Chapter 578: The Great Melee
Before the master on the other noose could even raise his hand, he was pierced through the chest by three arrows and fell down with a scream.
Wang Wu sheathed his bow and glanced at the falling figure: "Such strong qi, I almost couldn't pierce through it."
Arrow Eye squinted, nocked another armor-piercing heavy arrow, charged it up and fired, dealing 150% attack damage and taking away most of the health of another innate master.
As soon as the armor-piercing arrow left the bowstring, he flipped his wrist and quickly switched to a regular arrow, using two arrows in quick succession to block the opponent's retreat.
Seeing this, Wang Wu immediately followed up with two more blows, accurately ending the life of that innate master.
Arrow Eye shook his slightly sore fingers, then pulled another ordinary arrow from the quiver, a slight smile playing on his lips.
"Keep going, don't give them a chance to breathe."
However, under the cover of the innate masters, thousands of demonic sect disciples on the nooses had successively rushed to the edge of the city wall.
The disciples at the forefront of the Innate Inner Sect leaped down and onto the city wall, where they were greeted by 243 Third-Rank Awakened Ones who had been waiting there, as well as a large number of elite Qin soldiers wielding bronze swords and shields.
Although the innate masters are powerful, they still need three people to gang up on one person to barely avoid defeat when facing a third-stage awakened one. The city wall instantly turned into the most brutal meat grinder.
The disciples followed closely behind, leaping up the city wall along the noose, and engaged in fierce fighting with the elite Qin garrison soldiers and Qin warriors.
A disciple of the Demonic Sect, who had just climbed over the battlements, hadn't even gotten his footing when a heavy shield came hurtling towards him with a whooshing sound.
His fist slammed into the shield, producing a dull metallic boom that sent a shiver down his arm.
Behind the shield, a sharp bronze sword silently pierced out from below the edge of the shield and plunged into his abdomen with a "thud".
His body jerked forward, his pupils contracted sharply, and before he could even scream, another soldier struck him from the side with a sword, pinning him to the edge of the battlement.
"Push!" The shield-wielding soldier roared, thrusting his shield forward and knocking the disciple off the city wall.
Beside him, another disciple with a ferocious expression, his five fingers bent into claws, the tips of his fingers covered in a layer of dark red blood light, fiercely grabbed at the shoulder of a soldier.
With a "ripping" sound, five gashes were torn open in the shoulder armor, blood splattered, and a strange dark red color quickly appeared at the wounds, reducing the healing effect by 20%.
The soldier grunted, but his feet didn't budge.
Instead of looking at the wound, he took a step forward, slamming his shield into the other's outstretched arm, knocking away the claw that was about to grab a second time.
Taking advantage of the opponent's momentary sway, he took a diagonal step, swung his shield horizontally, and cut into the gap between the opponent and his comrade, sealing the previously torn formation gap again.
"Is that all the strength you have?" He gritted his teeth and swept his sword out from under the shield, forcing his opponent to take two steps back.
Further away, three innate masters were besieging a third-stage awakened individual from the Beacon Fire Territory.
One person attacked from the front with a heavy staff, each strike blocked by the Awakened One's longsword.
Another person attempted to cut into the defensive gap from the flank using claw techniques, but was swept away by the Awakened One's sword.
The third person, seizing the opportunity, lunged forward and thrust in the instant the gap between the two widened, aiming straight for the face with his Blood Fist.
The awakened one tilted his head, and the finger force grazed past his ear, scorching a black pit in the wall behind him.
Using the momentum of his sidestep, he smoothly drew a semi-circle with his weapon, forcing the innate master to his side back two steps.
The three-man encirclement was finally breached, creating a brief gap.
Despite being suppressed by three people, the Awakened One did not retreat. The sword light constantly adjusted its direction in the narrow space, and each counterattack forced at least one person back.
Just as the battle raged fiercely on the city wall, the 42-meter-high siege ladder, pushed by the servants, was finally erected on the wall.
The massive siege ladder slammed heavily against the battlements, its top striking the wall with a dull thud.
The servant disciples climbed up the cloud ladder like ants, letting out low growls like wild beasts, their eyes bloodshot, using all four limbs to climb desperately.
Smash it!
The Qin soldiers on the city wall roared and hurled heavy stones and logs down the ladders.
Amid screams, countless handymen disciples were smashed to pieces, their bones broken and their tendons snapped, as they were sent flying through the air.
But many more menial disciples continued to climb up, stepping over the corpses of their companions, completely ignoring the casualties.
Finally, some of the handyman disciples climbed onto the city wall.
The moment his feet touched the ground, he swept his long staff out horizontally. The first sweeping strike, accompanied by a whooshing sound, struck the elite soldier's calf, taking away 110 health points.
The garrison soldier immediately retaliated with his bronze sword, striking the servant disciple on the shoulder and dealing 144 points of damage.
The servant disciple turned pale with pain, took a step back to dodge the second sword, raised his staff high above his head, and used the second strike, a full-body slam, to smash into the soldier's shoulder joint.
The soldier raised his shield to block, and the club blasted a white mark on the shield, bouncing half a foot up.
The handyman disciple's hands went numb, but he used the force of the stick's rebound to turn half a circle, and suddenly launched the third move, the stabbing stick, the tip of the stick like a snake's tongue, straight for the opponent's heart.
The soldier sidestepped, avoiding a fatal blow, but the tip of the club still struck the connection between his left shoulder and breastplate, causing over 113 points of damage.
"Get down," the soldier muttered.
The shield slammed forward, pushing the servant disciple backward a step, then quickly followed up with a sword strike, the blade piercing the opponent's exposed ribs and forcing him back.
The two sides continued to engage in a stalemate on the city walls.
Each effective attack from a lowly disciple can deal 110 to 115 damage, while a single sword strike from an elite garrison soldier can deal around 140 damage.
The damage difference between the two sides was not significant, but the garrison soldier had a full 400 more health points than the servant disciple, and also had a 25% block rate bonus.
This means that a servant disciple would need more than a dozen blows to kill a soldier, while a soldier could end a servant disciple's life with just seven or eight sword strikes.
Such exchanges continued throughout the city walls, with blood staining every brick.
A Qin warrior attacked from the side, sweeping his halberd and forcing back two servant disciples who had just climbed onto the battlements.
The two men were still using their broken-bone club technique to parry as they retreated, but the continuous thrusts of the halberd came too fast. One of them was hit in the shoulder by the halberd and fell off the city wall with a muffled groan.
Looking around, arrows rained down, flames soared into the sky, and blood mist filled the air; the entire section of the city wall had been swallowed up by the shouts of battle.