End of the Magic Era - Chapter 908
Chapter 908: Puppet Tide
Lin Yun casually released a Flame Burst at Xiuban and sent him flying.
He then looked at the people around him and said, “Get ready to fight.”
That short sentence made everyone quiet down.
All eyes were on Lin Yun, and they seemed somewhat puzzled. Most of them were thinking, ‘We have just finished the attack on the fort, what else is there to fight?’
As if in response, fierce mana fluctuations began to spread, and the sound of metal clashing echoed over, wave after wave.
The mage army instantly started getting busy, rushing to the fort’s entrance, while Reina jumped up and took flight. Xiuban lifted Carnage with a fierce expression and ferociously rushed over with earthshaking steps.
After all, the entrance of that fort had already been destroyed by Lin Yun’s Four-Element Bomb, and the gates were wide open. It would be a real shame if someone rushed into the fort at such a time.
The puppet army was already fighting the enemy by the time everyone reached the entrance.
Monsters that stood two to three meters tall filled the horizon, and the bigger ones even reached up to six meters.
There was no lack of huge spiders with legs flickering with a cold light that could reach up to eight meters. When they charged forward, they created sharp, mournful sounds as they tore through the air.
There was a Kodo-like beast that shoved and knocked its way forward. The sword puppets’ blades sliced over, only to create sparks. In just moments, that monster ended up with several dozen wounds on its body, but no blood flowed out of these wounds, and they didn’t seem to hinder it at all. It pushed its way past a few sword puppets before charging straight towards the fort’s entrance.
There were all kinds of monsters crazily attacking the fort like an erupting beast tide. Smoke was rising behind the monsters, and the earth was shaking.
At that time, everyone was surprised when they realized that these monsters were actually puppets. Most of them were below Level 30, but there were too many of them. It was an army of puppets numbering no less than a few thousand.
They were fierce and fearless, and small injuries wouldn’t affect their fighting power. Once their numbers reached a certain point, they would be just as terrifying as the Undead, able to overwhelm their opponents with their numbers.
A Level 30 sword puppet tore a Level 25 spider puppet to shreds before immediately sinking in a flood of puppets.
It was like a fierce lion that fell within a group of bison and only lasted two seconds before becoming a pile of scrap iron.
There were only two hundred puppets guarding the entrance, and they were all at Level 30, yet they weren’t a match for the overwhelming number of inferior puppets.
These sword puppets kept falling back after being suppressed and rapidly reached the entrance of the fort. Behind them, the puppet army that rushed over immediately joined the battle.
Casting puppets raised both arms, and countless runes shone on their bodies. A large amount of flames and ice came together, and the structures of the spells collapsed the moment they were cast due to the extreme density, transforming into a pure Elemental Storm.
With this, the attack of the monster puppets was immediately alleviated. Two hundred Level 30 casting puppets, as well as a few dozen Level 35 casting puppets, played a more important role than a small mage army when faced with such a huge number of enemies.
With the large-scale flood of spells, the monster puppets at the forefront instantly turned into a pile of components.
The irresistible charge was halted because these monster puppets mostly consisted of close-range fighters. There were very few casting puppets among them. However, their defensive power and magic resistance were frightening, and far higher than other puppets of the same level.
If they were at the same level, Lin Yun’s batch of puppets might have been inferior in terms of defensive power.
Just after suppressing these monster puppets, a strange roar echoed behind the tide, sounding like a child’s sharp scream.
Smoke surged behind the monster puppets, and there were Fireballs, Frost Spikes, Wind Blades, and Rolling Rocks… It was like a chaotic rainstorm of the four elements falling towards the puppet army.
The number of spells could be compared to Lin Yun’s puppet army going all-out. The spells fell and ended up destroying ten sword puppets, and the counterattack was slowed down.
At this time, the smoke behind the several thousand monster puppets dispersed, revealing several hundred short beastmen with ashen skin riding various monster puppets. They were urging their puppets on as if they were driving vehicles.
These small Beastmen were covered in magic patterns that kept flickering with light as a large number of spells were released by them. Their casting abilities were quite formidable, a bit better than the Raging Flame Warlocks.
And this wasn’t just one, but all of them. They all were superior casters compared to Raging Flame Warlocks of the same rank. And more importantly, these guys used spells of all four elements. The speed at which they cast spells, as well as the diversity, was far better than ordinary Raging Flame Warlocks.
“Grey Beastmen! Be careful!” William shouted when he saw those small Beastmen.
That scream startled everyone.
Grey Beastmen were one of the eight races of Beastmen in the Raging Flame Plane. They were considered unconventional compared to the others because, among the races of the Raging Flame, there would rarely be a mage. Many of the Beastmen possessed an Abyssal bloodline and ended up becoming Warlocks and having an inherently good grasp of Abyssal spells. Very rarely would Beastmen use orthodox elemental spells.
And the Grey Beastmen were unconventional Beastmen that could use spells like ordinary human mages. Their bodies were covered in magic patterns reminiscent of those used by the Dark Elves, also giving them powerful magic abilities. Under the same circumstances, a human of the same rank wasn’t as powerful as a Grey Beastman.
But the main reason that they were said to be unconventional wasn’t this.
In fact, their stature was similar to that of Dwarves, yet they didn’t have the sturdy physique of Dwarves. Every Grey Beastman was thin and small, and the closest comparable being to a sturdy Grey Beastman would be an ordinary human woman. Thin arms and thin legs, and from a distance, they could pass off as starved ash-skinned goblins…
Their delicate bodies weren’t as good as those of human soldiers, let alone Beastmen.
After all, ordinary Beastman warriors were always tall and sturdy. Their arms could compare to the thigh of a human soldier, and some of the tallest and most robust Beastmen had arms as thick as some human soldiers’ waists.
This was why they were always called musclebrains when insulting them.
The weak physical strength of the Grey Beastman made the entire race devoid of warriors, making them the odd ones out. Moreover, these Grey Beastmen didn’t breed nearly as quickly as other Beastmen.
Ordinary Beastmen bred very quickly. In Noscent, there would always be large and small battles at the borders of human nations, and it was because too many of the Beastmen were born.
The huge population brought about huge pressure to provide food, especially during winter. If they didn’t plunder, some of the Beastmen would die from hunger. The race simply couldn’t think of spending winter in peace, because more and more of them would just starve if that happened.
It was normal for a Beastman family to have a dozen kids. Every family would have a newborn yearly, and if not for the high mortality rate of the infants, they would have the numbers to overwhelm any human armies.
But the Grey Beastmen were different. They weren’t as fertile as the other Beastmen, and they were even worse off than the humans of some regions.
This was also the reason behind their small numbers.
Their numbers were far lower than that of other Beastmen races, yet they were still acknowledged as one of the eight major Beastman Races of the Raging Flame Plane. This was all due to one thing: Almost every Grey Beastman was an alchemist!
They were proficient in alchemy and were even experts in the puppeteering field. Any random kid in the Grey Beastmen Tribe could make a crude and rough puppet. After getting older, all Grey Beastmen would be an Alchemist at the very least.
Their weak bodies were compensated for by their huge hordes of puppets. In a war, it would be normal for a few hundred Grey Beastmen to lead several thousand puppets. When faced with over a thousand Beastmen from another race, these few hundred Grey Beastmen could work with their puppets to sweep away their counterparts.
After all, puppets weren’t living beings. They were unafraid of death and could keep casting when their limbs were cut, while a Beastman’s fighting abilities would be influenced after an injury.
While being protected by their puppets, the Grey Beastmen could display their formidable casting ability and demonstrate power that far surpassed an ordinary Beastman army.
At this moment, the puppets controlled by the Grey Beastmen were crazily charging. Facing these lifeless puppets, Lin Yun’s puppet army wasn’t nearly as effective as they were against a typical Beastman army.
The swarms of inferior puppets were the same as cannon fodder to the Grey Beastmen. They simply didn’t care about consumption or losses, especially for the monster puppets around level 10. No matter how many of them died, the Grey Beastmen wouldn’t feel too bad about it. Any adult Grey Beastman could easily create a level 10 puppet.