Endless Winter: My Camp Upgrades Infinitely

Chapter 721: Chapter 296: Keen Instincts, Rallying the Troops, Bai Qiucheng’s Cunning Scheme

The forty-eighth year of Longyou, June 22

At the first light of dawn, southeast of Wushuang, at the entrance of the Xia Straight Road.

Li Xuanling looked into the depths of the passage, her brows furrowed, saying nothing.

More than ten people from Long Mountain behind her were also staring quietly into the dark depths, clearly waiting for something.

Tap tap tap......

Soon, a hurried footstep echoed from within the passage.

Everyone suddenly came to attention, immediately raising their heads to look over.

The person coming was Meng Ying, who was obviously in a hurry. Seeing Li Xuanling, he rushed over and cupped his hands, saying: ”Leader, the entire tunnel stretches for a length of twenty-three kilometers, with the other side’s exit less than two kilometers west of Hive Station, almost entirely buried under snow, definitely hard to find without careful attention.

No wonder Xia Hong could withdraw all the people from Wushuang right under our noses without us noticing.”

”You’re lucky it was just withdrawing the people unnoticed,” Li Xuanling’s expression slightly darkened as she continued: ”With this tunnel, the marching speed of Great Xia is more than ten times ours at Long Mountain. The four hours we took to march from Song Yuan last night would have been enough for Great Xia to secretly move all their Earth-digging Realm to Wushuang.

Thank goodness Xia Hong had no intention of defending Wushuang to the death. Otherwise, we would have foolishly charged thinking we were facing only four thousand people and ended up paying a doubled price to take Wushuang.”

Upon hearing this, the scouts Li Xuanping, Li Xuanqiu, and others behind lowered their heads slightly, their expressions rather embarrassed.

By now, they had all realized that the false information released by Great Xia last night had fooled them.

The thousand men coming from Hanqiong and the group pretending to head toward Wushuang while actually withdrawing were intentionally misleading Long Mountain, making them believe Great Xia intended to hold Wushuang.

And the two groups who brought back these false messages, Li Xuanping and Li Xuanqiu, naturally bore the greatest responsibility.

Before dawn, Li Xuanling had already publicly scolded the two, so she wouldn’t say anything more at this moment.

”How could we not have thought of building a tunnel under the snow?”

As Li Xuanling was about to speak, Li Xuandu, who had been observing from the side, couldn’t help but pat his head and sighed.

Seeing everyone immediately turn their heads to look at him, Li Xuandu pointed to the tunnel, his face showing no attempt to hide his admiration as he slowly spoke:

”I’ve seen that tunnel in the northeast as well. Great Xia built these two tunnels mostly using nearby wood, with a little iron mixed in for strength.

Although this tunnel is over twenty kilometers long, the material used was primarily wood, meaning the cost wasn’t high. Not only is the cost low, but the manpower required is minimal, apart from needing Earth-digging Realm for foundation work, the rest can be managed by Logging Realm.

The construction isn’t complicated, yet the significance is enormous. With these two tunnels, the travel time between Hanqiong, Hive Station, and Wushuang is several times shorter, the efficiency of transporting goods doubled, and the army can support each other in a very short time, instantly connecting the three places closely.”

As if unsatisfied with his explanation, Li Xuandu paused, then continued:

”Not only is it easy to build, but the maintenance cost is extremely low. Because of the tunnel length, unless it’s systematically sabotaged, or faces an excessively large Beast Tide, any potential damage is limited to a small section and can be easily repaired.

Moreover, with Ice Abyss’s constant snowfall, the tunnel would ultimately be covered by snow regardless of how it’s constructed, making it very hard to detect under normal circumstances.

Hidden, connected, convenient, low-cost in construction and maintenance, even decently defensible, this tunnel considers everything — it’s truly exceptional, simply exceptional!”

.........

All the Cold Resistance Level members from Long Mountain weren’t fools; upon hearing Li Xuandu’s words, they immediately realized the importance of the tunnel before them.

Even so, they didn’t react too much.

Li Xuandu also realized that their army had struck out at Wushuang the night before and the Long Mountain’s morale had already been hit, so his words might bolster Great Xia’s prestige, after a moment’s thought, he continued:

”But unfortunately, whether Great Xia is too naive or too confident, when they withdrew from Wushuang last night, they didn’t destroy this tunnel. If they can use it, naturally we can too. Great Xia used so much effort to build these two tunnels, they end up serving us Long Mountain.”

Upon hearing this, everyone’s eyes lit up.

Indeed!

Xia Hong had given up Wushuang, retreating with four thousand men to Hive Station.

These two tunnels now belonged to Long Mountain, didn’t they?

The three thousand Longyou Army could conveniently march through the tunnels from Wushuang to Hive Station.

”Haha, how naive...”

Just as a mindset of enjoying the hard work of others started to settle, Li Xuanling’s cold laugh abruptly interrupted everyone’s thoughts.

Turning her head toward the tunnel, Li Xuanling said in a serious tone: ”Too naive, too confident, you really think so? How much have we suffered at Xia Hong’s hands? You think not to destroy the tunnel, leaving it for us, and he wouldn’t think of that?”

Li Xuandu was stunned, but upon realizing, his forehead suddenly broke out in a cold sweat and he nodded.

”The leader is right; I was too naive!”

From the brief encounters with Xia Hong, the depth of his mind was indeed rare; not destroying the tunnel was likely intentional, and Xia Hong might have already set a trap, just waiting for them to use the straight road.