On top of the Steel Great Wall, the minotaurs had already noticed this scene.
One of them quickly leaned over and looked down, only to see a swarm of hideous, leaping bugs filling its vision.
They were crawling upward at a speed of three to four meters per second, leaving deep gouges in the wall from their sharp claws.
“Enemy attack! Magic beasts are attacking!”
“To arms!”
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Just as the shouts rang out, the hydralisks' spines arrived.
Even more terrifyingly, high-temperature plasma, resembling fireballs, launched from the ravagers' backs, tracing elegant arcs through the air before landing atop the wall.
These explosions, starting at Tier 7 in power, were something the minotaurs simply couldn't withstand.
“They’re so weak.”
Xia Jin shook her head inwardly as she watched.
What use was a wall on its own?
It was likely built just to keep out the magic beast kings from the outskirts.
Indeed, an ordinary king would truly be helpless against such a thing.
But what was arriving now was no such weak creature.
The climb by the two thousand Zerg was proving highly effective, so Xia Jin didn't hold back and ordered several times that number to join the charge.
The minotaurs hauled out massive boulders and hurled them downward, but to most of the Zerg, the impact was like an itch. At most, they would slide down a short distance; rarely did one actually fall.
In about half a minute, the first zergling reached the top.
The bug killed the guard at the entrance instantly and quickly turned its sights on the others.
The minotaurs on the wall watched in horror as black dots swarmed across their several-kilometer-long line of sight.
Hundreds of mutalisks took flight from behind the forest, launching explosive glaive wurms that filled the air with terrifying roars.
Soon, almost everything within view was a bug.
In less than a minute, over a hundred zerglings had climbed up.
By the second minute, the number had increased to over three hundred.
These bugs began their slaughter within the giant structure. Some ventured into the interior, where even the strongest minotaurs could not withstand a single casual blow from them.
After more than ten minutes of continuous killing, the zerglings encountered a second type of creature.
Cat-people.
“No wonder it's called the Orc Empire.”
It was a paradise for those who loved fluffy things.
If magic beasts were animals that mastered magic, then orcs were bipedal animals similar to humans.
Both were animals, but the latter generally possessed high intelligence, whereas the former required reaching a certain tier to achieve it.
As control was seized over the top of the Steel Great Wall, more zerglings began their ascent.
An hour later, the thousands of defenders within the giant structure were wiped out. Nearly twenty thousand Zerg had already left the area, launching an invasion into the vast territories of the Orc Empire.
As it turned out, it wasn't that orcs were weak, but that minotaurs were.
They encountered many strange orc sub-races afterward.
For example, werewolves, hedgehog-people, pangolin-people, and so on.
The strongest were undoubtedly the leopard, tiger, and even elephant-people, among whom Tier 7 or 8 individuals appeared frequently.
Those who reached Tier 8 had to be swarmed by a group of Zerg; otherwise, they were difficult to kill.
For Tier 9, Xia Jin directly deployed mutalisks and scourges.
Two and a half hours later, over two hundred thousand Zerg had invaded enemy territory.
Some of the larger ones, like the ultralisks, were simply airlifted by flying Zerg and carried over the wall.
...
It was clear that there were many strange technological creations within the Orc Empire, and its vast territories were exceptionally flat.
Lacking magic, these creatures relied purely on physical combat.
Without powerful long-range attacks, they were tormented by the Zerg's diverse tactics and crumbled in the blink of an eye.
A day later, a wave of retreat stretching nearly a thousand kilometers had appeared across the southwest of the Orc Empire.
“This is too easy.”
One of Xia Jin's projections landed lightly atop the wall and gazed toward the northeast, where an endless great plain unfolded before her.
Standing there, the only thing one could feel was their own insignificance.
“This definitely wasn't built by the orcs.”
Xia Jin began sending out elf bugs to gather intelligence within the Orc Empire and even started producing Zerg that resembled orcs. She eventually learned that the orcs themselves didn't know the origin of the structures.
“They have existed since ancient times.”
There was no technological sophistication to them; if anything was remarkable, it was their staggering scale—true ancient wonders.
With the advance here going so smoothly, Xia Jin momentarily found herself at a loss for what to do next.
“Next, I'll consider dealing with the Yelu Empire.”
Once the war with the Yelu Empire was over, it would be time for the final showdown with the Empire.
In fact, Xia Jin felt that allying with the Yelu Empire might be a better approach.
Because that nation was being suppressed and beaten by the Empire.
If the Zerg wanted to break free from the surface and eventually establish absolute control over this planet, a battle with the Empire was inevitable sooner or later.
But after weighing their strengths, she felt that perhaps allying with the Empire would be better after all.
Besides, even if she had that intention, the other party would need to share the same sentiment.
“Let's not overthink it. I'll focus on conquering the Orc Empire quickly and prepare for the hive's upgrade,” she sighed inwardly.
Rate on N.U.
