Several days later, the flames of war swept across the land once more. Countless Shaman armies swarmed forth, blotting out the sky as they braved artillery fire and a hail of bullets to charge toward the human positions.
The Shaman warriors at the forefront held small round bucklers to protect their heads and chests, charging at full speed. Muzzle flashes flickered continuously from the pillboxes ahead, and Shaman warriors tumbled to the ground one after another. Artillery shells shrieked through the air, their impacts claiming swathes of Shamans upon detonation.
Bloodlust and fury flooded the minds of the Shamans, banishing fear entirely. One Shaman warrior at the front finally reached a human pillbox. Leaping high into the air, he discarded his buckler, raised his warblade with both hands, and brought it down against the structure with all his might!
In his past experience, even if the roof of a human bunker were made of solid logs, a full-power strike like this could split it wide open!
The warblade struck. With an earsplitting clang, the Shaman warrior was jolted backward into midair.
The long blade gouged a deep groove across the pitch-black roof of the bunker, exposing the glistening silver gleam of cast steel underneath!
A shell detonated in front of the pillbox. Shrapnel swept through the warrior, tearing away a massive chunk of his body. Before departing this world, he still could not believe that the roof of a human pillbox was cast from solid steel.
The battle unfolded as it always had. The Shaman vanguard soon overwhelmed the first line of bunkers. Though they suffered tremendous casualties, they also found some bunkers in the second and third lines that still had timber roofs. War behemoths braved artillery fire and incoming projectiles, continuously hurling black-water leather balls deep into the human lines.
These war behemoths hurled their projectiles with deadly accuracy, ball after ball landing squarely upon the bunkers. The timber bunkers were corroded away in the blink of an eye, but the steel ones held firm for a considerable length of time.
Just as the battle seemed to follow its usual course, the earth suddenly began to tremble in a rhythmic cadence. Experienced Shaman veterans froze in bewilderment, slowing their strides and glancing around.
The Great Shamans holding the rear suddenly noticed their military qi ebbing away at an accelerated rate. Sensing something amiss, they swept their gaze across the battlefield, trying to pinpoint the source.
At that moment, iron legions began to emerge across the battlefield. The vanguard legion, ten thousand strong, marched forward in a tightly formed phalanx.
Wei Yuan stood at the head of the formation, Crimson Night Immortal-Slaying Sword in hand, leading this steel legion forward with measured, deliberate strides. Guided by military qi, tens of thousands marched in perfect unison, making the tremors beneath the earth grow increasingly pronounced.
Like a torrent of steel, this legion drove straight into the Shaman army. No matter how the Shamans shifted their ranks, it bore down upon them like a mountain of iron—slow, but inexorable!
Dread flared in the eyes of countless Shaman warriors; they had never faced an enemy like this. Heavily armored warriors were not unheard of, but never in such overwhelming numbers.
Unable to contain his panic any longer, a Great Shaman at the front bellowed, "Archers! Where are the archers?!" Several other Great Shamans scrambled to maneuver their units into an intercepting posture, throwing their ranks into disarray.
Some Great Shamans cast shamanic arts from afar, but the legion's military qi was overwhelming. The arts were sapped of more than half their potency before they even hit, and the cultivators within the battle formation easily dispersed what remained.
When the residual shockwaves struck the soldiers, their armor actually gleamed with an eerie blue light, neutralizing the shamanic arts on the spot! Could this legion truly be impervious to the curses and arts of Great Shamans?
The Shaman army finally reorganized its ranks and charged the force with bloodcurdling howls, only to be cut down row after row by relentless gunfire. Trampling over the bodies of their fallen comrades, the subsequent waves pressed on until they finally crashed against the steel battle array.
Suddenly, light flared across every soldier in the phalanx, their strength surging violently. With a thunderous roar in unison, they leveled their weapons and thrust forward! A crimson wave of blood blossomed all around the square, cutting down nearly every Shaman warrior in the vanguard!
Wei Yuan hovered in the air above. He did not strike directly, but instead marshaled the military qi, orchestrating the legion's rhythmic thrusts and slashes. From afar, Great Shamans continuously cast spells, but Wei Yuan neutralized most of them one by one. Bolstered by the vast military qi, he held his ground against over a dozen Great Shamans all by himself, without yielding an inch.
Blood showered continuously around the phalanx as the pile of Shaman corpses grew higher. Whenever a soldier fell, another silently stepped up from the rear rank to take his place.
Though besieged by enemies outnumbering them seven- to eightfold, this legion of a mere ten thousand proved an unyielding bastion. The Shamans charged in wave after wave only to collapse into row upon row of corpses, unable to make the slightest dent in the formation.
A Shaman warrior at the Dao Foundation stage charged the line, his blade chopping straight into a soldier's helmet. The immense force nearly sheared helmet and skull in two!
Yet in the blink of an eye, several bayonets pierced him through. One could not see the expressions hidden behind the surrounding soldiers' steel visors; they simply withdrew their weapons in silence, thrust again, withdrew, and thrust once more, until the Dao Foundation Shaman noble was perforated like a sieve.
With no time to use their fire guns, this Qingming force engaged the Shamans in the most primal form of bloody hand-to-hand combat!
Before long, a ring of Shaman corpses was piled around the iron square. Their military qi remained majestic, solemn, and unshakeable, whereas the military qi of the besieging Shamans began to fracture and fray.
Seeing that the moment had arrived, Wei Yuan immediately gave the order, and the four ten-thousand-strong steel legions waiting in reserve surged forward simultaneously. By this time, the vanguard elites of the Shaman army were concentrated on besieging the Longxiang Legion led by Wei Yuan, leaving the Shamans opposing the subsequent four heavy-armored legions far more sparse.
Merely by clearing their path with a creeping barrage, they tore open a long stretch of the enemy line and drove a wedge deep into the Shaman host.
The frontline Shaman commander had never anticipated that the humans would dare leave their pillboxes to fight in the open field. Watching nearly two hundred thousand warriors besiege the enemy's fifty thousand heavy-armored troops only to suffer catastrophic losses, entirely unable to halt the advance of Qingming's heavy-armored legions, he had no choice but to pull back some of the forces attacking the bunker line while committing all the reserves from his center army.
Seeing that the Shamans had committed their final reserves, Wei Yuan issued another command. War drums thundered, and yet more heavy-armored legions marched onto the battlefield!
No longer holding its defensive stance, the Longxiang Legion under Wei Yuan's personal command began its forward advance.
The soldiers moved with absolute precision: thrust, step forward; thrust, step forward!
Rows of Shamans turned into corpses, only to be trampled into paste beneath heavy steel boots. In this manner, the Longxiang Legion advanced against several times their number. Every step forward was paved with the bodies of the Shaman host.
The Shamans' military qi deteriorated rapidly, scattering to the point of collapse. The Great Shamans commanding the front fell into despair, casting anxious glances toward their center army. They could only order their subordinates to mount a desperate defense; none dared flank around, for behind the Longxiang Army marched a full one hundred thousand heavy-armored troops.
At last, the horns of retreat sounded. Breathing a collective sigh of relief, the Great Shamans pulled back at once. In the blink of an eye, the retreat devolved into a rout. Fortunately for them, the human troops were all heavy-armored legions and could not give chase.
The battle had raged for a full two hours since midnight, yet dawn remained far off. Never before had Shaman morale broken so early.
Wei Yuan ordered the Longxiang Army to halt in place, while two other ten-thousand-strong heavy-armored legions bypassed them to take up the pursuit. One of these legions drove directly behind the Shamans in the bunker sector, seemingly intent on wiping out that enemy force entirely.
However, the moment they stepped beyond the Qingming Domain and their military qi weakened without the reinforcement of the domain's power, a cold snort echoed from the sky: "Seeking death!"
Immediately, a dark red cloud of blood descended over the legion. A patter of blood rain drifted down. Many soldiers drenched by the blood rain collapsed silently, dying on the spot. Even more soldiers radiated faint azure light, tenaciously resisting the downpour. Yet the azure glow could not hold out for long; the moment it was extinguished by the rain, the soldier perished.
A Nether Shaman had intervened!
Wei Yuan's eyes darkened as he gazed up toward the sky.
Beyond the clouds and heavens, an exceedingly enraged roar suddenly reverberated: "The humans truly are despicable!!"
Before the echoes of the roar could fade, it receded into the distance, and the blood cloud above the legion dissipated.
A cold sneer touched the corners of Wei Yuan's lips. When this legion marched out, he had bestowed a strand of azure qi upon every single soldier. The Nether Shaman had slaughtered mortals bearing human karmic luck—the karmic debt he reaped was more than tenfold!
Having slain three thousand individuals blessed by karmic luck in one stroke, that Nether Shaman was effectively crippled for a considerable time to come.
Wei Yuan currently held a hundred thousand strands of azure qi in hand. He would see which other reckless Nether Shaman dared to strike directly against his soldiers.
Chapter 544