Otherworld Advance Team
Chapter 1340 - 1333: Peaceful Liberation

Chapter 1340: Chapter 1333: Peaceful Liberation

Reinforcements were hopeless, and counterattacks couldn’t defeat the Demon Clan’s army, so the soldiers defending Ziye Ning’s city were continuously demoralized. Deserters began to emerge, taking advantage of the night to scale the walls and flee Ziye Ning.

The Demon Clan’s scouts captured some deserters. According to their descriptions, provisions in the city were exhausted, and medicine was extremely scarce. Many injured soldiers were dragged until they succumbed to infections and died, their bodies hurriedly buried.

At this point, Dongsheng’s defenders were on the verge of collapse. Cheng Ziang felt that if they attempted to negotiate surrender now, they might be able to take down the great city of Ziye Ning without any real effort.

Thus, he suggested to the Demon Clan’s leader the idea of negotiating surrender. The leader was initially shocked but soon realized that this was a godsend opportunity.

His surprise was because, according to Demon Clan tradition, the concept of negotiated surrender hardly existed. Once the Demon Clan’s forces reclaimed a city occupied by the Dongsheng Empire, they would kill all Kyushu civilians inside.

However, times had changed. The Demon Clan’s propaganda department had expressly requested that massacring cities and harming Dongsheng soldiers who laid down their arms be stopped.

Though the shift in Luo’er’s propaganda had caused dissatisfaction among some of the Demon Clan, it had some effect on public opinion. At the very least, the animosity the Demon Clan felt toward those Dongsheng soldiers who surrendered had significantly lessened.

After much contemplation, the Demon Clan’s leader decided to negotiate surrender. Although winning Ziye Ning without fighting seemed to him like an unworthy victory, it was also a sound strategy from another perspective.

The Demon Clan’s forces didn’t have a tradition of valuing cunning over brute force, so in their view, victory in war had to be bought with blood.

Initiatives like negotiated surrenders were something they were reluctant to undertake and deemed unnecessary. Most of the time, they were at a disadvantage. Even when they occasionally launched a counter-offensive, it was due to the Kyushu forces’ strategic withdrawal rather than the Demon Clan actually driving out the Kyushu civilians.

On the twentieth day of the siege, the Demon Clan’s forces began to try negotiating surrender. Those willing to surrender were promised amnesty and proper resettlement. While the reliability of these promises was questionable, they still attracted many deserters from Dongsheng’s army—after all, the city had become a living hell, with instances of cannibalism starting to occur.

First, the soldiers fled, and then the defensive officers started making contact. The soldiers defending the city were essentially commanders and warriors. Before the siege, Dongsheng’s army had transferred out all Generals, as the casualty rate among them had been too grievous.

After ten days of negotiation, a month into the siege, Dongsheng’s defenders finally agreed to surrender, and thus the city gates were opened to let the Demon Clan’s forces enter.

According to the agreement, the Demon Clan’s troops were not to massacre the civilians upon entry and were to treat the soldiers who surrendered well. The leader of the Demon Clan adhered to these terms, and thus the Battle of Ziye Ning was peacefully resolved.

With two cities now under their control, the morale of the Demon Clan’s troops was at its peak. They confidently believed they could defeat any enemy and completely drive the forces of the Dongsheng Empire out of West Outer Heaven. Some even went as far as to say they should take the chance to launch an attack on Kyushu, letting Kyushu civilians taste what it was like to be invaded.

However, Cheng Ziang didn’t share this view. In his opinion, the success of the Demon Clan’s military advances was as much due to Dongsheng’s military reforms as it was to the Empire’s strategic withdrawals.

Reviewing past conflicts in West Outer Heaven, Cheng Ziang and his peers could clearly see that Dongsheng’s army would always choose to retreat from a position of strength, continually surrendering captured cities.

Even in the face of a Demon Clan counter-offensive, they would put up only token resistance before withdrawing. This had almost become the norm. Therefore, Cheng Ziang saw this current retreat by Dongsheng’s army as little different from prior actions, with perhaps the only difference being that this time the Demon Clan’s forces were more vigorous.

Clearly, as the Advance Team had anticipated, some in the Dongsheng Imperial Court did not wish to completely annihilate the Demon Clan; hence, each invasion was executed with restraint.

Based on the information Luo’er obtained from Zisu, during the counter-offensive phase, the Demon Clan’s army suffered relatively low casualties fighting against Dongsheng’s forces compared to when they battled the powerful nobility ensconced in West Outer Heaven.

Had it not been for the occasional "accidents" among the nobility’s private soldiers, the Demon Clan’s troops would have had difficulty driving them all out.

From this, Luo’er could almost confirm that Dongsheng Empire’s strategic withdrawal was actually to let the Demon Clan’s forces deal with the private soldiers of those noble families.

After securing Ziye Ning, Cheng Ziang and his colleagues ascended the city’s highest tower and gazed down upon this ancient Demon Clan city, sighing with emotion.

"This is Yue’er’s hometown..." Cheng Ziang looked around, genuinely moved.

"My ancestors fled from here to the Western Continent..." Baiyue’s eyes were lost in a haze as she murmured to herself.

"Ziye Ning, indeed a nice sounding name. I wonder if in the future, people in this city will still be able to hear the cries of the victims," Cheng Ziang sighed.

"Don’t scare people, it feels really creepy," Hu Daoke said, shivering as he hugged himself.

"Don’t make it sound like we’re living in a haunted house. The massacre site is outside the city in the Valley of Regret," Cheng Ziang pointed to a distant canyon.

"Hey, it seems pretty close. Should we go take a look?" Hu Daoke suggested.

"Yue’er, what do you think?" Cheng Ziang turned to Baiyue. He felt that they needed to be considerate of her feelings in this matter.

"Let’s go. I want to experience what happened back then," Baiyue nodded lightly.

"Ah, those people from Kyushu are really brutal, how could they bear to do it, rabbits are so cute," Hu Daoke sighed.

As soon as he finished speaking, Feng, who was following behind them, suddenly stopped and bowed her head deeply. Noticing her movement, Hu Daoke turned and asked, "What’s wrong, why have you suddenly stopped?"

"I’m sorry..." Feng said with her head down, stammering.

"Why are you apologizing all of a sudden?" Hu Daoke asked, looking puzzled.

"It’s because of your loose tongue," Cheng Ziang, who was walking behind, came forward and patted Feng’s little head, glaring at Hu Daoke before saying softly with his head low, "What apologies do you have to make? You are from the Western Continent. The tragedy that occurred here wasn’t caused by you."

"You don’t have the power to apologize for all the people of Kyushu, so don’t just say sorry," Baiyue said, holding her hand to comfort her.

"It feels like Feng has been more and more considering herself as a person from Kyushu lately. Little Fengye, calm down. You’re from the Western Continent, you are our partner," Hu Daoke said, shaking his head.

"Oh... oh!!" Feng looked up at them, somewhat flustered, with a flicker of excitement in her eyes.

"When we criticize the people of Kyushu, we are denouncing those brutal soldiers, not you. Don’t take it personally, understand?" Cheng Ziang sighed with relief.

"Mm-hmm!" Feng nodded continuously.

"Good, then let’s go," Cheng Ziang nodded satisfactorily, then called out to the group.

The party descended from the city tower, took horses from the Demon Clan’s army, and rode directly to the Valley of Regret, which was just over a kilometer away from Ziye Ning.

It was a deep rift valley which they could ride up from the eastern slope and then come to the edge of the canyon. Standing at the cliff’s edge and looking down into the deep valley over a hundred meters deep still inevitably made them feel a bit of fear.

A gentle breeze swept through, the valley was quiet and melodious, with no sound of distress. While looking at the canyon, Hu Daoke asked, "How do you think this canyon makes sounds?"

"Physical experience from Earth can’t be applied to the conditions in the Otherworld," explained Cheng Ziang, who turned to Baiyue, "Yue’er, try to gather magical power in the canyon and see."

Hearing his words, Baiyue nodded, took out her magic wand, stepped forward, and began to chant spells toward the canyon. As magical power circulated, the air began to flow, creating a rather strong current.

As Baiyue chanted spells, everyone could clearly hear the valley beginning to emit a moaning sound. When she accelerated the gathering of magical power, a chilling wail came through, causing Baiyue’s tears to immediately flow down.

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