Several days passed.
After the initial chaos and panic, Black Blood Stockade, relying on its deep foundations, gradually adapted to the rhythm of the beast tide's assault.
The contraction of the defensive lines was exceedingly decisive.
Those outer resource points that lay remote and held lesser value were discarded without the slightest mercy; while the core ore veins, herb gardens, and strategic mountain passes were held fast like nails driven into the earth.
Vast numbers of Rank 1 and Rank 2 Gu Masters were broken up and reorganized into five-man squads, tirelessly mopping up those low-rank beast herds that had lost all reason within the buffer zones;
while Lin Mu and the other Rank 3 clan elders frequently maneuvered and raced at high speed between the various defensive lines — wherever a crisis of Hundred Beast King or Thousand Beast King caliber emerged, a clan elder would descend to suppress it.
Although familiar faces fell to the beast tide every single day, and outer positions were continually filled level with the corpses of savage beasts and overrun, what was unbelievable was that this ferocious first wave of the beast tide had actually, truly been endured and held back by Black Blood Stockade!
Black Blood Stockade, the great deliberation hall.
A heavy stench of blood mingled with the aura of Gu worms lingered within the hall, refusing to disperse.
Bloodstained battle reports were carried in without pause by scouts, like falling snow.
Several clan elders whose nerves had been drawn taut for days on end, the whites of their eyes veined with red, at last found their tightly knit brows easing slightly after hearing the latest defensive line summary — some of them even letting out an exceedingly obvious long breath of relief.
"It seems that although this beast tide's scale is horrifying, no absolute calamity on the level of a Myriad Beast King has appeared."
A clan elder in charge of logistics wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, a trace of survivor's relief in his tone.
"So long as the beast tide holds at its current intensity, with our present contracted deployment and the resilience of our lines, if everyone grits their teeth, it's not impossible that we hold this thing!"
The moment these words were out, no small number in the hall nodded in agreement, their taut nerves finally granted a moment to breathe.
However, upon the rock-hard, cold face of the Rank 4 Patriarch Lin Cang, seated in the head position, not so much as a sliver of ease surfaced.
His gaze fell upon the map on the table, and finally came to rest on the position of the White Bone Alliance.
For he understood very well: the true, fatal killing intent had never been the beast tide.
...
White Bone Alliance, deep within the main base.
The patriarchs of the various minor stockades within the alliance had once again been summoned here.
Unlike the fervor and clamor of the war's early days, the atmosphere within the hall at this moment was oppressive, so heavy it seemed it might drip water.
"These are the latest developments at the front."
Standing before the sand table, Li Huang, young master of White Bone, reported with an ashen face:
"Although Black Blood Stockade has taken no light losses under the beast tide's assault, that old scoundrel Lin Cang contracted his lines with exceeding decisiveness. Their defenses now are like an iron barrel — they… have not collapsed rapidly as we anticipated."
The report ended, and the hall fell into dead silence.
The patriarchs exchanged glances, and the expressions on their faces held not the greed of before, but instead a marked measure of hesitation and retreat.
In their original calculations, they were to wait for the great fire of the beast tide to burn Black Blood Stockade utterly to ash, to drain Black Blood Stockade's foundations dry, and then they would comfortably stroll over to pluck the peaches and sweep the battlefield.
But now, this bone seemed harder than they had imagined.
"Alliance Master Li…"
Finally, one stockade patriarch could no longer bear the oppressive atmosphere and, working up his nerve, forced himself to speak:
"We've all seen the power of this beast tide. Once those animals go mad, they don't recognize kin from stranger, they can't tell friend from foe!"
"If we press our main force over there now and run headlong into those rampaging herds, those animals won't be clearing the road for us!"
These words instantly struck a powerful chord with the other patriarchs present.
"Indeed, Brother Li, why should we go wading into this muddy water?"
"In my view… why not wait a few more days? Let those animals grind down Black Blood Stockade's foundations a while longer for us. Once they've truly spent their last arrow and grain, it won't be too late for us to move!"
One after another they chimed in and echoed each other; put plainly, none of them was willing to serve as the cannon fodder filling the pit at such a critical juncture.
"Wait?"
Li Mang, seated in the head position, at last slowly rose to his feet.
Upon that aged face, shaped like a withered skeleton, a chillingly cold smile suddenly stretched out.
He did not lean upon that scepter; instead, he clasped his hands behind his back, and those eyes, like will-o'-the-wisps of the netherworld, swept over every single person present, exceedingly sinister, bit by bit.
"Wait for Lin Cang to fully stabilize this wave of the beast tide and catch his breath?"
Li Mang's voice was hoarse, carrying a cruelty that brooked no dispute:
"Or is it that you want to wait for him to free his hands entirely, so he can come knock open your stockade gates one household at a time, and settle accounts with all of you after the harvest?!"
These words fell like a heavy hammer, smashing hard into everyone's heart, and the hall instantly fell silent as cicadas in winter once more, no one daring to meet his gaze.
The cold smile at the corner of Li Mang's mouth grew all the thicker; he left these people no path of retreat whatsoever:
"Gentlemen, do not forget."
"That Poison Vow Gu, from back then."
Hsss—!
Hearing that name, several patriarchs who had been clamoring only moments ago went ghastly pale in an instant, a dense layer of cold sweat seeping from their foreheads at once.
Li Mang tore away his disguise completely:
"The war has already been fought to this point. The beast tide, too, was drawn over by our own hands."
"And now that the target has proven thorny, you want to pull out and watch the show?"
"Too late!"
Faced with this naked threat, everyone clamped their mouths shut tight, no longer daring so much as half a word of rebuttal.
But in the depths of their flickering, unsteady eyes, each of them was madly running their own private calculations.
Some were secretly working out how to hide their own direct bloodline descendants at the rear when the charge came; some were pondering how to make the men of other stockades draw the beasts' fire first; there were even those already considering how, should the situation turn ill, they might abandon their foundations and flee under cover of night.
How could the thoughts of such clay chickens and pottery dogs be hidden from Li Mang's eyes?
Yet Li Mang did not fly into a rage over these men's cowardice and selfishness.
On the contrary.
He suddenly swept his sleeve with exceeding force, producing a crisp snap like tearing silk.
"Rest easy."
Li Mang's voice echoed through the empty hall, carrying a resolve to burn the boats — a madness so absolute it made men shiver:
"This battle—"
"I will be the first blade to cut the road open. My White Bone Stockade takes the vanguard!"
What?!
The moment these words were out, the entire hall was stunned.
Every man raised his head in disbelief, staring at Li Mang as though looking at a madman.
The White Bone patriarch, who loved nothing more than scheming from behind the curtain, today intended to volunteer as cannon fodder, to take the vanguard?!
Paying no heed to the shock of the assembly, Li Mang slowly extended that great hand, withered as kindling, and seized fast the Bone Spine Scepter beside him, which exuded an ancient aura.
In those aged, deep-sunken eyes, a sharp light now burst forth that chilled men to the bone.
"As for Lin Cang…"
Li Mang spoke word by word, his voice carrying extreme confidence and bloodthirst. "This old man will deal with him personally."
At this, the hall truly and utterly fell dead silent.
Everyone drew in a sharp breath, monstrous waves surging in their hearts.
Every man knew that Lin Cang was already a solid, undeniable Rank 4 powerhouse. And Li Mang, on the surface, was no more than Rank 3 peak stage!
Challenging across a major realm?
Some were shocked and uncertain; some even wondered whether Li Mang had gone mad.
But Li Mang had no intention whatsoever of explaining.
He merely slowly raised his head, his gaze seeming to pierce through the hall's vaulted dome to gaze upon that firmament shrouded in the fires of war and the beast tide:
"The beast tide has already torn open Black Blood Stockade's hardest breach for us."
"If not now for the desperate gamble—"
"then when?!"
Dong!
The Bone Spine Scepter slammed down against the bluestone floor, giving off a crash of utmost heavy dullness.
"Pass down my order!"
Li Mang howled toward the heavens. "This battle — to the death, without cease!"
...
The dull, mournful sound of White Bone horns was at last scattered by the cold wind among the Southern Border's mountain ranges.
This earth-shaking prelude to war seemed almost ready to overturn the entire firmament.
However.
When this murderous wave of sound crossed layer upon layer of mountain ridge and blew into that lawless land hidden within an underground rift at the fringe of Black Wind Ridge, all that remained was a suffocating dead silence.
Grey Street.
Though the beast tide outside had not yet truly spread this far, the successive great battles had long since let the keenest-nosed vagrants here catch the scent of annihilation.
Great numbers of Demonic Path rogue cultivators and desperate men, ever drawn to profit and away from harm, had long since packed their valuables overnight and fled ahead of time from this land of strife, soon to become scorched earth.
That underground black market, once a place of choking smoke and squalor, now had its doors and windows sealed tight.
Stall after stall stood empty, like a ghost town.
Only the cold, dank mountain wind, sweeping up a few dry leaves and pieces of refuse scattered on the ground, blew slowly and desolately down the middle of the empty street.
And in the least conspicuous corner of Grey Street's deepest reaches, Old Ma's ramshackle sundry shop, with its hanging wind-dried organs, still stubbornly kept that wooden door half-ajar.
Pff… pff…
Old Ma had dragged out a small folding stool and sat somewhat hunched at the threshold.
In his hand he held that dry tobacco pipe he had used for decades, taking a puff now and then, exhaling thick white smoke.
That old face, full of creases, was written all over with utter boredom and a trace of loneliness he could not quite conceal.
After a good while, he knocked out the pipe bowl, looked at the street beyond his door — stagnant as dead water — and could not help cursing with a laugh:
"That rotten brat Lin Mu…"
"A Demonic Path seedling through and through. When calamity comes, each flies his own way. Look at the state of things, and not even a ghost's shadow of him — he's probably long since rolled up his bedding and bolted."
Old Ma sighed.
He knew that this time, Grey Street truly could not be lived in any longer.
Somewhat listlessly, he stood up, patted the dust from his clothes, and was about to turn around to shut that half-open shop door completely, and go find himself a way out as well.
However.
Just as his hand touched the rough edge of the wooden door.
Creeeak—
An exceedingly languid, bone-meltingly sultry, familiar voice, without the slightest warning, came drifting leisurely in from the hazy grey mist outside the shop.
"Old Ma."
"In such a hurry to close up… did you miss me?"