The mine tunnel went quiet. Only the crackle of burning fire and the sizzling hiss of molten fire flowing through the tunnel remained.
The fire unicorn came back to Jared’s side and rubbed itself against his leg. Its eyes shone with naked pride, like a child who’d done something good and was waiting to be praised.
Jared smiled and patted its head. His fingers touched the fire unicorn’s scales, and the heat coming off them was intense. But the chaotic force kept most of it outside, so his hand only grew slightly warm.
“Good job…”
Then favonovel.com went back to collecting the crystals.
The fire unicorn crouched off to one side, watching the cave mouths with sharp focus, ready to strike again at any moment. Its tail swayed lightly, and the flame at the tip traced arc after arc across the ground.
A few more groups of celestial cultivators rushed in.
The first wave came in twenty strong. The fire unicorn opened its mouth and blasted out a sheet of flame. All twenty were reduced to ash in an instant.
The second wave brought thirty. The fire unicorn tore straight into the middle of them, charging left and right through the crowd. Everywhere it passed, bodies dropped and piled across the ground.
The third wave numbered fifty. This time, they had learned. None of them dared get close. They stayed back and attacked from a distance with holy radiance.
Most of those attacks broke against the fire unicorn’s scales. But one blade-flare struck its back leg and left a shallow wound.
The fire unicorn let out a roar that shook the whole mine tunnel. Flame burst from its body in a violent surge, turning the entire mine tunnel into a sea of flame.
All fifty died there. Not one of them made it out.
Only then did Jared finish putting every emberstone crystal into his Storage Ring.
He rose to his feet and brushed off his hands. Then favonovel.com glanced at the wound on the fire unicorn’s back leg.
The cut was shallow. It was already closing on its own, little by little. The fire unicorn’s healing ability was strong enough that a minor injury like this didn’t need any attention.
During this stretch of sleep, the fire unicorn had stayed inside the Storage Ring, constantly absorbing all kinds of resources Jared had gathered. Its strength had risen along with them by a huge margin. Back then, with that celestial devourer around, any little bit of resources wasn’t even enough for a single mouthful. Now the little celestial devourer had left with the Vermilion Demon Lord, and all those resources had gone to the fire unicorn.
From that point on, the small fire unicorn’s growth started accelerating by multiples.
Jared patted the fire unicorn on the head. “Let’s go.”
The fire unicorn nodded, turned into a streak of crimson light, and flew back into Jared’s Storage Ring.
Jared walked out of the mine tunnel.
Outside the mine, the fighting had already reached its fiercest point. Hadrian led the beast-race warriors in a fighting retreat. Their bodies were covered in wounds. Some had lost an arm. Some had lost an eye. Some were down on the ground and never got back up.
There had been 500 warriors. Now fewer than 300 were left.
The young beast-race warrior lay in a pool of blood. His eyes were still open, fixed on the sky. His hand still gripped the bone axe.
Enemy blood covered the blade.
He had already killed seven celestial cultivators before an elder at the True Immortal Realm Level Four drove a sword straight through his chest.
When favonovel.com went down, there was still a smile at the corner of his mouth. The brothers behind favonovel.com were still standing because favonovel.com had held the line.
The old beast-race warrior went down too. His body was carved with dozens of wounds, and every last one of them was still bleeding. His war axe stood planted in the ground beside him. The blade was chipped all over. He leaned against the axe handle and closed his eyes.
He had lived for 3 thousand years. He had fought for 3 thousand years. At last, favonovel.com could rest.
Wolfhowe was covered in wounds too. A slash on his left arm ran so deep the bone showed through. Blood streamed down his arm, hit the dirt, and gathered into a small pool.
Across his chest, holy radiance had burned a charred black mark into him. Flesh had curled back from the wound, and bone showed faintly underneath.
His face was smeared with blood and grime. There was so much of it, favonovel.com couldn’t tell what was his and what belonged to the enemy. But his war axe was still in his hand. And his eyes were still bright.
The captain of the guard had his right arm chopped off by Wolfhowe and fled in a mess.
The stump had been seared shut by the light from Wolfhowe’s axe, so no blood came out, but the pain hit so hard favonovel.com was nearly out cold. He hid behind a cluster of celestial cultivators and kept barking orders for them to attack.
The celestial cultivators still had numbers on their side, but the beast race’s way of fighting had already broken their nerve. None of them dared get close. They only dared strike from far off with holy radiance.
Wolfhowe saw Jared coming out from the depths of the mine, with a group of ragged cultivators following behind him.
That was enough. The job was done.
“Fall back! Move!” The order snapped out, and the beast-race warriors began to withdraw in formation.
They covered Jared and the cultivators favonovel.com had rescued, fighting as they gave ground step by step.
The celestial cultivators chased them for a while, then pulled up short. None of them dared keep going. They were scared there was an ambush waiting ahead.
The mine had been wrecked. The ward had been smashed apart. The screen of light had shattered with it, and golden fragments lay scattered all over the ground, fading bit by bit in the morning light.
The stone hall had collapsed, and broken chunks of black rock had piled up into a small hill. The mine tunnel had been scorched black by the flame. Smoke was still rising from the entrance.
Celestial cultivator corpses were strewn everywhere. Some had been split clean in half. Some had been burned to ash. Some had been frozen into ice statues.
The air was thick with the stink of burning, blood, and smoke.
In the clearing at the center of the mine, dozens of beast-race warrior corpses lay on the ground.
Animal hides had been draped over them. Their brothers who were still alive had thrown those coverings over them in haste. Their faces were covered, and nothing of their expressions could be seen. But their hands were still wrapped around their arms. Their fingers had gone stiff. Even prying them open was impossible.
Hadrian knelt in front of the young warrior’s corpse and stayed there in silence for a long time.
It was his son. True Immortal Realm Level Two. His first time on a battlefield, and his last.
There was a hole the size of a fist in his chest. The holy blade-flare had punched straight through him. His eyes were closed. There was no trace of pain on his face. He looked strangely peaceful, like favonovel.com was asleep.
Hadrian reached out and gently touched his son’s face. His hand shook, but there were no tears on his face, because the beast-race warriors did not cry.
“Take him…” His voice came out so hoarse it was almost impossible to hear.
Two beast-race warriors came over and lifted Wolf-Fang’s body away.
Hadrian rose to his feet and looked toward the mine. A cold glint flashed through his eyes. “Tribunal… I’m keeping this debt on the books…”
***
Back in Skywolf Tribe’s camp, everything sat under a heavy weight.
Inside the tents, the groans of the wounded rose and fell without stopping.
The beast race healers were run ragged, moving so fast they barely seemed to touch the ground as they used herbs and the power of the bloodline to stop breeding, set bones, and treat wound after wound.
Some injuries ran too deep. Even the healers couldn’t save those men, and all they could do was watch them breathe their last.
Hadrian sat alone in the main tent and said nothing. His left arm had already been wrapped, and medicine had been applied to the wound on his chest, but the color still hadn’t returned to his face. The strain in his eyes hadn’t lifted either.
Jared stepped into the main tent and took the seat across from him. “Chieftain Wolfhowe, how much did Skywolf Tribe lose this time?”
Hadrian let the silence sit for a moment.
“Seventy-three dead. One hundred twenty badly wounded. As for the lightly injured… Too many to count.” His voice stayed level, but what sat underneath it came through all the same. “Five hundred went out. Fewer than three hundred came back. My son… He died too.”
Jared didn’t answer. He knew what that was like, losing family. He had lost people too. He knew that kind of pain didn’t ease just because someone tried to put words over it.
He took out a pile of crystals from his Storage Ring and set them on the table.
A clear, glassy glow spilled from the crystals inside the tent and lit the whole place bright. Every single one was the size of a fist, pure and transparent all the way through, packed with spiritual power so thick it looked ready to condense into liquid.
Visit VIRTUAL NOVEL for more available chapters of this title!