Chapter 3662 — Initial Encounter with the Enemy
The Blossom Guardian · Page 1 of 3
Just as Xiao Che and the others had said, if the three of them each fought alone, then no matter how many herbs they gathered early on or how many points they racked up, it would all be for nothing; in the end it would only benefit Meng Zhou and his lot. That way not only would they come away empty-handed, they would in effect be supplying the enemy—handing Meng Zhou a gift and indirectly making it even harder for Wei Zhao to contend for victory.
That was a real problem!
Wei Zhao thought it over, then pulled from his basket the map of the back mountain's outer fringes issued specially to every newcomer and studied it. Pointing to a spot where two streams converged, he said, "Then here's how we'll do it. For the first two days we still act separately, but at noon two days from now, we meet at Three Streams Junction here, and then return together. Time is tight, so the two of you stop shoving this back and forth with me—it's settled."
Acting apart for the first two days would let each of them search for as many herbs as possible and rack up points, and it was relatively safe at this stage.
After all, even if Meng Zhou and his people wanted to move against them, they would not choose to strike this early. They could not kill, and even if they ganged up to give Xiao Che and the others a sound beating, there would be no real gain in it for them. If they were going to act, they would surely pick the final return trip, when it would be easiest to plunder the fruits of another's labor and maximize their profit.
As for the rendezvous two days later, with Wei Zhao holding things together among the three of them, even if Meng Zhou and his crew had the numbers, they might not come out ahead. When the time came, who would crush whom was still anyone's guess!
Since Wei Zhao had put it that plainly, Xiao Che and Qiao Hongcai naturally had no further grounds to refuse and could only nod in agreement. After all, Wei Zhao's plan was not only more sensible and rational, it was also more advantageous to the two of them.
Seeing that the three had settled on a plan, the long-suffering senior brother still felt it carried a certain risk, but on second thought, how could a cultivator ever go from beginning to end without taking a single risk? Risk was forever in direct proportion to reward; that was simply the way of things.
"All right then—in any case, the three of you must be careful, and then careful again. Whatever you do, don't get careless. Your enemies are not only the other newcomers; don't forget that the back mountain itself is the true source of danger!" the long-suffering senior brother warned one last time.
Wei Zhao and the other two nodded. Once everything was ready, they went with the rest of the newcomers to the trial departure point on the plaza before the Back Mountain Hall.
At that moment, more than a dozen enormous flying spirit beasts waited at the departure point, poised to launch. These were standard equipment for the Back Mountain Hall; after all, their guardianship covered the entire back mountain, and whenever something came up, they ordinarily relied on flying spirit beasts for transport. If they had to go on foot, who knew how long it would be before they reached the scene of trouble.
So this was how the random deployment worked!
Only upon seeing these flying spirit beasts did Wei Zhao finally understand. When he had first heard the trial rules, he had wondered how newcomers like them would be deployed to the outer regions of the back mountain; he had assumed there would be some teleportation array or the like. So it turned out they were to be air-dropped by flying spirit beasts!
Once all the newcomers had taken their places on the beasts' backs, the dozen or so flying spirit beasts rose with a simultaneous roar—a magnificent sight that drew a burst of startled cries from the newcomers.