Chapter 4 – Hitching a Ride

Chapter 4 – Hitching a Ride

"Are you the leader here?" Jiang Yao instantly asked when he came to Zhou Liqiang's side. The noble spirit of Jiang Yao was unmistakable, and his body released a natural oppression that made strangers fear him subconsciously.

"I am," Zhou Liqiang answered, his voice trembling slightly. "What can I do for you, your lordship?"

"We are going to the western area of the continent, but the trip is long, and we can't travel on our own. We wish to follow alongside your caravan. I heard that your destination is the Myriad Sand Kingdom and coincidentally that is close to our destination."

Hearing that they wished to travel with them, Zhou Liqiang suddenly felt relieved. Such an overwhelming figure, he would be able to protect them if something unforeseen should happen, so he happily took the payment that Jiang Yao gave out and prepared a carriage for them.

It was not rare for guests to hitch a ride with a caravan, so they had plenty of unused carriages. All of these were within a storage treasure, and these carriages were all inscribed, so they moved with the use of spirit crystals instead of having to be dragged by beasts.

This was also the reason that although they were happy to have Jiang Yao in their group, he still needed to pay. They could not afford to pay for the operation of extra carriages.

Although the carriages ran far on an earth ranked spirit crystal, they were costly and not easy to come across.

Therefore, Jiang Yao had to provide his own earth ranked spirit crystals for the fare.

Luo Xiao also quickly realized this, so he did not complain. There were still a few hours before their caravan would hit the roads, and they had to prepare the carriage for Jiang Yao and Luo Xiao. So, while waiting for them to prepare the final things, they started moving around the area.

They did not walk far away; all they did was to take a stroll around the various caravans, trying to listen to the news of what had happened in the rest of the continent.

After walking around for an hour, they decided to return to the caravan; however, when they got closer, they could hear a ruckus. Sounds of fighting reverberated through the air, the nauseating stench of blood could not be covered up.

Frowning both Jiang Yao and Luo Xiao hastened their steps, and when they arrived at the place where the caravan had been preparing before, they found that it had turned into a battlefield.

Fortunately, the people of the caravan had some foresight, and everything of value was stored within their storage treasures. However, they had begun fighting with another caravan group, and each group had their contracted mercenaries in the fight as well.

Luo Xiao felt a headache coming his way, his head was hurting, and he was annoyed. "Stop it," he shouted, but no one heard him, and he was getting frustrated.

"Jiang Yao, stop them," he ordered Jiang Yao with such familiarity that it was clear that they had spent a lot of time together.

Jiang Yao looked amusedly at Luo Xiao, after which he made a gesture with his hand.

Ice enveloped the entire battlefield, no one was able to break it, and they all felt frozen to their bones, unable to continue the fight.

"What is going on here?" Luo Xiao asked, his expression black like the bottom of a pot, and his voice filled with annoyance.

Zhou Liqiang glared at a man opposite him and sneered, "We don't know. They came unexpectedly and started a fight with us for no good reason."

Luo Xiao was getting more and more annoyed. "Why would you do that?" he asked the other group's leader, but this guy said nothing and just glared at Zhou Liqiang.

It was not before then that Jiang Yao spoke up. "I assume that this is partly our fault."

His words caused everyone to be shocked, some because they had never thought he would guess it, while others were puzzled as to what they could have done.

"These guys have been paid by Jiang Luo to cause problems for any group that accepts us. It is clear that he wants us to travel alone." Although Jiang Yao spoke like this, he was not angered or frustrated.

He reached out his hand and clenched his fist. "Shatter," he muttered, and everyone from the attacking group turned to dust that scattered in the wind.

There was no blood, no gore, but this was much more frightening than what they had expected. A single gesture of his hand and thousands of men had turned to dust. This strength was truly too magnificent.

"We apologize for dragging you into this, here is a token of our apology," Jiang Yao said as he tossed a bag to Zhou Liqiang and withdrew the rest of the frost.

Opening the bag curiously, Zhou Liqiang was shocked. Inside was over ten thousand earth spirit crystals.

This amount was overwhelming, he was immensely happy, and his grin was spreading from one corner of his face to the other; his eyes had turned into crescent moons in happiness.

Completely ignoring them, Jiang Yao and Luo Xiao stood at the side and saw how the many carriages were being taken out of the storage treasures once more, before they all busied about, getting ready to set off.

This time they did not leave. They waited patiently, and after a bit of time had passed, all preparations were done.

Jiang Yao and Luo Xiao boarded their carriage, and as they looked around, satisfaction could be seen on their faces. It was a special carriage. It required more earth stones to move, but it was also much more luxurious than the others.