Chapter 52: Narrow Paths for Enemies
The beastmen rushed to battle in a disorganized manner, and even worse, George and Eve Frostleaf joined forces to block the gates, fighting against the last two bull-headed men. Those inside couldn’t get out, and those outside couldn’t get support, being caught in a pincer attack.
The Paladin army dispersed the beastmen’s formation with just one charge, slicing the beastmen into small groups. Even among the beastmen, the stronger and more intelligent horned beasts fell one by one under the assault of five or six men.
With the last two bull-headed men down, the scales of victory quickly tipped in favor of humanity.
Jima stood on the chest of a bull-headed man, holding a spear, looking left and right. She spotted a horned beast wielding two large machetes, deflecting her spear thrusts and using its armor and tough body to withstand her spear strikes. It charged into the battle line, hacking at the shield wall with its blades.
The Paladin soldiers raised their shields to block while stabbing at its legs, but the horned beast endured the damage, kicking a soldier down. The formation opened up a gap, and seeing this, the horned beast felt elated, just as it was about to rush in to take down a few as backup.
Jima tightened her grip on the spear and thrust it forcefully into its unprotected flank, causing the horned beast to hesitate. Several longswords jabbed at its unarmored areas. It desperately twisted its head, its sheep-like eyes glaring red with unwillingness, reflecting Jima’s pure face.
The horned beast uttered two words: “Despicable…”
Jima smiled at it and twisted the spear hard.
The horned beast fell, and Jima stepped on its back to pull the spear out, smiling at the soldiers who looked at her, saying, “No need to thank me.”
An arrow flew through the air from behind.
Jima turned around just in time to see an arrow, which should have hit her forehead, veer off and strike a soldier’s shield.
The shooter was a lowly horned beast. Unable to bear Jima’s despicable ambush, it attempted to shoot another arrow after missing its first shot.
Jima beckoned to the lowly horned beast with her finger, smiling, “Come down and be my friend.”
The lowly horned beast looked bewildered, dropped its bow, and jumped down from the wooden wall, falling to the ground.
“How wicked, actually using a sneak attack.” Jima stepped forward, pointing at the lowly horned beast, instructing the soldiers behind her, “Help me kill this despicable little thing.”
The soldiers swarmed forward, and several spears pierced the lowly horned beast decisively.
The horned beasts on the wooden wall fell like chaff before a scythe. George appeared atop the wooden wall, shouting:
“Warriors! Charge with me! Watch out for arrows!”
The sergeant major shouted, “First squad! First squad! Move in!”
A squad of ten soldiers raised shields, stepping over the carcasses of the beastmen as they charged toward the gates.
“Pretty good discipline,” Jima praised, spreading her wings. Utilizing her simulation ability, she flapped her wings and soared over the wooden wall.
The clever horned beast, which had exposed Jima’s ruse, had long since abandoned the wooden wall defenses, leaving only the lowly horned beasts that served as cannon fodder.
It regrouped the horned beasts, blocking the path to high ground with stones, where the walls stood full of lowly horned archers, clearly prepared to resist stubbornly.
Jima nimbly dodged a few arrows fired at her from below, shouting to George, “Not much time left, hurry up!”
George wasted no time, leaping up to the high ground, followed closely by Eve Frostleaf, who charged into the crowd of archers with a furious onslaught.
Jima turned invisible in mid-air, conserving her magical power without moving. Timing her attack, she saw the clever horned beast isolated and immediately swooped down, thrusting her spear viciously into its back. The clever horned beast fell to the ground, and Jima swiftly extracted the spear, landing in front of it. Before it could utter a final word, she thrust the spear into its neck, flipping its face over, revealing its goat-like eyes filled with hatred staring at Jima.
“The smarter beasts die fastest,” Jima smiled, driving the spear deeper, and looking up to see George rushing over, intending to behead her, she revealed a pure smile, “Another head is mine.”
George’s gaze lingered on Jima’s spear for a moment, and the succubus Jima quickly wiped it off, shaking off the blood.
He might have just realized how much she enjoyed killing… which was fine.
Unbothered, Jima set her sights on an unfortunate lowly horned beast, unable to resist licking her lips, charging at it to let the blood flow.
George said nothing, turning to clear a path for Jima.
The remainder of the battle held no suspense. The remaining hundred or so beastmen on the high ground were a disorganized lot. Normally, if they fought to the end with discipline, they might have held off the three extraordinary individuals for a while. But with their leader slain and the main army approaching, they immediately fell into chaos, fleeing like chickens, one after another falling victim.
Half an hour later, as the dust settled, fewer than ten beastmen escaped over the walls, while all the others were slain. After clearing the battlefield and executing all the wounded beastmen, the sergeant major counted the numbers and surprisingly found that not a single soldier had died, although over a dozen had been injured. Under divine healing, these injuries weren’t a significant issue.
The morale of the army soared.
However, Jima didn’t care about this. The first thing she did was search for something in the divination that could promote her.
Was it on the shaman of the beastmen?
She asked her silver coin.
The coin spun in mid-air, showing “yes” face up.
Jima completely ignored the smell of burnt flesh, pulling Li Anxi Cat to help her rummage through the belongings of the beastmen shaman.
“What a bunch of nonsense? A tentacle staff? Not this.” Jima discarded the tentacle staff and pulled out a roll of human skin parchment. Excitedly, she unfolded it. The text on it was filled with magical power, making her eyes feel uncomfortable. Glancing over briefly, she noted: “Human sacrifice?”
The writing was in the demon language, which Jima could understand. The only thing that hindered her comprehension of the ritual was the author’s exasperating expressiveness. Luckily, with her rich experience, she figured out its general meaning and gradually understood its function.
“By stacking flesh and blood, forming a flesh tree, using the flesh tree to change the form of life anew?”
“…Making humans grow horns? Wait, isn’t that turning into beastmen?”
Nearby, Li Anxi Cat dug out a half-burned letter from the charred corpses, meowing hurriedly.
Jima took the letter. It was written beautifully in flowing script, all in demon language—beastmen lacked their own script.
Due to the letter being burned with several holes, some sections were missing.
“…Children, develop some humans into our kin, be gentle with them. Even if they are unwilling to participate, let them go. Those despicable and vile humans will educate our kin with horns…”
The final signature was: Mother of All Beasts.
“Beastmen actually want to eat humans and recruit them?” Jima shook her head, “What a failure, learning everything from demons.”
She didn’t care, discarding the letter and continuing to ponder the nonsensical human skin parchment, whose obscure knowledge gradually gave her a moment of enlightenment, shaping a new method for purifying extraordinary substances from green dragons in her mind.
…
…
Meanwhile.
A middle-aged woman, as if protecting her son, held onto a horned child, whose face bore a scratch, inflicted by a soldier who had charged at him while cleaning the battlefield.
Had the middle-aged woman not quickly pulled the horned child away, the injury on his face would likely have been much worse.
“You!” The middle-aged woman tightened her hold on the horned child, pointing at the Paladin soldier and shouting, “You are committing murder!”
“Yes, I’m sorry,” the Paladin soldier quickly put down his sword, saying, “It’s too dark, I didn’t see.”
“Nonsense! He’s so short, how could you possibly misjudge?”
“It was dark, I only saw a pair of horns. How would I know if it was a lowly horned beast?”
“I will report to Lord George and have you hanged.”
“I really didn’t mean to, I’m sorry.”
“We’re going to seek justice from Lord George.”
The middle-aged woman’s face flushed with anger as she pulled the horned child along, but the child tugged at her clothes, shaking his head, “Forget it.”
“What do you mean forget it? He almost killed you this time, what about next time?”
The horned child shook his head: “If he gets hanged, everyone will hate me more.”
“Poor child.”
The middle-aged woman shook her head.
“I’m sorry,” the Paladin soldier bowed to the horned child.
The horned child nodded, and the Paladin soldier, feeling relieved, quickly turned and left, muttering, “Why does it seem like that woman sees him as her own son?”
The horned child looked at the middle-aged woman, somewhat overwhelmed: “Thank you.”
For the first time, he felt maternal love from a woman.
The middle-aged woman squatted down, helping him tidy his hair: “It’s okay.”
“Just don’t do this again next time,” the horned child said, “You’re also relying on the army, it’s not favorable to be seen as an unwanted guest.”
“It’s alright, I told you, you are like my child.” The middle-aged woman smiled lovingly, “Let me look at you a little longer.”
The horned child’s heart trembled, and he asked for some reason, “Will you… will you abandon your child?”
The middle-aged woman suddenly hugged the horned child tightly: “Never!”
…
…
“Jima, Jima. Clap!”
George clapped his hands loudly next to Jima’s ear.
Startled, Jima jumped up, seeing it was George, and said, “You scared me to death! What’s the matter?”
“Have you come up with any ideas?”
“Almost, don’t disturb me again. You should study the Mother of All Beasts’ schemes properly.” Saying this, Jima, like someone with a late-stage obsession with their mobile phone, turned her eyes back to the human skin parchment in her hands.
“Discussion is over, you’ve been looking for almost an hour.” George said, “Now I need you for something.”
“I’m busy now.” Jima focused on the human skin parchment, “Just right, I need a lot of fresh corpses. Really lucky, perhaps after this promotion, I’ll be able to be taller, bigger, and stronger.”
George forcibly took the human skin parchment from Jima, saying, “This is important.”
“Give it back!” Jima reached for it, but unfortunately, George held it high, pressing one hand on Jima’s head.
Jima gave up trying to recover the parchment, placing her hands on her hips: “Damn it, wait until I grow up and get taller, let’s see if you still bully me.”
“You need to tell fortunes on the beastmen’s combat movements.”
“Is there bad news?”
“No.”
“Why the hurry?” Jima said, “It’s not something you can solve just by flipping a coin. It requires a major divination.”
“I don’t trust, better safe than sorry.”
“Fine, I’ll hurry up, just as long as you don’t find me disgusting.” Jima said, “Bring a few intact beastmen corpses over for me to use in the divination.”
The three bull-headed corpses that wouldn’t close their eyes became the divination materials.
Jima used a butcher’s knife to cut open their bellies, probing inside with a spear, observing the shape of the entrails. After aligning the entrails together, she lit a candle and worked for about half an hour.
Finally, she looked up at George and said:
“One good news, one bad news.”
“Good news?”
“The divination was a great success.”
“Bad news?”
“The beastmen’s combat brigade might reach here in about five hours.” Jima said, “If we take off now, the army won’t be able to shake them off.”
“Why so fast?”
“Bad luck.” Jima speculated, “As you retreated, they just happened to choose this direction to pursue. The beastmen shaman probably sent out raven messengers to seek reinforcements.”
