After the main officers were drawn away by their respective opponents, and when I was forced to withdraw my Constellation spirits from the frontline to deal with Xue Tu's army of Blood Golems, the rank and file mercenaries began sustaining casualties. A few of them had succ.u.mbed to the esoteric blood techniques of the Blood Slaughter Sect disciples, while others suffered from grievous wounds. Fortunately, we had medics who could cast healing magic and allow them to pull through without fear that they might die, but they remained out of the fight for at least a day or two. Some, even longer, despite the healing spells cast on them.

The others were a.s.signed sentry duty to ensure the Blood Slaughter Sect and other threats (such as monsters) weren't going to come back. Or if they did, we could sound the alarm and be ready for them. Truthfully, I was exhausted from expending so much mana to fight Xue Tu, but compared to the wounded, I got off pretty lightly so I couldn't complain.

"What do you think the Blood Slaughter Sect was after?" Anastasia asked, perplexed, but I didn't know the answer either.

"Who knows?"

"Perhaps there's some treasure inside the tomb?" Princ.i.p.al Porter suggested, almost taking me by surprise. Except that I had detected his presence earlier. Even if I was too tired to be alert of people sneaking up on me, my gla.s.ses had a motion tracker that detected his movements earlier. Sure, it only sounded out the movements in a 180 degree arc in front of me, but I constantly turned about, and thus was able to spot Princ.i.p.al Porter before he reached us.

"What kind of treasure?" Anastasia asked, naturally curious. "I don't think it's gold or jewelry like in those tomb exploration movies and novels, right?"

"While it is true that many tombs around the world contain treasure, there are many more sites that do not. At least not the same kind of treasure as we call them today." Princ.i.p.al Porter was stroking his beard. "Don't let those tomb raider movies, games and novels fool you and idealize tombs. Most of them don't actually contain gold or priceless artifacts. Well, honestly, historical artifacts still sell for a lot, but usually governments take them and enshrine them in national museums, so it's not as if you can make tons of money off them unless you go to a black market. And unless you can prove their authenticity, n.o.body is stupid enough to buy some random statue or whatever off you. Those stories, games and movies often idealize ancient tombs, but they really don't have that much treasure. Most archaeological digs turn up nothing of value more often than not…monetary value, anyway." He smiled. "But they have priceless historical value and provide an incredible wealth of knowledge. Not that most people watching those movies are interested in that kind of treasure."

I nodded, well aware of that as a history student. Most people tended to idealize tomb exploration stories, especially with the success of Harrison Ford's Indiana Jone movies and Lara Croft games, but archaeological digs were frequently dull and boring affairs. It involved a lot of back-breaking work, meticulously chiseling away at sites under the blazing hot sun, braving bugs and discomfort that the outdoors threw at you.

In short, don't let the tomb raiders and explorer stories deceive you. Archaeology is a lot of hard work and suffering. Fortunately, there were pa.s.sionate scholars who still do it because of their thirst for knowledge, not greed for treasure and money.

But that did not explain why the Blood Slaughter Sect was so invested in the tomb, to the extent where they would throw away so many of their disciples. Indeed, the Silver Wolves had inflicted such an appaling death toll on the retreating Blood Slaughter Sect that there couldn't be more than 10% of their forces left. If Liu had chosen to stay and fight to the last, they would have been wiped out to the very last man.

Even so, I doubted that Liu would just retreat and give up on the tomb. That Blood Slaughter Sect elder was just too stubborn to give up, and his craftiness was going to pose us problems. He would definitely find an alternative route to attack us. He had sacrificed far too much of his sect, including his own leader, to give up now. No doubt he was off somewhere nearby, plotting some sinister scheme to take the tomb without needing to rely on brute force.

That said, I wondered about Xue Tu. Even though he was technically the leader of the Blood Slaughter Sect, something didn't feel right about the whole thing. I wouldn't be surprised if he had only been a puppet, propped up on the throne by none other than Liu so that the old man could manipulate the sect from behind the scenes and effectively rule the sect as a regent without drawing too much attention and resentment toward himself.

Just like how the patriarchs of the Fujiwara clan ruled as regents in their grandsons' stead after forcing the previous Emperors to abdicate once they reached of age.

"If we only knew what they are looking for, we can better prepare," Brent murmured as he joined us, looking extremely weary. He looked battered and exhausted, with burns on his skin from enduring the explosion that resulted from overloading of the b.l.o.o.d.y Berserker with critical damage. He had declined treatment from the medics, insisting that the healing mages took care of all the rank and file mercenaries and other officers first.

"I'm afraid I haven't got a clue," Princ.i.p.al Porter admitted grumpily. "The whole reason for organizing this expedition is to dig up information about this tomb in the first place! We don't know who was buried here, or which civilization it belonged to! Except that it predated the Era of Unification and most likely belonged to the Dark Age of Technology. Before it even, if our carbon testing spells prove to be correct."

"So perhaps they are looking for some relic from the Dark Age of Technology? Some sort of machine or piece of technology…like a Standard Template Construct?"

"Don't mix this up with Warhammer 40,000," Professor Porter growled irritably at Brent's guess. "Standard Template Constructs don't exist in this universe. But to answer the first part of your question, probably. Though I have no idea what kind of relic they are looking for. Still, the technological devices from before the Dark Age exceeded our imagination. It is well known that it was the machines and technology from before the Dark Age – something to do with opening up quantum portals and gateways to alternate dimensions, or creating webways that allow for faster-than-light travel between star systems – that resulted in Emergence events…an experiment gone wrong when humanity attempted to spread beyond their solar system to colonize the galaxy."

"The Dark Church," Anastasia murmured horrified. Having been part of the a.s.sa.s.sins Guild when the religious extremist group of terrorists hired them, she firsthand knew how ruthless they could be when artificially triggering Emergence events to kill large populations of civilians. Her guess was only natural. Of course the Dark Church would want to grab hold of such ancient technology that was reputedly the cause of all these Emergence events that made our lives miserable in the first place.

Those nutjobs actually wors.h.i.+pped monsters from another dimensions and fanatically welcomed them to our world so that humanity (except themselves) could be erased, and to restore it to some sort of warped nature fas.h.i.+oned in their distorted views.

"But I haven't heard of the Blood Slaughter Sect having any connection to the Dark Church," Brent said with a frown. "I won't pretend to know everything about them, but from what intelligence I gather, I'm sure they have nothing to do with each other."

"Good point. Otherwise we would have seen a.s.sa.s.sins working alongside them." Anastasia nodded. "But I haven't seen any sign of my ex-colleagues."

"In any case, we should remain vigilant and keep an eye out for their return." Brent sighed heavily. "This has become more complicated than I thought. We'll probably need to request for reinforcements, and post a permanent guard here to ensure that n.o.body, Dark Church or Blood Slaughter Sect, gets access to whatever Dark Age technological relics buried within the tomb. Unless your team can dig up and transport whatever is inside the tomb, Princ.i.p.al Porter."

"We'll try," Princ.i.p.al Porter replied absently, rubbing the side of his neck wearily. "But so far we have found nothing to suggest that there are any such valuable technology hidden inside the tomb. In the first place, why would they bury technologies inside a tomb? Treasures, I understand, but technological devises and interdimensional gateways? Inside a burial ground? Why the h.e.l.l would anyone want to put those stuff inside a tomb?"

"Perhaps we are looking at this from the wrong angle," I suggested with a shrug. "Before this was a tomb, it was a research facility. An abandoned one. So n.o.body knew what was under the earth at all, even when they buried someone here and built a huge tomb around it. The Blood Slaughter Sect isn't interested in the tomb itself, but what lies underneath it – which is a research facility. Something that's older than the tomb."

"You might be right," Princ.i.p.al Ported agreed with a nod. "I'll get my team to dig underneath, and see what we can find under the grave. There were previous reports that some portions of the ground felt hollow, as if there's another s.p.a.ce below it."

"Interesting," Brent mused, and then he came to a decision. "I'll a.s.sign a security detail to watch over your team as you work, Princ.i.p.al Porter. The rest of us will continue to patrol the perimeter of the site as usual, to ensure those b.a.s.t.a.r.ds won't return. Or if they do, we'll be ready for them."

"That will be much appreciated." Princ.i.p.al Porter nodded with a smile, and then shuffled away. "Now we'll be returning to work."

"Before you do so, you should catch some sleep, Princ.i.p.al." Brent was quick to call out after the departing old man. "You look like you need it badly."

"You soldiers need it more than we do, to be honest," Princ.i.p.al Porter protested. "Make sure to allow your men the rest they need. They won't be able to fight if they're exhausted."

Brent's lips thinned, likely because he was offended by Porter's insinuation that he didn't know how to take care of his subordinates, but he appreciated the advice nonetheless and showed no sign of resentment.

"I will definitely see to that, Princ.i.p.al." He glanced at me and Anastasia. "The two of you had better go to sleep once your s.h.i.+ft ends."

"Yes, Captain!" Anastasia saluted. I merely nodded, too winded from the constant battles to do anything else.

Right now, I really wanted to sleep, but I still had another two hours of sentry duty to do. Especially with so many of the other mercenaries injured in the fighting…so we had no choice. Well, I would just have to deal with it.

Fortunately, time flew past at an incredible rate, and before I knew it, I was sound asleep atop the sleeping mat that all soldiers carried.

*

"What do we do now, Elder Liu?"

One of the surviving Blood Slaughter Sect disciples asked, looking terrified. He had been bloodied during the encounter with the Silver Wolves mercenaries. All of them were. Very few of them had escaped unscathed.

Even Elder Liu had sustained a few injuries himself, a couple of first degree burns from that red-haired mercenary. Thankfully, his blood techniques allowed him to speed up his healing and provided rapid regeneration, so the injuries were gone by now.

On the other hand, his subordinates and disciples didn't share the same potency or level of blood techniques as him, and their rate of healing was not as fast as him. By the time they fully recovered, the d.a.m.ned mercenaries would have reestablished their perimeter, rebuild the damages to their barrier that was set up by their spirit array formation, and patched up the wounded as well.

It would be impossible to launch another direct, frontal attack from now on. Especially with his forces decimated. Liu had originally set out with over two hundred Blood Slaughter Sect disciples. Now, only a little over twenty remained. Even though they had inflicted significant casualties on the Silver Wolves mercenaries, there was still a sizeable force left. Not to mention, their main fighting force in the form of Spartacus and the late sect leader Xue Tu had been slain in combat.

Liu clenched his fists in frustration. Even though he had been aware of the Silver Wolves' reputation and had ensured not to underestimate them, their power still far surpa.s.sed his imagination. He had thought that the Blood Slaughter Sect would stand a chance if the Silver Wolves mercenaries' leader, Feng Hai, wasn't present. But who knew the Hurricane Fist Brent Bradford was capable of destroying their trump card, the b.l.o.o.d.y Berserker?

And that fool Xue Tu…even though Liu had relented to the young upstart taking over as sect leader, the idiot had gone and gotten himself killed because of his obsession over a girl. A girl who wasn't even here! Honestly, Liu couldn't care less about the leaders.h.i.+p of the sect. Xue Tu had inherited the position from his late father, and Liu was sworn to protect and guide the young man. Unfortunately, the stubborn, reckless fool had disregarded the elder's advice and impetuously plunged ahead on his own, doing whatever he wanted.

Now he had died ignominiously, his corpse probably claimed by the Silver Wolves mercenaries and buried anonymously somewhere in this Heaven forsaken swamp. Liu had no idea how he was going to face the idiot's father in the afterlife, but he decided to worry about it when he got there.

For now, he had to prioritize the mission objective. He looked over the battered survivors of his once proud sect and drew a deep breath.

"Our goal remains unchanged," he declared, his eyes still fierce and unyielding. "We will seize the tomb and the gateway within through whatever means necessary."

"But how?" one of the disciples demanded. "You saw how powerful those Silver Wolves mercenaries are. We'll never be able to defeat them!"

"You're right," Liu admitted. He wasn't that petty and stupid of a villain to randomly kill a subordinate for speaking the truth. Only morons did that, or childish authors who were trying to make a point about how evil their antagonists were without realizing the world simply didn't work that way. "We can't defeat them in combat, so we won't fight them."

"Eh?" That caught the attention of all the surviving disciples, who stared at him, bewildered. Liu felt a smile spread over his wrinkled face before he continued.

"Don't forget our main goal. It's not to defeat the Silver Wolves. It's to complete the ritual and awaken the Great One."

"…ah."

"That's right."

"If we awaken the Great One, he will fight for us!"

"That's right!" Liu contemplated his current options thoughtfully, and then his sly smile grew wider. "It's likely that those archaeologists still have no idea what's beneath the tomb. If I'm not mistaken, there should be a network of tunnels leading to the ancient temple. It might take us a while to navigate and map out the subterranean maze, but if we can reach the Blood Altar before the Silver Wolves mercenaries or archaeologists discover it, we can complete the ritual before they noticed that we are directly underneath them and then set the Great One upon them! Their blood will be the sacrifice that we need to fully awaken him!"

"OOOH!"

With a roar of approval, the disciples of the Blood Slaughter Sect rose in delight. Grinning, Liu raised his hand and punched the air.

"Blood for the Blood G.o.d!"

"Skulls for the Skull Throne!" his disciples chorused excitedly in return, a s.h.i.+mmering red aura settling over them murderously and almost driving them to a frenzy.