The group entered the mine and began digging to the right, behind the mutated beasts and the army of monsters, where three mountain peaks were connected.

The men poured their spiritual energy into their shovels and hoes, and worked with all their might to dig a side passage.

Ji Fengyao, Xique, and Bailu were responsible for picking out the raw ore they dug out from the soil, and then using small daggers to separate the spirit stones.

"One, two, three..." Ji Fengyao happily whispered as she collected the spirit stones.

Listening to the little bandit's clear and cheerful voice, and as the numbers she reported grew larger and larger, everyone became even more enthusiastic and dug with great fervor.

A few more days passed.

At noon that day, Li Yu arrived in the new city with three hundred henchmen of the Black Purgatory.

When they summoned the spies from Black Purgatory in New City to inquire, they discovered that Ji Fengyao and the others had never been to New City at all, and all the people Black Purgatory had sent to track them had disappeared!

Are they still in Mangcheng?

Li Yu led several hundred henchmen back to Mangcheng without stopping, but they found nothing.

"That's strange. Could they have grown wings and flown away?" Li Yu put his hands on his hips, looked at the vast Mangshan Mountains in the distance, and racked his brains to guess where Ji Fengyao and the others might have gone.

In order to kill the Ninth Prince, the Venerable One mobilized almost all the sects in the martial arts world;

The only task assigned was to Donglongmen.

Therefore, that group of people could not have gone to the northwest; they could only have entered the new northern country.

However, the task His Majesty assigned in the Northern Kingdom was merely to kill two kings and nobles. There's no reason for the Eastern Dragon Gate to send its high-ranking officials to personally carry out this task.

Just as Li Yu was puzzled, a disciple came to report: "Reporting to Chief Envoy Li, the information we have gathered from below seems to indicate that those people have extremely close ties with the Canal Gang, and the two families are even related by marriage."

"Talking about marriage?" Li Yu didn't quite understand.

"The two young ladies from the Cao Gang died during the beast tide attack on the city. The marriage between the two families was in name only, and the wedding was never held," the member of the gang explained.

Li Yu understood this time: "In other words, the Cao family is currently arranging funerals for the two young ladies."

"Yes, today is the seventh day after the death of the two young ladies of the Cao family," the monks said.

Li Yu's thin lips curled into a wicked smile: "There's no reason for a fiancé not to attend his fiancée's funeral. They must have gone to the Cao family in disguise to hide their whereabouts."

Having said that, Li Yu's cold and sharp voice, like striking a stone, suddenly rose in pitch: "Let's go! To the Cao family!"

"Yes, Chief Envoy Li!" Hundreds of members responded in unison, following Li Yu, and charged towards Yongcheng, the headquarters of the Canal Gang, filled with murderous intent.

To their surprise, when they broke into the headquarters of the Canal Gang, it was completely empty.

The vast headquarters compound of the Grand Canal Gang had three courtyards.

White silk and mourning clothes were everywhere inside and outside the house. Several courtyards were filled with empty coffins with their lids off, and the innermost hall was set up as a mourning hall.

The large character "奠" (meaning "offering sacrifice") in the center of the mourning hall was particularly eye-catching.

Even more striking were the two enormous banners fluttering in the wind at the entrance of the mourning hall, with the words written in large, blood-red characters:

"The shrine for the Black-Led Dog has been prepared in advance; its life will be taken another day!"

"The coffins in the courtyard are all cheap, crudely made ones. Find your own coffin and put it in the correct one!"

Upon seeing the two banners, the members of Black Purgatory's sect twitched at the corners of their eyes:

This little canal gang is really tough!

In this world, the Cao Gang is the second group to dare to provoke the Black Purgatory like this!

Li Yu was furious, his anger reaching the heavens: "The Canal Gang! They have no reason to exist!"