Is that a Wisp?

'Hmm, we're entering the Barren Range right now,' Krune thought, ensuring his body didn't even budge an inch unnecessarily while he was getting carried by the Yin Beast.

Of course, he wasn't knocked out unconscious. He had been taking shallow breaths the moment the Yin Beast made an appearance, only making it seem like he was taking in deep breaths by making his chest expand and contract accordingly.

Had the Yin Beast decided to observe for some more seconds, his cover would have been seen through. Thankfully, he had endured long enough, putting on such a convincing attack.

It was a thought process he went through after seeing Old Leaf kidnapped. He had obviously looked through Old Leaf's house, failing to find any traces. Even the claw marks under the window were something he had done to bait the bandits.

The Yin Beast originally hadn't left any traces behind while kidnapping him. So, it made him think of a couple of possibilities.

First of all, why hadn't Old Leaf made any sounds? Surely he would have woken up while he was being carried by the Yin Beast, which of course, wouldn't have been comfortable to his old, weary body.

However, there hadn't been any sounds that day. Secondly, the Yin Beast had remained at the doorstep to Old Leaf's house for quite some time before entering. It was apparent that the Yin Beast was intelligent and was first observing the people inside.

It had done the same to Krune's house as well. Upon seeing that there were two people inside, it left them as is and had instead targeted Old Leaf, who lived alone.

As for the bandits in Old Leaf's house, they had been bound while knocked unconscious. After determining that, the Yin Beasts carried all of them and vanished.

Now that the first phase of his plan had come to fruition, Krune observed through his echolocation, sensing that the Yin Beast followed the same path that it had taken the previous time when he followed behind them.

Soon after, they reached the place where he had lost track of them. Krune paid extra attention, surprised when he noticed that on the side of the road, hidden behind a boulder, was a hole through which it jumped.

It was a short fall, a height around three meters. And upon landing, the Yin Beast walked forward. There were countless growls that echoed in the place, entering what seemed to be a massive cave.

Krune wasn't able to sense the entirety of the place, as it spanned beyond what the sounds of his breathing could reach and be reflected back at him.

Suddenly, the Yin Beast jumped, landed on something that seemed to be a pillar of sorts before making a low jump, landing on the ground as it placed Krune there. Its figure then vanished as Krune stealthily opened his eyes, looking around to see that the Yin Beast was nowhere to be seen.

He quickly got up, taking in his surroundings in alarm.

It was a massive cavern, with what seemed like pools of sorts dug into the ground. All the pools were empty, and placed in them were the bones of creatures. Krune spotted the bones of what seemed to be like rats forming a large pile in one pool.

In the second pool, there were worms of some sort, disgusting in nature. Before the Yin Beast had vanished, it had stopped at this pool, scooped out a mouthful and then left.

'It seems the primary food for these Yin Beasts are this worm species. But damn, there must be millions of them there,' he thought, also noticing that this worm species was unable to scale up the walls, hence being trapped within the pool.

Krune then noticed a small cave section deep into the place, storing something. He was unable to make it out from far away, finally observing his current location.

Unsurprisingly, he, too, was in a pool. And in this pool were human bones, quite the number of them. He looked around, noticing two of the bandits alive, still unconscious. There were the bones of two of them situated nearby, with pieces of flesh still on them, a sign that they had only been eaten recently.

He then focused on the final bandit, one that was dead but still retained most of his flesh. Squirming on the floor beside him were ten creatures, humanoid, like babies.

A simple glance at them confirmed his suspicions. They were actually young Yin Beasts. 'I hadn't ever seen Yin Beasts having offspring.'

Most of the time, a Yin Beast would attack a village or town, and soldiers would be dispatched to subdue it. Most of the territory of the Daxia Empire consisted of dense forests and dangerous terrain unfit for human living.

And since the Yin Beasts lived in such locations and only headed out to kill humans, not much of them were known.

After all, even the Daxia Empire didn't have the guts to charge an army into the dangerous forests in pursue of the Yin Beasts. In fact, they had done that in the past and had suffered crushing defeats.

After that, they only focused on defending their territory and didn't wish to bother the forests that much. After all, the Yin Beasts weren't the most threatening. The Nightmares were.

Even though Yin Beasts were troublesome, they could still be handled. If a group of them charged at a town, killing them was easy since they could launch a barrage of arrows at them to kill them.

Only the Nightmares that were unaffected by regular weapons were troublesome.

'So, they have offspring.' After some observation and looking at his surroundings, Krune concluded, 'I see, so the Yin Beasts only need human flesh for their newborn. That makes sense as to why the Yin Beasts never engaged in pointless slaughter and devoured all the killed humans before leaving. They were actually feeding it to their newborn.'

Upon seeing that there were five newborns nibbling on the bandit corpse, Krune turned around, grunting as he climbed over the pool, making a circle over the entire cave for traces before coming to a conclusion. "There are only three adult Yin Beasts."

Once he arrived at the entrances, he focused on his echolocation, nodding when he heard faint sounds of metal clashing and the roars of the men. "It seems the bandits have taken the bait."