222: Chapter 222 Watching from the sidelines, a dog-eat-dog game (2)

After hooking onto the top edge of the stone wall, Shorty did not pause—he ran along the top toward the exit of the narrow alley.

The top of the stone wall was less than two feet wide—with every step, only half of his heel found purchase on the bricks.

Yet his speed was extremely fast—in less than five breaths, he had reached the space directly above the narrow alley exit.

Directly above the alley exit—below him was the rear rank of the Haiyuan Clan shield formation.

The Bone Hookers in the rear were swinging their hooks upward—preparing for the next round of hooking the shield wall.

Shorty cast the fishing net down from the top of the stone wall—the spread of the net perfectly covered the eight Haiyuan Clan Bone Hookers in the rear rank.

The moment the net fell—dark green slime adhered to the Bone Hookers' carapaces.

Upon contact with the slime, the bone texture on the surface of the carapaces shifted from dark cyan to grayish-white.

The corrosion process was the same as what had occurred on the front of the shield wall—the slime seeped into the bone surface, eroding the dense bone armor into a layer of extremely fine pits, turning the dense surface bone into something porous.

The Bone Hookers simultaneously emitted a high-frequency hiss—the pain of their carapaces being corroded was the same as the pain Haiyuan Clan felt when pricked by acidic seaweed underwater—not fatal, but excruciating.

The eight Bone Hookers simultaneously threw the bone hooks in their hands to the ground—reaching to tear at the fishing net on their bodies.

As the net was pulled, it tightened—the eight Haiyuan Clan members were scooped up together by the net, their bony limbs tangled into a mess.

The Black-Armored Commander turned—seeing that all the Bone Hookers in the rear rank had been caught by the fishing net.

He opened his mouth and emitted a very short guttural sound—nearly three degrees off in pitch from the attack command—it was an order for the rear rank to disperse.

As the command was issued—his own right foot had already stepped half a pace backward.

Moving from the front of the narrow alley toward the side-rear—preparing to go and cut the fishing net off the Bone Hookers.

Scarface saw the Black-Armored Commander turn.

The bone shields in the front rank of the shield wall were disrupted by the fishing net—the moment the Bone Spearmen in the rear saw the Commander turn, the rhythm of their spear-tip advancement faltered for a beat.

The missed beat lasted less than half a breath—but it was enough for Scarface to charge out through the gap in the shield wall.

His long spear struck first—the tip jabbed at the top edge of the bone shield directly opposite—using the leverage to press the shield down a notch.

The moment the shield was pressed down—he took the poisoned dagger from his mouth into his right hand—and thrust it from the top edge of the shield toward the face of the Haiyuan Clan warrior.

The Haiyuan Clan's facial bone armor was extremely thin—around the eyes, there was only a layer of semi-transparent bone membrane.

The sound of the short dagger piercing the bone membrane was a very faint "puff"—after the blade tip penetrated the membrane, it made contact with the ganglion behind it.

The Haiyuan Clan's central ganglion was behind the eyeball—less than half an inch away.

The moment the blade tip touched the ganglion—the four limbs of that Haiyuan Clan warrior simultaneously went out of control.

The bone shield fell from his hand onto the ground—the surface of the shield was stained with a layer of grayish-blue bodily fluid seeping from beneath the shield.

The bodily fluid was highly viscous—it solidified quickly after touching the mud and sand.

Scarface pulled his blade—turned—and thrust the short dagger toward the knee of the second Haiyuan Clan warrior.

The bone armor on the front of the knee was much thicker than at the joint seams—the blade tip could not pierce it.

But the poison spread across the surface of the bone armor—seeping inward through the tiny crevices of the bone texture.

The speed of seepage was nearly five times slower than a direct thrust—but the effect was the same once it seeped in.

Below the knee of that Haiyuan Clan warrior, the same symptoms as the first appeared—the calf muscles went out of control, and the body toppled sideways.

By the time the Black-Armored Commander turned around—two from the front rank had already fallen.

After Scarface charged out, two more Private Soldiers followed, rushing from behind the shield wall.

The three men created a very brief point of firepower in the narrow gap of the shield formation's front rank—tearing open a gap nearly two paces wide in the Haiyuan Clan shield formation's front line of defense.

The gap was not large—but when the Haiyuan Clan shield formation's rear rank was scooped up by the fishing net, Scarface donned a small shield to charge in, and the two Private Soldiers' poisoned weapons formed cross-fire in the narrow space—when these three accidents occurred at the same point simultaneously, the Haiyuan Clan's shield formation temporarily broke at that spot.

The Black-Armored Commander aimed his bone spear at Scarface's chest—preparing to thrust it directly through the chaotic Haiyuan Clan warriors in the front.

The spear tip was less than five zhang away from Scarface—it could strike in less than half a breath.

Then, a False Core Vice-Commander appeared from the flank.

The False Core Vice-Commander—a Haiyuan Clan member with a black-cyan carapace, whose skeleton was a circle smaller than the Black-Armored Commander's but whose bone texture density was nearly double—charged toward the narrow alley exit from the flank.

Just a moment ago outside the narrow alley—the two Vice-Commanders had split into two routes.

One route followed the Black-Armored Commander to attack the front of the narrow alley, while the other took a detour from the flank—attempting to outflank the Private Soldiers from the direction of the stone house behind the narrow alley.

The detouring Vice-Commander was charging head-on—and his direction of charge overlapped with the Black-Armored Commander's thrust direction less than ten zhang outside the narrow alley exit.

The Black-Armored Commander and the False Core Vice-Commander simultaneously realized in that instant—the spear tip and the Vice-Commander's charge route had collided.

The Black-Armored Commander jerked the bone spear back.

The process of retracting the bone spear sliced a very narrow air-current rupture in the air—the edge of the air-current rupture grazed the False Core Vice-Commander's left shoulder carapace.

A very thin white mark was cut onto the surface of the bone armor—damaging less than half a layer of the bone material.

The False Core Vice-Commander shifted his charge direction to the right.

The angle of the shift was too sharp—his claws slid sideways on the muddy sand for nearly a zhang.

He collided with the stone wall at the exit of the narrow alley—the reef bricks on the stone wall knocked a small piece off his bone armor from the outside in, and the knocked-off bone shard fell at his feet.

Beneath the knocked-off armor shard—a layer of not-yet-fully-grown gray new bone material was revealed.

Scarface did not miss these two breaths.

During the two breaths when the Black-Armored Commander and the Vice-Commander collided—Scarface withdrew from the front rank of the shield formation—retreating back into the narrow alley.

As he retreated, he swiped his short dagger against one of the bone shields in the very front rank of the Haiyuan Clan shield formation—the blade slapped against the shield surface.

The poison on the blade—was smeared onto the bone texture of the bone shield.

Then he pulled the short dagger back—and picked up another shield that had been thrown on the ground from the hands of a dead Private Soldier.

After retreating—the shield wall within the narrow alley closed again.

Scarface plugged the last picked-up shield into the gap—five shields sealed the narrow alley once again.

At this moment—the Black-Armored Commander's attention was still on the two Haiyuan Clan warriors at his feet.

The two Haiyuan Clan members with poisoned knees—within a few minutes, had completely lost the ability to move below their calves.

It was not fatal—the Haiyuan Clan did not have a reaction of dying from the poison; the pharmacology of the poison was cold-type nerve blocking, and the duration of the blockage depended on the dilution speed of the poison within the joint fluid.

But they could no longer participate in the battle.

The Black-Armored Commander tapped the bone spear at the knees of these two Haiyuan Clan warriors' armor—the faint glow of the bone spear's crystal confirmed they could no longer stand up.

Then he pointed the bone spear toward the narrow alley once again.

In the rear—the eight Bone Hookers caught by the fishing net had already torn nearly half of the net—the slime had eroded the carapaces, but it dried after the burning was done.

The dried slime turned into powder and fell off the carapaces—six out of the eight were able to stand up.

Two had been corroded by the slime down to their joints—and could not move for the time being.

The battle inside the narrow alley had continued until now—nearly half a stick of incense.

Of the twelve Private Soldiers—six had fallen.

Among the remaining six—five were injured, and one was holding a short dagger behind the shield wall but his hand was shaking so much he couldn't grip the hilt firmly.

No one cried for surrender.

Of the fifty Haiyuan Clan elites—nine had fallen and could not move.

Three had poisoned knees—six had been injured by the corrosive poison and short daggers.

The remaining forty-one—had advanced one-quarter of the way into the narrow alley.

This was not the advancement speed the Haiyuan Clan should have.

A Late Foundation Establishment Stage elite assault team—fighting a Private Soldier squad of only twelve Foundation Establishment Cultivators—should normally complete the advancement within half a stick of incense, pushing to the end rather than just one-quarter.

The narrow alley was a terrain limitation—but terrain could only slow speed, not suppress it to this extent.

What truly suppressed the advancement speed was the poison—the poison coated on every weapon of the Private Soldiers.

Interference-type poison, not fatal.

The poisoned Haiyuan Clan members would lose mobility for at least nearly half a stick of incense before falling—and during this half a stick of incense, the shield wall in the narrow alley retreated inward, retreating to a narrower place, the shield wall leaned closer together, and the Haiyuan Clan's numerical advantage was increasingly suppressed by the terrain.

The Black-Armored Commander hesitated for the first time.

He was calculating.

Continuing to hack at the stone wall with the bone spear—the spirit power of the crystal shards was nearly exhausted.

Continuing to shove manpower inside—shoving them in one by one was equivalent to throwing away lives.

Sending the rear Bone Hookers to detour from the other side—there was an even narrower crevice behind the stone house, the crevice was less than three feet, it was impossible to squeeze through.

He spun his bone spear in his hand—the speed of the spear shaft spinning in his left palm was extremely slow.

Then he made a decision.

From the narrow alley exit—head toward the Pier.

Abandon the narrow alley.

The flank assault team's objective was to attack from the flank toward the Blue Moon Island Inner Harbor—wasting time with the Private Soldiers in the narrow alley deviated from the original objective.

If they couldn't get out of the narrow alley—then detour from the open space outside.

The angle between the narrow alley and the stone house—detouring left from the alley entrance past the back of the stone house, there was a narrow gravel path.

The gravel path was so narrow that it could only allow one Haiyuan Clan member to pass—but after the gravel path led to the outer extension of the stone house, it could loop around to the open space behind the other side of the narrow alley.

Reaching the rear open space—it was less than one hundred zhang from the back door of the Lords Mansion.