Chapter 399 Investigation Action

In the morning, when the chubby guy saw Ling Mo, he immediately felt like Ling Mo had ascended to immortality, radiating an aura of celestial energy all over.

“You… have achieved enlightenment?” The chubby guy looked Ling Mo up and down, frowning.

It was the first time he had seen Ling Mo display such a demeanor since getting to know him.

It seemed like he had reached a level of clarity as if all the major events of his life had been resolved, and anyone unaware might think he was about to become an immortal.

Ling Mo simply smiled faintly, “Just encountered something good, and I’m in a good mood.”

Standing next to him, Xia Xinyan was pretending to be dead.

As if she hadn’t heard anything at all.

The chubby guy didn’t notice Miss Xia’s actions and continued to scrutinize Ling Mo for a moment, then proceeded to say, “Last night, the brothers discovered an abnormal location, suspected to be one of the demon strongholds, so I came to ask you guys.”

“Hmm?” This caught Xia Xinyan’s interest, “Where?”

“Cang Hai City— I had someone inquire about it, and it seems that since the Dark Zone opened, the number of demons there has been quite high, so no forces chose to establish a stronghold in Cang Hai City; not even a forward base.”

The Dark Zone is different from the real world, even those major powers have few who dare to set up strongholds in city ruins because the terrain in city ruins is more complex, and there are likely more demons hidden inside. So, they prefer to establish strongholds in relatively wide and desolate areas, rather than risking their lives and incurring massive losses in city ruins.

However, this doesn’t mean players have given up on the cities in the Dark Zone. Most powerful factions choose to explore deeper into the city ruins after establishing a foothold in the strongholds, mainly because the cities in the Dark Zone are complete reflections of the real world, allowing them to find a lot of good stuff inside. Plus, the demons roaming the city might drop plenty of good items. In short, it’s high risk, high reward, and naturally, there are people willing to take the chance.

Another reason is the exploration of intelligence. Since they have already established a stronghold, they need to explore the surrounding environment thoroughly, whether for assault warnings or subsequent occupation actions, reconnaissance is a necessary step.

But some cities completely lack forward strongholds because the monsters wandering within are excessively numerous. Setting up a forward base there would be a meaningless act of dancing ballet on the tip of a knife, and even the surrounding areas of such cities are basically classified as danger zones.

Distribution-wise, those areas are mainly concentrated in the north, relatively dense. There have indeed been some powerful individuals who explored such places, but they didn’t gather much intelligence, let alone major demon strongholds.

Cang Hai City is one of those locations. In fact, people had previously gone to investigate Cang Hai City, but aside from the abundance of monsters, there wasn’t anything special. Moreover, it was just a second-tier city. In reality, there weren’t any major powers in Cang Hai City, and since the city itself lacked any strategic significance for occupation, further exploration would be more harmful than helpful, leading to dwindling interest over time.

However, this time, when the Eagles Alliance members went north based on Xia Xinyan’s given directions, they noticed something unusual as they delved deeper into Cang Hai City— the number of demons there was merely a secondary concern; they appeared smarter overall and even learned to coordinate attacks and feign retreats to lure enemies into traps. This kind of behavior had never happened before, so they reported the situation back.

Xia Xinyan recalled her past life circumstances.

In her previous life, she hadn’t entered Cang Hai City, but she was quite close. Until her death, she had heard that a team heading toward Cang Hai City had suffered heavy casualties and was seeking rescue.

After that, she didn’t know, and according to the real-time updates of the battle reports from that time, it seemed that the situation was tight everywhere, and it would be difficult to obtain support for Cang Hai City, likely leading to a total collapse in the end.

But it was certain that there were things in Cang Hai City.

“We can go take a look,” Xia Xinyan said. “At the very least, we need to know what a demon stronghold looks like to better formulate our subsequent combat strategies.”

The chubby guy paused, “Miss Xia doesn’t know what a demon stronghold looks like?”

Xia Xinyan replied, “…If I knew, I’d probably already be planning the final counter-offensive strategy.”

She genuinely did not know what a demon stronghold looked like.

Because in her past life, the team she was with hadn’t even entered the city before encountering an ambush—just as the chubby guy mentioned earlier, demons near those strongholds seemed significantly smarter, having learned how to ambush. The expedition of her previous life had been wiped out due to the catastrophe of city takeover, where everyone was tense and unprepared right from the start, resulting in numerous ambushes.

When Xia Xinyan first reincarnated, she had reflected on the oddities of the previous expedition. But since things had happened too quickly, she had many speculations without a place to verify them. She wasn’t sure if the emerging intelligent behavior of those demons was a general change among all demons or just the ones near the demon strongholds. Additionally, how those demons managed to know about the expedition in advance and prepare was also a mystery that needed to be unraveled. Without understanding this, even the most well-prepared expedition could repeat the same mistakes as in her last life.

Moreover, what exactly were demon strongholds—the last time before her death, she heard from frontline reports that a team had encountered a demon stronghold but lost contact without sending more information, likely had been completely wiped out. This also proved that the closer one got to a demon stronghold, the more dangerous it should be.

Precisely for these reasons, it was even more critical to investigate ahead of time.

Hearing her say this, the chubby guy chuckled, “I thought Miss Xia knew everything…”

Ling Mo cast him a glance, “Alright, since Xinyan says so, let the people in Cang Hai City retreat and wait. First, ensure their safety. We’ll prepare and then head over.”

“Should we take more people?” the chubby guy asked.

“No need,” Xia Xinyan shook her head, “This action is quite dangerous, so be prepared to flee at any time. The fewer people, the better—though the basic personnel configuration must be complete.”

She already had a personnel selection in mind. Besides the three of them, bringing along Bai Yu, Xiao Bai, and the fox would suffice.

Of course, if they could also bring Monica along, that would be best. Although she looked a bit unreliable, she was indeed the strongest insurance, having lived in the stronghold for so long and made so much money. It was about time she did something for the Chicks, right?

Most importantly, this action came at a great time, allowing her to quickly switch her mood and bury the humiliation of last night’s disgrace.