70: Chapter 70 Attacks on the Mudflats

The three teams spread out into a loose skirmish line about thirty paces wide across the mudflats.

The Silver Leaf Sentinels walked on the far left, the footsteps of the eight half-elves on the wet mud so light they made almost no sound.

The twin brother and sister leading them, Selan and Vera, walked side by side at the very front of the line.

Both held their longbows in hand, strings half-drawn, their fingers resting constantly on the nocks of their arrows.

Their Warlock, Evelyn, followed a few paces behind.

Clad in a dark green cloak, her hood obscured most of her face, revealing only a pointed chin and a few strands of silver-gray hair.

Scholar Gray's temporary team walked in the middle.

The Dwarf, Durin, carried a Warhammer taller than himself on his shoulder, while several mercenaries pushed a modified handcart piled high with archaeological tools and food supplies.

Richard's team walked on the far right, near the boundary where the mudflats met the shore.

Selina was the first to notice something was wrong.

Her Storm Sense had been active ever since they stepped onto the mudflats.

Silver-blue static flickered faintly on her wrists.

Suddenly, the static discharged violently. The current surged up her forearm to her shoulder, causing a few strands of her chestnut hair to stand slightly on end.

She stopped in her tracks, a faint glimmer of electricity lighting up her silver eyes.

"Straight ahead, beneath the mudflats."

Her voice was loud and rapid, her fingers already gripping her eye of the storm holy emblem.

"There are many living entities... their heart rates are faster than humans, and their numbers are growing."

"They are burrowing up from the mud! There are at least dozens right now, and more are coming!"

Before her voice could fade, the mudflat less than dozens of meters ahead suddenly exploded.

Dozens of spots burst open at once as the grayish-black mud was violently upturned from below.

Sheets of mud surged upward like fountains, and countless hunched figures emerged from the muddy water.

These creatures were roughly as high as an adult's shoulder, their bodies covered in slippery, dark green scales.

The skin between their scales was covered in abnormal bulges, as if something was writhing beneath.

Their heads were shaped like fish heads, with massive mouths splitting wide from one gill cover to the other, filled with jagged, disgusting fangs.

In their hands, they held various ramshackle weapons.

Rusted daggers, chipped spears, crude clubs made of ground whalebone, and some simply brandishing stones they had picked up.

But what caught Richard's attention the most were their eyes.

The eyes of these murlocs were not the normal round pupils of fish, but two bottomless black holes.

It looked as though the eyeballs in their sockets had been gouged out by something, leaving only two hollow cavities, yet deep within those hollows, a faint, dim red pinpoint of light glowed.

Their movements as they crawled out of the mud were not chaotic, but almost perfectly synchronized.

Hundreds of murlocs emerged from beneath the mudflats, yet not a single one made a sound.

There were no battle cries, no hisses, none of the sharp, gibbering shrieks typical of murlocs.

Across the entire mudflat, there was only the muffled sound of churning mud and the squelch of footsteps on the mire.

This silence was far more spine-chilling than any roar.

"Frontline, take your positions!"

The half-elf Selan's voice came from the left. His bow was fully drawn, the arrow tip aimed at the nearest murloc.

His sister, Vera, stood half a step beside him, also drawing her bow to its limit. Their movements were perfectly synchronized, like the same person on both sides of a mirror.

The remaining five Archers of the Silver Leaf Sentinels quickly formed an arched shooting formation behind them, their arrowheads all pointing forward in unison.

The Dwarf, Durin, swung the Warhammer off his shoulder and slammed it onto the ground, the hammerhead splashing a ring of muddy water as it hit the mire.

His voice was gruff and resolute: "Defensive formation! Pull the cart back!"

Richard also drew his dwarven roaring battleaxe.

At the same time, he drew his halberd from his back, holding it in his left hand with the spear tip pointing outward.

Astonishing strength surged from deep within his muscles the moment he gripped his weapons.

His Second Heart beat like a war drum in his chest, pumping wave after wave of heat into his limbs.

To outsiders, he looked like nothing more than a tall warrior clad in steel armor, wielding a battleaxe and a halberd.

"Lia, guard the front. Selina, support with divine arts."

"Morpheus, Jinbao, Black Cat—you guys are on free ranged attacks," he ordered immediately.

Cecilia had already drawn her Enchantment sword, her newly configured kite shield braced firmly in front of her.

This shield was custom-made for her at an equipment shop in Blackwater City.

The face of the shield was engraved with reinforcing Enchantment runes, glowing with a very faint metallic sheen, making it heavier and sturdier than the one smashed by the Vampire.

Morpheus took his position at the very back of the team, the amethyst at the tip of his staff already glowing as he prepared to cast a fire spell.

Jinbao pulled a fire bomb from his increasingly bulging toolkit, clutching it in his stubby fingers.

Black Cat rested her hand crossbow on her forearm, the bolt already nocked and the tip aimed at the thickest part of the murloc crowd.

The tide of murlocs quickly closed in on the defensive line.

The first wave of murlocs, numbering about forty or fifty, lunged toward the lines of the three teams with near-frenzied speed.

At Selan's short command, the half-elf Archers released their arrows simultaneously, the dense vibration of the bowstrings sounding like heavy rain pelting canvas.

The rain of arrows traced a neat arc in the air, burying themselves accurately into the chests, throats, and eye sockets of the frontmost murlocs.

Within the first few seconds of the opening engagement, the Silver Leaf Sentinels' firepower cleared out the dozen or so murlocs leading the charge, each struck down with a single lethal shot.

The archery of the half-elf rangers was indeed well-deserved, specifically targeting the gaps in the scales and the eye sockets.

Evelyn, the Silver Leaf Sentinels' Warlock, extended a slender hand from beneath her cloak, her finger tracing a complex rune in the air.

A large section of the mudflat's mire suddenly bulged upward.

A thick tree root burst forth from the mud, followed immediately by a second, and then a third.

Within seconds, over a dozen roots intertwined and coiled together, forming a three-meter-tall humanoid silhouette.

The treant's eyes glowed with a soft, emerald green light as it let out a low rumble.

It swung its thick, branch-like arms and smashed them down into the murloc crowd.

Every strike sent a murloc flying!

Mud, shattered murloc scales, and bones splattered everywhere under the treant's onslaught.

Richard did not wait on the defensive line.

Gripping his halberd, he took a massive stride forward toward the oncoming tide, stepping right into the densest part of the murloc crowd.

He swept the halberd in his left hand, the blade tracing a semi-circular silver arc through the air.

The three murlocs in the front row were simultaneously sliced at the waist by the halberd's axe blade.

Their scales were like paper before his immense strength; the blade sliced through scales, skin, muscle, and spine with almost no resistance.

The upper and lower halves of the three murlocs separated in the mud.

Entrails and dark red blood splattered across the grayish-black mire.

Only to be trampled into a part of the mud by the murlocs surging from behind.