"This is bad! The bullmen's capital has also fallen! We must return and report to the clan leader immediately!"
Two hawkmen scouts flew through the sky toward the imperial capital.
Chen Xu, who had just arrived, saw the retreating figures of the hawkmen.
"It seems they've noticed, but it's already too late, beastmen."
Sensing Chen Xu's arrival, Bone Guard One ran out from the capital city.
"My Lord!"
"The hawkmen scouts just left. I expect the reinforcements from the other races will arrive soon."
Chen Xu dismounted from his skeleton and looked toward the territory of the tigermen.
"The number of skeleton soldiers has reached its limit at 150,000. There's no point in waiting any longer. We will head west and decide everything in a single battle against the beastmen."
After speaking, he looked at Bone Guard One. "What are your thoughts? After all, this is your path to ascension. If you have other ideas, we can follow them."
Chen Xu was quite easygoing and respected the thoughts of Bone Guard One.
"My Lord, Bone Guard One follows your will."
"Alright, then I'll go with you. I can throw a few curses at critical moments."
With the final battle approaching, Chen Xu grew excited. With an army of 150,000 in hand, even the ten races at their peak only had 100,000 troops. With 150,000 against 100,000, the advantage was on his side!
Now that the snakemen, ratmen, and bullmen had been wiped out first, Chen Xu held the absolute advantage in terms of numbers, morale, and strength.
"My Lord, it is better if Bone Guard One leads the troops. While the clan leader level experts of the beastmen are no threat to me, several of them together could stall me. I fear My Lord might be ambushed."
Bone Guard One remembered the fierce assault of the bullmen leader. If the elephantmen leader and the pigmen leader also utilized such heavy and violent fighting styles, he would indeed be tied down.
"Very well, you take the lead. I will keep 1,000 skeleton soldiers here and wait for you."
Chen Xu respected Bone Guard One's choice. Since he wore a cloak with a permanent magic shield and a necklace with a repulsion field, his safety shouldn't be a major concern.
...
"Clan leader! This is bad! The bullmen's capital has fallen!"
The hawkmen scout descended rapidly, so panicked that he stumbled upon landing.
"What! How long has it been? It hasn't even been a day!"
"Are you sure you saw correctly? Your mind wasn't affected by those skeletons?"
"Leaders, it is the absolute truth. Originally, the bullmen and ratmen soldiers were holding the walls, locked in a stalemate with the skeletons."
"But suddenly, the bullmen warriors near the skeletons began to move sluggishly, and the skeletons swarmed up the walls."
"Projection of inner energy?" The elephantmen leader was very confused. "But skeletons don't even have meridians. Where would they get inner energy?"
"Should our armies retreat to the walls of the imperial capital and rely on the fortifications to fight?"
"Heh, Brother Cat, you might be willing, but the new emperor might not be," the bearmen leader said sarcastically.
"Enough! Stop arguing! If we don't survive this skeleton calamity, you can finish your argument in the afterlife!"
...
"Elephantmen brothers up ahead, do you know why we're here?"
"No idea. Don't you dogmen usually have the best information?"
"Heh, we just received sudden orders to come here immediately."
"Wait, be quiet." A dogmen soldier suddenly lay on the ground and pressed his ear to the earth. "There's a massive commotion!"
"Enemy attack! All troops on alert!" The hawkmen soldiers in the sky, utilizing their high altitude advantage, had already spotted the distant skeleton army.
Bone Guard One also spotted the hawkmen, which meant the beastmen coalition was just ahead.
Vanguard's Courage was activated as he began to build momentum for a charge. Bone Guard One and 9,000 skeleton soldiers detached from the main army, launching forward like a cannonball.
"These skeletons are so fast! No, they're getting even faster! Elephantmen, raise shields!"
The elephantmen soldiers in the front row slammed their massive shields into the ground, gripping them with both hands and their trunks, forming a solid wall.
"Dogmen and catmen archers! Fire!"
In an instant, arrows rained down like a storm.
But the skeleton legion, buffed by Vanguard's Courage, didn't falter for a second, continuing to rapidly close the distance to the beastmen coalition's position.
Soon, the two armies collided. Bone Guard One seized the momentum to deliver a horizontal slash. His bone blade, condensed with the power of the vanguard, swept through, cutting three elephantmen and their shields in half.
Elsewhere, the skeleton soldiers relied on the momentum of the vanguard to viciously hack their blades against the giant elephantmen shields.
However, the strength of the ordinary skeleton soldiers was too weak to pierce the shields. Seeing that they were about to block the charge of the skeletons behind them, Bone Guard One commanded the skeletons in front of the shields to strike themselves.
Instantly, over a thousand skeleton soldiers simultaneously detonated an Ice Ring. The front-line elephantmen and other nearby beastmen were all frozen into ice sculptures.
The skeleton soldiers charging from behind shattered the ice sculptures and surged into the beastmen army, beginning the slaughter.
With the Aura of Cold combined with Cold Enhancement, the beastmen soldiers felt as if they were in the frigid cold of the Extreme North. Their limbs grew numb, and their thoughts became sluggish.
"This is bad! A gap has been opened in the elephantmen shield wall!"
Just as the skeleton soldiers were about to break through and split the beastmen coalition's formation, several beastmen leaders joined the fray.
The bearmen leader's palms moved like the wind, each strike shattering a skeleton soldier. The elephantmen leader was like a tank, pushing against the skeletons' vanguard momentum as he counter-charged into the legion, his trunk sweeping through them like a scythe through wheat.
The pigmen leader, Zhu Wuneng, also fought with grand, sweeping motions. His long rake danced in his hands as if it weighed nothing, precisely striking the weak points of the skeleton soldiers.
Since the clan leader level experts were all Martial Artists with established inner energy, the skeleton soldiers' Aura of Cold and Ice Ring failed to cause significant damage, though they did accelerate the consumption of their inner energy.
Meanwhile, the leaders of the hawkmen, dogmen, and catmen converged on Bone Guard One.
Their attacks failed to damage Bone Guard One, but they succeeded in restricting him from slaughtering other beastmen soldiers.
He wanted to use Shield Bash to swat away the birdman in the sky and then burst forward to kill or heavily wound the seemingly weakest catmen leader first. However, the cooperation between the catmen and dogmen was incredibly seamless; Bone Guard One's full-strength strike was blocked by their combined efforts.
Seeing the ambush fail, Bone Guard One didn't intend to waste energy on a forced assault. Instead, he shifted to a battle of attrition.
This was only the vanguard; a continuous stream of skeleton soldiers would follow.
The undead aura naturally dissipated by undead creatures was a poison that the living found abhorrent and intolerable.
The more skeleton soldiers gathered and fell here, the denser the undead aura would become, and the beastmen Martial Artists would eventually be unable to replenish their inner energy.
In this fight, time was on the side of the skeletons.
"These skeletons... why won't they stop coming!"
"Hawk leader! Exactly how many skeletons are there!" the elephantmen leader roared. The prolonged combat, the double drain on his physical strength and inner energy, and the sight of endless skeletons had stripped him of his initial arrogance.
"I... I don't know," the hawkmen leader said weakly.
From high in the air, he had been watching the skeleton soldiers join the battlefield from afar.
Most terrifyingly, it seemed that for every skeleton soldier that died here, an equal number would soon come charging from the distance.
"Something's wrong. The worldly energy is tainted. A cold, yin force is mixed within it. Do not attempt to draw in energy to replenish your inner energy!" The elephantmen leader, who had pushed deep into the skeleton legion alone, was the first to sense the undead aura.
"What? If we can't replenish our inner energy, how can we resist the erosion of these skeletons!"
"The undead aura has spread. This land now belongs to the Lord of the Undead."
As Bone Guard One spoke, a glow emanated from the bones of the surrounding skeleton soldiers.
The undead aura had reached a critical threshold, and Bone Guard One's Hold Fast skill took effect, increasing the defense of all skeleton soldiers once again.
The bearmen's palms and the pigmen's rake could no longer take down a skeleton soldier in a single hit.
"You can speak! You have intelligence!" The leaders were terrified. They had assumed these skeletons were merely a natural disaster, like a falling star from the heavens.
But what kind of race were these skeletons? So evil, so terrifying.
A blade light flashed. The dogmen leader, distracted by fear, gave Bone Guard One an opening to sever one of his arms.
The catmen leader tried to move in for cover, but Bone Guard One relied on Hold Fast to tank the hit and struck again, splitting the dogmen leader in half.
He then swung his blade at the catmen leader. The hawkmen leader in the sky hurriedly dove down to the rescue.
But this played right into Bone Guard One's hands. He delivered a simple, unadorned Shield Bash, slamming the hawkmen leader to the ground. Ignoring the catmen leader's attack, he swung his blade with full force. Decapitation!
Seeing things turn sour, the catmen leader tried to rush toward Zhu Wuneng.
Bone Guard One immediately commanded the skeleton soldiers to self-detonate. The shockwave from the Ice Rings hindered the catmen leader's escape.
With another strike, the catmen leader also fell.
"Brother Elephant, fall back! Retreat for now!" the bearmen leader shouted toward the elephantmen leader.
"Retreat? Retreat to where? We can retreat, but can our children?" Zhu Wuneng seemed to see the inevitable end. He gripped his rake tightly and charged at Bone Guard One.
"Better to take a gamble. If we kill this big skeleton, maybe the others will vanish!"
The rake flew up and down, every move aimed at vital points. Bone Guard One could only defend with his shield, slowly backing away and feigning weakness.
Zhu Wuneng thought his enemy was exhausted and pressed his advantage even harder, channeling his inner energy into the rake until cracks appeared on the bone shield.
Suddenly, one Ice Ring after another exploded around the bearmen leader, the elephantmen leader, and Zhu Wuneng. Bone Guard One had created enough distance, using the skeleton soldiers' Ice Rings to separate the three of them.
A Shield Bash knocked the rake aside, followed by a counter-slash. Zhu Wuneng pulled his weapon back to parry.
Shield Bash, Shield Bash, Shield Bash—a relentless chain of Shield Bash suppressed Zhu Wuneng, rendering him unable to make any other move.
The surrounding skeleton soldiers took the opportunity to step forward and hack at Zhu Wuneng. The pigmen's martial arts did not excel in defense. Unable to move, Zhu Wuneng quickly lost his combat effectiveness under the flurry of blades and had his head smashed flat by Bone Guard One's shield.
Seeing Zhu Wuneng fall, the elephantmen leader let out a helpless, long cry and channeled all his inner energy to charge at Bone Guard One.
The bearmen leader did the same.
But those who have lost hope have no fighting power. Soon, the last two leaders and the beastmen soldiers were all dead.
Only the rows of skeleton soldiers remained standing on the field.
Bone Guard One drew his blade and pointed it toward the imperial capital of the tigermen. Instantly, all the skeleton soldiers began their charge once more. This time, there was no one to stop them. There were no defenders left on the walls, and the skeleton army flooded the tigermen capital like a tide.
Rate on N.U.
