The Empress's Gigolo

Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios

While some of the soldiers went to hew some timber, Ren Baqian and his people waited by the river shore

Regardless of whether the wood would be used to craft rafts or pitch camp, this was a necessary preparation.

By the shore, Ren Baqian used binoculars and observed the other side of the river. He detected something quietly waiting there, but it didn’t have much movement.

Someone must have seen it just now when they went upstream to check? It didn’t really matter even if the plan had failed, did it?

Could it be that the other party still had reinforcements? What could it be?

Ren Baqian pondered for a moment and dropped the thought temporarily when he failed to grasp the gist of the issue.

He wasn’t well versed in such strategies and couldn’t figure out what the other party was thinking.

In any case, his army would completely triumph over them. The only thing that they could do was to come up with something that would cripple Ren Baqian’s military strength.

Otherwise, they would have to use new recruits and garrisons to face the winged cavalry and the Protectorate of the South, who were all at least Man Wheel experts. That would be no different from courting death.

The other party couldn’t possibly be thinking that a bunch of new recruits would defeat the aboriginal army, right? Even if their numbers were 20 or even 30 times greater.

If war was simply a game of accumulating men, then Dayao would have already been destroyed over 100 times.

Therefore, as long as the aboriginals remained as cautious as possible, avoided falling into traps, and prevented excessive damage to their military strength, putting down this revolt would be a guaranteed success.

All the aboriginals could do was to counter every move of the other party.

Recalling what someone had mentioned before, every outstanding commander was a coward, which was why they would ponder so much. They would consider every aspect and would never miss a single detail.

Ren Baqian felt that this explanation somehow made sense.

He wasn’t timid at all. Thus, he wasn’t destined to become an outstanding commander.

Ren Baqian turned his head and looked around for Li Fu, but quickly spotted Qingyun Sword and Zuo Cheng. Presently, both of them looked like guardian deities.

Li Fu paid no attention to the both of them. He continued wondering, Why? Why were there Heaven-grade weapons? Why were there two of them?

“Senior, there’s an army obstructing the road ahead. It would be better if you could capture their commander and destroy those soldiers. This way, we can return earlier to conduct research on the rocket,” Ren Baqian said as he rode his horse beside Li Fu.

Without even lifting his head, Li Fu left looking weary and continued to rack his brains.

Ren Baqian wasn’t the slightest bit concerned. He also didn’t think that Li Fu would become a hired thug for him because of this one sentence.

Even though Li Fu had a distracted look on his face, as distracted as he could be, he was still the world’s most powerful expert.

At this moment, Ren Baqian suddenly heard thunder-like sounds from afar.

“Is it going to rain?” Ren Baqian lifted his head and looked up toward the sky in the distance. If it were to rain, the river would swell and the current would become faster. If that happened, it would be much more troublesome to cross the river.

However, as far as his eyes could see, the sky was clear and sunny. There were no signs of impending rain.

Suddenly, the situation ahead turned chaotic.

“Flood! Flood! Hurry and report to the Protector General and Her Majesty! Tell them to quickly retreat!” many of the soldiers shouted.

Ren Baqian’s eyebrows twitched as he leaped up from his mount and was finally able to extend his line of sight beyond the crowd to look at the situation in the distance.

All he could see was a white line rushing toward his direction! In front of that white line, there were numerous little dots that seemed like out of control huskies that were rampaging toward his direction.

“F*ck!” Ren Baqian felt like spouting profanities. So this was what the other party was planning!

They had never intended to collapse the dam while Ren Baqian and his people were crossing. The force of the water that they had amassed was sufficient to flood both sides of the river.

No wonder the other party was calm and composed. They didn’t even have the slightest reaction after learning that Ren Baqian had sent his men upstream to investigate.

The empress and Xi Wanya reacted even quicker than Ren Baqian. Both of them had leaped up into the air, witnessed everything, and immediately shouted out, “Everyone, move back up the mountain. Leave everything behind! All personnel, quickly retreat!”

“Don’t be disordered. Follow the sequence of distance and quickly move back up the mountain,” Xi Wanya shouted loudly as well.

Ren Baqian landed on the back of his horned cow and looked at the hill beside them. The rearguard of their forces was actually pretty close to the hill. However, some of them in vanguard were already nearing the river and were at least 1,500 meters away from the hill.

With the speed of a Man Wheel expert, it would take three minutes to travel this distance.

As for the white line that Ren Baqian had seen just now, it would take at least three minutes for it to reach the hill as well.

It seemed like the army had enough time to make it. However, with thousands of people concentrated in the area, the problem was that there was no room to run!

Presently, this problem was evident. Ren Baqian looked around him and saw that the soldiers near the hill had already quickly made it to the top. However, those around him were still in chaos.

Even though Xi Wanya had repeatedly shouted out not to panic, disorder was inevitable. It would be possible if there was sufficient time, but there just wasn’t enough time now.

Regardless of whether it was water or fire, they both wait for no man!

“Kill!” Just at this moment, a battle cry sounded from the hill.

An army of around 1,000 soldiers charged toward the aboriginals and fired a flurry of arrows before they even got close.

“They aren’t the rebel army, they are practitioners from the different sects!” Even though Ren Baqian was far away, he immediately determined their identities the moment he saw their movements.

It was almost impossible to ambush the nearby army, yet a group of 1,000 practitioners actually managed to get so close without being detected!

“Damn it! Are you people from the protectorate good-for-nothings?” Ren Baqian was pissed off!

The situation here was originally already chaotic. Now, another group of enemies had appeared at the hill to obstruct the escape route, slowing down the speed of the retreat. At this rate, there was no telling how many people would perish in this flood.

“Go!” The empress landed beside Ren Baqian. She groaned as she carried him with one hand and charged toward the enemies that had just appeared at the hill.

“Senior Li Fu!” At that moment, Ren Baqian shouted down, “Look for Li Fu, Your Majesty. Otherwise, even if all the enemies on the hill were killed, with the current speed of the retreat, there is no telling how many people will be washed away by the flood!”

The empress heeded Ren Baqian’s words and began looking for Li Fu while in midair. She took a turn and landed beside him.

“I urge you to take action, senior!” Ren Baqian cupped his hands toward Li Fu.

“I’ll not meddle with such trivial stuff!” Li Fu glanced at him and shook his head.

“If we were to lose this battle, the south, the Chen Nation, and the Yun Nation will be in a mess. With Great Xia eyeing us covetously and our internal affairs in chaos, how would it be possible to develop the science and technology necessary to build a rocket? We plead for your assistance, senior. We don’t need you to attack the rebels, we just hope you can save those soldiers! When we return, I’ll make you a hang glider and let you have a ride in the sky!” Ren Baqian said hastily.

Previously, the rod strike from Li Fu had startled Ren Baqian. Currently, if there was someone who had the ability to stop the violent flooding water, it could only be him.

Li Fu hesitated for a while before nodding and saying, “Fine, I’ll help you. Get your people to hide behind me!”

Ren Baqian was elated after hearing this and hurriedly said to the empress, “Your Majesty, get those who can’t make it up the hill in time to hide behind Li Fu.”

The empress had no objections and cupped her hands toward Li Fu as an expression of gratitude. After that, she got everyone to gather together behind him

When everyone had assembled, the empress lifted Ren Baqian and landed on top of a tree before watching Li Fu’s every action very closely.

At that instant, the rebels threw down a few corpses from the hill. As they exchanged a few blows with the aboriginals, a few of them ran back.

Their motive was to delay the aboriginal army, and they had achieved their purpose.

Ren Baqian fixed his gaze at the front. The line of water that was rushing forth was only about 100 meters away from their people. Huge waves of around two meters tall swelled up toward the crowd along with a loud rumble.

Li Fu was facing this huge wave with just his rod and standing behind him were thousands of soldiers tightly assembled.

Within a matter of only a few breaths, the wave had swelled up in front of everyone.

Looking solemn, Li Fu stared closely at the wave. The Dragon Turtle Rod in his hands suddenly grew two meters long and stretched ahead.

Boom!

An approximately ten meter radius of water in front of Li Fu immediately burst apart. He looked very pleased with the usefulness of just this one strike. According to his estimation, just one strike with his rod should be able to split apart the water with a range of about 100 meters.

However, the water began crashing down on his head the very next second.

Li Fu was shocked. How could the power of his strike be so weak? He then used his rod to create countless shadows in front of him.

The waves now parted from where Li Fu was standing and merged back together behind the soldiers.

The surrounding soldiers could very clearly see a countless amount of marine life in that water.

Ren Baqian and the empress could see everything clearly from the top of the tree. Li Fu didn’t only strike once with his rod, but countless times in fact. Countless shadows created by his rod filled up the space in front of him.

The flood was simply split apart in front of Li Fu and pushed outward to both sides by his rod. Colliding with the water on the outside, the water pressure built up and combined together.

Yet, it was just enough to avoid the numerous soldiers behind Li Fu.

Observing the situation from afar, the aboriginals looked as if they were a piece of reef in the water, brushing against the flow of the current.

Having previously even destroyed a mountain in one move, Li Fu splitting the water 100 meters apart wasn’t exactly breathtaking.

After all, he merely used one strike to destroy a mountain, yet he had to unleash countless moves at present. The area in front of Li Fu was completely filled with flashes of his rod’s shadows.

However, Li Fu’s control of his strength could be said to have reached great heights! To be able to allow the water to avoid everyone and join back together a meter behind them, such control of his strength made him worthy of being called the world’s most powerful expert.

All the baihu standing on the hill were bedazzled, as were Qingyun Sword and the others standing behind him.

However, even though Li Fu had currently received the admiration of everyone, he wanted to swear so badly in his heart!

Damn it! Has my strength deteriorated so much? It’s so shocking! I originally thought that I would be able to split apart the water with just one move, but in the end, it took me a few hundred moves just to do that. I had to expend all my energy just to be able to barely save these people. At this rate, I won’t be able to hold on for much longer!

Since I already agreed to it, I have to keep these people safe no matter what. Otherwise, I will have nowhere else to put my face.