Chapter 287: The Abyssal Summoners' Onslaught, the Sea of Skeletons

Chapter 287: The Abyssal Summoners' Onslaught, the Sea of Skeletons

A wall of bones emerged on the ground, blocking the path of the escort team.

The bone wall advanced, and countless skeletons leaped from it, brandishing their broken weapons and surging towards the escort team.

Captain Eric, leader of the Elven Guard, raised his hand and ordered the attack. The Elven warriors fired their crossbows in unison, releasing a rain of arrows that shattered the oncoming skeletons.

However, as the bone wall rolled forward, it swallowed the shattered skeletons, incorporating them into its structure.

More skeletons emerged from the wall, continuing their relentless advance towards the Elven Guard.

Three Arcanists from the Elven Guard combined their powers and cast Flame Wall, creating a massive wall of fire that burned the bone wall.

The wall of bones ignited, but this did not stop its relentless advance. Instead, it intensified the flames, and flame skeletons leaped from the wall, setting fire to everything they touched within the escort team.

"Retreat!"

Eric, witnessing the approaching wall of fiery bones, quickly ordered his team to fall back while increasing their rate of fire in an attempt to break through the bone wall.

However, the crossbow bolts had limited effect against the thirty-meter-long, five-meter-high wall of bones.

Eric leaped from his Moonshadow Panther and shouted, swinging his long-handled weapon to create a deep trench in the ground.

The bone wall rolled over the trench, temporarily averting the crisis.

But before he could catch his breath, the bone wall disintegrated into countless skeletons, crawling out of the trench.

One, two, three... thousands upon thousands.

The skeletons emerged from the trench, reassembling into a bone wall and continuing their relentless advance, now closing in from three directions.

If surrounded by such a vast number of skeletons, even with their low combat strength, the escort team of fifty humans and elves would face a formidable threat.

Captain Eric, realizing they couldn't break through, immediately ordered, "Turn back! Retreat from the encirclement of the bone wall!"

The Elven Guard swiftly changed direction to break through the encirclement.

Just then, a roar echoed from the left side of the mountain peak.

A group of bloodline demons with ram heads and goat bodies descended, some running on the ground, others flying in the sky, some phasing into the void, and some releasing oppressive auras that enveloped the entire area.

This group was none other than the Abyssal Summoners, an elite force of bloodline demons.

The summoned bloodline demons were not ordinary; they possessed skills, source energy, and the combat prowess of psionic beings.

As a result, this group of bloodline demons displayed a diverse range of abilities, including invisible assassins, defensive warriors, magical archers, mentalists, and curse casters.

Leading them was a bloodline demon lord, a powerful demon of the lord class.

The bloodline demon lord hovered in midair, spreading his blood-red wings and emitting an overwhelming pressure that crushed all living beings.

In an instant, all the elves and humans felt their heads buzzing, and although their willpower wasn't shattered by this oppressive force, they still experienced immense discomfort, undoubtedly affecting their combat effectiveness.

Captain Eric scanned the group of bloodline demons and was shocked to find that their numbers exceeded sixty, not including the countless skeletons surrounding them.

There was also an unseen force controlling the sea of skeletons.

He felt immense pressure and personally led his team to engage the bloodline demons, brandishing their weapons to hold them back.

The human mystics followed suit, drawing their weapons and facing the bloodline demons.

The battle erupted, with humans, elves, bloodline demons, and the sea of skeletons clashing in a chaotic melee.

The bloodline demon lord, Ugmas, roared skyward and raised his hand, unleashing a half-meter-wide crimson wave of light towards the escort team.

Boom! The crimson wave of light crashed into the escort team, splitting it in half. Wherever the wave passed, elves, humans, and their mounts were scattered.

Demon Lord Ugmas raised his hand again, gathering another wave of crimson light.

Few in the escort team could withstand such an attack from a lord-class demon.

Just then, a horned eagle swooped down from the sky. Fiona shouted, "Ugmas, it's you again! This time, I won't let you escape!"

Fiona leaped from midair, brandishing her lance and charging towards Ugmas.

Ugmas raised his hand, redirecting the crimson wave of light originally aimed at the escort team towards Fiona.

Boom! The lance's strike clashed with the crimson wave, exploding into a circle of intense shockwaves.

The violent explosion caused their eardrums to throb painfully.

Fiona and Demon Lord Ugmas were old adversaries.

They had clashed on the Abyssal Battlefield, proving to be evenly matched foes.

Compared to their previous encounter, Fiona's combat strength had significantly improved, but after a direct clash, she realized that Ugmas's strength had also increased.

The battle raged on, and it was unclear who would emerge victorious.

The fighting intensified, and as the battle continued, the surrounding sea of skeletons grew denser, forming a bone wall that relentlessly advanced towards the escort team. No matter how the escort team attacked, they couldn't stop the relentless tide of skeletons.

The skeletal undead units, devoid of life and fear, continued to reassemble within the bone wall, forming new skeleton troops even as they were shattered by arrows and spells.

Only the dispelling magic of Arcanists could destroy the undead energy binding the skeleton troops.

However, the sheer number of skeleton troops overwhelmed the three Arcanists in the group, who, despite exhausting their magic power, couldn't disperse the vast sea of skeletons.

Just then, Lu Heng returned to the battlefield, closely following Fiona, and quickly assessed the situation.

The most pressing issue was the overwhelming tide of skeleton troops. Some had already breached the escort team, wounding Arcanists with their weapons and claws.

Although the skeleton troops' attack power wasn't high, their sheer numbers meant that even minor injuries could become fatal as blood loss and prolonged combat exacerbated small wounds.

Therefore, addressing the skeleton troop problem was an immediate priority.

As the bone wall advanced, threatening to engulf the escort team, Lu Heng drew his Aurora Blade and began to charge it.

Upon completing the charge, his body shot forward, breaking the sound barrier with a loud bang, and unleashed the Wind Dragon Extinction Slash, the ultimate Swordsmanship technique of Sword Saint Teres.

With a single slash, a violent wind pressure erupted, forming a wind dragon that roared into the sea of skeletons.

The wind dragon, capable of lifting even 30-ton stone pillars, swept into the skeleton troops, shattering every skeleton and bone in its path and carrying them into the sky.

In an instant, the wind dragon transformed into a bone dragon, with countless bones dancing in the whirlwind, creating a scene both eerie and terrifying.

The bone dragon instantly shattered the bone wall, sending thousands of bone fragments flying into the sky, scattering them for kilometers, never to reassemble.

With a single Wind Dragon Extinction Slash, the threat of the skeleton troops was eliminated.

The Elven warriors present were all astonished by this display.

Many of them recognized the move: "That's... Wind Dragon Extinction Slash! Teres' Swordsmanship!"

Not only were the Elven warriors surprised, but even Fiona was taken aback.

As the wind dragon roared, she glanced back and saw it raging within the sea of skeletons, her eyes widening in amazement.

She had witnessed Teres' Swordsmanship firsthand, and it was undoubtedly the most powerful technique in the Queldore world.

She never expected to see it executed by a human.

With Lu Heng's destruction of the bone wall, the remaining skeleton troops were no longer a threat and were easily dispatched by the combined efforts of the Elven warriors and human mystics.

However, there was undoubtedly a Necromancer or Necromancer Wizard controlling the skeleton troops nearby, a threat that needed to be eliminated to ensure long-term safety.

As Lu Heng passed by Su Muyu, he reminded her, "Within three kilometers, there's definitely a Lich or Necromancer. Find them."

Su Muyu nodded and replied, "I'm looking for them."

In fact, before Lu Heng's return, she had been searching for a way to counter the skeleton troops.

Direct attacks were ineffective against such a vast number of skeleton troops; the best strategy was to find the controller.

So, she had been trying to locate the entity controlling the skeleton troops since the start.

However, three kilometers was a considerable distance.

Using conventional detection methods to search every corner within a three-kilometer radius would take hours.

The only way to find the Necromancer within a short time was through Energy Fluctuation Sensing.

As long as the target cast a spell within the skill's detection range, she could determine the general direction and search accordingly, making it much easier to locate them.

This was why Energy Fluctuation Sensing was a B-Grade skill.

No energy fluctuation within the detection range could escape its sensing.

Moreover, the skill's detection range was 30 times the user's Mental Power.

With the Tree of Knowledge's blessing, Su Muyu's Mental Power had reached 109 points.

This meant that Energy Fluctuation Sensing had a detection range of 3270 meters.

The entire three-kilometer area was within the skill's detection range.

Additionally, the Celestial Phoenix, through its unique ability to perceive through summoned creatures, also possessed Energy Fluctuation Sensing, effectively expanding the detection range.

With the skeleton troops defeated, the Necromancer controlling them would need to cast a spell if they wanted to take further action.

At that moment, Su Muyu sensed a faint energy fluctuation through the Celestial Phoenix, originating from the southwest.

She opened her eyes wide and looked in that direction.

There was a hill in that direction, about four kilometers away.

The distance was further than Lu Heng had anticipated, and it would have been impossible to detect the target without the Celestial Phoenix flying in the southwest direction.

Just then, the scattered skeleton sea began to stir. Countless skeleton fragments gathered and assembled into a gigantic fifteen-meter-tall skeleton.

The colossal skeleton stood up, stomping on the ground with a "thud, thud, thud," and charged towards the escort team.

Lu Heng released his Origin Energy and slashed with Rift Slash.

With a single strike, the giant skeleton shattered, and the Rift Slash's blade energy reduced all the skeleton fragments to dust.

After destroying the giant skeleton, Lu Heng turned to Su Muyu and asked with his eyes if she had found the target.

"I found it. It's near a hill four kilometers southwest. Should I attack it?" Su Muyu asked.

"The Celestial Phoenix is hard to kill, and it's best to finish it off with one shot. Once it escapes, it'll be difficult to catch again," Lu Heng wanted to personally deal with this target, but the intense battle kept him occupied.

Lin Zeyu took the initiative and said, "Give me invisibility, and I'll go catch it. As long as I can see it, it won't get away."

Lu Heng agreed to the plan and asked Su Muyu to provide Lin Zeyu with an invisibility effect.

A sniper with invisibility was naturally invincible; even gods couldn't detect them before they fired a shot.

With detection abilities, the maximum effective range for detecting invisibility was around one or two hundred meters. Beyond a kilometer, there was almost no chance of detecting an invisible target.

Unless it was a summoned unit like the Celestial Phoenix that could directly approach for close-range reconnaissance.

However, before firing, the sniper wouldn't even know the target's approximate location, so the enemy had no idea which direction to search.

They didn't even know if the target existed.

Just like this Necromancer, if he hadn't cast a spell, Su Muyu wouldn't have been able to locate him.

Lin Zeyu entered stealth mode and approached the hill to the southwest.

With the Celestial Phoenix's aerial reconnaissance, he got within two kilometers of the target and saw the Horned Demon Lich through the scope of his Electromagnetic Acceleration Sniper Rifle.

This Horned Demon Lich was hiding in a cave, only emerging to cast spells before retreating back into hiding.

As a Lich, the skeleton sea on the battlefield could serve as his eyes, allowing him to monitor every move on the battlefield while controlling the situation from four kilometers away, putting him in an invincible position.

Lin Zeyu crawled up a small hill and saw the Horned Demon Lich through his scope as he came out to cast a spell. He then used the Hunter Mark on the Lich.

With the Hunter Mark locked on, he could see the Lich's red silhouette even when he retreated into the cave.

The Horned Demon Lich finished casting his spell and returned to the cave, standing in the shadows and observing the battle.

Lin Zeyu crawled on the small hill, shifting his position.

Although the Lich had retreated into the cave, the front half of the cave was relatively straight, providing a shooting angle from outside.

Lin Zeyu began to move, searching for the right angle.

After moving sideways for twenty meters, he found the perfect angle and prepared.

Through the scope, he couldn't see the Lich because he was hiding in the cave.

However, with the Hunter Mark, he could see a red silhouette in the darkness.

This was the power of the Hunter Mark, making it one of the most suitable skills for snipers.

Lin Zeyu turned off the safety on his sniper rifle, activated the Plasma Armor Piercing Shell skill, aimed at the mark, and pulled the trigger.

Bang! The bullet shot out of the chamber at an initial velocity of 1521 meters per second, crossing the two-kilometer distance in an instant and flying into the shadows of the cave.

After the shot, through Lin Zeyu's Hunter Vision, he saw the red silhouette of the Horned Demon partially crack but not completely shatter, as if it was running deeper into the cave.

At this moment, detonating the Hunter Mark would cause damage equivalent to a sniper shot, with a high probability of killing the Lich.

However, if the mark was detonated and the Lich survived, the mark would disappear, potentially allowing the target to escape.

To be safe, Lin Zeyu jumped up and rushed towards the cave. When he was six hundred meters away, he took out his Grenade Launcher and fired an Origin Energy Cloud Grenade at the cave.

Boom!

The Origin Energy Cloud Grenade exploded inside the cave.

Through his Hunter Vision, Lin Zeyu clearly saw the flames engulfing the red silhouette of the Horned Demon.

The red silhouette struggled in the flames for a moment before becoming completely still.

Lin Zeyu received a notification of the Horned Demon Lich's demise, earning 5000 Demon Energy and raising his Origin Energy level to 35.

Throughout the entire process, he hadn't even faced the Lich directly. He fired from two kilometers away and then finished the job with a grenade from six hundred meters, easily eliminating the Horned Demon Lich.

After killing the Lich, Lin Zeyu immediately turned back to the battlefield, continuing to snipe other Bloodborn Demons.

(End of Chapter)

Chapter end