Chapter 7: Bloody Battle
The forces of the Black Dragon Tribe and the allied troops of the two opposing tribes began their unified assault on each other from several li away.
At a distance of several li, soul attacks crossed that span in the blink of an eye. Linley and the many ordinary residents of the Black Dragon Tribe could clearly see a vast number of semi-transparent phantoms streaking across the sky, striking toward the enemy.
"Boom!" Some soul attacks collided and dispersed in midair, while most continued their assault toward the opposing side.
The warriors on both sides tried to dodge the soul attacks. But the soul attacks were overwhelming, and many unlucky midgod warriors were hit. Once struck… even if they didn't die, their souls would be affected.
"Thud!" "Thud!"…
One by one, the bodies of warriors fell from the sky on both sides.
"Senmi!"
"Third Brother!"
The midgod warriors were filled with grief and fury.
"An army composed entirely of midgods slaughtering each other…" Linley and the other tribe members, positioned behind the army, watched this scene from afar, deeply shocked. "Dozens of midgods died in an instant. Group combat is truly terrifying!"
Beside him, Bebe muttered softly, "Woo, if there were hundreds of thousands of divine-level soldiers launching a coordinated attack, even a highgod would be finished, right?"
Delia's face also changed.
How could such a battle ever be seen in the Yulan Continent? But in the Infernal Realm, this was merely a tribal skirmish.
Linley couldn't help recalling a scene from the Necropolis of the Gods.
That time, on the eleventh floor of the Necropolis, they had encountered a million Abyssal Blade Demons. As the million demons swooped down, they simultaneously swung their blades. Nearly a million blade auras descended. Linley and his group had nearly been wiped out.
"Whoosh!" Suddenly, several soul attacks flew toward Linley and his large group.
"Scatter!" Linley immediately sent a mental message.
It wasn't just them. Most of the Black Dragon Tribe's residents also dodged immediately.
Many soul attacks, avoided by their own midgod warriors, ended up flying toward Linley's group. These were all midgod-level soul attacks, and most of the tribe residents in the rear were lowgods. If hit, nine out of ten would die.
"We shouldn't stay behind the army," Bebe said with a grimace. "It's too easy to get caught in the crossfire!"
Linley carefully observed the battle's progression. "The fighting is getting fiercer!"
"Material attacks!" Steddon roared in fury, enraged that the two tribes had allied against him. Under Steddon's command, the Black Dragon Tribe's army launched their own attacks.
The battle escalated!
"Whoosh!" Cyan sword qi streaked across the sky, leaving ripples in space. The Infernal Realm was far more stable than a material plane. In the Yulan Continent, Linley could easily tear through space. But here, creating spatial ripples was already impressive.
"Roar!" Elemental beasts materialized out of thin air—various colored creatures appearing in the sky, tearing into each other.
"Boom!" Thick bolts of lightning also split the sky, crashing down on the enemy.
"Hiss…"
The warriors on both sides attacked each other with wild abandon. When a single midgod warrior was hit by several material attacks at once, he was blasted into dust. In just one exchange, dozens of midgod divine sparks fell from the sky.
"This isn't good," Linley frowned. "The Black Dragon Tribe's army has fewer than two thousand soldiers, while the enemy has three thousand."
In this kind of mutual assault, the Black Dragon Tribe was at a disadvantage.
"Haha, Steddon, today you die for sure!" The gaunt man in the golden robe shrieked, while the tiger-headed chieftain of the other tribe bellowed, "Brothers, kill them all! Leave no one alive!"
Steddon's face twisted with rage.
"All people of the Black Dragon Tribe, slaughter the enemy!" Steddon roared.
Then—
The nearly twenty thousand tribe residents who had been behind the army almost simultaneously drew their weapons and unleashed their strongest attacks. In the sky, illusory sword shadows, elemental beasts, and various flashes of light appeared…
Overwhelming and sky-covering, more than ten thousand attacks instantly rained down on the enemy.
"Kill them!" The Black Dragon Tribe's residents held nothing back.
Linley, Delia, and Bebe were stunned.
"Linley, attack quickly!" A harsh shout beside them snapped Linley out of it.
Linley turned to look. Quette, who had always been gentle and friendly, now had a twisted, furious face like an enraged lion. He shouted at Linley and the others, "This is the final moment! If the army falls, we fall too. They'll slaughter us all. Kill them! Fight!"
Bebe was the first to react. He immediately roared, "Kill!" and swung his black dagger, sending streaks of black light toward the enemy. This black dagger was a special gift from Beirut to Bebe.
Everyone went mad, fighting for survival!
"Kill!" Linley and Delia also drew their weapons.
Without caring about anything else, they simply struck out at the enemy. Linley wielded his Black Gravity Heavy Sword, sending several earthen-yellow giant swords flying. These giant swords looked like elemental attacks but also contained the Pulse of the Earth.
"Charge! Kill!" The tiger-headed chieftain roared.
"Charge! Kill!" Steddon shouted as well.
What had started as ranged attacks turned into close combat. Seeing their friends and brothers fall, everyone's eyes turned red. The two sides streaked across the sky, clashing in midair. Several hundred midgods even charged directly into the lowgod ranks.
The gap between lowgods and midgods was huge, especially with hundreds of midgods attacking.
The ordinary residents of the Black Dragon Tribe could only retreat frantically, launching ranged attacks from a distance.
"What is Steddon doing?" Linley was deeply dissatisfied. "The Black Dragon Tribe's warriors are clearly outnumbered, yet he's still recklessly engaging. At this point, he should personally take out the enemy leaders. That's the only way!"
With fewer troops, killing the enemy commander was the fastest path to victory.
But Linley wasn't Steddon.
He couldn't know what Steddon was thinking.
Beside Linley, Quette suddenly saw a tall figure fall from the sky. His eyes turned red, and he screamed, "Brother!" His elder brother had led him from the material plane all the way to now. But today, his brother was dead!
"Kill!" Quette's mind went blank, his eyes bloodshot, and he tried to charge at the enemy.
"Quette!" Linley sent a mental shout, jolting Quette back to his senses.
"Fall back now! Dying here is worthless," Linley urged urgently. In this chaotic melee, Linley himself could do little. He could only do his best to protect the three of them.
Linley and his group were still relatively far back. The enemy midgods hadn't reached them yet.
"Hahaha!" Laughter rang out nearby.
Just a few dozen meters from Linley, six lowgods of the Black Dragon Tribe exploded into pieces. Six lowgod divine sparks were snatched up by three hands. It was three enemy midgod warriors. After killing six lowgods in an instant, they noticed Linley and his group.
"Still some midgods here, too cowardly to join the army?" one bald, scar-faced warrior sneered. "Brothers, kill them!"
"Kill them!"
The three enemy midgods charged at Linley's group like starving wolves, their eyes gleaming with bloodlust.
"Delia, protect yourself!" Linley sent a mental message.
"Looking for death!" Bebe roared and charged first.
"Hmph!" The treacherous bald man headed straight for Linley, clearly targeting him as a lowgod. "Kid, die!" The spear with yellow spots thrust directly at Linley. Linley swung his Black Gravity Heavy Sword to meet it.
Just as the yellow-spotted spear was about to clash with the Black Gravity Heavy Sword, Linley's sword twisted strangely, avoiding the spear entirely. He let the spear thrust toward him…
"Huh?" The bald man widened his eyes in surprise.
"Clang!"
A purple blood soft sword suddenly appeared in Linley's left hand, its blade blocking the tip of the yellow-spotted spear.
"Hmph!" The bald man sneered inwardly. "Kid, you don't know my specialty is soul attacks!" A phantom spear shadow passed through Linley's body, heading for his mind. But as the bald man launched this attack—
Linley's Black Gravity Heavy Sword landed on the bald man.
"So what if you're good at soul attacks? A lowgod's soul power is far too weak." The bald man wasn't worried, but then his face changed drastically. Linley's Void Sword Wave had easily pierced his soul defense.
The bald man stared at Linley in shock. "Ah, you—" Then his eyes went dim.
"The Void Sword Wave is now three times stronger than twenty years ago," Linley said coldly.
Back at the Bronze Mountain, when Linley had just begun fusing the Pulse of the Earth with the Laws of the Earth, its power had increased by several tenths. Now, twenty years later, most of the Laws of the Earth had fused with the Pulse of the Earth. After fusing more than half, the Void Sword Wave's power had tripled.
How could the bald man withstand that?
As for the bald man's soul attack?
Anyone specializing in soul attacks who ran into Linley was just unlucky!
"Delia—" Linley quickly turned to look. Eight Delias appeared in the sky, and the midgod chasing her suddenly slowed down. Bebe instantly rushed in front of him—
"Die!" Bebe, despite his youthful appearance, showed no mercy.
"Pfft!"
The black dagger plunged into the midgod's head.
"Ah!" The midgod, until his last moment, glared at Delia in unwillingness. He had never imagined that Delia, a wind-element midgod, had comprehended the most bizarre of the wind-element laws—the Wind Spatial Law!
Three midgods were dead!
Linley then collected the bald man's divine artifact, divine spark, and spatial ring.
"Whoosh." The eight Delias merged into one. She flew over and smiled at Linley. "Linley, how was that? My cooperation with Bebe?"
Bebe exclaimed in surprise, "Boss, Delia's move was amazing! Those two midgods got hit, their speed dropped drastically, and they were all tied up. Then I took them both out. So easy!"
Linley looked at Delia in surprise.
"Linley, remember I told you? When we got married, the wind-element lowgod divine spark I absorbed contained a law similar to Vacuum Binding—it's called the Wind Spatial Law," Delia explained.
Linley nodded.
"I've found that the three law insights in that midgod divine spark of Nif are far less useful than this one," Delia remarked.
Linley breathed a sigh of relief.
The wind-element laws indeed had connections to space.
"This Wind Spatial Law must be quite powerful. Lord Beirut probably chose that divine spark carefully back then," Linley thought gratefully. Looking around, the battle was bloody, and many in the tribe had died.
A feeling stirred in Linley's heart—
This tribal war was just a microcosm of the entire Infernal Realm.
"We have to survive in the Infernal Realm!" Linley looked at Delia and Bebe, silently vowing.