The elderly’s family members stared fixedly at the hunters who had bought them.
Their eyes were filled with trepidation and anticipation, their palms slick with sweat.
They were terrified that the other party would suddenly regret the deal or try to lower the price.
As the leader of the veteran bounty group "Blade's Edge" who had just won the bid for an elder, Ryan had indeed been nearly frightened out of his wits by that bout of coughing.
That was over eight hundred thousand gold coins!
It was almost all of the group's operational funds.
If the guide were to pass away right as they were setting off, he would lose everything.
"Priestess! Quickly, go check on him!"
Ryan shouted to his team in a rush, his voice cracking with urgency.
A young girl wearing white priestess robes stepped forward quickly.
She leaned over to carefully examine the old man's condition.
Her fingers glowed with a gentle blue light as she pressed them lightly against the man’s chest.
After a moment, she looked up, her expression softening slightly.
"He’s fine. He just choked and has some qi deficiency."
"His physical state... is much the same as our previous assessment."
Hearing these words, Ryan and his teammates finally let out a collective sigh of relief.
Several members couldn't help but grumble in low voices.
"Scared the life out of me..."
"How long did it take us to scrounge up this money?"
"Old man, you'd better hang in there."
Ryan wiped the sweat from his forehead, his heartbeat finally steadying.
After this scare, he didn't intend to delay any further.
He took the lead in approaching the dwarf, Blackbeard, to conduct the final route confirmation before departure.
Blackbeard spread out a hand-drawn map riddled with markings.
His short, thick fingers gestured across it with practiced familiarity.
"Sticking to the 'West Ridge'?"
Ryan nodded with a firm tone.
"Yes. We'll hug the base of the wall. Safety first."
"Our main goal this time is to explore the mid-section of the ridge."
"We'll go about forty kilometers deep to record the topographical changes."
Blackbeard grunted in acknowledgment, pointing to several shadowed areas.
"The mist is relatively thin there, and there are fewer demons."
"However, there are a few depressions in the terrain where malice tends to gather."
He used his nail to tap several red-cross markings on the map.
"Be sure to steer clear of these spots."
"A team ignored the warnings last year and met their ends there."
Ryan’s expression turned solemn as he took careful note of the advice.
Their "Blade's Edge" group did not intend to cross the Wall of Sighs.
Rather, they were a reconnaissance team under a long-term contract with the Dwarven Royal City.
They specialized in venturing deep into the wall to map geographical information, recording terrain shifts and patterns in the density of the mist, as well as the specific distribution and activity ranges of spectral demons.
The Dwarven Royal Court would purchase this intelligence at high prices; this was their livelihood.
After confirming all the details, Ryan carefully tucked the map away.
Seeing Blackbeard holding his mug and appearing as though he wanted to say more, he asked curiously, "Lord Blackbeard, is there something else you need to mention?"
Blackbeard shook his head and drained the mug of ale in one go.
"Nothing, it's just..."
He paused and let out a sigh.
"Forget it. They probably gave up."
"After all, searching for a city-state inside the Wall of Sighs..."
"It really is too absurd."
He let out a chuckle, his voice thick with self-deprecation.
"If living people really inhabited that place, would we need to issue so many exploration missions?"
"Would we still be relying on using a vast number of the dying to pave the way just to force a path through the Wall of Sighs?"
Ryan listened with confusion, unsure who he was referring to.
Blackbeard waved a hand and said no more.
However, he couldn't help but recall what happened two days prior.
Lin Gui had sought him out specifically with a very serious attitude, asking for information on almost all teams entering the Wall of Sighs in the near future, especially those that would pass near the "Blackwater Ruins."
He seemed to be looking for a team to collaborate with for the entry.
Blackbeard actually strongly agreed with that idea.
In his eyes, the strength of Lin Gui's trio wasn't exactly top-tier: one High Rank mage and two Low-tier Transcendent girls. It would be far too risky for such a combination to force their way into the Wall of Sighs alone.
Collaborating with a mature bounty team was much safer.
The other party would have experience, a guide, and familiarity with the routes. Lin Gui and the others would only need to follow along and provide some compensation.
It was the most prudent approach.
Therefore, Blackbeard had seriously recommended several teams back then, placing special emphasis on the Demon Hunter Cass.
Cass's route happened to pass near the Blackwater Ruins. Moreover, his strength was sufficient—he was at the Low-tier Legendary Rank. His team was small, which meant a smaller target that wouldn't easily be noticed by demons.
Following Cass would have offered a much higher level of safety.
Only...
Blackbeard remembered the white-haired elf beside Lin Gui when he made the suggestion.
The look she gave him was exceptionally displeased, even carrying a hint of rejection, as if he had proposed an utterly terrible idea.
Blackbeard hadn't thought much of it at the time, dismissing it as a young girl’s temperament.
And now, the selection meeting had ended. He had looked carefully around the venue but hadn't seen Lin Gui’s trio anywhere.
"It really is strange..." Blackbeard muttered, stroking his beard.
They had asked so many questions and made so many preparations, yet they didn't show up at the most crucial moment.
Surely they hadn't suddenly come to their senses and given up?
Blackbeard sighed. If they had given up because they'd come to their senses, that would be for the best. He was only afraid that Lin Gui had simply blundered in alone with those two girls. What was the difference between that and seeking death?
A total of three teams were entering the Wall of Sighs this time.
Cass's Demon Hunter unit.
Ryan's "Blade's Edge."
And then there was a group of people Blackbeard had never seen before.
This group made Blackbeard feel extremely peculiar and uneasy.
The one in the lead was a woman at the High-tier Transcendent level.
She called herself Jesse; her expression was indifferent, and her gaze was excessively calm.
The two men beside her were even stranger. One had features so handsome they seemed inhuman, his skin pale and his lips always curled into a faint smile. The other had empty, eerie eyes; the mere sight of him sent an inexplicable chill down Blackbeard’s spine.
What unsettled Blackbeard the most, however, was the squad of "knights" following behind them.
Those people moved with a stiff, synchronized gait, their iron boots clanking rhythmically against the ground. They were fully armored with visors covering their faces, making it impossible to see their features. A cold, deathly aura emanated from them—an aura that did not belong to the living.
Blackbeard had once encountered a similar scent in the depths beneath the Dwarven Royal City, within that ancient forbidden zone known as the "Dragon Bone Graveyard." The undead creatures that had wandered there for untold ages bore that exact smell.
Yet now, the sun was high and the light was piercing. If they truly were such things, how could they stand out in the sunlight?
Blackbeard instinctively tightened his grip on the handle of the battle-axe at his waist, his muscles tensing.
He truly wondered what this group of strange characters intended to do by entering the Wall of Sighs. Could it be that they, like that Lin Gui boy, were searching for some Avalon?
Blackbeard shook his head and tilted it back to take a large gulp of ale. The spicy liquid seared his throat, but it could not wash away the sliver of doubt in his heart.
No matter what they were entering for, it really had nothing to do with him.
In this City-State Era, far too many strange things occurred. As a dwarven special envoy stationed here, he couldn't manage it all, and he didn't care to try.
Yet what Blackbeard did not know was that what he saw today—something he considered trivial—would silently lay the groundwork for the future destruction of the Dwarven Royal City.
Rate on N.U.
