Chapter 463 The Expedition Begins

However, shortly after, the fat guy mentioned something worth noting – Tang Nian Nian is quite mysterious; she’s mysterious in every aspect.

Even the intelligence network barely found any information about her. Her level of mystery is comparable to that of Xia Xinyan—exactly, for the outside world, trying to investigate Xia Xinyan usually just leads back to a couple of useful bits of information that are pretty much easy to find online: daughter of the Summer Family, that’s it.

Not only is Chicks excellent at keeping information confidential, but the more crucial point is that Xia Xinyan mostly supports Ling Mo from the shadows. Most of the time, it’s Ling Mo who takes the spotlight, naturally leading to less information about her. Even now, there’s no reliable intel about Xia Xinyan’s power online, which further proves her level of mystery.

Thus, since Tang Nian Nian is quite similar, it’s certain that she hasn’t really been active in the open either, and any further conclusions would have to rely on guesses.

And those guesses are pretty amusing; at least from the currently available bits of intel, Tang Nian Nian doesn’t belong to any faction or organization. She isn’t even part of the Eternal Life Palace. If what she said about having an engagement with Yan Zi Gui is true, the investigation would need to start with the establishment of the Eternal Life Palace, but there’s no time to waste on that now.

Tang Nian Nian mentioned earlier that she has her people, and she even knew about their operation in the Dark Zone, chasing after Yan Zi Gui right after the latter escaped, which shows that Tang Nian Nian was fully prepared, even making arrangements before they started moving – it feels a bit like a nesting doll; Eden pulls a trick on the Eternal Life Palace, they pull a trick on Eden, and Tang Nian Nian pulls a trick on them doing Eden’s and the Eternal Life Palace’s trick, all while Tang Nian Nian remains completely absent and doesn’t affect them.

This indicates that, at least outside of all known powers, other lurking forces still exist, and their strength might not be any weaker than the top-tier factions.

After all, Tang Nian Nian just said she plans to return and take over the Eternal Life Palace. If it were just her alone, taking over the Eternal Life Palace would be quite unlikely.

Of course, that has nothing to do with them now—there’s no point in chasing her down right now to ask for help in the expedition; since she’s chosen to hide her strength, it’s unlikely she’d offer help in this situation. But everyone’s ambitions are different… that term might still apply, and perhaps there are other ways to assist humanity, right?

The fat guy chased after her to check out the so-called rest she mentioned – and then saw a long row of big ice sculptures outside the door. That girl just froze the people solid, but the thawing process was quick. Within a while, everyone recovered their mobility, and aside from being wet, there wasn’t any other impact. It’s probably due to her special abilities.

It’s not bad; he really thinks this woman is intriguing.

Unfortunately, chasing her seems quite difficult.

And there’s no time to chase now.

Because the expedition had to be advanced—

At two in the morning the next day, news came from the Dark Zone: the Shockwave, one of the top factions, encountered a massive demon attack at their forward stronghold in the exploration area and was completely annihilated. The captain sent out a message just before dying. After receiving the news, nearby factions rushed over to provide assistance—only to nearly get wiped out as well.

According to the intel brought back by the fleeing survivors, those demons were almost all above the high-level demon threshold, and there seemed to be some organization among them, along with a basic understanding of battlefield strategies. The last two waves of teams were ambushed right off the bat, leading to their original fighting force significantly diminishing before they were all wiped out.

Moreover, those demons not only executed a planned attack on that stronghold but had even begun to push towards the main exploration routes of other factions. The teams still exploring were essentially unretreated vanguard units, primarily seeking to locate the demon stronghold, etc. Looking at their numbers and strength, facing those demons would leave them with almost no chance of survival.

Even more than that, aside from that batch of demons, intel from other exploration zones also indicated that a large number of demons had entered an unusual state of excitement, seemingly mobilized entirely, indicating a trend of full-scale action.

At this moment, everyone had no choice but to confirm—those demons had taken the initiative to launch their offensive.

So regardless of the reason or their preparedness, the expedition must commence at once; they absolutely cannot allow those demons to breach the human stronghold’s perimeter. This had evidently turned into a territorial dispute from the beginning.

To block those demons, they could only mobilize the main forces of all factions—though this isn’t exactly what was planned for the expedition, but that’s life; plans always fall behind changes, and even if it feels incredibly precarious, they must forge ahead.

This night was destined to be restless.

Who knows how many people were woken from dreams by a phone call, and in a state of half-sleep, they were bombarded with the news of the “expedition officially beginning,” promptly shaking off all remnants of sleep; they hurriedly dressed and rushed to the Dark Zone. The mass mobilization of personnel naturally affected ordinary civilians who were not participating in this expedition. Although they didn’t know why this expedition was suddenly advanced, they understood that the situation had begun with no going back.

The fate of humanity and everyone’s lives might just hinge on this very mission.

Chicks and Eagles Alliance also bore this heavy responsibility as they embarked on the expedition journey. All main members were mobilized, perhaps for the first time, the Dark Zone saw so many humans moving out together.

The core plan of this expedition was quite simple—destroy all currently confirmed demon strongholds, and clear all low-level demons who can’t communicate and only attack—then every person would hang a piece of demon meat until encountering legitimate communicable demons; they’d first attempt negotiation. Those who refused to coexist peacefully would be struck until they capitulated; those who wouldn’t surrender would be cleared out.

Why bring along a piece of demon meat? There’s a rationale—firstly, this would cause demons to think it’s their own kind. Adding to that, demons tend to unconditionally submit to demons stronger than themselves when they can’t win, making the recruitment effort smoother. Furthermore, each batch of surrendered demons equates to a new fighting force, which is absolutely beneficial for humanity.

As for Chicks… they didn’t need to go through much trouble, as they had Wing and canned meat. Plus, with the mobilization of main members, it was simply impossible for them to lose.

Thus, nearly everyone was completely confident about this expedition.

Moreover, the initial phase of the expedition indeed went quite smoothly.

After they left the human stronghold’s radius, most of the demons encountered at first were low-level beings. After all, these areas were mostly quite distant from the demon strongholds; the wandering demons’ evolutionary levels were naturally low, making them practically indistinguishable from wild beasts, with no communication ability. Faced with such low-level demons, there was no need to hold back; they were all cleared away—this counted as humanity’s first official united cleanup since entering the Dark Zone. Although most factions previously engaged in similar cleanup tasks, those were mostly just to deal with demons near their strongholds, not covering such expansive areas or doing a thorough sweep.

It cleared away quite a few potential threats.

After the initial skirmishes and cleanup actions, everyone had basically hung up their pieces of demon meat, making the cleanup efforts even smoother—

For those wandering demons, it would be like enjoying hotpot and singing a song when suddenly a large group of their kind showed up without saying a word and just went on a spree. This action finally made those demons realize what these “kindred” were planning to do, and then… those demons started to run for their lives.

Yes, run for their lives.

This proved that the demons being encountered now were no longer low-level entities; while they still hadn’t faced any that could talk, the increase in their evolutionary levels indicated that what they were about to encounter wouldn’t be as easy to clear out as before.

Moreover, the positions of the demon strongholds weren’t tightly packed together; on the contrary, many were rather distanced. Hence, once they closed in close enough, the large group had to split up to act independently, which was part of their prior arrangements, each responsible for the areas they had scouted. The outcome, good or bad, would depend on whether they’d put in the effort to investigate during these past two weeks; it was quite fair.

However, it wouldn’t entirely be a solo effort, as all factions would regularly report happenings to each other—for example, progress updates, and upon encountering any danger, they would send out distress signals, permitting the nearby factions to prioritize aid.

Overall, the general action steps for this expedition were quite similar to those Xia Xinyan experienced in her past life, except the previous expedition aimed to clear out all demons entirely, while this one merely sought to eliminate those who refused to cooperate.

And the biggest difference lies in that this expedition was far better prepared than the last one. Although the preparation time was significantly shorter than before, the intel about demons exceeded anything garnered in her past life, and as the saying goes, “know thy self and know thy enemy.” At least, for now, this expedition promised to be significantly smoother than the previous one.

Yet, considering the demon ambush incident that nearly wiped out the entire army in her past life, Xia Xinyan still urged everyone to proceed with extra caution during the journey; if anything feels off, they should inform each other immediately.

Naturally, no one opposed her advice; at this moment, no one wished to sacrifice themselves for humanity. Everyone wanted to live to complete the task and return, so no one was going to take this operation lightly.

As this smooth progress continued, the first group to encounter powerful enemies was Summer Jincang.

And it was near Cang Hai City, where Ling Mo previously created that massive pit—he ran smack into a demon army head-on.

The first battle between humanity and demons officially began.