37 Raid

*Things like sexism and racism are purely for worldbuilding and to make it more realistic. Thank you for your understanding.*

Under the veil of the night, over one hundred figures descended upon a small hunting village.

Making up the commander's squadron were four generals, eleven elite soldiers and one-hundred-and-ten normal soldiers. Considering that they were tasked with wiping out small villages and towns, it was definitely overkill.

The only reason such a squad was needed was for the sheer efficiency needed to complete their mission before the main army invaded.

Qing Fang led his twenty-two men, two elite soldiers and twenty normal soldiers, through a thick forest and after the commander who was leading them. Words were not exchanged as dozens of eyes continuously scanned the surroundings.

To the mortal ear, no sound could be heard as the squadron advanced at deadly paces toward the small hunting village that their commander had laid his eyes on. The winds sharply hissed as many blue-armoured figures weaved in and out of the trees.

At this stage, their squadron had separated from the other squads and the closest one was over ten miles away now. The one hundred squads, each led by a Stage 5 commander, had to cover the entire globe and eliminate all rural life within a month.

Thus, when the main army arrived, the decisive battle for the planet would immediately begin. Such shocking speed of taking over a planet would surely cause the Huoyan Clan to crumble.

At this moment, every single pair of eyes were as cold as Qing Fang's were normally. After all, this was war. Ruthlessness and cruelty were the new normal on this foreign planet and the mission was more important than their lives.

However, amidst the cold eyes, Qing Fang felt at home. The battlefield was truly harmonious to him; the field upon which the sacred cycle of life and death occurred. He couldn't wait to throw himself into the huge battle that would occur when the main army arrived.

"Quickly now." The voice of the commander addressed his four generals as he started to travel at the limits of a middle Stage 2's speed. He moved quickly and without wasted energy, showing his battle prowess worthy of a Stage 5.

"We're picking up the pace. If any are unable to keep up, tell them we will wait for them at the destination. Make sure they know where we're heading." Qing Fang spoke to the two elite soldiers running at either side of him.

They nodded with serious eyes before falling behind and informing the normal soldiers under their command of Qing Fang's orders. In times of war, insubordination was intolerable and orders were not up for debate, even if the one issuing them had questionable competence. It was a matter of setting a precedent of obedience.

Following his commander, as they were now only five miles away from the hunting village, Qing Fang looked around at this new environment. After all, this was the first time he had been to another planet and he was intrigued.

The air was very humid and dry. It seems that it was in the middle of summer on this planet since temperatures were this high at night. It was a contrast to Qingpu where it was nearing the end of autumn. Although the flora and fauna he passed looked similar to the ones found on Qingpu, Qing Fang knew that they were a different species that didn't exist there.

The sky and moon were similar to Qingpu but that didn't lower Qing Fang's infatuation with this new environment. After all, travelling to a different planet altogether was just too exotic.

As well as continuously scanning the surroundings for danger and monitoring his men, Qing Fang's eyes continuously darted from flowers to small animals that he had never seen before.

However, before he could revel in this experience any further, his commander signalled to him. He did not turn and kept on running toward the destination while communicating with his generals effectively.

Qing Fang and the other generals looked at him. The commander made a few detailed hand signs that covered a range of vocabulary that was understood by them.

'Six Stage 2 Beasts... Wolves... Two hundred meters... Eliminate.' After grasping the message the signals held, Qing Fang increased his speed and rushed ahead of the commander with one other general.

If the Beasts were any stronger, the commander would choose to go around them to avoid needless mistakes that might end in casualties and a loss of fighting power. From this, the generals could see that they lucked out and managed to find an extremely competent Stage 5 as their commander, Qing Fang included.

Making eye contact with the other general, Qing Fang nodded as they both ran with the speed of a peak Stage 3 cultivator. Trees passed like a blur and the humid air got colder as they increased their speeds and broke away from the squad.

And after a few seconds, the two generals spotted a pack of Stage 2 grey wolves. Since their species did not exist on Qingpu, the law fragments these Beasts could manipulate was unknown. However, it was no matter. After all, a Stage 4 and Quasi Stage 4 were the wolves' opponents.

Qing Fang nodded once again to the other commander as he sent six extremely powerful spears of water that even a Stage 4 would have to avoid directly toward the hearts of the wolves. As well as this, the other general waved his hands and an extremely large wave of fire covered the area where the six wolves stood eating grass.

Qing Fang's attack was to instantly kill the targets and the other general mobilised an area attack to ensure that they died if the wolves somehow dodged what they shouldn't be able to. Although it seemed way too much for six mere Stage 2 Beasts, they weren't taking any chances. Make a mistake, and their commander would be justified to kill them under war law.

Naturally, the six wolves instantly died as a huge hole in their abdomens replaced their hearts. After that, their bodies and the surrounding trees and bushes were incinerated into nothingness. Seeing this, the general accompanying Qing Fang immediately controlled the fire to disappear. Setting fire to the forest was the last thing they wanted to do.

After this, they continued advancing to the hunting village side by side but lowered their speed to that of a peak Stage 1. They must wait for their commander and confirm that the targets were eliminated. In times like these, the generals must work hard to make everything as easy as possible for their commander.

After all, efficiency was key.

Travelling through the woods at a much slower speed but still faster than what a mortal could hope to achieve, the commander and the rest of the squad soon emerged from the forest behind them.

Qing Fang signalled that the targets were eliminated and the commander nodded. After that, the two generals fell back in line and their elite soldiers came back to their sides once again.

This whole exchange lasted less than thirty seconds.

Qing Fang noticed that two normal soldiers were missing from his ranks. Looking to his elite soldiers, they confirmed that they had fallen behind but knew the location of the hunting village. Qing Fang nodded to them and looked to his commander. The hunting village was now only four hundred meters away.

And after ten more seconds, the commander halted the squad just outside the periphery of the village. After which, he expanded his senses over the village and even passively peered into the World of Laws just to be sure. The fact that he could do this passively without meditation was credited to hundreds of years of cultivation.

Sensing no cultivators, the commander called to his generals.

"We will gather in the middle of the houses and wait. Instruct the normal soldiers to quickly kill any residents of the houses while the elite soldiers supervise." His voice was hushed and carried right into the ears of the four generals.

All four nodded and the commander then flashed and reappeared in the middle of the hunting village, expanding his senses past its borders and watching for any danger that might suddenly appear. Patrolling cultivators were not uncommon. In that case, the commander and his four generals would go to take care of them while the others continued the assassinations.

Qing Fang turned to his two elite soldiers, his eyes flashing as he spoke to them quickly and concisely. "Normal soldiers will go into the houses in two-man cells and kill any inhabitants. You will supervise. You are permitted to kill any unwilling soldiers." After seeing them nod solemnly, Qing Fang flashed and appeared by the side of his commander with the other three generals.

Then, under the gaze of the generals, while the commander was alert for patrols, the one hundred and ten normal soldiers rushed to the approximately sixty houses of the hunting village and destroyed the doors while rushing inside in cells of two. Any unmanned houses would be taken out by a cell that had already cleared one.

Roles in operations were strict and must be followed.

Screams, cries, shouts and pleas came from a few houses; the inhabitants have likely woken from the door being destroyed.

No mercy was shown as men, women, children, elderly people and even a couple of babies were ruthlessly murdered with deadly efficiency. This put a smile in the eyes of the generals. They had got a good batch of subordinates. Even though they were selected for their obedience on the field, killing babies might have stopped a few in their tracks.

But not this squadron. The elite soldiers watched with satisfaction for their efficiency as cells emerged from houses after only ten seconds and moved onto the few houses that had yet to be cleared.

After a few more mortals had been slaughtered and the two-man cells emerged from the houses unscathed but covered in blood, the elite soldiers acting as supervisors shouted to their respective generals that the village was clear.

Informing the commander that it was clear, the squadron departed after making sure everyone that had fallen behind was present.

Twenty seconds was all it took to wipe out the village.

...

Two days later.

It was night as the squadron prepared to eliminate the first town they had come across. It was quite large, with an approximate population of ten thousand given by the commander. They had waited until night to take action after discovering it that evening.

Since eliminating the first village, the squadron had efficiently taken out twenty-two more villages varying in size but mostly similar to the first. With an average of eleven villages per day, it was a good speed.

Up until now, they had only encountered just under twenty cultivators in and around the villages that they had eliminated. The strongest was higher Stage 2 and was personally taken care of by the commander to avoid any mishaps.

Overall, thousands of square miles had been covered already and they had eliminated an estimation of over five thousand people on Doushan Planet. There had been no deaths within the squadron and that was a great achievement.

Most squadrons had lost at least one normal soldier either to a Beast or to an enemy cultivator. But still, the heavy casualties were only taken when assaulting towns like Qing Fang's commander was now.

Looking out over the town, small stone walls about three meters high encircled it. They could be explained by the Beasts that became much more active at night and even prowled close to the walls themselves. The town itself consisted of a few thousand buildings connected by stone-paved streets that were very wide.

Qing Fang didn't know whether it was a merchant town, but it was a very rich-looking place. The buildings were multiple stories and paved with stone tiles, and there was even a market district filled with restaurants and shops.

The hour was late, with it being three hours past midnight. Most mortals had gone to bed with a few drinking out late. As for the cultivators? There were patrols around the town coming from a small pagoda in the centre of the town. That was also where the Town Lord was determined to stay, and the commander will take care of him personally.

The Lord of a town this size would be at least higher Stage 2 and at most peak Stage 3. However, the commander was not taking any risks and was taking action personally.

The plan was to wipe out the mortals on the streets and the patrols first after which the bulk of the squadron would silently descend upon the small pagoda to murder all of the patrolling cultivators.

A first was clenched in the air.

And with the signal from the commander, every cultivator rushed at their top speeds in six-man cells to silently eliminate the mortals and cultivators on the night streets. The elite soldiers moved out personally while the generals were stationed at four high points in the town.

They washed their gazes over the streets and would swiftly kill anyone that might emerge from any one of the houses throughout the entire town. Meanwhile, the commander departed to wipe out any particularly large buildings that may hold a lot of people.

Qing Fang watched his men move like ghosts on the streets, breaking the necks of wandering drunkards and barraging any cultivators with a sea of silent attacks in their blind spots. They didn't hide the bodies and it was also his job to kill anyone who stumbled upon them.

However, that was unlikely as the squadron acted from the perimeter of the city inwards.

The cultivators wiped out the streets without any casualties and a handful of minor injuries. Qing Fang had seen one or two Huoyan cultivators manage to attack with law fragments before they were overwhelmed, managing to injure a few of the squadron. Fortunately, the noise created was not overly loud and didn't cause anyone to awaken who wasn't already.

After clearing the streets of any Huoyan cultivators and mortals, the normal and elite soldiers soon congregated around the small pagoda while masking their presence. They now had to wait for the commander before they stormed the building.

But, under the keen eyes of Qing Fang, movement was noticed just behind the doors of the main pagoda as extremely faint shadows were cast just within his sight. The first mistake of the squadron was about to unfold, however, he wouldn't let it happen.

Two Huoyan cultivators appeared at the door of the small pagoda, about to start their patrol. The reason that they weren't discovered by the squadron waiting just outside was that they hadn't been talking and were completely silent.

However, the eyes of the Huoyan cultivators widened when they left the building and saw around eighty cultivators covered in blood and also staring at them with similarly wide eyes. Behind them were the dark streets covered in blood and body parts with bodies lying dismembered and mutilated everywhere.

But before the two patrolling cultivators could even make a sound, two spears of water penetrated their necks with insane speed and embedded into the stone floor behind them with a dull crack. The spears lodged into the ground and the dead bodies of the two cultivators stood standing, not being able to fall because of the spear that had impaled them holding their bodies up.

The cultivators belonging to the squadron followed the trajectory of the spears that just fell apart into water and caused the bodies to fall to the ground as well. There, they saw a blue-armoured figure standing atop a tall building with eyes coldly looking upon them through the slits in the helmet upon his head.

The moon was cast behind him, leaving only an armoured silhouette visible from down on the blood-covered streets.

The figure, Qing Fang, gave a thumbs up to the squadron even though it wasn't part of their signal language. Because of this, a few cultivators held the urge to laugh and only smiled as they looked up to the figure of their guardian angel looking over them. With such a powerful and alert general, they felt much safer.

With the streets completely clean and Qing Fang keenly watching the entrance of the small pagoda and the remaining generals surveying the streets, the main force of the squadron only had to wait for the commander now.

And after taking out several large buildings, two of which were an orphanage and a hospital, the commander regrouped with the main force and entered the small pagoda under the watch of Qing Fang.

Qing Fang kept his eyes on the many houses and even killed a person exiting one of them before he heard a commotion from the small pagoda. Looking over, he saw an enemy cultivator suddenly smash his way out of the top floor of the pagoda, desperately trying to escape.

'The Town Lord, huh?' Qing Fang thought before shooting one hundred spears toward the body of the lower Stage 3 from all directions. With no surprise, the Town Lord tried to defend himself and attempted to hijack the control of the spears since he was coincidentally also a Water path cultivator. However, his efforts were fruitless and his small skinny body was torn to shreds and transformed into confetti of intestines and flesh before falling to the streets and even splashing on a few members of the squad.

Qing Fang placed his hands together and laughingly bowed toward the two unlucky gentlemen before paying them no more heed. He focused his attention back on the streets and even saw two of the generals mobilise to another area of the town from the corner of his eye.

After a minute or two, no more thudding, slicing or squelching could be heard by Qing Fang from the small pagoda and the commander instantly appeared beside him. He didn't care to pay too much attention to the small pagoda as he still had his role in this massacre.

The commander spoke to Qing Fang shortly after he appeared beside him. "Same routine as with the villages. Let the normal and elite soldiers clear up while we wait to move on." He said with a deep voice and blood dripping from his helmet and onto the roof tiles beneath their feet.

"Yes, commander." Qing Fang affirmed before relaying the orders of the commander to the other three generals as the commander prowled the streets, killing any that came out of their houses.

Following this, Qing Fang watched as the soldiers under his command systematically cleared every building that was found to have mortals within it through detection. This time, his men were exceptionally careful as he didn't even hear one scream coming from any houses under his jurisdiction.

The night only got darker as people were ruthlessly slaughtered. The ones who managed to wake up were the unluckiest, as they had to quiver in fear until armoured figures were right outside their door.

Little girls and boys, tossing and turning in their warm blankets as the light from the moon shone into their bedrooms never awoke, their heads being cut off and falling to the floor while their headless bodies still snuggled into their blankets.

Babies awoke screaming in the middle of the night, causing their parents to let out a defeated sigh. However, when the crying stopped all on its own, they let out sighs of relief before falling back to sleep, unaware that their baby was now two halves of a baby. And they were soon to follow.

'I guess since this is our first town, they are hoping to impress the commander. I'd say it's working.' Qing Fang thought as he saw a satisfied look on the commander's face as he looked upon the cultivators moving upon the streets toward the next houses containing targets for assassination.

After a few more minutes of the massacre, the town was deemed to be void of any life, the streets filled with bodies and the buildings even more so.

Just like that, a town of ten thousand people was wiped out in under ten minutes. One thousand people a minute and fifteen people a second.

...

Over the next fifteen days, Qing Fang's commander led their squadron to eliminate one-hundred-and-eighteen villages as well as six more towns. The largest of the towns had a population of sixty thousand Huoyan Clansmen.

However, this time they were not without casualties. Nineteen normal soldiers had been lost as well as two elite soldiers. Seven of the normal soldiers belonged to Qing Fang while the two elite soldiers were under two other generals.

All of the deaths had been when assaulting towns. It was extremely difficult to get such a good result like that of the first town they eliminated. One of the Town Lords was even hiding his cultivation level as a lower Stage 4 while masquerading as a lower Stage 3. Just that incident cost eleven of the total lives lost.

Unfortunately for the parents of that Town Lord, not a single cell of his body remained after the commander had ruthlessly destroyed his very spirit.

Overall, the total kill count of Qing Fang's squadron was nearly three-hundred-thousand confirmed kills and that was only counting humans. The number of Beasts that they had killed along the way was not light either.

Assuming that the other squadrons had killed the same number, thirty million people had died on Doushan in the last seventeen days.

Also, during this time, a network between all one hundred squadrons had been established. Using stolen communication amulets as well as messengers, Qing Fang now knew that nearly all of the rural areas had been taken care of.

All that remained near them were a few villages hidden deep within the forests and obscured from an ariel view.

And three days later, all of the rural land on Doushan under the jurisdiction of Qing Fang's commander was cleansed of any human life except for themselves. And luckily, there were no cities near them either. Otherwise, they would have had to assassinate any person who tried to leave its walls.

For the next ten days, Qing Fang's squadron would, however, not be able to relax. The commander had ordered them to head to the nearest city and reinforce the other squadron holding it.

The total number of cities on Doushan was eighty-nine, each with a population larger than ten million.

...

Qing Fang stood behind his commander and next to the three other generals as they stared at the walls of a huge city called Jiesheng City. Its population was thirteen million and housed a dozen Stage 5s.

Next to them was another commander donned in gold inlaid armour. He spoke to Qing Fang's commander.

"After clearing the villages and towns, we worked to assassinate any person who tried to leave while staying in the shadows. According to the plan, we have made them afraid of leaving the walls and confined them here until the main army arrives." He only looked at his fellow commander and did not even acknowledge Qing Fang or the other three generals.

However, they didn't mind. It was the privilege of the strong to pick and choose. And even Qing Fang respected strength.

"Good. Luckily they haven't contacted Ronghua Planet and alerted the Huoyan Stage 6s. They must think that we don't dare to attack the cities because we are too weak. They also have no idea that all life on Doushan not encased in the walls of a city is completely gone. Since they do not think much of us for the moment, even after probably contacting other cities, it looks as though our mission is successful." Qing Fang's commander spoke seriously. Even though he entertained the idea of them completing their mission, he was not happy nor relieved and stayed alert.

Qing Fang listened to the exchange happening. He wasn't overly clear on the complete plans of the commanders but now he had the gist of it. They would use the walls of the city as an animal pen as the Huoyan Clansmen inside believed they were afraid to attack. Holding this stalemate until the main army descended, the animals in the pen would be ready for slaughter.

And even though the Stage 5s of the city would love to destroy the "nuisances" attacking their city, "probably some powerful bandits", they thought; they hadn't actually seen their enemies. They lurked in the shadows, hidden and ready to retreat at any moment.

They knew this and also knew the futility of them trying to act.

When their time was up, Qing Fang would join the main army in swarming the cities of this planet.

...

Ten days later.

Qing Fang and his squadron looked up to the skies above Jiesheng City.

Reflected in their gleaming eyes were hundreds of thousands of figures hovering above the city.

*4,199/3,000 words*