After gathering all the resources, Ren Yue waited for Long Chen to emerge from the warehouse.
Long Chen eventually emerged; his hands were dyed with blood. He had a bright smile on his face. Ren Yue was about to ask him the reason behind that happy look, but she soon noticed 71 warriors following him.
Ren Yue and her guards easily recognized these warriors. They were those prisoners that had been imprisoned earlier!
"I beheaded that guy in the third chamber," Long Chen informed Ren Yue.
Ren Yue could care less about this fact. The warriors following Long Chen caught her entire attention.
"…What is going on? Why did you free them?" Ren Yue asked.
Long Chen explained, "Miss Ren, I managed to convince them to join our side. They have all signed the blood contract to never betray us."
Ren Yue raised her brow upon hearing those words. However, she trusted Long Chen and believed he wouldn't do anything foolish.
"Let's leave. That guy's comrades will be here anytime soon," Ren Yue spoke.
Long Chen remained on his position and had that same serene smile on his face. He spoke, "Actually, I wanted to inform Miss Ren to wait for me at the second warehouse. I will meet you three days later."
"What? Where are you going?" Ren Yue asked, startled by his words.
"This mysterious group laid a trap for us to find our identity and location. They are going to attack with their full strength to ensure nothing goes awry," Long Chen explained good-naturedly.
"That's natural," Ren Yue responded nonchalantly.
Long Chen continued to stare at Ren Yue with a smile and she soon realized what he was planning.
"No way! You are planning that?!" Ren Yue suddenly shouted.
"Miss Ren, this is our only chance. I hope you understand. I would take you along, but your identity is a bit sensitive. If you come along, then Grandpa Mo and Peng Gen will come with us as well. How will the other guards reach the second warehouse?" Long Chen spoke.
Ren Yue bit her lips as she heard his logic. She knew that his words made sense, but she didn't want him to take the risk alone.
Furthermore, she had no confidence that these convicts wouldn't hurt Long Chen.
"Don't worry too much. I will be careful," Long Chen reassured her before turning his head.
"Follow me," He spoke without even waiting for Ren Yue's order. He knew that she couldn't make up her mind any time soon. It was best to make the decision for her.
The seventy one warriors who had recently regained their freedom followed Long Chen.
Ren Yue's group started moving towards the second warehouse.
In the meantime, Long Chen's group moved across the wilderness as he was targeting the second merchant convoy of this week.
Long Chen's motive was to utilize his spies in these convoys and poison the guards with a similar method while seventy one warriors attack them.
In fact, the number of warriors on Long Chen's side greatly eclipsed the guards protecting the caravan.
After assaulting these two convoys, Long Chen immediately headed towards the second warehouse.
In the meantime, the Noble Shadow's elite warriors reached Ren Yue's first warehouse on the same day they departed.
They were shocked to see that the entire warehouse was empty, except for Zou Mu's corpse in one of its chambers.
According to the wounds on his body, Zou Mu had been tortured greatly before his eventual demise.
These elite warriors of the Noble Shadow believed that this group couldn't have escaped far and searched the nearby area. They even questioned the travelers roaming in this area. Unfortunately, they found no clues.
And it would only be three days later that they would find out that the other two convoys that they were secretly protecting had been looted as well.
This time, the guards were left behind. But all they mentioned was that the enemy had a huge group. He even exaggerated a bit and made it seem as if the enemy had hundreds of warriors and all of them were 3 Star Warriors or 4 Star Warriors.
Their excuse for lying was rather straightforward. They wished to downplay their defeat.
However, this news greatly startled the Noble Shadow. In fact, the influential merchants in Dongchun City got wind of this news as well.
They heard that the Noble Shadow tried to deal with this mysterious group, but instead, they lost one of their members.
And soon, this mysterious group targeted the other two convoys with a large number of warriors.
The news about the Noble Shadow's weakness spread among the merchants.
Most of them wished to tear their pact with the Noble Shadow. The Noble Shadow was clearly losing its power and prestige to this mysterious group.
The Noble Shadow's members naturally saw through the merchant's schemes, but they didn't take any action. They were more curious about this mysterious group.
Ren Yue was surprised to hear so many rumors regarding her group. In fact, these rumors made it seem as if her faction was actually a major group when in reality, her foundation was still quite unstable.
Long Chen came to meet her in her room.
"What is it, Brother Long?" Ren Yue asked.
"Yue'er. Our member count has broken past hundred warriors. Nearly thirty of them are 3 Star Warriors while the rest are 2 Star Warriors. It's time we publicize your faction while giving one last ultimatum to the Noble Shadow," Long Chen spoke.
During the last two weeks, Long Chen and Ren Yue had found the name of this mysterious organization they were fighting.
It wasn't weird since four low-ranked members of this organization had already joined Ren Yue's faction.
Although these low-ranked members didn't know of any vital secrets of Noble Shadow, they did know its name.
This was more than enough for Long Chen.
Ren Yue nodded as she spoke, "This means that the next assault will be our last. We just need to use them to send a message."
"That's correct," Long Chen nodded.
Ren Yue fell silent upon hearing that affirmation. She asked a couple of minutes later, "…I am curious, what did you promise those prisoners that they willingly joined my faction?"
In response, Long Chen merely smiled and responded, "I gave them an offer they couldn't refuse. Firstly, I informed them that I would kill whoever refused to sign the blood contract. This convinced nearly all of them. After all, they didn't really hold that great loyalty for the Noble Shadow or their masters, so they didn't hesitate all that much. Moreover, I promised them a much greater salary than their current one while also providing them with a good cultivation technique."
"Lastly, I told them that the only condition on the contract was to never betray us. They are free to leave this faction at any point as long as they leave this city far away with their family. If they violate this contract, their blood will instantly wither, and they will die."
"…This isn't just a normal blood contract, is it?" Ren Yue asked. She had never heard of a blood contract sucking someone's blood.
Long Chen was startled upon hearing those words. He actually couldn't reveal to her that this was an Ancient Evil Blood Contract.
"This…I…" He actually stuttered as he tried to explain the origins of this contract.
Ren Yue waved off her hand and spoke, "I don't care about the origin of this contract. Just don't hurt yourself."
Long Chen's heart felt warm upon hearing those words. He was truly touched. He knew that she had most likely guessed that this was an evil contract, but she was still willing to act oblivious to protect him.
In this world, utilizing this sort of evil contract was absolutely forbidden. If Ren Yue ever reveals to the world that Long Chen had actually tied warriors using an evil contract, all the cultivators and warriors would be out for his blood.
"…I…I will be careful, Yue'er," Long Chen spoke gratefully.
"…Alright. Let's begin the preparations for our final assault. I don't think poison will work any longer. The Noble Shadow will probably inform all the merchants of our trick to earn their trust," Ren Yue spoke.
"Yeah. But we don't need to target someone strong this time," Long Chen spoke with a smile.
"Too many merchant caravans depart from Dongchun City. No matter how large the Noble Shadow is, it can't keep an eye on all of them. They will probably focus on the carriages belonging to the influential merchants, since they have been our targets all this time. But what this time, we aren't after the resources. We just need to send a message so a mid-ranked merchant's caravan should suffice," Long Chen explained coolly.
Ren Yue agreed with his reasoning. No matter how good the Noble Shadow's guess is, they couldn't predict where Ren Yue's faction would attack.
In any case, Ren Yue possessed such a large number of warriors that assaulting and defeating even two caravans simultaneously was easily possible.