Chapter 76: The Hidden Danger After Losing the Camel

  The second half of the night... silence!

  Outside the palace, several camel cries echoed, the mournful cries pierced through the night sky, making this piece of originally quiet night sky even more chilling.

  The camel's mournful cry made Li Ling and the others feel a chill in their hearts, and they all looked at each other with a mixture of surprise and fear. The expressions on their faces were not good, because the camel's mournful cry represented that the camel had encountered misfortune.

  "Not good, the camel is in danger!" Li Ling was the first to react, furrowing his brow and turning to run towards the outside of the hall. However, one of the camels had already fallen to the ground, its throat cut by a sharp blade and bleeding profusely, on the verge of death.

  Li Ling took a few steps forward, and the person who had ambushed the camel had already disappeared into the night sky. The newcomer was naturally there to stop Li Ling and his three companions from entering the center of the desert.

  Li Ling squatted down and stroked the camel that was on its last breath. The camel let out a few groans before it died.

  "We still have another camel?" An Qi looked around quietly, but didn't see the shadow of the other camel.

  Was another camel also led away and killed somewhere else?

  Li Ling looked at the dead camel on the ground and sighed slightly: "A moment of negligence allowed the opponent to take advantage of it. It seems that this camel was killed by someone with extremely fast knife skills, cutting its throat in one swift motion. The opponent struck so quickly that the camel only had time to let out a cry before falling into a pool of blood."

  "Was it one of those four agents from just now?" Xiao Yuan asked with a slight pause.

  "It shouldn't be, those four foreign agents from earlier, two were severely injured and unconscious, the other two lost their fighting spirit and retreated in defeat, they didn't even have time to escape, how could they come back to kill our camels? I think there must be someone else who also has designs on our peaceful village." Li Ling analyzed, shaking his head secretly, feeling that this matter was getting more and more complicated.

  Mandala's eyes sparkled with wisdom as she crouched down to carefully examine the camel's wound. Her fingers stained with blood, and she sniffed at her nose, carefully checking the camel's fur all over its body. Finally, Mandala found a plum blossom-shaped dart-like hidden weapon under the camel's abdomen.

  The tip of Man Tuo Luo's finger moved slightly, and she tore off a strip of cloth from her body to wrap around the plum blossom dart. Her eyebrows furrowed slightly.

  "This is a Plum Blossom Dart!" Li Ling looked at the Plum Blossom Dart that Mandala had taken from the camel's fur, and said in slight astonishment.

  "This plum blossom dart is not ordinary, but coated with a deadly poison. This poison appears like blooming blood flowers in the moonlight, emitting a faint glow. I suspect this is a plum blossom dart coated with snake venom." Mandrake held the plum blossom dart in her hand, looking at the one wrapped in cloth strips.

  "That... the other party, since they are hiding in the dark to hurt our camels, their purpose is to cut off our means of transportation and the camel's ability to find water, ah, it's really terrible. Now what should we do?" Xiao Yuan let out a slight sigh, as an outdoor survival expert, although he had rich experience, but in the desert, if they lost the camel, it would be equivalent to losing a good navigator and survival opportunity.

  Li Ling took the plum blossom dart from Man Tuo Luo's hand, flipping it over to examine both sides of the dart. "Now, we still have a camel whose life or death is uncertain," he said. "However, since the opponent has taken this camel away, it can be seen that they do not want to drive the camel to extinction either. They also need the camel to get out of the desert!"

  "I suppose so," Mandrake said. "But how are we going to find them now?"

  "Do you know and have explored where the other party is? Are they also in the ancient city of Loulan without leaving? Is it far from us?" asked calmly.

  "They shouldn't be too far away, at least not within our range of perception, but also not too far away. In the desert, it's extremely easy to leave footprints behind, and they'll track our footprints all the way here. However, we can only wait for an opportunity to retake the camel when they're completely unaware." Li Ling's eyes were calm and quiet as he analyzed their current situation and what to do next.

  "But! There's a huge danger point, that is... if the other side waits until we're on the verge of collapse due to lack of water and then launches a sneak attack, what do we do?" Xiao Yuan was also very clever and instantly raised this absolutely possible problem.

  "Even if it happens, we have no choice, we can only gamble! And we won't lose, because we have a perfect killer move that they absolutely can't think of!" Li Ling smiled mysteriously and then looked at Xiao Yuan: "Uncle Xiao Yuan, relying on your experience, how long can you hold out in the desert?"

  Xiao Yuan knew the burden was on his own shoulders, and he fell silent for a moment, lost in thought.

  "At most, it's just a month and a half. If I exceed that, I'll collapse due to insufficient physical strength or nutrition. After all, this is the Taklamakan Desert, where there are hidden quicksand and sandstorms everywhere, and the danger level isn't comparable to ordinary deserts. Moreover, as far as I know, there are only a few oases around here." Xiao Yuan's face didn't show any relief, just a long sigh.

  "With no more camels, we can only rely on ourselves. Our water and food also need to be carried by us, which will increase our burden." Li Ling took the water bag and several bags of dried meat from the camel's body that had already stopped breathing, carrying them all by himself.

  Man Tuo Luo grabbed the water bag in Li Ling's hand, lowered her head and said with her eyes looking at her toes: "Jun Zhi, I'll carry these two water bags!"

  "Alright." Li Ling smiled slightly and handed the two water bags to Mandrake. Li Ling knew that Mandrake was a different species, with a physique many times stronger than ordinary humans.

  Anjing also rushed to Li Ling's side, grabbed the bag containing dried meat, and muttered with her dry lips: "I want to carry a bag too."

  Looking at An Jing's calm and arrogant demeanor, Li Ling felt a slight sense of surprise, but An Jing's expression reminded him of Xiao Yue's previous expression. Was this jealousy?

  "It's no good." Li Ling didn't know how to refuse An Jing.

  "Quiet Miss, you have a weak physique, it's better to be more careful, and those people's target is Quiet Miss, the most important thing for Quiet Miss is to protect herself thoroughly." Mandala said with her head bowed.

  "It seems that in the team, I'm the most useless one. I can only drag everyone down." Anjing was a bit downhearted, thinking that she had always been a burden to others and would often bring trouble to them.

  "We can't, we still need you to lead the way for us. Without you, we won't have a direction." Li Ling smiled slightly and looked at An Jing with reassuring eyes.

  Nodding slightly, gazing out at the endless desert, lost in thought.