Chapter 390 A Hospitable People

The hospitable mountain people even prepared a lot of dried food, local specialties, when sending everyone off. Although Y'zaks' large backpack made it clear that Hao Ren and his group wouldn't lack supplies on the road, the mountain people said it was their clan's custom when seeing off friends, so Hao Ren gratefully accepted the gifts.

This warm reception should be credited to Becky's good connections. It was unexpected that this mercenary girl had established such a high reputation among these foreigners. Becky's explanation was simple: "The mountain people are an easy-to-understand people. They repay kindness with kindness and resentment with resentment. My personality is similar, so after helping them a few times, it's easy to become friends."

He hadn't expected that this mercenary girl, who seemed to be only interested in money, still had such a simple and pure side at heart.

After leaving the small border village, the group didn't delay their journey any further, spending the next few days traveling at full speed.

It was hard work to travel day and night like this on the vast grassland, but the magnificent exotic scenery along the way diverted the group's attention to some extent, so it wasn't too difficult. Riding a horse in such a vast place was a novel experience that wasn't easily experienced. Even Vivian and Nangong Wuyue, who had traveled all over the world, seemed very interested along the way. Lily was even more so: she simply loved this unrestrained wilderness environment. Half the time she rode her horse, and half the time she ran with Y'zaks behind the team, occasionally carrying her horse for a while. Her travel life was particularly rich and colorful...

Hao Ren felt that if he didn't find a populated place soon, Lily would soon devolve back to her pre-enlightenment state: now she jumped off her horse again, acting strangely... racing her horse on all fours.

It was simply unbearable to watch.

"You guys are quite interesting," Becky turned her head and looked at Y'zaks, who was running wildly at the back of the team, and the werewolf girl racing her mount on all fours. She felt that all the rare things she could witness in her life had happened in these few days. "I'll ask again, are you sure you're all studying magic?"

"Of course," Hao Ren had repeated this question many times, and now he had basically reached the point where he could talk nonsense without changing his expression. He just made up stories as he went along. "Lily just ate the wrong medicine when doing alchemy experiments..."

"Didn't you say last time that she was struck by lightning during a magic experiment?"

"Oh, she was struck by lightning while taking medicine, and her head was also caught in a door."

Vivian sighed and exchanged thoughts with Nangong Wuyue next to her: "I suddenly don't want to bully Big Dog anymore. Let's treat her better in the future."

Lily had no idea what these heartless guys were saying about her behind her back. She happily frolicked for a while, then suddenly darted to Hao Ren's side, and then, regardless of the horse's galloping, she agilely jumped onto the horse's back, grabbed Hao Ren's shoulders from behind, and shook him vigorously: "Landlord, landlord! We're almost at the foot of the mountain!"

After shouting this like a madman, Lily jumped back to the ground in a few steps, took a few quick steps to catch up with her horse, and hung herself back on the horse's back. Her movements were so smooth that outsiders would probably be scared into a heart attack, but this girl played as smoothly as walking on flat ground: no matter how strange her personality or how magical her bloodline, Lily was truly the number one martial artist in Hao Ren's five-person team. After all, even a fierce man like Y'zaks relied on overwhelming power, and the real technical fighting master still had to be Lily.

It was a pity that this girl never used her talent in the right place.

Hao Ren was almost shaken off his horse by Lily. After finally stabilizing himself, he raised his head and saw that the distant mountain range was now close at hand. This mountain range had appeared on the horizon a long time ago, but as the saying goes, "Looking at the mountain makes the horse die," and the group had been galloping for several hours to reach the foot of the mountain.

This mountain range was the famous "Dragonspine Mountains" in the western part of the Kingdom of Holletta, named for its continuousness, and the fact that a large portion of the mountains were distributed with evenly spaced, dramatically undulating, spine-like mountains. It stretched from the inland of western Holletta to the depths of the grassland, and was a barrier that Hao Ren and the others couldn't avoid on their way to Lake Beinz.

Because the sacred Lake Beinz was on the other side of the mountain range, the people of Holletta spent a lot of manpower and material resources to excavate large tunnels or mountain roads in various places to cross this mountain range. Some key places were even connected with costly perpetual teleportation arrays (mainly the "sacred buildings" such as cathedrals on both sides of the mountain range; the church and the royal family would spare no expense to ensure smooth communication between themselves and the holy land). Hao Ren and the others' original plan was to turn south at the mountain range, take a broken line from the kingdom's interior, and finally pass through a newer tunnel through the mountain range. However, in order to find clues to the "otherworld woman" who had acted two days earlier than them, the group temporarily decided in the mountain people's village to directly cross this barrier from the ancient mountain road near the grassland border.

Compared to the two routes, the latter looked shorter in a straight line, but in fact, the time spent was about the same: although the tunnel through the mountain range required detouring to the kingdom's interior, it was relatively easier to travel. Although the ancient mountain road was a direct route, it was not a shortcut due to the rugged roads and complex conditions in the mountains. Of course, for experienced mercenaries with various skills, there was no difference between the two routes.

Becky was a level two mercenary. Although quite young, she must have had real skills to pass through the layers of tests and obtain today's rating. Before Lake Beinz increased its level of blockade due to the Orb incident, she had crossed this mountain range many times (mainly to earn extra money), so this time she took the lead as a guide. Becky led the group into an inconspicuous mountain depression at the foot of the mountain that was easily missed by rookies, and found the ancient mountain road that sloped upwards.

"Be careful here," everyone dismounted and walked. Becky led the horse at the front, "This area is said to be one of the relics of ancient civilization. There are some strange magical beasts in the mountains that are difficult to explain, although they are not difficult to deal with... but it will be troublesome to get entangled with them. This road condition is not suitable for combat."

"Speaking of which, ancient civilizations are really everywhere," Nangong Wuyue muttered. The bare mountains around blocked the gentle wind on the grassland, and the current altitude had not yet reached the misty mountain waist, so the mermaid girl was slightly unhappy with the dryness of the air. "How much did they stir up?"

"Anyway, the commotion was so big that it annoyed the goddess," Becky said with a smile, "It is said that the entire Dragonspine Mountains were forcibly created from the ground by the ancient human magic emperor 'Eroken' using a forbidden curse, which is why it suddenly lies across the plains. My grandfather said that Eroken completely disrupted the blueprint set by the goddess at the beginning of creation when he created this mountain range, but the reason he did this was simply because he didn't like the cold wind blowing from the west of the plains—the magic emperors of ancient civilization were so... um..."

Hao Ren tried to remind her: "Courting death?"

"Yes, courting death!" Becky nodded vigorously, "This statement is quite appropriate. Anyway, my grandfather said that the magic emperors of ancient civilization were very arrogant. All the magicians at that time were arrogant. The werewolf magic emperor 'Sanuer' created the Sunset Volcano, and the elf queen Lorisa—also a magic emperor—overstepped the authority of God to create the semi-eternal Tree of Life, and allowed that tree to draw nutrients from the goddess's holy spring to maintain eternal life. The vampire magic emperor 'Derrin' was the initial initiator of creating perfect life by overstepping divine authority."

"Um... indeed quite arrogant." Hao Ren was also a little amazed at the creativity of the magic emperors back then. At the same time, he began to wonder what would happen if these "mad scientists" with open minds really appeared in front of Raven 12345, but after thinking about it for a long time, he still felt that Raven 12345 would probably find it very troublesome and hand over the mess to the inspectors under her command...

"The Dragonspine Mountains are Eroken's creation, and the power of that earth monarch still remains here," Becky said, excitedly telling the legendary stories she had heard from her grandfather. At this time, she continued to speak on her own, "It is said that the stone monsters in the mountains that attack people today are driven by Eroken's crazy soul fragments. It's best if we don't encounter that kind of thing. Although the threat is not great, it is particularly difficult to kill. They're very hard."

"Rumble—"

Almost at the same time as Becky's voice fell, a muffled thunder-like roar suddenly came from deep in the mountains.

Vivian's eighteen hundred "being tricked warning indicators" began to frantically alarm. She felt that she was probably going to be unlucky again.