Chapter 549: Attack
[V6C79 – Sorrow of a Silent Parting]
At this moment, the Evernight main camp was covered in raging flames, and their battle line was shrinking rapidly toward the center. The units charging at the foremost were only a couple hundred meters away from the majestic castle. Some of the long-range snipers could already hit the castle at this range.
Qianye was already closing in on the castle as he led the Zhao clan vanguard battalion in a rapid charge. The assault along the way was exceptionally smooth and proceeded without so much as a decent trace of resistance. But Qianye saw at least three imperial units along the way that had clearly gone through arduous battles—fallen soldiers were strewn across the ground and the survivors, completely exhausted.
Coincidence or otherwise, the squads charging in front of Qianye happened to lose their fighting capacity just below the castle.
With no time to linger, Qianye kept on marching until he was three hundred meters from the castle. Only then did he command his soldiers to assume combat positions and prepare for the assault.
All important enemy sites were marked clearly on the military orders issued to individual commanders. Among them, the castle where the great dark monarchs were stationed served as the command center of the entire Evernight camp. A complete victory would be achieved only after taking this fort.
A strong urge to charge out emerged in Qianye’s heart as he gazed at the abysmal castle and the dark mist surrounding it. He was just about to step forward when he recalled the thousands of soldiers behind him. Without the support of someone like him, the vanguard soldiers of the two battalions would be slaughtered should they encounter an Evernight expert. The Evernight army had suffered grave casualties up to this point, so all those who had survived were inevitably powerful experts.
Qianye decided to observe once more and wait for a good opportunity. It was at this time that another thousand-man squad charged out from the side. The soldiers had Zhang clan insignias on their uniforms, and their leader was the champion whom Qianye had saved during the previous battle.
The Zhang clan general was delighted upon seeing Qianye. He arrived beside Qianye under cover of the landscape and said, “What a coincidence, I have never expected to run into you here! I didn’t get the chance to thank you properly back then, my name is Zhang Shiduo.”
“I’m Qianye.” Qianye shook the man’s hand.
Zhang Shiduo shot a glance at the castle standing against the night sky. “This place won’t be easy to attack. Shall we go together?”
“Okay.”
Zhang Shiduo was just about to speak when a sudden whistling sound emerged from up front. The bullet almost grazed past his scalp after he had lowered his head. Zhang Shiduo jumped up halfway and fired a burst of bullets toward the wall, whereupon a sharpshooter fell down with a miserable cry.
The man crouched down once more and spewed out a series of curses before resuming their detailed discussion of the assault.
“Brother Qianye, it looks like the brothers under your command are proficient in close quarter combat. I have more snipers in my group. How about this? We’ll provide cover fire first while you go and take down that position over there. Then, my men will scale the building. See that tower over there? As long as I can get there, I’ll be able to suppress a good portion of the black bastards in the castle.”
Zhang Shiduo was nearly forty and possessed enough combat experience to form a solid plan in the blink of an eye. He was a rank-twelve champion proficient in mid-range sniping and could use an assault rifle to exert the effectiveness of a heavy cannon. If he were allowed to reach a high vantage point, it would surely affect the entire battlefield.
Qianye shot a glance at the northwestern sentry tower and, with his True Sight, saw a dark shadowy mass. Apparently, it was an extraordinary expert.
Qianye pondered for a while and said, “There’s an expert in the sentry tower, but it doesn’t matter. I’ll go and finish him.”
“Expert?” Zhang Shiduo opened up an ammo box, produced three Extreme Yang Bullets, and loaded all of them into his assault rifle. He said while patting the gun, “No need to risk your life, just force him out. He can’t dodge my bullets within a hundred meters.”
Qianye glanced at the assault rifle and couldn’t help but feel a bit pained. “Three Extreme Yang Bullets? Isn’t that too wasteful? It’s just a third-rank count.”
Zhang Shiduo laughed heartily. “Brother, you’re still young. Bullets are there for one’s use, it’ll be a true waste if you die without shooting them.” With that, he patted Qianye hard on the back and said, “Remember, draw him out. Don’t risk your life.”
Qianye smiled.
At this point, some other imperial squads were arriving little by little with some choosing to circle around the castle instead. Fierce cannon fire had broken out on the eastern side of the fortress. A certain squad had apparently started fighting without waiting for all members to arrive, eager for contributions.
Qianye listened intently to the sounds of battle.
Zhang Shiduo was also paying attention. “What a fierce battle. They’ve charged onto the walls just like that!”
The timbre of the origin guns was especially clear in Qianye’s ears, so much so that they had suppressed all the other sounds on the battlefield, including the heavy artillery fire. Zhang Shiduo, as a rank-twelve champion, couldn’t discern the sound produced by void origin power. Qianye, on the other hand, was especially sensitive to it after absorbing Sky Demon’s embers and the ancient essence fragment.
Someone capable of using void origin power in a casual firefight was apparently no ordinary expert. But the worst part was that they were all users of darkness origin power, and needless to say, they were experts from the Evernight side.
Qianye sighed. “They’re about to lose.”
Zhang Shiduo was startled. “Lose? How can it be so fast?”
His words hadn’t even ended when the sounds of fighting died down on the other side of the castle. Apparently, the soldiers who had climbed up onto the walls had encountered terrible fates. A mysterious atmosphere descended on the battlefield as the stirring imperial squads became cautious.
Killing intent flashed in Qianye’s eyes. He was just about to stand up when Zhang Shiduo grabbed ahold of him. The latter shook his head and said, “Wait for fire-support.”
“Fire-support?” Qianye had never experienced a large scale battle before, but he decided to wait a while since Zhang Shiduo had said so.
Before long, the loud whistle of heavy cannon shells broke the silence around the castle. Continuous explosions echoed in the sky as the shells were intercepted and ignited mid-air.
The imperial cannons didn’t stop, however, just because of this minor setback. They fired with even greater ferocity, and toward the end, hundreds of them even began firing in a volley. It seemed the artillery squads had moved their short-range cannons over to be able to muster such a bombardment.
Explosions filled the air as numerous airships arrived over the castle for an aerial bombardment. It was at this time that a network of fire appeared in the sky and flew past one of the airships at great speed.
That airship spat out tongues of flame, and very soon, it ignited into a ball of fire which fell slowly toward the ground. Several burning men jumped down from the airship. Their sharp screams echoed through the skies but quickly reached abrupt ends.
The airship’s wreckage crashed head-first to the ground amidst a series of loud explosions. Another net of fire appeared over the castle and shot toward another battleship at unbelievable speeds. This ship met the same fate.
The imperial airships turned back upon seeing the impossible situation, but the fire net appeared once again to ignite the slowest airship in the fleet. Only afterward did it return to silence.
The flaming nets didn’t look like gun or cannon fire. It was likely the secret art deployed by a certain expert. It was exceptionally powerful, and even a battle airship couldn’t block a single strike from it. If this flaming net were to descend upon Qianye’s squad, it was quite likely that less than ten people out of the two combined battalions would survive.
This was proof of Zhang Shiduo’s veteran experience. Qianye’s entire force would’ve been wiped out had he attacked rashly just now and ran into that flaming net.
A single attack capable of destroying a battleship’s defenses meant that the user was likely a mighty marquis at least. There was no way to kill such an expert with a swarm of ordinary soldiers. Without a powerful expert to restrict him, that person might be able to retreat calmly after performing a massacre.
Qianye grasped East Peak tightly with a frown on his face. The expert in the castle was indeed powerful, but pack hunting tactics were important on a battlefield. Although Qianye wasn’t his match, he was confident enough to participate in a joint attack.
Zhang Shiduo pulled Qianye back once more. “Don’t be rash, there are experts in the army in charge of dealing with them.”
Qianye suppressed his battle intent and continued waiting.
The imperial heavy cannons were now firing with greater ferocity, almost pouring their wrath into the barrage. The defending army in the castle was clearly beginning to feel some strain. It was at this time that the fiery net appeared once again. It didn’t move but simply froze in the air, protecting half the castle underneath.
The cannon shells would be ignited as soon as they passed through the net. Less than a tenth shot through from the edges, but they were intercepted with relative ease.
Even so, the imperial heavy cannons fired continuously for an entire quarter of an hour in a bid to exhaust that expert’s power. The cannon fire came to a sudden stop just as everyone, including Qianye, was starting to wonder if it would ever end. Soon afterward, the sound of a bugle—one representing the order to launch an all-out attack—reverberated throughout the battlefield.
After hearing the signal to attack, a restless Qianye immediately jumped out from behind cover and made a beeline for the castle like a specter. Zhang Shiduo also rose and fired several tracer rounds from a special handgun. Beams of light struck the sentry tower as well as a number of dark firing points on the wall.
These shots served as a target marker. The Zhang clan warriors immediately opened fire, sending countless streams of fire toward the designated locations with shocking accuracy. Some of those firing points were immediately silenced, while the others were suppressed. Seeing the opportunity, the soldiers of the Zhao clan vanguard battalion charged toward the castle. They didn’t just sprint blindly over but crisscrossed through cover while maintaining heavy firepower.
Qianye rushed for the sentry tower. His target was the hidden expert upon it. Qianye no longer hid his aura after arriving near the castle and locked firmly onto the opponent.
The sentry tower was filled with rolling waves of darkness. The shadowy figure sitting within the darkness opened its amber eyes and muttered in a raspy voice, “A little rank-ten bastard? How bold!”