42: Chapter 42 Battle and Terror in the Dark

Closest to the barrier, a few exceptionally sturdy magic wolves—fur matted and falling off, revealing rotting muscles—were gnashing their teeth crazily at Lin Tian behind the light screen. Their aura had clearly reached Bronze 9-star!

"Tsk, if it weren't for seeing their level, I'd really want to go out there and slap them a couple of times myself!" Lin Tian clicked his tongue, complaining with a touch of humor.

He then calmly gave the order, "Heavy Armored Spearmen, step forward! Give them a taste of something through the light screen! Remember, strike and retract immediately; make good use of the screen's one-way property!"

"Hah!" The Heavy Armored Spearmen in the front row roared in unison. Their steel spears transformed into a cold forest of blades, thrusting violently through the light screen!

A bizarre scene unfolded: the soldiers' arms and spears could pass through the light screen without any obstruction, but the monsters' claws and fangs couldn't penetrate it at all! In an instant, the magic wolves and other monsters crowded at the front suffered. Sharp spears thrust out from the "wall" without warning, precisely piercing their eye sockets, throats, and hearts!

Splat! Splat!

The dull thud of blades entering flesh and the dying howls of monsters instantly intertwined! Dirty blood splattered onto the light screen, only to be purified and slide off by an invisible force. In the first wave of contact, dozens of monsters fell with screams.

"Moon Shadow Archers, target within 100 meters, suppressive volley!" Lin Tian ordered immediately.

Hum!

The vibration of bowstrings sounded like a chorus of the Grim Reaper. The Moon Shadow Archers, who had long been ready, released their fingers. Countless arrows with emerald feathers and trails of moonlight poured out like a torrential storm, piercing through the light screen and landing in the dense crowd of monsters outside!

The arrows had immense penetrating power, often piercing through two or three monsters before losing momentum. Immediately, the area within 100 meters outside the screen was like a wheat field mowed down by a scythe; monsters fell in droves, wailing everywhere.

Lin Tian strolled to Lin Yin's side. She was already standing with her bow drawn, her eyes searching for more distant targets like a falcon. Moonlight flowed around her, and that aura—interweaving holiness and bloodlust—became even more distinct against the backdrop of the slaughter.

"How does it feel?" Lin Tian asked in a low voice, his tone filled with both concern and anticipation.

"Power is surging, Lord." Lin Yin turned her head and smiled slightly at him. That smile held a hint of pre-battle excitement amidst its coldness. "The moonlit night is my domain."

She quickly locked onto a target. About two hundred meters away, a Silver 1-star Polluted Giant Spider, as large as a small hill, with eight compound eyes and corrosive slime dripping from its abdomen, was moving forward. It was commanding a large number of small spider demons, clearly the "mini-boss" of this area.

"Found a big one, Silver 1-star." Lin Yin reported, having already begun to condense her power. She stretched her arms, raising her moonlight longbow toward the night sky. Invisible moonlight energy gathered frantically toward her, condensing at her fingertips into that heart-stopping, giant moonlight arrow. The dazzling silver light grew stronger and stronger, illuminating the surrounding area, which naturally alerted the giant spider in the distance.

The giant spider's eight compound eyes rotated simultaneously, locking onto the dazzling "little moon" inside the light screen and Lin Yin's figure. It let out a sharp hiss, and its massive body moved toward the shadows in a slightly panicked manner.

"Quite a commotion. Can you lock onto it?" Lin Tian raised an eyebrow.

"It cannot escape." Lin Yin's tone was calm but contained absolute confidence. When the arrow's radiance condensed to its peak, her red lips parted slightly, and she released the string.

Whoosh!!!

A piercing screech rose again! That brilliant silver rainbow cut through the darkness, ignoring distance as if it had traversed space, arriving in an instant! The giant spider spat out a thick, corrosive spider web in an attempt to block it, but the moonlight arrow easily pierced through and purified it, then...

Boom!!!

An explosion far more violent than the previous ones rang out! The energy contained within a Silver-tier monster was much greater; the light of the explosion shot into the sky, illuminating that area like broad daylight.

The shockwave even blew away some monsters further away. When the light dissipated, only a larger scorched crater and sticky, smoking fragments scattered everywhere remained.

[Your unit, Holy Envoy of the Profound Moon · Lin Yin, has killed a Silver 1-star Polluted Giant Spider (Boss). Level increased to Bronze 6-star.]

[Your level has increased to Bronze 6-star!]

Moonlight flared intensely on Lin Yin, and her aura surged, clearly reaching Bronze 6-star!

"Beautiful!" Lin Tian couldn't help but cheer. Looking at his own strength, which had also skyrocketed, he felt wonderful inside. A strange thought popped up: "Does my leveling speed... count as being a kept man?" Then he righteously denied it, "Pah! What 'kept man'! This is the empire built by my generals through their own ability. I am simply sharing the fruits of development reasonably. Can a Lord's business be called being a kept man? This is called 'eating soft rice hard'!"

He felt as if he could already see that, at this efficiency, reaching Silver tier before midnight was by no means a luxury.

The battle continued. Relying on the light screen, the soldiers efficiently harvested the monsters' lives. The gaps left by the dead monsters were instantly filled by even crazier monsters behind them.

They seemed driven by some invisible madness, completely disregarding casualties, rushing forward one after another toward this land of "flesh and blood." Arrows rained down, spears stood like a forest, and the Mystic Rock Spirit Guards steadily held off the stragglers that occasionally broke through the long-range firepower and pounced to bite at the light screen.

The military formation even began to try advancing slowly under the cover of firepower, expanding the safe zone by dozens of meters.

Two hours passed, and the military formation had advanced nearly two hundred meters from the edge of the protective shield. The soil under their feet had been soaked by the monsters' blood and severed limbs, and the soldiers' levels had generally increased, their morale soaring.

Just as they repelled another wave of monster attacks and Lin Tian was preparing to order another steady advance...

An unprecedented, bone-chilling coldness shot up Lin Tian's spine to the top of his head without warning! It wasn't an actual drop in temperature, but an extreme terror stemming from the instinct of life when facing a higher-level predator! Every hair on his body stood on end, and his heart felt as if it had been tightly gripped by an invisible giant hand!

He looked up sharply, his gaze like lightning, shooting toward the deepest part of the darkness in the distance. There, at the very edge of the battlefield illuminated by firelight, in that pure darkness where even the moonlight seemed to be devoured, he "felt" a gaze.

An indifferent, massive, and indescribably malicious gaze seemed to have just "glanced" in this direction. Just by being "glanced" at, Lin Tian felt his soul trembling. That was definitely not Silver tier... it was a higher level, a terrifying existence that seemed to be the embodiment of the night itself, having had its attention drawn by the continuous slaughter and the aura of the Lord.

"All forces—!!!" Lin Tian used all his strength to suppress the fear into a shout, his voice slightly distorted by extreme tension. "Retreat! Immediately! Retreat back to the protective shield, quickly!!!"

Without any hesitation, there was no time to explain. The absolute authority established over a long time and the instinctive obedience to the Lord's orders saved their lives at this moment.

Lin Yin and the others realized something was wrong the moment Lin Tian spoke, and they simultaneously hissed the order: "Retreat! Retreat quickly!"

The well-trained army displayed extremely high quality. The Mystic Rock Spirit Guards in the front row quickly changed formation into a sturdy wall to cover the retreat, while the Heavy Armored Spearmen and Moon Shadow Archers turned around without hesitation, rushing toward the light screen a hundred meters away at top speed. Although there was brief chaos during the process, there was no collapse.

When the last Mystic Rock Spirit Guard covering the retreat stepped backward into the light screen, the heart that had been in Lin Tian's throat finally dropped a little. He leaned against the light screen, staring fixedly into the depths of the darkness, his temples already covered in cold sweat.

That feeling of being watched continued for about another minute before slowly receding like a tide, as if that terrifying existence had lost interest and moved its gaze away.