As Xuan Hao was descending towards the trading caravan on his sword together with Qing Yi, he looked at the people surrounding the trading caravan with a slight surprise.
Most of them did not look like normal bandits that had turned to robbing others due to things like food or bad living conditions. Instead, they looked more like a bunch of trained soldiers, at least the way they carried themselves were similar to how soldiers would.
This however was not what surprised Xuan Hao, what ended up surprising him was the strength of the desert bandits. Most of them were at the peak of the Qi Condensation Realm, with a few reaching the Foundation Establishment Realm, there was even one person at the Core Formation Realm.
The strength of the desert bandits was more than enough for them to settle down and claim an area for themselves, why would they still remain as bandits? Xuan Hao honestly had no clue, but he could always ask them to try and find out.
…
Yang Li was a normal soldier of the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms army, back then, he had reached the peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm and had been promoted to the position of a lieutenant general.
The position was quite high in the military of the Heavenly Sky Kingdom and he was the only one who had reached the rank while only being at the Foundation Establishment Realm. The reason being that he had performed well and excelled over the other people eligible for the role, while not as strong, a general needed to be able to lead his men and Yang Li excelled at that.
He helped conquer territory for the Heavenly Sky Kingdom in the east where no kingdom was established yet and he fought in skirmishes against the Azure Sky Kingdom at the borders.'
He did well and kept his men safe during all this, but it all changed when he grew older… Some of his higher ups were no longer so pleased with him still being stuck at the Foundation Establishment Realm at his age, they mostly thought he would breakthrough in the future, but at the age of 37, he was still at the peak of the Foundation Establishment Realm.
Seeing no future hope for him, Yang Li was kicked out of his position and replaced by a younger and more promising junior.
Going from an honourable lieutenant general to what was a normal captain was too much for him and Yang Li turned to drink his troubles away.
In the end, he started causing problems and was officially kicked out of the military.
Yang Li resented the Heavenly Sky Kingdom for what they did to him and on one fateful night, someone came to him, promising him what the Heavenly Sky Kingdom took from him, what was rightfully his!
All he had to do was create trouble inside the Heavenly Sky Kingdom, being a bandit robbing passing trading caravans was a starting point, when he grew his group strong enough, he would move on to sabotaging the Heavenly Sky Kingdoms army.
"Boss! A trading caravan is passing by!" Those words passed by Yang Li's ears and he thought to himself, just one more robbery and he could start getting his revenge on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom! Just one more time, he would go out and have some fun with his brothers!
"Let's go boys! We will surely be able to have some fun tonight!" Just one more time… That was what Yang Li thought as he looked at the person descending from the sky on a flying sword, Yang Li started trembled all over.
He knew they had slammed headfirst into a brick wall and there would most likely be no chance for regret.
Flying… Only a domain lord knew how to fly! What were the chances that they encountered one when they were out robbing a random trading caravan?
Yang Li felt that his chances for getting revenge on the Heavenly Sky Kingdom slowly disappeared as the person on the sword slowly landed on the ground between him and the trading caravan.
…
Looking at the scared look on the Core Formation experts face, Xuan Hao felt like laughing to himself. The poor guy probably thought he was a Domain Lord expert, after all, not many knew that a sword cultivator who comprehended True Sword Intent could use it to fly even below the Domain Lord Realm.
Though, him being a Nascent Soul expert or a Domain Lord would most likely make no difference as the guy was only at the Core Formation Realm.
"Qing Ming!" Upon reaching the ground, Qing Yi quickly jumped off the sword and ran over to Qing Ming, who stood in front of the trading caravan.
This caused the faces of the desert bandits to turn even more pale, while the members of the trading caravan look relieved.
The person with the expert knew someone from the caravan! This caused most of the people from the trading caravan to relax as they felt like they had just escaped a dangerous situation.
The Desert bandits on the other hand were shaking all over as everyone silently stared at the plain looked man standing in the middle of both groups. Even without him releasing any aura or anything, both groups silently waited for him to say anything.
"Ahm! May I-"
"Eeeeek!" Just as Xuan Hao was about to say something, one of the bandits screamed loudly and ran off into the distance. Making both Xuan Hao and the rest of the people wonder where he got the sudden burst of speed and courage from.
Swoosh!
Just as the man was about to make it over a sand dune and escape, Xuan Hao released his sword intent and killed the bandit at the spot.
Xuan Hao felt slightly disturbed upon killing another living person, but the experience of Xuan Hao traveling through the world at a young age helped him quickly regain his former calm.
In the past, Xuan Hao had killed quite a good amount of people while traveling from kingdom to kingdom before settling down in the Flying Sword Sect. The world was not really safe. There was danger everywhere and even a moment of hesitation could cost one's life.