105: Chapter 105 The Eye of Shadow

"Frost Mage Lin Shiyun's Frost Spiritual Circuit."

Wang Sheng looked down at his armor. The ice-blue lines bloomed and faded within the cracks like frost flowers, each flicker absorbing the impact of the brute force for him.

The Frost Spiritual Circuit that Frost Mage Lin Shiyun had carved herself was just like her tsundere personality; while she said, "Don't you dare die," the runes she carved were precise down to every stroke, protecting him.

A hint of wariness flashed in Chief Shi Ba's eyes. Wang Sheng's defensive power was stronger than he had anticipated; the Frost Spiritual Circuit's dispersal of the impact meant that even after three punches, he hadn't managed to break through Wang Sheng's defenses.

But the wariness was fleeting. The pride of a Brute Force Warrior did not allow him to show any hesitation in front of a 5th-rank Barbarian Warrior.

His mouth curled wider, his yellow teeth resembling a beast's fangs. In his turbid, earthy-yellow eyes, greed and killing intent burned like two fires fanned by the wind, growing fiercer by the second.

"How many more punches can you block?"

His voice rumbled through the fragmented smoke like muffled thunder, each word carrying the pressure of a 6th-rank Barbarian Warrior's brute force, as if a mountain were speaking, causing the rubble to tremble in resonance.

He stepped forward, and the earth cracked. Debris sprang up like bullets. This wasn't an attack, but a display of intimidation by a Brute Force Warrior before unleashing his full power, much like a mountain shaking its foundation before collapsing.

Wang Sheng clenched his fists slowly. The golden holy light between his fingers was like a compressed sun, scorching and heavy, but his heart was like a crack on an ice surface—not filled with fear, but with clear judgment.

5th-rank Barbarian Warrior versus 6th-rank Barbarian Warrior; his spiritual power was more than half depleted, his Shield of Light had shattered twice, and the Frost Spiritual Circuit was running on overload.

How many more punches could he block? Three? Two? One? But these questions only flashed through his mind like a shooting star across the night sky, vanishing in an instant. Because he had no way back.

Behind him was Guangming Village, Shen Xun'er, Zhao Linger, Frost Mage Lin Shiyun, Su Mengyao, Murong Xue, and one hundred and eight people who had entrusted their lives to him.

If he took one step back, they would have nowhere to retreat.

Behind the granary of Guangming Village.

When Liu Ruyan returned from her reconnaissance in the east, the morning light had already dyed the horizon a pale gold.

Her night-ops suit was stained with mud and grass, like withered leaves soaked in morning dew, and the dark gray fabric looked like fragments of shadows in the morning light.

Her misty eyes carried a hint of exhaustion in the morning light, yet they were sharp, like a honed blade—the fatigue only made them sharper.

On her way back to the village, she noticed an anomaly.

The coordination between the Beast Tide and Chief Shi Ba's troops was too precise. The time the Beast Tide applied pressure from the west was exactly when Chief Shi Ba attacked the gate from the east, as if two hands were simultaneously pressing down on the prey's shoulders, leaving it nowhere to escape.

Such precision didn't seem accidental; it was more like someone was relaying the defense deployment of Guangming Village to both sides, as if a chess player were manipulating both black and white pieces on a board, with every move precise to the second.

Her intuition as a Phantom Assassin told her this wasn't the instinct of a Savage Beast, nor was it something Chief Shi Ba's intellect could achieve. Someone was passing information in the dark.

She didn't report directly to the defense wall; instead, she used her Phantom Assassin concealment technique to sneak into the village.

The concealment technique turned her into a wisp of smoke; under the cover of morning light and dust, her figure was as transparent as air, and her footsteps were as silent as falling leaves.

Her willow-like figure was like a gray shadow in concealment, and her willow-leaf brows and phoenix eyes were like a pair of cold stars beneath her veil, sharp and alert.

Her waist was slender, yet every inch was just right. The night-ops suit clung to her willow-branch-like body, and the curve from her waist to her hips seemed carved by the most exquisite craftsman, like a crescent moon, appearing in the concealment like moonlight flowing through the dark night,

But no one could see this right now, because she had become the shadow itself.

Behind the granary, under an inconspicuous pile of Savage Beast bones.

Her fingers searched through the bone pile like the most precise probe exploring the darkness.

The bone pile was debris left over after the battle, where fragments of Savage Beast bones and rocks were piled together, emitting a fishy, decaying stench that would make any normal person detour.

But Liu Ruyan was not a normal person. Her misty eyes caught a trace of abnormal dark purple shimmer within the bone pile.

Her fingers touched a cold, dark purple crystal.

It was only the size of a fingernail, like the most inconspicuous grain of sand,

But dark purple spiritual power veins extended from the crystal like a spider web, as if an invisible spider were weaving the most precise net in the dark.

The spiritual power veins penetrated the ground like tree roots, rooting into the soil and silently extending tentacles within a hundred-meter radius.

"Shadow Eye." Liu Ruyan's voice was as ethereal as smoke yet cold, like winter moonlight falling on a blade.

This was a surveillance tool of the Shadow Clan.

It could remotely perceive all sights and sounds within a hundred-meter radius, as if a pair of unblinking dark purple slit pupils had been installed behind the granary of Guangming Village,

and it transmitted everything it perceived through the Shadow Clan's unique low-frequency communication, like the most loyal spy reporting every movement in the enemy's heartland.

The location of this Shadow Eye was perfect for observing the defense deployments of the east and north. Chief Shi Ba knew the best time to attack the gate from the east, and the precise coordination of the Beast Tide pressing from the west—all this information came from this Shadow Eye.

This was the "inside man." It wasn't that someone inside Guangming Village had betrayed them, but that the Shadow Clan had placed a pair of eyes inside the village.

That Shadow Clan scout on the other side of the Lingxi River had taken advantage of a moment when no one was looking one night to drop this Shadow Eye into the bone pile behind the granary, like a venomous snake quietly slithering into the heart of Guangming Village.

A hint of killing intent flashed in Liu Ruyan's misty eyes, like frost under the moon.

Her phantom dagger lit up with a faint silver light, like a needle tip condensed from moonlight—precise, cold, and fatal.

Her hand was as steady as a rock the moment she gripped the dagger, her slender fingers like the most precise scalpel, every ounce of force calculated to the millimeter.

"Found it."

One strike. The Shadow Eye shattered, the dark purple spiritual power dissipating like smoke, vanishing into nothingness like a snake with its head severed, twitching in its final moments.

The spiritual power veins retreated from the ground, disappeared, and fell into silence, like a spider web turning to ash in a fire.

The shattered dark purple crystal turned into powder and was blown away by the morning breeze, as if the last trace left by the Shadow Clan in Guangming Village had been completely wiped away.

She reported to Wang Sheng via the communication spirit stone, her misty voice carrying a hint of cold satisfaction, like a hunter's calm after confirming the prey had fallen.

"Chief, the 'inside man' is not a person; it is a Shadow Eye. It has been destroyed. The coordination between Chief Shi Ba and the Beast Tide will be cut off, but it is already too late; they are already attacking."

On the other end of the communication spirit stone, Wang Sheng's voice was like crumbling bricks, rough but firm.

"Good work, Ruyan. Return to Hua Jieyu and stand by; your spiritual power is too depleted."

The corners of Liu Ruyan's mouth curved, a trace of imperceptible softness flashing in her misty eyes.

She did not answer, merely sheathed her phantom dagger, and her figure dissipated into the morning light like smoke.