost only a handful of people. The dozen or so injured were not badly hurt either.
Even though they had guessed the outsiders might be strong, the shocking result still left the [Scavenger Gang] shaken. If just a few more squads of this level appeared, then none of the four great gangs would be able to stand against them.
By now, the victors were already cleaning up the battlefield and taking a short rest. With Veranica’s experience as one of Icefang Island’s gang leaders, she could tell at a glance that they had deliberately left some survivors alive. Clearly, this attack had a very specific purpose.
Sure enough, before long, they dragged out a thin, sharp-faced [Bone Gang] member and brought him before a young man who seemed to be their captain. Veranica recognized the captive. He was one of the [Bone Gang]’s deputy leaders. It seemed he had tried to escape during the chaos, but clearly he hadn’t succeeded.
Because they were far away, Veranica could not hear what the two sides were saying. She could only see that the captain seemed to be questioning the [Bone Gang] deputy. But whatever the deputy answered did not satisfy him. Even after his arms and legs were broken and he was in such pain he almost fainted, he still didn’t reveal anything useful. In the end, the angry captain simply cut off his head with one stroke.
Watching the whole process, Veranica couldn’t help but think.
That deputy was no brave, iron-willed man. In fact, anyone who could survive on Icefang Island was usually a selfish person who only thought of themselves. People joined gangs only to live better. They might sometimes defend the group for the sake of pride or survival, but when life and death came, no one valued their mouth more than their head. Even within the [Scavenger Gang], it was the same.
So if that man died without saying anything, it was most likely because he truly didn’t know the answer they wanted.
Strange. They had planned such a big ambush, yet they got no useful result. Did these mysterious people make a mistake somewhere? Or maybe that interrogation was just something they did on the side?
Veranica couldn’t figure it out. She might be smarter than most Ice Demons, but her race by nature preferred fists over brains. Even though the [Scavenger Gang] was less violent than others, it was still a gang of criminals. Without enough strength to keep control, she would have been replaced as leader long ago.
She instinctively glanced at Yiyi, her adviser, but Yiyi only shook her head in silence. Even the smartest person couldn’t guess the truth with so little information.
Veranica sighed inside, about to say something more, when suddenly another underling whispered in shock.
“Big sis, look! They’re leaving!”
Hearing this, the leader stopped forcing her brain to work and quickly looked down. Sure enough, the mysterious force was already lining up to move out. They only carried away a few of their own fallen soldiers. As for the hundred or more [Bone Gang] corpses, they burned them all in one big fire, leaving not a single bone behind.
The blood left on the ground after the fight didn’t matter. On Icefang Island, that was too common to attract attention. And since they had deliberately hunted down anyone who tried to escape earlier, it was clear these people didn’t want their presence exposed too soon.
They were definitely searching for something in secret.
“Let’s go. Follow them.”
Calling to a few of her men, Veranica quickly led the group down from the slope, trailing far behind the enemy.
But the open ground was different from the hillside. Knowing how dangerous the enemy was, she didn’t dare get too close. She could only track them through faint traces left on the path. The two groups moved like this for over ten kilometers.
The farther they went, the stranger Veranica felt. Her expression grew tense, and a bad guess slowly formed in her heart.
Because she realized the mysterious group wasn’t wandering randomly. They were circling around the underground hot spring discovered a few years ago, the one that could cleanse the cold energy inside Snowgrass!