They stowed away their camping equipment and set out the next day. Their formation had Jian Wu and Hou Jingshu as the vanguard. Huǒ Shuchang was in the center. His fire elemental attacks only had a range of a few dozen chih, but it was still better than everyone else. Taking up the rear of their formation was Zheng Yawen and Yin Wuhan—who was still quite moody.
Because they needed to remain alert, they traveled mostly in silence. They ran into more magical beasts the closer they got to the ruins. They also discovered the sites of several battles. Sometimes there would be magical beasts and human corpses, and sometimes all they would see were various battle markings to denote what happened.
Hou Jingshu knew she needed to remain alert, but she found herself looking at Jian Wu more often th
