Chapter 00181: Ambush on the Mountain Road
# Ambush on the Mountain Road
Chapter 181
Novel: After the Immortals Disappeared
Chapter 181: Ambush on the Mountain Road
Mrs.
Ying, who had been listening all along, blurted out, "That should be quite useful in battle."
As soon as the words left her mouth, she realized she had misspoken.
The others fell silent, and Liu Bangban lowered his head, not daring to respond.
He Yue changed the subject, "Since General Ke has come to plead, can the Fu family escape this calamity?"
Ke Jihai had quelled the rebel forces at Woling Pass and was currently the most trusted general of the court, having personally rushed back to plead for the Fu family.
The monarch was counting on him to defeat Dong Haoming, so surely he would have to give some face, right?
"We will know soon enough."
Mrs.
Ying felt a bit frustrated and lifted the curtain to observe the road conditions.
Their carriage was winding down the mountain road, and the snow was getting heavier, making it impossible to see anything beyond three zhang.
In such conditions, no matter how wide and flat the mountain road was, one had to be doubly cautious.
Only the two horse lanterns in front and behind responded to each other.
Hmm? Front and back?
She glanced back, "There’s another carriage following us; I wonder whose it is."
The carriage of General Ke was quite close, within two zhang.
This was the unspoken understanding of traveling in the snow; everyone maintained a distance to assist each other in case of emergencies.
Which family had left the banquet midway?
He Lingchuan also leaned out to take a look, then pulled back and closed his eyes for a moment before saying, "What a coincidence, it’s the common carriage that followed us up the mountain. I suspect the passenger is the young man who handed General Ke the booklet during the banquet; he doesn’t seem to be from a wealthy or official family."
He paused, "Hmm, that carriage has stopped."
Mrs.
Ying asked in surprise, "How did you see that in such heavy snow?" She could only see a faint warm light from the lantern and the vague shadow of the carriage; any further identification was impossible.
Actually, it was quite simple.
The lantern of that carriage was covered with green paper, emitting a yellowish-green light.
Other carriages had the normal yellow-white light.
He Lingchuan had observed the way here; how could he forget?
But he looked at He Chunhua across from him and smiled, "Just a guess."
Whether it was an illusion or not, it seemed his father didn’t want him to receive Ke Jihai’s Hundred Slicing Blade?
Just then, in his last glance, he saw the carriage stop, and the driver jumped down to inspect the wheels, not knowing what problem had occurred.
Mrs.
Ying rolled her eyes.
However, her words reminded He Lingchuan.
Since he was idle here, he simply decided to put his learning into practice and tried to expand his divine sense again.
To others, he appeared to be resting with his eyes closed.
The results showed that using it at night was much better than during the day; the burden was even lighter, perhaps related to the weakness of his divine soul.
This feeling was quite peculiar; he could clearly "see" the shape of each snowflake.
Though they were hexagonal, there were subtle differences between each one and between their edges.
One must know that the snowflakes swirling around the front and back of the carriage numbered in the thousands; even if one looked with their eyes, they could not see them all, yet the divine sense could capture every detail.
With such an intuitive comparison, he realized the benefits of using divine sense to perceive objects.
Needless to say, this was also an essential skill for home travel and combat.
He Lingchuan was so engrossed in expanding his divine sense that he found he could only extend it to two zhang; beyond that, he could not.
This was likely limited by the strength of his divine soul.
The accumulated snow on the road, the stones below the cliff, the white vapor exhaled by the driver, and the strange shadows on the mountain wall.
Hmm?
He Lingchuan suddenly opened his eyes, leaned out, and shouted, "Stop! Enemy attack!"
He was separated from the driver by a thick cloth screen, and this shout, infused with true energy, sounded like winter thunder, causing the driver’s ears to buzz, instinctively pulling on the reins.
In such snowy weather, the carriage was already moving slowly, and with a pull, it came to a halt.
Everyone was caught off guard and leaned forward.
Ying Hongchan complained, "What..."
Before she could finish her words, a massive rock crashed down right in front of the carriage, shattering the black stone slabs laid on the ground into dozens of pieces.
But that wasn't the end; it rolled forward a few times and directly fell off the mountain road.
A moment later, a dull thud echoed from below the mountain.
Mrs.
Ying's face turned as white as paper.
This irregular giant stone was larger than the door of an inn and weighed at least six or seven hundred jin.
If her eldest son hadn’t stopped the carriage just now, their family would have been crushed down the cliff by the giant stone!
This was a royal villa; could a weathered giant stone fall so suddenly from the mountain?
She forgot that He Lingchuan had also shouted "enemy attack."
A shadow swept across the sky.
Everyone looked up and saw a massive figure descending from the sky, crashing down onto General Ke Jihai's carriage with a loud bang!
This strike was precisely aimed; the high-quality sour branch wood carriage burst apart as if it were made of paper, splintering into pieces.
The flying wood shards even shot out two zhang away, hitting the horses pulling the He family’s carriage.
One horse was injured on the shoulder and startled, rearing up and trying to turn the carriage around.
"General Ke!"
The He family was horrified.
The commander of over a hundred thousand troops was thus inexplicably crushed to death in his carriage?
By the light of the lantern, everyone could see that the second giant shadow that crashed down was no longer a boulder, but a brown giant ape!
This creature stood over a zhang tall, its muscles bulging as if they would burst through its skin, weighing at least two thousand jin.
It was covered in scars and wore a thorny collar around its neck; He Lingchuan had only seen such spiked collars on fierce dogs, originally meant to prevent tigers and wolves from biting their necks, but he never expected it to be on a giant ape.
Even stranger, it was clad in a grim gray armor that seemed to block vital areas; it didn’t look like metal but rather... bone?
The giant ape, after crashing down like a cannonball, did not stop; it swung its iron fists and began smashing the carriage of Ke Jihai into pieces.
Mrs.
Ying wanted to scream, but when she saw its pair of blood-red eyes scanning over, she quickly covered her mouth.
"Get out of the carriage!" He Chunhua ordered in a low voice, taking advantage of the carriage blocking the giant ape's line of sight, he picked up his wife and jumped to the ground.
With the giant ape being this powerful, the carriage was no longer a safe cover but rather restricted everyone’s movements.
He Yue also pulled the dazed Liu Bangban and the driver out of the carriage.
While the giant ape was wildly smashing Ke Jihai's carriage, He Lingchuan drew his knife and swiftly severed the harness of their own carriage, leading out two horses, "Get on the horses, quickly!"
On the mountain road, calling for help was futile; to survive, they had to rely on their own speed.
Only by quickly hiding in the forest could they find some safety.
This was not the time to hesitate; He Chunhua jumped onto a horse, turned its head, and headed up the mountain.
He Yue also jumped onto a horse and reached out to his elder brother, but He Lingchuan threw Liu Bangban up instead, "You go!"
He Yue panicked, "Brother!"
But He Lingchuan gave the horse a hard slap on the rear, urging it to charge forward after He Chunhua.
Of course, he would not sit idly by; he grabbed the driver's collar and leaped toward the common carriage behind.
The two were only about two zhang apart, and for He Lingchuan, it was just a matter of lifting his legs to reach.
Before his feet even touched the ground, he repeated his earlier action, freeing the two horses pulling the carriage.
In his view, this Hundred Slicing Blade was not as sharp as the Broken Blade, but it was still a rare treasure; it sliced through the tough wood like cutting tofu, saving both time and effort.
At a critical moment, a good blade could save lives.
The driver and passenger of this carriage were already stunned by the giant ape and were caught off guard by He Lingchuan's actions.
Just as they were about to shout, He Lingchuan reminded them, "Get on the horses and escape, quickly!"
No matter how wide and flat the mountain road was, it was difficult for a carriage to turn around; how could one escape on horseback with such speed and agility?
He Lingchuan also saw clearly that the passenger in the carriage was indeed the young man who had presented a booklet to Ke Jihai during the banquet.
His driver, as if waking from a dream, jumped onto a horse and ran back.
The passenger tried to climb onto the back seat but nearly fell off.
He Lingchuan steadied the passenger and mounted the last horse himself, heading toward the mountain peak.
This was his main objective; he wanted to borrow their horse.
Eight people, four horses, in the blink of an eye, they were on the path to escape.
This series of actions seemed complex, but it took only seven or eight breaths of time, just as the giant ape smashed the carriage six or seven times.
How could such a massive and violent beast suddenly appear in Shihuan City?
He Lingchuan immediately thought of the northern demon kingdom.
A banished crocodile demon could be considered a god in the flood before Woling Pass, stirring up storms and defeating the water army of the Yuan Kingdom, so perhaps these powerful demons also came from the northern borders?
The giant ape had torn Ke Jihai's carriage to shreds, and one of the horses managed to escape, while the other, unfortunately, was still tied to the carriage and neighed in fear.
Next, the giant ape casually swatted a few times, using its strength to lift the entire carriage over its head and throw it off the cliff!
There were still more than ten zhang to the ground; even if Ke Jihai hadn’t been crushed, he would have been killed by the fall.
He Lingchuan heard the horse's mournful whinny fade away, then abruptly stop, his palms sweating profusely.
This giant ape attacked two carriages; was its target Ke Jihai or the He family?
Against Ke Jihai, it personally intervened, but for the He family’s carriage, it only threw a giant stone.
So, was Ke Jihai its primary target?
If he could clarify this point, perhaps the He family would have a greater hope of survival.
At this moment, they were heading up the mountain road, hoping to distance themselves from the giant ape in a short time.
That creature looked immensely powerful but did not seem to be a speedster.
The snow had stopped falling at some point.
Just then, from the corner of He Lingchuan's eye, he caught a glimpse of something flashing past in the dense forest beside them.
Ahead, He Yue was also exclaiming, "Be careful, there’s something in the forest!"
But that thing darted away, moving faster than a galloping horse.
He Lingchuan gathered his qi and shouted, "Father, duck!"
Leading the way were He Chunhua and his wife.
Upon hearing his son’s shout, he turned to look, but the forest was pitch black, and he saw nothing.
Ahead was a large piece of solid rock, rising over a zhang above the road, with the mountain path winding around its edge.
Before He Chunhua could retract his gaze, a figure appeared atop the rock, swooping down from above like a bird of prey!
It completely ignored the three riders behind and aimed directly for He Chunhua’s life.
To capture the leader first; even the demon understood this principle.
Fortunately, He Chunhua had long been on high alert.
As soon as he caught a glimpse of movement in the corner of his eye, he instinctively yanked the horse's head.
Thank you to the generous contributions from Ri Xing Shuo, haha, Xian Lai Kan Hai Mang Shi Zhong Di, Ye Xue You, and Die Die Su Bing!
(End of Chapter)