Wolves
Wolves
The heavy slabs of pavement burst open, and earth as well as rocks were sent flying everywhere as a gigantic tentacle lunged out!
The same thing was happening in other parts of the town. Gigantic tentacles were attacking people as though they knew that the mortals were leaving. Black, horrific creatures broke through the earth and emerged from it one after another. Human resistance was futile as people were screaming in fear and groaning from pains due to injuries they sustained. People just ran around aimlessly. The sound of the earth cracking open and buildings collapsing did not stop. The solid stone houses and city walls were designed to ward off pagans, but they appeared useless against the most powerful ancient creature on this planet. Houses collapsed and city walls tumbled as if they were only made of pulp. Instead of attacking humans directly, many of the tentacles smartly clung to buildings and shook them till they crumbled. It just seemed like they knew it was a more effective way to cause mass casualty.
Or maybe, the tentacles were just attacking targets within their reach. To the angry ancient creature, all man-made things deserved to die!
Just after Hao Ren and Ophra were done with a group of tentacles, the sound of buildings collapsing, the earth tearing open and people screaming could be heard from the town. Becky's face turned pale. "The town has fallen!"
"It was inevitable. But, I didn't expect it to happen so quickly." Despite the bad news, Ophra still maintained her composure. Instead of wallowing in regret for not discovering the tentacles' movements earlier, she quickly ordered a rescue operation. "Jefferson, evacuate people in the area. Inform Gordon and his team to leave. Take as many supplies as possible and burn everything else because fire will stop the tentacles. Everyone is to retreat towards Dragonspine Ridge. Walker, bring your men to attack the tentacles in town..."
As Ophra was issuing her orders, a house approximately 100 m away suddenly collapsed. A few black tentacles emerged from the smoking ruins. Ophra waved her sword at the direction of the tentacles without even looking and the latter instantly burst into white flames. They were burned into ashes in no time.
Hao Ren's brows twitched. He was deeply impressed by the most fearsome warrior in the Kingdom of Holletta. He wondered how she would rank as a demon hunter in the Surface World.
While Leyton was in a state of chaos, a strong, purple light beam was shot up towards the sky from the church in the middle of the town. The tentacles began to wither under the bright light as the cracks in the earth quickly began to seal up—it was Gelton, who had activated the last defense of the divine array as an expedient measure. At least, the disaster was suppressed for the moment!
Both the Royal and Church Knights took this window of opportunity to lead the people out of the town, running towards the path to Dragonspine Ridge. Meanwhile, other soldiers quickly mobilised themselves and exterminated the stunned tentacles. Although such an endeavour was just a drop in the ocean in terms of damage to the Gnarled Grove, they had at least earned themselves a few minutes of time for evacuation before the divine array exhausted its energy.
As if the tentacles could sense the mortals putting up resistance, Hao Ren heard a roaring rumble underneath his feet. He could feel the earth trembling under his feet like more tentacles were coming in this direction.
"Looks like they're quickly waking up," the MDT said with an unusual nervous tone of voice. "This massive thing is waking up in stages. Its core may still be asleep, but its tentacles have already awakened!"
Ophra pulled her brows together. "And, it appears that the tentacles are capable of thinking... They're trying to prevent people from fleeing... and that's not good!"
Everyone knew what Ophra meant when she said "that's not good"; the buried portion of the Gnarled Grove was massively wide, covering an area from Dragonspine Ridge all the way to the centre of the Blood Lake. So, it could be said that the Beinz Diocese was practically built on the branch of this ancient living plant. Now that the plant was awake, no matter where the people ran, they were not going to be safe!
Sure enough, just as Ophra's voice trailed off, a mage flew back from afar and reported to Ophra while he was still up in the air. "Marshal! Monsters can be seen on the highway! Those monsters in the Gnarled Grove have also gone berserk!"
"Add reinforcements to escort the people in the evacuation process. Leave behind all heavy items and reserved weapons. We won't be able to use them if we can't escape! Ophra issued her order loudly before turning to look at Hao Ren and his company. "You guys..."
"We'll go help on the highway!" Not waiting for Ophra to finish, Hao Ren moved towards the highway outside of town. Ophra was a little stunned, but the corners of her mouth were curled up in a smile. She followed him from behind.
The situation outside of town was just as bad. Since it was outside the divine array's field of influence, a large amount of tentacles were breaking through the road's surface and attacking people indiscriminately. The monsters in the Gnarled Grove had already breached the blockade, and begun to attack people too; these severely crooked, poison-laden monsters reminded Hao Ren about the message written on the parchments. He initially thought that these monsters were simply mutated creatures, but he now figured out their real identity: they could well be the descendants of what the writings called, the "Third Born"—the frenzied monsters, which were short-lived and born out of the residue of the Blood Tide! Although they were thought to have died off with the rest of the world, these monsters fed on the protection of the First Born and managed to survive under the unique subterrainean environment of the Gnarled Grove!
Becky yanked her sword out, clenching her teeth before turning into a cyclone as she charged towards the monsters on the highway. Compared to the tentacles, which could only inflict damage to a limited area, these frenzied dinobeasts were the biggest threat to civilians!
"Let me help you!" Lily followed Becky closely behind, shouting and wielding her Frostfire Claws to join the battle. She remembered learning a trick from Becky's Sword Storm skill earlier. Both of them wielded their weapons and transformed into twin cyclones—they were like a pair of out-of-control propellers, clearing the way of monsters. Looking at the two mercenaries in astonishment, Ophra said, "That's the power of Er Ren Zhuan¹!"
Hao Ren was speechless.
While the knights engaged the tentacles on the highway, Ophra and Hao Ren quickly came face-to-face with dinobeasts from the Gnarled Grove. However, the amount of monsters were so large that the both of them would quickly be overrun.
Just a few minutes into the battle, Becky withdrew from the fight as she had too many stars over her head from all the spinning. She was going to need three minutes of respite before she could join Lily to play their Er Ren Zhuan again. That left Lily in a solo fight with the monsters, so Lily thought it was probably better to retreat for a while.
The old werewolf, Elson, who had been by Ophra's side all this while had already began his transformation. He was well-built with bulging muscles on his body. His limbs were enlarged as well as stretched and his face had all the features of a wolf. Standing beside him were five other werewolf knights; male and female. They were Ophra's strongest werewolf warriors. These mighty warriors had warded off the first wave of attack from the dinobeasts, but there was an endless amount of monsters still coming out from the Gnarled Grove. One of the werewolves whistled before looking at Ophra. "Marshal, we must complete our transformation in order to fight them off!"
Ophra shook the black blood stain off the tip of her sword. She said, "There's no visible moonlight now. Can you do that?"
"We're no ordinary werewolves!" Elson grinned, revealing his fangs. "Step back, people! You don't want to get hurt when we're shapeshifting!"
Hao Ren and Ophra quickly took a step back. Elson and the other higher werewolves began to transform rapidly. They lost their human faces, and hair began to grow rapidly all over their bodies. Instinctively, Hao Ren turned his head and looked at Lily. Sure enough, he saw that the maiden had already grabbed a large bag of Spicy Sticks in her hand and stuffed them in her mouth. While she was at it, she waved at her senior werewolves and mumbled, "Please wait for me... I can shapeshift too!"
At that moment, Hao Ren sensed something was definitely wrong somewhere...