After traveling approximately seven or eight miles, they entered a dense forest.
Just as they were about to take the northward fork, Yi Qing warned aloud, "When I came here, I encountered thieves setting traps. While they were not paying attention, I rushed through. They should still be around now."
Indeed!
The two sects encountered a team of fifteen black-clad ambushers in that place.
With Yi Qing leading the way, everyone bypassed those traps and dashed through a nearby thicket.
The black-clad men tried to block them but, in a blink of an eye, the two sect leaders had killed six or seven of them, causing the rest to scatter in terror.
Ning remarked, "Setting traps at this fork seems to aim at forcing us directly west towards the city."
"Exactly," said Yi Qing, "There were Demon Cult members at Guanting before. Since fake monks came today, others must have gone to report as well."
"The Demon Cult already knows we are here."
Zhao Rongchao cast her a look of goodwill.
