69: Chapter 69 Perseverance

The low-level Yao Beasts charging at the very front had no time to dodge; they slammed heavily onto the ground in droves, splashing blood and mud everywhere.

Steady, accurate, ruthless!

Within a hundred meters, the Yao Beasts were packed tightly together, charging frantically without fear of death.

At such close range and with such dense Formations, it would be difficult for the archers to miss even if they wanted to.

Swift Wind Wolves and Shadow Wolves fell one after another, wailing as they died in the buffer zone between fifty and a hundred meters from the city wall, their layered corpses quickly covering the ground.

The arrowhead of every single arrow had been dipped in potent Yao Beast poison beforehand; to touch it was to rot, to graze it was to collapse.

For these low-level Yao Beasts, the rain of arrows filling the sky was the scythe of an Asura claiming their lives. Once it pierced their bodies, the virulent poison instantly spread through their Bloodline, snuffing out their vitality in a heartbeat.

In a Yao Beast siege, if the enemy could be stopped by ranged attacks, no one was willing to take risks and engage in close-quarters combat. This was an ironclad rule that every Martial Artist and Cultivator defending the city knew by heart.

By the time the quivers of the two hundred Body Tempering Peak archers were empty, the ground beneath the city was littered with corpses. Over a thousand Swift Wind Wolves and Shadow Wolves had fallen into eternal silence, unable to stir up any more ferocity.

The wolf pack's valiant charging Formation was thrown into complete chaos, and their offensive suddenly faltered.

Yet the beast tide was endless. Many exotic Yao Beasts mixed behind the wolf pack accelerated, dashing through the gaps created by the chaos of the corpses ahead.

Do not underestimate these Early Stage Tier 1 low-level Yao Beasts; they were born with swift speed and immense explosive power, and they still lunged toward the city wall with monstrous ferocity.

As the torrent of Yao Beasts broke through the blockade of the arrow rain and approached the fifty-meter 'death line' of the city wall, a synchronized order to rotate defenses rang out once more.

Five hundred well-rested Martial Artists at the Middle to Late Stage of Body Tempering stepped forward, steadily taking over the defense line from the Body Tempering Peak archers, whose stamina was exhausted and whose True Qi was mostly depleted.

"Release arrows!"

Li Xuance shouted, his voice shaking the city wall.

All the archers on the city wall released their bowstrings simultaneously, and a thousand arrows flew at once.

In an instant, the rain of arrows swept over like a plague of locusts, covering the entire beast horde.

The sharp, piercing whistle of arrows cutting through the air intertwined and clashed with the shrill, violent roars of the Yao Beasts, playing a tragic and fierce war song of the city defense across the wilderness.

By now, the wolf pack charging at the front had been slaughtered by the two rounds of arrow rain and had no combat power left.

Replacing them was a herd of Ironclad Rhinoceroses clad in thick, horny armor.

The dense volley of arrows slammed fiercely against the dark, hard rhino armor, emitting only dull, heavy thuds. The vast majority of the arrows were either deflected or snapped by the tough plating.

Only a very small number of arrows, lucky enough to strike fatal weak points like the eye sockets, throat, or soft flesh under the belly, could cause these thick-skinned behemoths to collapse with a crash.

The physique of an Ironclad Rhinoceros was formidable, and its resistance to poison was far beyond that of the wolf pack.

The surviving Ironclad Rhinoceroses ignored the arrow wounds on their bodies and continued to charge headlong toward the city gate with steps as heavy as mountains.

Their intelligence was crude, yet they deeply understood the key to a siege. As long as they smashed through the heavy city gate, the endless beast tide behind them could charge straight in and trample the entire Wangshan Town.

The bloody battle lasted for a full hour.

All the ground traps and enemy-entrapment Formations beneath the city were destroyed by the brute force of the Yao Beasts, and the remnants of the beast tide finally approached the base of the city wall.

After several rounds of slaughter by the arrow rain, the overall number of the once-massive beast tide had been reduced by thirty to forty percent.

The first true torrent of the beast tide slammed violently into the pale green protective spiritual light shield covering the entire city!

Earth-shattering, dull thuds of impact rang out incessantly, like ten thousand drums beating in unison or a heavy rainstorm pounding against a massive bell.

The tough cyan light shield trembled violently, its spiritual light flickering, and ripples of fine cracks spread frantically, bringing it to the brink of collapse.

The low-level Yao Beasts in the very front bore the brunt of the impact; they were instantly blasted into flying flesh and shattered bones by the backlash of the Formation. Yet the Yao Beasts behind them showed no fear and knew not how to retreat; they stepped over the warm corpses and sticky blood-mud of their own kind, charging forward wave after wave to slam frantically against the light screen.

In the blink of an eye, a shocking, layered mountain of Yao Beast corpses piled up outside the protective light screen, and dark red blood flowed along the terrain, soaking the entire land.

"All Martial Artists, retreat and rest! All Cultivators, take your positions, stabilize the line, and prepare the Talismans for bombardment!"

The steady and powerful command of Li Xuance spread through the spiritual energy to every corner of the city wall, clearly reaching the ears of every defender.

The two hundred Cultivators at the Qi Refinement Stage, who had long been waiting for the signal, immediately stepped forward and stood firmly in their defensive positions.

Half of these two hundred Qi Refinement Stage Cultivators were clansmen of the Li Family, and the other half were experienced Loose Cultivators recruited from Wangshan Market; all were the backbone of the combat force in Wangshan Town.

"Fire!"

As the word fell, ten thousand spells were unleashed!

In an instant, spiritual light surged on the city wall, brilliant and colorful. A magnificent, dazzling, yet murderously cold radiance suddenly lit up the dim sky.

All the Cultivators simultaneously channeled their spiritual power, infusing it into the Talismans in their palms, and then hurled them with all their might toward the beast tide below the city.

"Boom! Boom! Boom!"

Hundreds of Blazing Flame Talismans exploded one after another in the center of the beast horde, and the roaring flames surged into the sky, instantly swallowing a large swath of Yao Beasts.

The scorching heat waves surged frantically, drilling through the gaps in the thick armor of the Ironclad Rhinoceroses and into their bodies, burning these behemoths until they roared in agony and spun around wildly in place.

Yet the ferocity of the Yao Beasts was bone-deep, and their vitality was extremely tenacious. Even with their bodies ablaze and flesh charred, countless Ironclad Rhinoceroses still endured the intense pain of the flames, charging forward stubbornly without fear of death.

Swish! Swish! Swish!

Countless Silver Sword Talismans transformed into streaks of brilliant silver light, speeding through the air to precisely snipe those thick-skinned, heavily armored Yao Beasts that were hard to kill with arrow rain, as well as the agile exotic beasts that twisted and dodged.

Szz—

A large number of Earth Prison Talismans flared with yellow light, taking shape upon landing and transforming into layers of rock and earth shackles. They tightly bound the feet of the beast horde, significantly slowing the speed of the Yao Beast charge and setting up a killing field for the subsequent bombardment of fire and blade Talismans.

Fireballs rushing, earth cones piercing, wind blades slicing, ground spikes thrusting... A variety of lethal Talismans bloomed in turns, stacking layer upon layer.

The area within a hundred paces in front of the city wall had completely turned into a purgatory of death, filled with smoke and endless murderous intent.

One by one, the Talismans burned into gray-white ash and drifted away with the wind, while new ones were swiftly taken out by the Cultivators and immediately activated.

The bombardment of Talismans filling the sky greatly relieved the defensive pressure on the archers on the city wall, dealing devastating, wide-area damage to the remaining low-level Yao Beasts.

The massive war reserves accumulated by the Li Family over several years were unleashed without reservation, all turning into lethal blades that harvested the lives of the Yao Beasts, guarding the city.

The fierce and bloody battle of offense and defense lasted for a full several hours.

Beneath the city wall, the corpses of the Yao Beasts piled up like a mountain, nearly half the height of the city wall.

The combat power of the massive first wave of the beast tide had already been reduced by more than half.

The dark red blood covering the ground soaked into the soil, and the thick, fishy stench of blood permeated the wilderness, lingering for a long time, pungent and terrifying.

The great protective city Formation still stood tall, protecting the city, but the corners of the city wall were already covered in dense, minute cracks, and the mottled stone bricks were dilapidated and crumbling.

The Spirit Stones and Spiritual Vein maintaining the Formation were being depleted rapidly, and the rate of consumption had reached a terrifying level.