Chapter 247-1: It’s Over, Completely Over (1) |
The cross-boundary war finally drew to a close when support from the Super Beast Legion arrived.
The player legion all returned as souls to Emperor’s Mound Village.
But this battle also dealt grievous losses to the Etherbreath race.
Under Blood King’s command, more than half of the Blood Pool Super Beast Legion was lost, and Blood King himself was gravely wounded, on the verge of death and fallen into a coma.
The great war ended in desolation, and the battlefield was deathly silent.
Charred earth was soaked with the blood of Etherbreath warriors, and on the cracked ground lay scattered residue crystals left by fallen warriors of the Super Beast Legion.
The End Behemoth’s shattered body lay across the center of the battlefield like a collapsed mountain. Its six pairs of scarlet compound eyes were long dimmed, and wounds on its surface still vented blood mist.
A gale swept the field, lifting fine ash.
Burned-out traces of blood, desiccated bone shards, embers yet unquenched… all that remained was a scene of ruin and brutality.
Their steps were heavy, their eyes vacant. Now and then, if they dragged from the extracted residue a wounded one who still had breath, they immediately wrapped him in a flesh-and-blood mycelial carpet and sent him to the rear.
There was no cheer of victory on site, nor any joy of surviving a calamity, only stifled panting and the occasional painful groan.
At the very center of the battlefield, war priests from the Soul Pool Legion, who had rushed over, dragged Blood King out from the shattered End Behemoth.
All the while, they kept injecting life force into Blood King’s body.
This was an injury the Etherbreath race had never faced before.
In theory, as long as the End Behemoth survived, Blood King would suffer no harm.
But the energy unleashed by the invading force, while seeping into the End Behemoth, also inflicted severe injuries on Blood King linked to it.
At this moment, purple stripes covered Blood King’s body, coiling over his surface like venomous snakes and continuously siphoning life force.
Blood King was like a candle guttering in the wind, likely to go out at any time.
In the end, the war priests who came to support wrapped Blood King’s severely wounded body in dark red mycelium, forming a thumping blood cocoon. By continuously infusing life force, they offset the ongoing damage brought by the Wither power within, forcibly extending Blood King’s life.
The view pulled into the distance.
The setting sun sank westward. Its last ray swept across the battlefield, illuminating countless broken bio-weapons and super beast remains.
They were like gravestones on the field, recording the ferocity of this battle.
Only all that belonged to the players had vanished.
No corpses, no weapons… as if they had never appeared. As if it was merely an internal war of the Etherbreath race.
But the cross-boundary war did not end with the fall of this battle.
Players were still continuously descending into the Etherbreath World through spatial rifts, spreading out across it from the point of origin. The form of war had been chaotic from the start.
Even if the Super Beast Legion still had strength to contend with the player legion in a frontal war, it was hard to effectively wipe out such scattered fighting power.
The only feasible method was to garrison several key cities and wait for players to arrive.
Or to split the legion’s strength and establish hunting units to scour the world and pursue the players.
As for following the spatial tunnel to the world of the invading force, the remaining seven Thrones did not dare.
Because they did not know what the scene was on the other end of the spatial tunnel.
If they teleported over and ran into an ambush, what awaited them would be a trapped beast battle with no escape.
—
Half a day later, in Apocalypse City.
Under the dome of the Etherbreath royal court, seven figures sat around a circular blood crystal conference table, each a different life form.
To the Etherbreath race, the core of a ‘racial member’ was the memory sac.
Bodies in their eyes were like different styles and colors of clothing to humans, or differently shaped vehicles, merely external.
Upon the conference table, there should have been eight Thrones, but one seat was vacant.
Blood King was still in a coma and could not attend this meeting.
After the other seven Thrones of the Etherbreath race took their seats, none spoke. The fluorescent spores embedded in the dome flickered, casting shifting light and shadow over the faces of the seven Thrones.
“The second nest has just finished incubating. The floating beasts can be sent at any time to the invaders’ world to conduct reconnaissance, but the premise is that we must seize the area around the spatial rift as soon as possible.”
The speaker was Bone King of the Etherbreath race. Its voice was rasping, and as it spoke, its jagged knuckles tapped the tabletop.
At once, images surfaced on the blood crystal at the center of the table: bodies of three hundred massive floating behemoths were being woven into shape by innumerable fluorescent planktonic organisms.
Hearing this, Erosion King, seated beside Bone King, nodded.
“What we cannot distinguish is whether the forces that have appeared at this stage of the invasion are merely probing strength or their main army. What do you all think?”
This was exactly what the other Thrones feared as well.
Each time the Etherbreath race under their command randomly linked to a small world, they would dispatch floating behemoths and other reconnaissance forces to that world for a probing contact and investigation.
They would determine the power tier of that world and then decide whether to initiate war.
This model was experience accumulated in cross-boundary wars.
The Etherbreath race had taken many detours in its development, and its cross-boundary war model had encountered an extinction crisis.
In one invasion war, the army they led encountered a force that had also descended upon the world as invaders.
That battle still filled them with terror to this day.
Endless darkness shrouded the land. No matter how many warriors the Etherbreath race sent, they were swallowed by the surging dark.
It was not a war of attrition.
From the start, the Etherbreath race was treated as nourishment.
The enemy grew stronger the more it fought, while the Etherbreath race’s strength dwindled as it fought.
In the end, at the cost of three Thrones, they fled back to their home world, hastily shattered the space origin point, and closed the spatial rift.
Fortunately, the dark force did not pursue; otherwise, it could be imagined that the Etherbreath World would have been destroyed under the sweep of that terrifying power.
Therefore, a detailed investigation of the other world’s situation was the most critical link in the Etherbreath race’s war model.
Thus they could not judge whether the force invading this time was probing at the current stage or had already launched a full-scale war.
No one could answer the question, and the meeting again fell into silence.
At this moment, Fungus King in the third seat spoke first.
“No matter what, this war is now unavoidable. The most important thing is to take the area where the spatial rift is located, and then carry out the investigation. I propose that Bone King and I handle the war around the spatial rift region, while you organize hunting teams to search for the small invading groups still plundering across our world.”
For this proposal, the other Thrones nodded in agreement.
“Right, put the invasion of the blue world on hold for now. Withdraw all forces stationed at the space origin point. There is no need to waste resources to keep the spatial rift open. The most important thing right now is to defend the homeland, not foreign invasion.” Soul King at the end suddenly proposed.
Hearing this, Bone King immediately shook his head.
“I suggest keeping the spatial rift. The future course of this war is unpredictable. Keeping the spatial rift is also leaving our Etherbreath race a line of retreat. If our strength proves insufficient to resist the invading force, perhaps going to the blue world will be the best choice.”
Facing this rebuttal, Soul King continued to explain.
“The power tier of the blue world has not yet been determined. If it truly reaches the point where we cannot resist and are ready to withdraw, rashly going to the blue world may not be the optimal choice. That place could also be the grave where the Etherbreath race meets destruction. I stand by my view: close the spatial rift.”
“I agree to keep the spatial rift. The energy in the air of the blue world is thin, and its power will not be very strong. It will be a line of retreat.” Erosion King also expressed his view at this time.
“Retreat? Erosion King, when did you become so timid? For tens of thousands of years the Etherbreath race has trampled countless worlds. When have we ever needed to leave ourselves a way out?”
Facing the questioning, Erosion King’s tendrils slowly writhed, his tone low.
“This is not timidity, it is strategy. We still have not figured out the invaders’ bottom line. In the initial main-force engagement, they already routed the Blood Pool Legion and even drove Blood King to the brink of death. What does that mean? Do they have an even larger force behind them? If the final situation turns unfavorable, are we to take the entire Etherbreath race to be buried with it?”
Shadow King, who had remained silent, nodded at this time.
“I think Erosion King is right. This is not retreat but preserving the fire. The blue world is poor in resources, but at least it does not have these damned invaders. If we truly face the worst, we can at least take the core racial members and withdraw.”
Hearing this, Evil King’s emotions fluctuated greatly.
“Withdraw? What are you saying? Where is the Etherbreath race’s honor? We have never retreated in war.”
“Honor cannot be eaten. If we cannot even guarantee the survival of the race, what honor is there to talk about? Evil King, you are of the younger generation, so you have not experienced despair.” Saying this, Soul King stood up, sweeping his gaze across the Thrones present.
“Do you still remember that endless darkness? The shadow of that war remains seared in my heart.”
“We are not the only invaders and plunderers. There are many strong races in the outside worlds. Insisting on honor alone will only lead us to destruction. Leaving a retreat is also for the future.”
“Precisely because I lived through that era, I know better than you what true despair is… Therefore I propose that we continue to maintain the spatial rift and station some forces to guard it.”
On whether to keep the spatial rift linked to Earth, the seven Thrones launched into a heated debate.