# Chapter 67: Brutal
After exchanging all the one-star titles, Su Xiao closed the title shop and looked down at the battlefield below. Wherever his gaze landed, fire explosions never ceased for a moment. Although the vassal soldiers' combat uniforms had decent defense—if the "physical defense" of these uniforms was 80, then fire resistance might be 20 at best.
These uniforms were made from metal fiber mixed with sand-cotton fiber, providing excellent slash and penetration resistance. Unfortunately, the boar warriors dealt heavy weapon blunt damage combined with fire damage.
On the chaotic battlefield, Hausman stood out prominently—bare-chested, wielding a nearly 2-meter-long spiked hammer, with the "Sun Ring" brand burned onto his back. He was the soul figure on their side of the battlefield. However, compared to him, five other fellows displayed a rather sneaky style.
These were the Five Brothers of Boar Mages. After mastering solar power, these five bastards revealed their extraordinary talent. Their combat method hadn't changed—each still held a seemingly crude wooden staff that actually contained Black Maple Tree branches wrapped inside as fireball staves.
They still fought by amplifying fireballs, but because all five brothers possessed the innate passive ability "Spell Resonance," when they blasted out large fireballs with their staves, there was a decent chance of triggering a five-fireball chain.
If that was all, the fireball squad would be at most an elite squad. But after mastering solar power, everything changed. The large fireballs these five bastards released had actually become Solar Flame fireballs. This wasn't just upgrading from a slingshot to a cannon—it was jumping straight from a slingshot to an intercontinental missile.
If they could only fire a single solar fireball each time, that would be one thing. But the key was their "Spell Resonance" ability—when releasing solar fireballs, there was about a 20% chance of "rat-tat-tat-tat-tat" five consecutive solar fireballs.
And that wasn't the most shameless part. The Five Brothers of the fireball squad were inseparable. Not just sleeping—even when they shit, they squatted in a row.
In battle, all five brothers would appear simultaneously. If one of them triggered a five-solar-fireball chain, that was already enough for the enemy to handle. Thinking that was all? Not quite.
These five bastards either taught themselves, finally understood the low-level spell notes Su Xiao gave them, or grasped it during their transformation—they had acquired a second spell ability: "Scorch."
"Scorch" was particularly simple: first, mental lock-on, then ignite the enemy, causing flames to burn on them, resulting in continuous physical burns and fire damage.
In actual combat, there was no concept of spell overlap. The Five Brothers would open with five "Scorches" right from the start.
When this ability hit the enemy, it was uncertain how many layers of "Scorch" effect the enemy would receive, because this ability could also trigger the "Spell Resonance" effect. If their luck exploded, the enemy would immediately get 25 layers of "Scorch" effect at the start of battle.
Generally, when this happened, the enemy would howl miserably as they burned to death. With 25 layers of "Scorch" stacked together, the enemy was like a match that had already been lit.
The vassal officers were quite capable. Some with strong survivability couldn't be burned to death quickly even if the Five Brothers' luck exploded and stacked 25 layers of "Scorch."
The true purpose of the "Scorch" effect wasn't for killing enemies. It could kill because the Five Brothers could stack it to 25 layers, causing a qualitative change in intensity. The original purpose of this ability was positioning.
First apply the "Scorch" effect to the enemy, then the fireballs released by the Five Brothers would, to some extent, track the target under the "Scorch" effect.
Although it wasn't as exaggerated as tracking missiles, it could still curve to track. Don't forget how powerful the Five Brothers' solar fireball ability was. All five of them together were like a constantly firing mage machine gun.
In the chaotic melee on the battlefield, the Five Brothers' role couldn't compare to five heavy tanks. Ultimately, once their solar power was depleted, they would immediately become useless. But they were officer killers.
The Five Brothers weren't responsible for the melee. Those five vicious, narrow little eyes would sneakily hide among the other boar warriors.
At first glance, they varied in height, weight, and build, looking much like short pig-men, standing about 1.3 to 1.5 meters tall. Some were as thin as beanpoles, others so fat their clothes couldn't cover their bellies.
But they were the officer killers on the battlefield. Since the battle began, 12 enemy low-to-mid-level officers had died at their hands. The highest-ranking was a vassal captain.
They hid among their own boar warriors, using "Scorch" to burn enemies alive. That vassal captain's dying roar was particularly unwilling.
These five bastards had burned out 2 Holy Spirit chests for Su Xiao. They weren't exactly soldier-class units, hence the high chest drop rate.
Su Xiao looked at the Five Brothers hiding in a pit pretending to be corpses in the distance. This talent—he hadn't wasted his efforts in cultivating them.
The battle situation looked excellent for their side, but Su Xiao was always worried about one thing: whether the vassal side had brought heavy artillery-level weapons. Bubu Wang had gone to scout the enemy rear but had found nothing so far.
Heavy artillery-level weapons were no joke. Fortunately, those things were bulky. This time, the vassal side had urgently assembled troops and didn't think much of Su Xiao's boar warriors, so the likelihood of bringing heavy artillery was low.
The melee on the battlefield continued. As a boar warrior swung his warhammer, the vassal soldier facing him immediately raised his battle blade to block. This vassal soldier's skin was grayish, with a slight metallic sheen.
The gray-faced vassal gritted his teeth, his jaw muscles bulging. As a tremendous force came through his hands, a wave of flame rushed toward him.
Boom!
The fire explosion pushed the gray-faced vassal stumbling backward. His facial skin stung with heat, but without any pause, he lunged forward, dodging the warhammer swinging down from above, gripped his blade with both hands, and slashed horizontally.
Pfft!
A large head was sent flying, trailing a line of blood. Blood and fire intertwined on the battlefield.
After killing his enemy, the gray-faced vassal exhaled a large puff of hot air, panting heavily, feeling like his lungs were about to catch fire.
Just then, a gust of foul wind came from his side. He turned his head just in time to see a warhammer wrapped in golden-red flames already before his eyes. He could even see the burnt bone fragments stuck to the hammer face and smell the scorched odor.
The gray-faced vassal cursed "pig" in his heart before a loud crash filled his ears—the last sound he would ever hear.
This vassal soldier was engulfed in flames. Due to the blunt impact force, his broken body flew backward out of the flames and landed with a thud.
The boar warrior who had just hammered an enemy to death turned his gaze. A cold flash passed by, followed by a sharp cutting sound. His field of vision rapidly lowered as the battlefield's noise, screams, wails, and the groans of the dying gradually faded away, eventually disappearing.
Beside this boar warrior's corpse, a vassal officer holding a sharp sword walked past. His expression was stern, his hair naturally curly, and the small mustache on his chin gave him an inexplicable sharpness.
Not far away, five pairs of vicious eyes locked onto this vassal officer. The Five Brothers had found their prey, hiding among the boar warriors.
It wouldn't be long before the Five Brothers became infamous among the enemy—notorious officer killers.
On this brutal battlefield, anyone could become someone else's prey.
The successive fire explosions triggered by the boar warriors' "Rage" ability caused the enemy's defensive lines to collapse layer by layer. Even though the enemy commander had consolidated the original dozen or so defensive lines into three, they still couldn't hold.
This ultimately led to their boar warriors and the enemy vassal soldiers engaging in a chaotic melee across the vast Gobi desert.
After 2 hours of fighting, the enemy tried to shrink their defensive lines, but the battlefield was too chaotic.
After 5 hours of fighting, the sky began to lighten. The enemy commander-in-chief issued a retreat order, but the soldiers and warriors locked in melee couldn't just withdraw.
After 8 hours of fighting, by 8 AM the next day, the vassal side finally couldn't hold on. They formed suicide squads to create an unbreakable defensive line while the other soldiers retreated.
The first battle ended in the most brutal way possible. Of the 200,000 enemy troops that marched to the border region, only about 60,000 returned. The casualty numbers wouldn't normally have reached this level, but because of the enemy's pursuit, the slower retreating wounded units chose to stay behind as rearguard. Many died, and many were captured.
To say nothing else, the "Vassal Alliance" soldiers were both capable fighters and had backbone. In this first battle, because the boar warriors' abilities countered the vassal soldiers, if these had been ordinary vassal troops, they wouldn't have held out for 8 hours—they would have broken and fled within 5.
In the main command room, Su Xiao looked at the battle report Baha had compiled. About 200,000 vassal soldiers had attacked, 60,000 escaped, over 30,000 were captured, about 100,000 were killed, and the rest were unaccounted for, likely scattered into small units.
Was the victory sweet? Not at all. Their side had a total of 105,792 boar warriors killed in action, plus many wounded. The kill ratio with the enemy was about 1 to 1.
This made Su Xiao feel the situation was very unfavorable. If all vassal soldiers fought like this, there was no way to win unless the Evolution Nest could be upgraded another level.
The current casualty rate was about 1 to 1. Their advantages were: Sun Faith + Insect Race combat instincts + War Lord morale +70 points, plus the boar warriors' repeatedly enhanced willpower, making them not easily afraid or prone to routing. Before 70% or 80% of their forces were killed, they were unlikely to break. Fighting to the death without retreat was the key to their victory.
Su Xiao picked up the communicator, first contacting Kaisa, then Li Xiniwei.
Since it was after the battle, finding out the enemy's background wasn't difficult. Su Xiao learned why the enemy was so troublesome. The enemy's commander-in-chief this time was named Leizi, with the rank of Brigadier General.
Su Xiao had encountered this person before and had investigated him. After Brigadier General Leizi died, his deeds would surely appear in vassal school history textbooks.
This famous general, during the war with humanity, served as the commander-in-chief of the "Batutu River Battle Zone." The Warhammer Force under his command was one of the three elite frontline forces.
Warhammer, Magnetic Storm, and Heavy Artillery were recognized as the three strongest vassal forces in the battle zone. Warhammer and Heavy Artillery were under the "Vassal Alliance," while Magnetic Storm was under the "Aurora Council."
If you averaged out the combat power of the forces under the three major vassal factions, the ranking would be: the Vassal Alliance's forces were the strongest—they could fight the best, being arms dealers.
Second was the Aurora Council, which focused on biological technology.
Last was the Watchtower. No wonder they always played the nice guy—they couldn't beat their other "two brothers," so they could only pretend to be friendly to maintain face as a major vassal faction.
Su Xiao understood why this battle had been so intense. The Vassal Alliance itself was the most combat-capable of the three major vassal factions, and the Warhammer Force they faced was one of the two elite forces within the Vassal Alliance. This was the elite of the elite—it would be strange if it weren't hard to fight.
Calculating this way, the average combat power of the boar warriors had already been raised to a satisfactory level.
From the current situation, defeating the vassals with the current boar warrior army was impossible, at least within this world progress's time limit.
If their stay in this world reached its limit—the maximum duration of the world war—the Void Tree would forcibly teleport all participants out of this world, causing the war mission to fail.
The current level wasn't enough; they needed to go further. Originally, Su Xiao's plan was to risk a fourth upgrade of the Evolution Nest. This fortress organ, upgrading it was similar to strengthening weapons—the more times upgraded, the higher the risk.
A simple analogy: the current Evolution Nest was at +3. To upgrade to +4, even with full preparation, the failure probability was high. Once it failed, all previous efforts would be wasted. Without the ability to replenish boar warrior numbers, they would eventually be wiped out by the vassal side.
After triggering the historical-level event, the situation took a turn. The Void Tree opened the title shop.
Besides risking a fourth upgrade of the Evolution Nest, Su Xiao saw a second strategy: continuously raise the exchange level in the title shop, from LV1 all the way to LV7, then use Soul Coins to buy all the titles inside, then use the Title Burning Disc to burn and synthesize them into seven-star titles.
Su Xiao currently had 4 seven-star titles: Crownless King, War Lord, World Invasion, and Blood Intent.
Among them, War Lord and Blood Intent needed to be kept. The latter, when enhancing blood energy, could permanently increase blood energy intensity—a rare good thing.
Su Xiao's idea was to upgrade War Lord from a seven-star title to an eight-star title. Since he was already not acting like a decent person in the enemy contractors' eyes, he might as well go even harder.
Su Xiao knew all too well how "good" his luck was, so he wouldn't rashly upgrade until the success rate of raising War Lord to an eight-star title reached 100%.
To ensure War Lord's 100% promotion to an eight-star title, he needed to place it at the center of the title disc, insert 5 seven-star titles as auxiliary titles in the 5 surrounding slots, then consume those 5 auxiliary titles to begin title burning. Only this could ensure War Lord's promotion to an eight-star title.
Among the existing seven-star titles, Crownless King looked particularly strong, but due to Su Xiao's Blade Grandmaster, Melee Grandmaster, 560 Soul Strength, Soul Gaze (LVx), and multiple control immunities, judgment immunities, and judgment counters, Crownless King suffered an unprecedented weakening in Su Xiao's hands.
A title that was originally very strong could only be left in the corner gathering dust. This thing had to withstand the enemy's judgment ability and only take effect after Su Xiao's judgment succeeded.
The situation Su Xiao faced was that he rarely experienced successful judgments—he usually got judgment immunity, never reaching the success step. Every time he tried to trigger Crownless King's effect, it would get stuck.
Normally, Su Xiao wore the five-star title Deep Blue Shadow instead of Crownless King, because the former provided a greater boost to his own strength.
So this time, Su Xiao decided to say goodbye to this title that looked powerful but was actually useless.
The other seven-star title, World Invasion, was particularly strong. Su Xiao had obtained it during his last invasion of the Dark Star world.
The main effect of this title wasn't its strongest point. The strongest was a characteristic listed below.
"Note: If this title is used as an auxiliary title for title burning, this title will count as two same-star auxiliary titles."
That meant Crownless King + World Invasion already counted as 3 seven-star auxiliary titles. If he could get 2 more seven-star titles, War Lord could be promoted to an eight-star title.
At that point, he could let the vassal side, as well as Golden Earl, Holy Poem, Orlando, and others, experience what an upgraded version of Bai Ye-style legion tactics was like.
To achieve this, he not only needed a high enough exchange level in the title shop but also sufficient Soul Coins.
Creating an eight-star title in a short time would definitely be a huge expense.
To ensure everything was foolproof, and since the two "ATM Sisters" had been drained dry, Su Xiao was considering finding another "ATM Sister." If they were like Molei and Yueshitu—not holding grudges, valuing their lives more—he wouldn't need to kill them. If they held grudges, he would extract once and then immediately silence them.
Besides the ATM Sister, Su Xiao had seen in the world contact platform that Prince and others were also in this world.
Heaven's Little Team, this mining team, made him somewhat nostalgic. The ore he had robbed last time was really too valuable. No matter how much Lide had, he would take it all.
Lide's original words were: "This is high-grade stuff dug up from the Apocalypse side. The collection process, post-extraction handling, and later storage are all top-tier professional work. Of course, I'll take as much as there is."
Su Xiao frowned in thought. How to find Heaven's Little Team? The contract he had signed with that team last time had inexplicably completely failed, leaving no trace. Perhaps it was caused by the Apocalypse Paradise's protection mechanism for miners.
Su Xiao wasn't without methods. He first needed to activate the title "Apocalypse." At that point, he had a high probability of reactivating the Apocalypse Paradise side's world contact platform.
Then, whether searching for a new "ATM Sister" or "Charity Brother," or extracting Heaven's Little Team's location, it would all be feasible.
Moreover, through the world contact platform, he could obtain real-time enemy intelligence—multiple benefits in one move.
...
Somewhere in the vassal territory, a kilometer underground in a mine shaft, Prince, who had just raised his mining pick, suddenly shuddered. Even he was a bit puzzled, raising his hand to rub his nose.
Beside him, Belle, wearing a miner's hat with a few freckles on her face and a slightly red nose, asked, "What's wrong? Is it cold?"
"I don't know why, but my heart suddenly jumped. Strange,"
Prince calmed his mind and raised his mining pick again. In his view, mining was the source of happiness—except when being robbed, it was pretty happy at other times.