He glanced at Meng Zhelan's medicine box, and his heart tightened.
“Come on, take us to that road.” Li Xi’s voice was firm and decisive.
The three quickly followed the route indicated by the big ox, breaking the silence of the mountains with the sound of their footsteps.
Suddenly, the sound of rapid hoofbeats broke the tranquility of the mountains.
Li Xi immediately signaled everyone to stop, and the three of them hid in the bushes, nervously observing the situation.
A group of soldiers on fast horses galloped past, their destination clearly not here.
As the sound of horses' hooves faded into the distance, Li Xi finally let out a long breath and muttered softly, "This is truly unbelievable. How could there be soldiers here? Where did they come from?"
Prince An noticed that the soldiers were dressed in the uniforms of Yuncheng patrolmen. This place was far from Yuncheng, so why were they here?
He was filled with doubt. He snapped his fingers, and a moment later, a man in black appeared beside him.
Prince An gave him a few instructions, and the man in black nodded and then left.
Li Xi and Da Niu stood silently to the side until the pedestrians gradually disappeared into the distance.
Da Niu finally spoke, breaking the silence: "Brother Li, I think I should go down the mountain to find some people to help. After all, more people means more strength, and it will be easier to find them."
This seemed like a feasible plan, and Li Xi suggested, "Da Niu, you go down the mountain first, and Young Master An and I will continue the search here. If you encounter them at the foot of the mountain, light this signal flare."
She handed a signal flare to Da Niu. Although she wasn't sure if Meng Zhelan and the others had already come down the mountain, it was always good to be prepared.
After Da Niu left, Li Xi turned to Prince An, intending to say, "Your Highness, I'm going to take a closer look around, you..." However, before she could finish speaking, Prince An interrupted her.
“I will accompany you!” Prince An said decisively, and then walked towards the edge of the cliff first.
Li Xi frowned and could only hurry to catch up.
This cliff is quite steep and difficult for ordinary people to climb, but it is not difficult for a martial arts master with excellent lightness skills.
After walking for a while, Li Xi suddenly stopped, her gaze fixed on a protrusion on the cliff face. There, a glimpse of a black hem of clothing could be seen.
Her nerves immediately tensed, and she instinctively gripped the sword in her hand tighter.
Prince An also noticed something was wrong. He followed Li Xi's gaze and saw the black hem of a garment on the cliff face sway slightly before falling silent.
"Your Highness, it looks like Tian Tian's clothes. I'll go down and take a look!" Li Xi said in a low voice, and then she flashed and rushed towards the cliff.
Li Xi moved like a ghost along the cliff face, her eyes sharp as an eagle's, fixed on the black hem of her clothes.
She carefully picked up the piece of fabric and examined it closely; it was indeed the clothes that Tian Tian had worn when she went out today.
An ominous premonition suddenly welled up in my heart. Could it be that something bad had happened to Tian Tian?
Just then, a faint cry for help came from below the cliff. Li Xi's expression tightened, and she immediately followed the direction of the sound.
A figure was trapped in a narrow crevice in the rocks—it was the missing Sweetie!
"Your Highness, you wait upstairs for rescue, I'll go down to save people." Before she finished speaking, she had already used her strength to nimbly leap towards where Tian Tian was.
"Miss Xi, it's you! I thought I was going to die here today." Her sweet voice carried a hint of surprise and relief.
"Don't talk nonsense. With me here, how could anything happen to you?"
Li Xi quickly checked the surrounding rock walls, found a relatively loose rock, and pushed it aside forcefully, leaving a passage for Tian Tian to escape.
Sweetie crawled out of the passage, and Li Xi helped her stand up. Her face was pale from blood loss.
The two prepared to leave this dangerous place.
Suddenly, a deep rumble resounded, and the entire crevice began to shake violently.
"Oh no, this place is about to collapse!" Li Xi's eyes narrowed, and she quickly grabbed Tian Tian's hand and rushed towards the cave entrance.
Just as they were about to rush out of the cave, a huge rock fell from the sky and blocked their way.
The surroundings were shrouded in darkness, so dark that one couldn't see their own hand in front of their face. Li Xi took out a luminous pearl from his pocket; this thing was much more useful than a tinderbox.
"Sweetie, let me see where you're hurt." Li Xi brought the luminous pearl closer to Sweetie, carefully examining the bleeding points.
She took out some hemostatic powder from her bag and gently applied it to the wound. Then she took out some bandages from her bag to bandage Tian Tian.
The wound on her arm was shocking, bleeding profusely; if the bleeding wasn't stopped in time, it would likely become infected. Fortunately, the medicine Meng Zhelan had prepared for them was of excellent quality.
"Sweetie, how did you fall there? Where are Lan'er and Uncle Gu?" Li Xi was completely clueless.
“They were captured. At that time, I went down to the edge of the cliff to pick wild herbs, and just as I was about to return, I heard that someone was planning to capture them. When I tried to climb up, I was discovered by those people. They cut the vines, causing me to fall. Fortunately, I managed to grab a broken tree in time, otherwise I would have fallen to the bottom of the cliff.”
Sun Tiantian's face showed regret, thinking that if only she could...
"Miss Xi, I'm so sorry. If I had gone up earlier, this might not have happened."
“Silly girl, how can I blame you? Now we need to think of a way to leave here.” Li Xi said as she stood up and looked around. All she could see were hard rocks.
Her gaze fell on a cave entrance in the corner, almost completely covered by rocks, from which a faint light shone.
He crouched down and gently brushed away the rubble covering the cave entrance, revealing a narrow passage that could only accommodate one person at a time.
A resolute glint flashed in Li Xi's eyes: "I'll go in first, you follow behind."
Sweetie's eyes were full of worry: "Then be careful."
Li Xi took a deep breath and squeezed into the narrow passage. Tian Tian followed closely behind. In this dark passage, the two could only move forward by the faint light and the sound of each other's breathing.
At the end of the passage, a sudden gust of cold wind blew by, and Li Xi and Tian Tian couldn't help but shiver.
Before them lay a vast underground cavern, in the center of which sat a pool of emerald-green liquid, emitting an eerie glow. Ancient and mysterious runes were carved into the cave walls, seemingly imbued with some kind of power.
As Li Xi approached the pool of liquid, she felt a strange energy fluctuation emanating from it, warm and mysterious.
She reached out and lightly touched the emerald liquid with her fingertips. Instantly, a powerful light burst forth from her fingertips, illuminating the entire cave. The runes seemed to be activated, beginning to shimmer with dazzling light.
This scene was completely beyond her comprehension; she stared in astonishment at the light and the flickering runes at her fingertips.
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