Chapter 98: Charging The Gates |
As I walked atop the wall, my heartbeat rang in my ears, and the snow crunched under my feet. The biting wind sent a chill down my spine, and the snowstorm grew stronger and colder with each passing second. I breathed out a misty breath and narrowed my eyes against the howling winds and snow in the distance. No matter how hard I tried, the heavy snowfall made it difficult to see what was happening.
Even a cultivator’s eyes couldn’t pierce through it, and there was a good chance the monstrous beasts had calculated this too.
I turned around and gave the town one last look.
A crowd of people was evacuating on the opposite side from where the attack was coming. We were generally surrounded, but the monstrous beasts knew that spreading their forces would weaken their piercing pressure against the walls. I hoped their commander was not foolish enough to spread their forces too thin and understood the basics of warfare.
Hopefully, if they decided to attack from behind and somehow snuck past the sensory arrays I had painstakingly put up, the governor’s soldiers would warn us. There was no smoke signal from the other sides of the walls, indicating no attack there. Even if there was one, it would be hard to see in this heavy snowstorm.
I took a deep breath and calmed my rapidly beating heart. Worrying about everything else or what the enemy had up their sleeve was no use. I had prepared as much as I could with the limited resources available.
Explosions in the distance rang so loud that they drowned out even the howling wind for a second. I narrowed my eyes and stared into the distance. There were some red flashes, but nothing concrete I could make out. However, after a dozen seconds, the winds carried the smell of blood all the way here. Hence, it was safe to assume that some of the arrays I had placed just outside the forest had been effective.
This idea came from landmines in my last life, except I used flawed arrays that would explode on contact as a weapon.
The improvised minefield would have been detected without an army of monstrous beasts who could use Qi.
“Sir, should we attack too?” asked one of the Body Tempering Cultivators.
Even though the governor and two clan leaders were close by, I had the final decision on these matters. I had ensured everyone knew that over the past few weeks. The last thing I wanted was confusion on the battlefield due to conflicting orders from the governor and me.
“No, hold on for now,” I said calmly, though internally I was swearing like a sailor.
This was not good at all. With the limited visibility, one of our biggest advantages was neutralized.
We had prepared a lot of poisoned spears, and I had made sure everyone here knew the weaknesses of certain monstrous beasts. This would have given even Body Tempering Cultivators a chance to kill them. But all that was in vain as the strong winds from the snowstorm and the limited visibility made it nearly impossible to hit the right target.
I hadn’t thought they would be patient enough to wait for a snowstorm. Even monstrous beasts had to eat, and there wasn’t much they could consume out here except each other.
Whoever their strategist was, they were dangerous and risk-taking creatures. They preferred that monstrous beasts eat each other rather than attack us on a clear day. They had gambled on a snowstorm occurring. Perhaps they thought that even with some beasts devouring each other, fewer would die compared to attacking our walls.
It seemed my bout of misinformation had held them back quite a bit, and most of all, they hadn’t underestimated me.
“They actually developed anti-human strategies,” I muttered.
Though we were enemies, I admired whoever came up with this. Monstrous beasts did not have books or other resources to learn from past events. This was all something their strategist had devised on their own.
I grabbed my two daggers and unsheathed them from a hidden sheath in the inner part of my robes.
Tightening my grip on the blades, I came to a resolution.
No matter what, I had to kill the monstrous beast scheming these strategies. A lot of people would die otherwise. Even if we somehow survived this onslaught and they lost, that strategist could not be allowed to escape.
Suddenly, a deep primal roar in the distance raised the hairs on the back of my neck.
“Something big is rushing toward us!” I yelled loudly enough for the other Qi Gathering Cultivators atop the wall to hear. The governor nodded, and the clan leaders signaled they had heard me.
The snow was blocking my sight, but my senses were still sharp. The army of monstrous beasts blurred together like one giant forest fire approaching us. But one of the monstrous beasts had separated from the group and charged straight at us.
Explosions rang closer and closer, signaling that the monstrous beast was still charging even after running through some landmines. They were unable to harm it!
A guttural roar grew louder, and we all tensed in anticipation of what would happen next. The Body Tempering Cultivators grabbed their poison-dipped spears, ready to throw them. In contrast the clan leaders readied their artifacts, and the governor prepared his technique.
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Whatever was charging at us was around the peak of Qi Gathering and had strong defenses. It was too fast to be a turtle-like monstrous beast, so there was still a good chance we could break through its defenses.
I contemplated telling the others how strong the monstrous beast was but decided against it. Such information would only lower morale, and those who needed to know could already sense its strength.
As the monstrous beast grew closer, it revealed itself as a giant creature the size of a truck, resembling a boar with a snout large enough to cover its head. Immediately, I recognized the danger it posed.
The Body Tempering Cultivators threw their spears, but the sharpened metal bounced off its skin, causing no damage. The poison had no chance to take effect.
"Give me this," I said, taking a soldier's spear next to me and imbuing it with Qi.
I threw the projectile, and it cut through the wind at breakneck speed, hitting the monstrous beast at the top of its head.
But even with all the power I could muster, the spear's metallic tip crumbled upon impact. A small scratch was beneath its fur but nowhere near enough for the poison to enter and slow down the beast.
The clan leaders used their artifacts, shooting beams of Qi at the monstrous boar, but it only made the creature grunt. At the same time, the governor pointed his palm at the beast, and a blast of Qi struck its flank. The monstrous boar shook for a moment, but it did not stop.
The governor and clan leaders began charging their moves again. Still, they were already moving away, realizing the monstrous beast would crash into the wall before they could attack again.
An Earth Legged Boar. I had never seen one before, but it was known for its solid defenses and especially powerful legs. Nothing else was particularly special about the beast, but that seemed more than enough.
As it got closer, I looked for any weak points. The monstrous beast's eyes were hidden behind its snout, rendering it blind. Typically, that would give an average cultivator an advantage as they could dodge out of the way. But now wasn't a time when we could dodge.
Leaning on the edge of the wall, I looked down and roughly calculated how long the monstrous beast would take to reach this place. Stopping it right at the wall would be useless. Its momentum would still carry it through the walls even if it died.
Jumping down, the thick snow crunched under my feet. Unlike in the town where the snow was cleared daily, the snow outside had accumulated to knee height. I had used it to better hide my traps, but running through this was not an option. It would slow me down too much.
I jumped up, maneuvered mid-air, and landed feet-first on the vertical part of the wall. Using Rushing Bull Step, I kicked off the marble stone and shot toward the charging monstrous beast like a bullet.
Once I reached the beast, I maneuvered out of its charge and used my dagger to stab into its back, stopping myself from falling. The daggers only barely pierced the monstrous beast's skin and fat.
There was no time to consider how the book I had read might have underestimated the boar-like beast's toughness. I balanced myself despite the shaking as the beast moved. Imbuing the daggers with Qi, I swung down.
Though my dagger went far enough to draw blood and flesh, it halted as soon as it hit something hard. The monstrous boar grunted and shook its back, trying to shake me off, but it was useless.
I grabbed its fur and repositioned myself
Falling Moon Claw!
Using my strongest attack point-blank and charging it up as much as possible, I created a bleeding cut on the back of its neck. Though the beast heaved heavily and left a trail of blood on the snow, its charge barely slowed. Even if I attacked again and again, it would take a dozen attacks to kill this thing. It would have reached the walls by then, and I would run out of Qi.
I decided in a split second, as the beast was already too close to the wall. Using its back as a foothold, I jumped off just as it smashed into the wall. Immediately, the barrier around the town shimmered and broke, and the part of the wall the boar had smashed down into came down with it.
With its crazy momentum, rocks went flying, hitting some people. Those atop the wall where the beast crashed fell, their screams quieted as the beast crushed their bodies. It was not a pretty sight; their mangled forms were smashed aside.
The monstrous beast grunted and looked around confused, as if what had happened was an accident.
But I didn't have time to observe the beast. Rocks passed toward me, and I used my Qi-imbued daggers to cut them down before any could hit me.
The monstrous beast didn't stay confused for long. It approached one of the fallen Body Tempering Cultivators and crushed his body under its hoof like a bloody pimple. It was a gross sight, and the snow around the broken wall turned red, with a trail of blood leading toward the break in the wall like a road for the other monstrous beasts to follow.
“Governor!” I called out to the only other man I knew could injure the monstrous beast.
Unlike the clan leaders, he had to have techniques that could do real damage. He met my gaze and nodded, and we simultaneously charged toward the monstrous beast.
“Lion Roar Fist!” the governor yelled as crimson Qi gathered in his fist, forming into a lion head silhouette. He slammed his fist into the boar’s ribs.
The attack sent the monstrous beast sliding on the snow outside the wall, but its legs steadied. It stared at the governor hatefully, but it seemed to forget about me entirely.
I imbued my daggers with Qi, jumped on its back once more, and began slashing at the exposed nape of its neck. The upper part of the boar’s spine was visible after the last attacks, so I relentlessly slashed at its nape, and the beast groaned in pain.
The governor took this chance to imbue his fists with Qi and pummel the boar’s ribs. Neither of us used Martial Techniques, knowing we had to conserve our Qi for the other enemies.
“Shit,” I cursed under my breath as I sensed the army of monstrous beasts getting closer. At this rate, even if the boar died, we were done.
I abandoned my attack and yelled to the governor, “Get back on the wall! The rest of this guy’s friends are coming.”
He looked at me confused, questioning my decision, but there was no time to explain. Ultimately, he followed my orders and jumped back atop the wall.
With no more targets around, the boar-like monstrous beast roared. It opened its mouth wide and gathered Qi in its throat, preparing to shoot a blast. But before it could, I swung my dagger and unleashed a Falling Moon Claw slash.
The invisible slashes, shaped like a spiraling cylinder, entered the boar’s mouth and sliced the back of its throat. The boar grunted and gurgled, falling to the ground and thrashing before it drowned in its own blood.
No matter how strong a monstrous beast or cultivator was, they still needed to breathe. The boar had run quite a distance and was breathing heavily, so it drowned in its own blood faster than most.
I glanced at the broken part of the wall; the barrier had fallen. Turning to the other side, I saw shadows in the snowstorm of the monstrous beasts charging toward the town.
The wall was broken, and our bluffing barrier was down. Thankfully, in the snowstorm, the leader of the monstrous beasts shouldn’t have noticed what had happened. The snowstorm obstructed their view just as much as ours.
But there was no mistaking that we were on the back foot in this conflict, and an opening in the wall had formed much quicker than expected. We suffered a devastating loss before the monstrous beast army reached the walls.
No matter what, I couldn’t let any of them enter the city.