Chapter 226
Chapter 226. An Eerie Scene
At last, after paying for it with casualties amounting to two-thirds of their force, they managed to drive the Experimental Legion into the orcs’ hinterland. But when they tried to withdraw, they were entangled by a tide of orcs, and their retreat became bitterly difficult.
Orcs surged in from every direction. Battle axes and Bone Spears wove a net of death, and with every passing second, Golden Knights fell.
Deep within the orc encampment, the chieftains of several great clans were roaring over a sand table.
The Blackrock Chieftain kicked over the table with one foot, sending bone wine cups shattering across the ground.
“Useless fools! A million clansmen cannot stop two broken legions? Use the ‘Soul-Suppressing Box’ at once! Those experimental soldiers can detonate themselves, and the arcane spores can corrupt the mind. Wait any longer, and the entire allied army will be reduced to corpses!”
The captain of the personal guard did not dare hesitate. He held a wooden box wrapped in black Runes with both hands and led his squad out of the encampment like an arrow loosed from a bowstring.
The Runes on the surface of the wooden box glimmered faintly, releasing waves that suppressed arcane power. It was an artifact passed down from the orc ancestors, made specifically to imprison souls.
But they were still too late.
“BOOM...”
The first explosion erupted in the orc hinterland. Then came the second, the third... The soldiers of the Experimental Legion were like puppets bound by a preset command. The instant they lost the ability to move, they activated their self-destruction mechanisms.
Dark-purple arcane power rose one surge after another. The pungent spores spread like dense fog, and the moment they settled on the orcs, patches of red rashes broke out across their bodies.
“AAAAH!”
The infected orcs’ eyes turned blood-red in an instant. They raised their battle axes and hacked at the companions beside them.
But the orcs had already prepared for this. The uninfected soldiers immediately swung their blades at those who had lost control. Scalding blood splashed onto the frozen soil, yet it could not halt the spread of the spores.
Ten thousand, twenty thousand, forty thousand... The number of infected orcs swelled at a terrifying pace, and chaos appeared in the orc formation.
The remnants of the Heart of Steel and the Hand of Courage seized the chance to counterattack. The Sky Knight Order’s dragonfire fell with precision upon the areas where the chaos was at its worst, tearing open a bloody path for the ground troops.
“Faster. Move faster!”
The captain of the personal guard clutched the Soul-Suppressing Box and sprinted madly through the chaotic mass of orcs.
He saw his own clansmen slaughtering one another. He saw dark-purple spores burrowing like living things into the soldiers’ mouths and noses. His heart felt as though it had been seized by a giant claw.
When they finally rushed to the center of the explosions, the sight before them made everyone’s scalp crawl.
Within a radius of ten li, orcs were killing one another everywhere. The fog masses formed by the dark-purple spores grew thicker and thicker until even sunlight could not pierce them.
The Runes on the Soul-Suppressing Box flashed wildly as the artifact tried to suppress the corruption, yet it could only form a faint ring of white light around the box, like a candle flame in a raging gale.
“Open the box!”
The captain of the personal guard roared, his hands trembling as he undid the coiled Rune bands.
The instant the wooden box opened, an ancient and heavy aura spread outward. Under that aura, the infected orcs stiffened slightly.
But it lasted only for a moment. More experimental soldiers detonated themselves in the distance, and newly infected orcs surged over, instantly scattering the suppression of the Soul-Suppressing Box.
The personal guards could only watch as the spores crawled up their own skin. They watched as their captain’s eyes gradually turned red and he raised his bone blade to hack at the companion beside him.
The chaos was still spreading. The soldiers of the Heart of Steel and the Hand of Courage had already retreated to the edge of the fortress. They looked back at the orc hinterland shrouded beneath the dark-purple spores, and the bodies beneath their armor trembled uncontrollably.
Xilan stood atop the battlements, gazing at the ever-expanding “purple mist,” his face pale.
He had known that the Experimental Legion’s self-detonation would bring casualties, but he had never imagined that the corruptive power of these arcane spores would be so terrifying.
How could this be called a weapon? It was clearly a plague capable of destroying everything.
Below the fortress, the orcs’ roars gradually turned into despairing wails.
And that purple mist was still expanding in silence, like a mouth that devoured all things, slowly biting toward the entire battlefield.
At some point, the slaughter high in the sky had stopped.
The Domain powerhouses hovered at the edge of the clouds, lowering their heads to gaze at the dark-purple sea of mist spreading below. Their eyes were filled with undisguised shock.
The battle axes of the orc Domain powerhouses stopped in midair, and the magical halos around the Kroll powerhouses gradually faded.
No one could continue fighting before such a sight.
Below, the orcs corrupted by the arcane spores were still devouring one another in madness. The purple mist wriggled like a living creature, and even the air carried a corrosive, sweet reek of blood.
“Quickly, cut isolation trenches!”
A Domain powerhouse of the Blackrock Clan roared and dove down first.
Dou Qi surged around him like a streak of golden lightning. He cleaved open a deep trench at the edge of the purple mist, and the scorching Dou Qi burned the earth black, temporarily blocking the spread of the spores.
The other orc Domain powerhouses immediately followed. Magic and Dou Qi wove into a net, layer upon layer blocking the path before the purple mist. Sweat slid down their cheeks; clearly, maintaining such a defense was extremely taxing.
Just then, Xilan’s expression changed abruptly. A wisp of pale-purple spores had actually bypassed the orc defensive line and drifted toward the Land of Resilience with the wind.
The fortress walls were high, but they could not stop mist that seeped through every opening.
“Dragon Mother Daenerys!” Xilan roared from atop the battlements.
The Dragon Mother’s figure descended from the sky in an instant. The Domain Dragons beside her breathed dragonfire at the same time, and golden flames built a wall of fire before the fortress.
“All mages, activate the Defensive Magic Arrays.”
Daenerys’s voice carried unquestionable authority. The Kroll mage formation immediately lit with white radiance, intertwining with the dragonfire into a vast protective net.
The purple mist struck the protective net and released a sizzling sound, like boiling oil meeting water.
An eerie silence fell over the battlefield.
The orc Domain powerhouses desperately reinforced the isolation trenches outside the purple mist, while the Kroll forces and the dragons held up the protective net before the fortress. The two sides faced each other across that deadly sea of mist, yet neither attacked again.
The arcane spores were still multiplying madly, constantly battering the two defensive lines and releasing a corrosive sound that made one’s teeth ache.
A young orc Domain powerhouse ran short of Dou Qi, and a gap appeared in the isolation line. The purple mist immediately surged in, infecting several soldiers beside him in an instant.
He watched helplessly as his companions turned into red-eyed madmen and gnawed through their own throats, yet he could only grit his teeth and seal the gap. The place on his arm where the spores had splashed had already begun to fester.
Atop the battlements, the light of an old mage’s purification array dimmed. He coughed blood and retreated, and the apprentice beside him immediately stepped forward to take his place, his young face filled with resolve.
The heat of the dragonfire was dropping. The dragons’ breathing grew heavier and heavier, and a few purple spores had even clung to their scales, slowly eating away at their luster.
Xilan looked at that tottering wall of fire, then at the orcs opposite them, who were struggling just as bitterly. Suddenly, he found it absurd.
A few minutes ago, they had still been enemies locked in a life-and-death struggle. Now, they were fighting desperately against the same thing: a monster more terrifying than war itself.
Daenerys wiped the blood from the corner of her mouth.Draconic Spell flowed through her palm, temporarily suppressing the decline of the wall of fire.
She glanced at the Blackrock Chieftain opposite her. He was looking at her as well, his gaze complicated.
“At this rate, none of us will survive.”
Blackrock’s voice came through the wind, carrying a trace of exhaustion.
“Your spores are mutating. The defensive lines will not hold much longer.”
Daenerys said nothing. She merely tightened her grip on the Dragon Sword in her hand.
She knew he was telling the truth, but to make her lower her guard and join forces with the orcs? She could not do it.
The purple mist violently struck the defensive lines once more, and both sides’ defenses trembled fiercely at the same time.
The Domain powerhouses in the sky descended and stood behind their respective defensive lines. No one spoke, but they all understood.
If this stalemate continued, the entire Land of Resilience, including these million orcs, would be swallowed by the purple mist.
The sound of the spores corroding the protective net drifted through the wind, like Death’s hourglass counting down.
Xilan suddenly spoke, his voice carrying across the battlefield.
“With the Land of Resilience as the boundary, each side will cleanse its own side. Anyone who crosses the line will be killed without mercy.”
The Blackrock Chieftain was silent for a moment before he slowly nodded.
“Agreed.”
There was no handshake and no pact, only an invisible boundary drawn across the middle of the sea of mist.
The orc Domain powerhouses began concentrating on clearing the infected within their defensive line, while the Kroll forces devoted all their strength to reinforcing the protective net before the fortress. Whenever the purple mist occasionally lost control and crossed the boundary, it was immediately annihilated by both sides together.
The stench of blood and rot mingled in the wind. The enemies of yesterday had become temporary “comrades-in-arms,” yet neither side dared to relax its vigilance.
Xilan gazed at the purple mist that was still expanding, and he understood clearly in his heart.
This was only a temporary peace. The moment the spores were cleared away, the war would resume in an even more frenzied form.