Snow, bottomless cracks in the ice field, towering peaks, and cliffs so narrow that you can only pass through two or three people at a time – these are the only sights that can be seen east of the Valley of Blood.

The howling wind, mixed with the icy frost, almost obscured the entire sky, and the snow in the sky heralded the death of winter had descended on the Broken Boundary Mountain.

The coldest winter has begun.

For the Empire's legions, the most difficult problem in fighting north of Broken Mountain is never supply and logistics, nor is it a lack of troops, but every time the first biggest blizzard begins, the entire north falls into an ice cave hell!

In such bitter cold, not to mention the dispatch of an army, even a small number of elite rangers are difficult to move, so that every winter the fortress of Broken Mountain has to shrink its forces so as not to appear non-combat attrition.

Not to mention the east of the Valley of Bloodbones, which is no longer a place where living life can survive - even the werewolves and minotaurs that live on the ice fields, as well as the rest of the monster community, choose to head south every winter.

In particular, the werewolves climb over the Broken Mountains almost every year, raiding and sweeping through the northern part of the Sakran Prince's domain, razing villages and improvised fortresses to the ground and slaughtering unarmed farmers.

More often than not, of course, before they start to raid, they will be rounded up and hunted down by the rangers of the Broken Mountain Fortress, and most of them will be wiped out, with only a few able to escape back to the north, and then raid south again the following year.

The inexhaustible monsters and the werewolves of the ice plain that cannot be killed have always been a problem in the heart of the Broken Mountain Fortress.

But right now, in the eastern part of this ice cave hellish Valley of Blood, there is an "army" of thousands of people marching along the narrow road between the mountains!

From a distance, it looks like a gray-white "river" passing slowly, and the continuous sound makes the ice walls and snow on both sides of the mountain tremble.

And at the end of the horizon, out of sight, more "streams" are gradually merging in—no noise, no conversation, only their stiff and sluggish, rolling like a torrent of footsteps can be heard in the howling wind.

This dead torrent "silently" moved along the snowy mountains howling in the north wind towards the east of the Valley of Blood.

A loud roar echoed in the sky above the Great Snow Mountain, and in the blizzard, a black-feathered eagle hovered and fell from the sky, standing firmly on the shoulder of the black-haired wizard.

Loren, with a solemn face, lay on the edge of the cliff and looked down, not only between the mountains, but also on those narrow cliffs, all of them were lined up in a neat formation of rotting demons, marching in formation!

Isaac lying beside him almost had his head stretched out, staring at the scene he had never seen before, and Lusen's expression on the side was even more difficult to see, clenching his teeth all the time, and his eyes were full of the word "impossible" under the tips of his dark blue hair.

"Holy Cross, his grandmother's ......" Isaac, who had taken a lot of effort to get up, swallowed his saliva fiercely: "I... I said, how many monsters are there?"

"I don't know. ”

The gray-eyed boy bit his lower lip stubbornly, and his right hand, which was holding the hilt of the sword at his waist, kept trembling: "Even if it is calculated according to the smallest number, I'm afraid... It won't be less than ten thousand!"

"Ten thousand?" Isaac gasped, "I remember all the defenders of the Broken Mountain Fortress... That's about 10,000 people, right?"

The ugly Lusen nodded heavily.

Although Lusen guessed that the invasion was probably real when the rotting demon appeared, he could only feel what it was called shocking if he saw it with his own eyes!

"Lord Loren!"

The gray-eyed boy pressed the black-haired wizard's shoulder with a "snap!" and looked at him seriously: "I know I swore an oath, and I am no longer the guard of the Broken Boundary Mountain Fortress - but this information is really very critical, we must immediately return and relay this matter to His Royal Highness Crown Prince Connad!"

After hesitating for a moment, the black-haired wizard shook his head calmly: "Not now. ”

"Not now?!Do you know the Broken Mountain Fortress......

"I know that the current strength of the Broken Mountain Fortress is probably not enough to resist a northern monster invasion!" Loren interrupted Lusen, sighed and said:

"From the moment the search party was killed and the watchtower was destroyed, His Highness Connad sensed that an invasion was approaching, and probably more than we could have imagined - but the problem was that he didn't have enough evidence to prove it, and he didn't know exactly what was going on in the Valley of the Blood. ”

Lusen couldn't help but be stunned.

"What's more, even if we go back now, it won't help - firstly, no one will believe the three of us, and secondly, if we really tell them that an army of monsters is heading east, it will probably be counterproductive!"

The gray-eyed boy frowned slightly, obviously understanding.

Even if they really believed their words, I am afraid that the vast majority of people would think that the target of this monster army was not the Empire, but somewhere else, and the final result would be absolutely unimaginable......

Loren on the side glanced at him meaningfully, and a trace of worry flashed in his pupils.

Now it seems that the Prince of Sackland may have expected that this invasion would most likely be different from any previous one, which is why Brandon was sent north to look for clues.

More importantly, if Brandon dies in the north, not only will there be no monsters to invade Conod, but there will also be plenty of reasons to "take revenge" and gather the forces of the entire Sakrand Empire to launch a huge "expedition".

If Brandon is tough enough to get the clue back in the end, Prince Sackland, as the commander of the Broken Mountain Fortress, will also have enough reason to concentrate the power of the entire empire in his hands.

In other words, no matter what the outcome, it will be an absolutely favorable outcome for Connad de Salion - whether Brandon and the entire team going north can come back alive or not will not matter to him from the beginning.

Even if he gains nothing, he has nothing to lose, this is simply a "deal" that is sure to make a profit!

"Wait, if that's the case... That doesn't make sense!"

Isaac on the side frowned and suddenly "interjected": "I have read the records of the Wizard Tower, from the first generation of the empire to the present, there have been a total of nine monster invasions - of course, counting this, it should be the tenth. ”

"Nine invasions, all of which took place in the vicinity of Bloodbreak Valley and Broken Mountain, all before the start of the harsh winter - if it were the same as before, this group of large popsicles should have gone to attack the Broken Mountain Fortress!"

"What do you mean?" the gray-eyed boy reflected alertly.

"What Isaac means is that this 'invasion' is different from any previous one - if the monsters of the north have really finished gathering, they should have launched an invasion of the Broken Mountain Fortress long ago before the harsh winter falls!" Loren continued:

"The result of this is that apart from buying more preparation time for the Broken Mountain Fortress and making the fortress more difficult to gnaw, it is impossible for them to have any advantage at all!"

Feeling the biting cold of the north wind, the black-haired wizard with a solemn face clenched his palms slightly.

That's right, if their target is really the Broken Mountain Fortress, then he and Brandon don't have to do anything at all, because the monsters who haven't marched to the south until now can't easily take the fortress.

But what if they weren't targeting the Broken Mountain Fortress?

If a certain evil god apostle who gathered this monster army from the beginning actually had other plans?

"Lusen, I have a question. ”

"Speak, please. Sensing the solemn expression of the black-haired wizard, the gray-eyed boy did not dare to slack off at all.

"I need you to judge. Loren slowly raised his right hand and pointed to the end of the demon army's disappearance: "According to the 'marching route' of those rotting corpse demons, where is their most likely destination?"

"Most likely... Destination?" Lusen was slightly stunned and fell into deep thought, and the next second, the silver-gray pupils continued to contract in fear:

"Ned... Hogg ——?!"