âOut of the question!â Without waiting for Long Haochen to reply, Chen Yingâer immediately rejected decisively . âGrandmother, we are already a Titled Demon Hunt Squad . You donât have the authority to stop us anymore . I must follow Boss and the others, and go complete missions with them . â
Chen Hongyuâs eyes flashed, taking a deep tone, âUnderstood . Do as you please, but you will all have to prove your abilities of self-preservation to me for that, with your own strength . â
Chen Yingâer stared blankly, she didnât expect her grandfather to give such a delightful response, âHow should we prove it?â
Chen Hongbo declared, âAs long as your comrades and you can manage to defeat me, I will admit that you are capable enough to defend yourselves . â
âThatâs impossible!â Chen Yingâer immediately understood that her grandfather was telling them the same message in a roundabout way! On the surface, he agreed, but actually wanted to make things difficult for them in another way . Chen Hongbo was no one else but one of the top veterans of the Temple Alliance, a formidable Psychic Master of the third rank, whose spiritual energy reaches 300,000 .
Of course, spiritual energy is in no way a decisive factor of strength for a summoner, because they mostly rely on their summons, making their spiritual energy their certain backup force . So actually, the Spiritual Temple is the one who has the most powerhouses of the ninth step out of the six . But their fighting strength isnât the greatest: summoners ordinarily only train spiritual energy alongside of their summoning magic, and do not focus on any other skills or abilities . That makes their spiritual energy cultivation naturally more efficient .
Simply said, if Chen Hongyu with his 300,000 spiritual energy were to face Long Tianying who reaches 200,000, he would undoubtedly face defeat . But if that was in the battlefield, while facing myriads of enemies, Chen Hongyu would undoubtedly show far more use than Long Tianying .
Chen Hongyu declared, âSince things are that way, donât think of leaving . Do you think I donât know of your little scheme? If I let you return to your team, youâll immediately go with them to Yang Wenzhaoâs rescue . â
Yang Wenzhao? Long Haochen couldnât help but feel alert hearing this name . At the time of their Demon Hunt Selection Competition, Yang Wenzhao, Duan Yi, and he were known as the three great hopes of the Knight Templeâs younger generation . But he hadnât met Yang Wenzhao for a long time . And that Yang Wenzhao was not only Chen Yingâerâs fiancĂŠ, but also the grandson of the Divine Knight of Defense and Planning, Yang Haohan .
âYingâer, whatâs the matter? What about Yang Wenzhao?â Long Haochen asked Chen Yingâer in a haste .
Hearing his question, Chen Yingâerâs eyes reddened immediately, âHe⌠has been caught by the demons . Itâs unclear whether heâs still alive at this time . â
Originally, Yang Wenzhao and Duan Yiâs Demon Hunt Squad entered into demon territory to fight in the enemy rear after the start of the Holy War .
They were ranked among the best Demon Hunt Squad of the younger generations . As a whole, the talents forming their team werenât much inferior to Haochenâs team . Having gone through incessant tempering in the battles against demons, their strength made enormous progress . And Yang Wenzhao and Duan Yi showed good cleverness, meticulous thinking and appropriate commanding abilities . So from the beginning, they have been performing actively in demon territory, and completed quite a good amount of challenging missions .
As time passed and their real combat abilities increased, this Demon Hunt Squad followed in the wake of Long Haochenâs group, becoming a commander grade Demon Hunt Squad .
Although they didnât follow the same path, the Demon Hunt Squads of Long Haochen, Luc Xi, Yang Wenzhao, and Duan Yihad all already reached the commander grade by this day . Their four Demon Hunt Squads having all been established for less than five years, this was simply a miracle in the history of the Demon Hunt Squads .
But Yang Wenzhaoâs and Duan Yiâs commander grade Demon Hunt Squads finally had an accident .
The Holy War had already gone on for close to two years, and they were fighting in demon territory all this time, returning almost only once a year . But a short time before, they attacked the demon troops in charge of transportation of supplies, with fully prepared plans and battle arrangements . Yet that absolutely safe mission ended up in failure, for the simple reason that they had the bad luck to encounter a demon god .
Speaking of which, this was related to Long Haochen . This demon god that they encountered was prepared to join the front, to reinforce the Exorcist Mountain Pass .
Of their troops stationed at the human forts, the Exorcist Mountain Pass had the weakest arrangement of demon gods, their commander was after all the Emo-demon god Sytry . At the time Long Haochenâs group came to the Exorcist Mountain Pass, contributing to killing two demon gods, Sytry also sustained significant wounds . In such circumstances, the demon side naturally became concerned with the situation implicating the Exorcist Mountain Pass, and immediately dispatched a demon god to reinforce the demon force assigned to the Exorcist Mountain Pass .
This demon god was ranked rather high, being among the top 24 . Just so, a veteran amongst the demon powerhouses .
Therefore, Yang Wenzhao and Duan Yiâs two Demon Hunt Squads met with failure . Although this demon god hadnât been carrying his demon god pillar, his strength was far beyond their scope of resistance . The final result was a disaster, and their Demon Hunt Squads ended up almost annihilated .
Yang Wenzhao and Duan Yi were seized with severe wounds, and the only one that came back alive was the assassin from Duan Yiâs team, who carried the information .
The place of the accident was rather close to the Myriad Beast Mountain Pass, b ut after passing on the information he had been sent back with, this assassin finally dropped dead .
How could Chen Yingâer stand worriless after getting this piece of news? She immediately showed extreme panic . Originally, Chen Hongyu and Sanshui Popo didnât plan on informing Chen Yingâer, but she coincidentally found out .
Having listened to Chen Yingâerâs story, Long Haochenâs expression suddenly became extremely unsightly . First, without mentioning the relationship of fellow soldiers between Demon Hunt Squads, Yang Wenzhao and Duan Yi were rare talents to the Knight Temple! They were talented knights who could possibly become Divine Knights in the future . Since they were captured, Long Haochen had to rescue them no matter from which point of view he thought of the matter . Even if their current strength was far from sufficient to guarantee their success, they had at least to give it a try . Yang Haohanâs good care of Long Haochen was engraved in his memories; without the support from this head of the Knight Temple, maybe he would have been sent to the Demon God Emperor before the Holy Warâs start .
Breathing deeply, Long Haochen gave a look to Chen Hongyu, seriously declaring, âSenior, I accept your previous proposal . I am willing to challenge you alongside my comrades . But I hope for your conditions to be loosened . In front of our group of juniors, could you at least not use your equipment?â
Chen Hongyu didnât think that Long Haochen would still accept this evident bullying test . For a moment, he didnât show any response, but couldnât help but feel some appreciation for this Long Haochen . The fact this youngster decided to lead his team to challenge him meant that his decision of going to save Duan Yi and Yang Wenzhao was already made .
If his granddaughter wasnât part of this, Chen Hongyu wouldnât have tried a powerful Demon Hunt Squad that way . But when it involves his granddaughter, how could he let Chen Yingâer take such danger? But thereâs no way he could take back the words he just declared . As a Temple Head, thereâs no way to go back on oneâs word .
âAlright . I wonât use any equipment when facing your challenge . I will let you pick the time, and the location will be my Spiritual Templeâs Fighting Beasts Ground . â
Long Haochen nodded slightly, âTemple Head, we have not seen Yingâer for a long time . Please let us gather with her in the meantime: it will facilitate our battle tactics arrangements . â
âOkay . Though, in case your group wants to leave this Myriad Beast Mountain Pass, be aware that you will become forever unwelcome in our Spiritual Temple . Also, we will halt you in your tracks by sending the Templeâs forces . â
Long Haochen responded, âBe at ease, this kind of situation will absolutely not happen . â Afterwards, he performed a standard knight salute to Chen Hongyu, before putting his mask back on, leaving alongside Chen Yingâer .
âBoss, I . . . â As soon as they got out, Chen Yingâer once again pulled on Long Haochenâs arms . As all sorts of feelings welled up in her heart, she couldnât help but burst out in tears once again .
Long Haochen stroked her head, âFool, what are you crying for? Donât tell me you think the missions we have faced before were easier . Even without you, I would definitely go save Yang Wenzhao and Duan Yi at all costs after learning that they have been caught by the enemy . Calm down for now, we will be facing your grandfatherâs test after a time of rest and reorganization . You are the most familiar with Head Chen, so please give explanations to everyone . â
âYep, yep . â Chen Yingâer nodded repeatedly . For some reason, after Long Haochen arrived, the anxiety and uneasiness she had had lowered greatly . That was a habit from the time they frequently acted together . It seemed to her that as long as their captain is there, all troubles will disappear . That feeling of safety gradually formed after long times of cooperation, and was already deep-rooted inside Chen Yingâer .
Long Haochen brought her to the resting grounds arranged by the Spiritual Temple, to reunite with the others . Naturally, a show of affection followed, especially between Chen Yingâer and Wang Yuanyuan, who were originally good friends, good sisters . Seeing each other once again, they shrieked in excitement, causing excitement from everyone else .
The joy of their reunion diluted rapidly . After coming back to tranquility, Chen Yingâer talked about the previous matters .
After hearing her, everyone gathered their looks in agreement at Long Haochen, waiting for his decision .
Long Haochen declared, âWe must face the Temple Head Chen in this, otherwise he wonât permit us to bring Yingâer along . Han Yu, please make a trip to the Southern Mountain Pass on Star Kingâs back, and bring Sima back . Weâll have to gather all our forces to possibly win this battle . â
Han Yu replied, âYes, I am immediately going . â
Long Haochen brought him outside, where he called out Star King . After a few words of explanation from him, Han Yu rode Star King and departed immediately for the south .