Chapter Forty-Eight: A Horde of Demonic Beasts Approaches

On a high mountain, Little Dumpling lay soundly asleep on a bare, large rock, sleeping so peacefully that she didn’t feel the discomfort one might expect from being outdoors.

Standing nearby, Lu Qing watched her, now deep in slumber, with a puzzled expression. “Hey, little rascal?”

No response.

“Little rascal, wake up!”

Still no answer.

Growing anxious, Lu Qing bent down and gently tapped her face. “Hey?! Little rascal?!”

“Could it be she really fell asleep?”

“My medicinal wine, it’s this...”

“This strong an effect?”

Lu Qing murmured to himself, uncertain how to proceed, his mind tangled in knots.

What was he to do now?

While he fretted, he failed to notice two enormous beasts slowly approaching from behind.

One was a crawling creature half a man’s height, as wide as a slab of stone—Sara. The other was a creature with thick arms and legs like a gorilla, armored like a fortress—Mo Xie.

As if following an order, they headed straight toward them.

Just as Lu Qing seemed to sense something and turned his head, Mo Xie charged at him like a mad beast.

“Wuuah wuuu!!”

“Wuuah aaah wuuu!!”

“Monsters?!” Lu Qing yanked Little Dumpling away just in time, dodging the attack, shouting in shock.

But in an instant, Sara, who had been waiting for the perfect moment, leapt from the ground and slammed fiercely into Lu Qing and Little Dumpling.

“No—!!”

Lu Qing’s eyes widened as the impact hit him, leaving no time to react. He bore the blow hard.

“Ah...” Little Dumpling was slammed out of Lu Qing’s arms and crashed onto the ground, instantly sobering up. She slowly opened her eyes, reddened with tears.

“It hurts... so much!” She tried to move but found her entire body aching, especially her arm, which was completely immobile. She lay on the ground like an old tortoise.

“Wuuu wuuu...” She felt like crying.

What was going on? Who hit her?

Meanwhile, Lu Qing was flung back against a peach grove tree trunk. The impact throbbed through his back and organs.

“Ugh...” He slowly opened his eyes, wincing in pain. Before him, the two attacking beasts had multiplied into a large horde.

Flying beasts, crawling beasts, bipedal beasts—half human, half beast—there was a whole swarm, truly a crowd.

A dark mass so dense he couldn’t even spot Little Dumpling.

“How dare you?” he gritted his teeth, standing despite the pain. His powerful aura loomed over the beasts as he roared, “How dare you attack us? Are you trying to break the alliance between our two tribes and anger the Ghost Clan?”

“A joke,” the leader among the half-human beasts sneered. “When you angered us, the Monster Clan, you didn’t care about saving face, did you, brothers?”

“Yeah!”

“Hahaha, big brother, kill them. No one will ever know.”

“Right, we’ve been hiding near this hellish place for nearly ten days. Finally caught these two ghosts—no mercy.”

“Yes! Don’t spare them! Kill them to avenge Third Prince Long!”

“Third Prince Long?” Lu Qing caught the key name from their conversation.

The Dragon Clan’s Third Prince, Long Kong?

The one who risked himself for humanity, leading troops into the Ghost Clan’s hell?

Was he the one who ordered them to attack and kill Ghost Clan members?

Little Dumpling overheard some of this too. Ignoring her pain, she rushed forward, standing before Lu Qing and shouted, “You can’t attack us! We are Ghost Clan! He is a senior elder of the Ghost Clan, I am a young princess of the Ghost Clan! If you harm us, my father won’t forgive you!”

Lu Qing blinked.

He was a senior elder? How come he didn’t know?

The beasts froze for a moment. “You... you are the young princess of the Ghost Clan?”

Then...

Could she be the daughter of Former Monster King Man Wuyao?

“Yes!” Little Dumpling straightened her small neck and raised her chin proudly. “I am the young princess of the Ghost Clan—Miaoyuan. You cannot harm us!”

“Big brother, she’s the young princess,” one glanced back at their leader, uncertain whether to attack.

Their leader, the half-human beast named Withered Vine, was the first to receive Long Kong’s orders and the head of the earliest scouts.

He had planned to take these two as trophies to earn merit and reward but never expected this little rascal to be the former Monster King’s daughter.

This complicated matters.

“Big brother, what should we do?”

“Yeah, big brother, do we attack or not?”

“Big brother, if not her, we can attack the big one! We’ve been hiding here so long; we need results!”

“Right, big brother, Third Brother’s right! We can attack the big guy!”

Withered Vine nodded, biting his lip. “Fine. Spare the small one, attack the big one.”

Little Dumpling: “Huh?”

Lu Qing: “What kind of nonsense is this?!”

“Attack me?!”

“Why attack me?!”

“Because you are a senior elder of the Ghost Clan!” Withered Vine waved his hand, ordering, “Brothers, attack him! Take his head and present it to Third Prince Long.”

“Yes, big brother.”

“Brothers, charge!”

The swarm of monsters surged toward Lu Qing, a black flood that threatened to blot out the peach grove.

Lu Qing turned and fled, shouting, “I’m not a senior elder of the Ghost Clan!!”

“I’m a descendant of the Monster Clan!!”

Who would attack their own? Such stupidity.

Truly, these creatures were fools, having cultivated for hundreds, even millions of years without ever transforming—just imbeciles.

“No!” Little Dumpling grabbed one of the beasts, blocking its path. “You can’t hit him! He’s my uncle.”

“L-let go of me!!” The captured beast slurred its words.

She held it tightly, almost peeling off its scales. “You can’t hit him!”

The fish-scaled beast, Pika, stopped stubbornly, staring at her with feigned menace. “Y-you young princess, do you believe I’ll hit you?”

“You can’t hit me either! My mother is Man Wuyao, your former Monster King! How dare you hit me?”

“The former Monster King is dead. I can hit you!”

“You’re talking nonsense!” Little Dumpling shoved him down angrily, tears reddening her eyes. “My mother isn’t dead! She will come back!”

“Your mother is dead!” Pika growled, anger flaring after being pushed. “Because of your father, the former Monster King died! You should blame your father! You should see the Ghost Clan as our enemy and join us in fighting them!”

“I won’t! I won’t believe your lies! My father isn’t bad! I hate you! You are the bad ones!”

“Hmph, suit yourself.” Pika staggered to his feet and wobbled toward Lu Qing to attack.

Seeing this, Little Dumpling sprang forward again, pinning him down and yelling, “I said, don’t you dare hit my uncle!”

“Ah—!!” Pika, caught off guard, took a punch to the face, losing half a tooth.

In the next moment,

The Peachwood Grove echoed with heart-wrenching screams and howls.

“Ah!! My tooth!!”

“It hurts so much, wuuu...”

“She knocked out my tooth! Father, she knocked out my tooth!”

Pika cried as he stood, running to complain to the adult fish-beast Picheng in the crowd.

Little Dumpling: “...”

She hadn’t even cried yet.

But he was already complaining?

(End of chapter)