Chapter 487 ·Evil God (惡神) (4)

Il-mok calmly turned his head and surveyed the battlefield.

On the front wall where he had detonated the World-Destroying Primordial Jade Palm, there were now barely three thousand enemy soldiers remaining.

Considering they had thrown fifteen thousand men at that section alone, it was a rather devastating number.

The left and right flanks were dealing with about four to five thousand each. 

The combined number of enemies deployed from their main army and left and right flanks appeared to be roughly thirty-five thousand, meaning over twenty thousand had died so far.

However, they still had a massive army of thirty-five thousand remaining.

And right on cue, a fresh wave of ten thousand men broke off from their main camp and charged straight for the heavily cratered front wall.

On the left and right flanks as well, another five thousand troops poured in from both sides to keep the pressure on.

"Kill the avatar of the Evil God!!"

"Allah protects us!!"

Il-mok ignored the incomprehensible shouts and issued a command as he observed the battlefield.

"Hold the line and cycle out!"

The walls of Andkhoy were small.

Out of a staggering forty thousand Hong Dynasty soldiers, only about ten thousand could fight atop the wall. Split that across the four sides of the fortress, and he was limited to twenty-five hundred defenders per wall. 

That meant a whopping thirty thousand of his soldiers had no choice but to remain on the ground and serve as a reserve force.

However, giving up the high ground and throwing open the gates for an all-out battle wasn’t an option for him either. To fix this bottleneck, the Hong Dynasty troops had spent the last twenty days in Andkhoy drilling one specific maneuver over and over again until it was burned into their muscle memory.

They practiced rotating up and down the walls without ever breaking formation. 

The goal was to ensure that when the soldiers on the wall suffered heavy casualties or grew exhausted, they could rotate with the fresh reserve forces to continue the battle.

"Cycle out!"

As soon as Il-mok's command fell, the soldiers on the far right began to move down the wall in orderly succession. In response, the soldiers shifted one space to the right in perfect unison, and the gaps they left were sequentially filled by the reserve troops coming up the stairs on the left.

It was chaotic as hell up there, but their discipline didn't slip for a second. 

During their twenty-plus days of training, they had found a way to synchronize their rhythm in the most Heavenly Demon Divine Cult thing they could have possibly come up with.

"Divine! Light! Divine! Light!”

"Divine! Light! Divine! Light!”

They chanted like a living metronome.

"Heavenly! Demon! Descends!"

"Ten! Thousands! Demons! Obey!"

And as they matched the rhythm, their movements fell perfectly into place like terminators fresh from assembly.

Every. Single. Day.

For almost three weeks straight, they would shout their chants and time their footwork to these chants with terrifying dedication.

Whenever he had watched them practice during those days, Il-mok used to shake his head in disbelief.

Right now, however, he wasn't shaking his head, nor was he secretly calling them a bunch of deranged lunatics. And it wasn't just because their rotation was actually working perfectly either.

Slash!

It was because Il-mok was too busy sprinting up and down the battlements to fill the temporary gaps left by the soldiers.

His soldiers might be efficient in their work, but you couldn't move an entire army without exposing a few blind spots.

By the time the soldiers on the front wall had barely finished rotating their shift, the ten thousand additional troops that had set out from the enemy's main army finally arrived near the wall.

By then, almost all the poor bastards from the first wave who had been stuck on the wall were already dead.

"Kill them!!"

"Allah's messenger fights alongside us!!"

Ignoring the screeching battle cries of the fresh soldiers who had just been thrown into the battlefield, Il-mok glanced left and right at the flanks. The secondary forces sent from the enemy's wings had just arrived on the left and right walls, too.

And then there’s the condition of his own soldiers.

"Heavenly Demon Descends!!"

"Ten Thousand Demons Obeys!!!"

They were shouting themselves hoarse as they fought, but it was glaringly obvious that their movements had grown sluggish.

War was a brutal ordeal for the body.

Even if you were fighting without heavy armor, swinging a sword for just fifteen minutes straight was enough to leave anyone gasping for air.

The flanks desperately needed a rotation, too. 

But trying to cycle out troops while a horde of zealots was actively shooting arrows and swarming up the walls in the name of Allah was basically suicide.

"Huu."

Il-mok let out a slow breath and made his three dantians work again.

Immediately, spheres of two different colors gathered in both of Il-mok's hands.

The speed was much faster compared to when he had previously unleashed the World-Destroying Primordial Jade Palm since he was using a lesser amount of Qi than before.

He poured half of the previous one’s input and hurled the sphere of destruction toward the left.

Boom!!!

While a blinding flash of light and a deafening roar tore through the left wing, Il-mok was already spinning up another one. Before long, a second sphere hit the right flank.

(TL Note: Mr. Amir, a second sphere has just hit the battlefield!)

Boom!!!!

As successive explosions roared from both the left and right, Il-mok had to desperately stave off a profound sense of lethargy.

"Huu."

He could no longer cast the World-Destroying Primordial Jade Palm in this battle. His Upper Dantian was already completely empty of Yin Qi.

His Middle and Lower Dantian weren't doing much better, barely holding on to half a full cycle each.

(TL Note: Gapja/Jiazi is the first term of the Chinese sexagenary cycle. A full cycle lasts for 60 years since there are 60 terms within the Chinese sexagenary cycle. I usually translate it as ‘xxx years’ worth of blablabla’ since I assumed my readers knew common Wuxia tropes, but it belatedly occurred to me that some might not. So I apologize for the late explanation.)

"Waaaah!!"

"It’s the Light!! The Light is here!!!"

Seeing his soldiers shouting like children who had just witnessed their first fireworks festival, Il-mok immediately snapped them out of it.

"Left and right walls, start the rotation! Now!!"

As soon as Il-mok's command was given, the mid-ranking officers down the line started barking out orders.

"Cycle out!!"

"Focus!! Hold the damn formation while you move!!"

"Which moron is only using his legs?!"

"You don't need your arms to walk, you idiots! Keep swinging at the enemy!!"

Thanks to the officers screaming themselves hoarse, the troops quickly snapped back to reality.

"Divine! Light! Divine! Light!"

"Divine! Light! Divine! Light!"

Once again, the Hong Dynasty soldiers executed their rotation while chanting their slogans.

With the rotation sorted, Il-mok turned his attention back to the enemy lines.

Having two more miniature nukes detonate back-to-back had clearly done a number on them.

"T-The Evil God!!"

"The Evil God is real!!"

"R-run for your lives!!"

He could see soldiers starting to suffer panic attacks in various parts of the enemy lines.

Slash!

A few soldiers who tried to break ranks and run immediately had their heads lobbed off by their own commanders.

"Good. Be terrified out of your wits."

With the enemy soldiers starting to break down, Il-mok drew his sheathed Ascension Sword and went right back to hacking down the soldiers trying to climb his wall.

***

Boom!

Boom!!

Watching those two apocalyptic blasts detonate over his flanks made the hot blood running through his body completely cold.

Zayd's face turned pale as he looked at the devastation.

‘Is he not an avatar of the Evil God, but the Evil God itself?’

Zayd quickly shook his head to erase the irreverent thought.

‘No. We are Allah's warriors. This is merely a trial. In the end, it is we who must be victorious.’

As he repeatedly invoked Allah in his mind, his overwhelming anxiety finally began to subside.

"Right. Even though he unleashed it twice, its destructive power was noticeably weaker than the first time. This is undeniable proof that the avatar is exhausted."

He muttered that to deceive himself and looked at the Evil God’s avatar.

The man was swinging his sword back and forth at his soldiers.

Zayd nodded his head in satisfaction. "Just as I thought, he is exhausted."

Why bother lowering himself to the battlefield when he has such terrifying divine might at his disposal?

Of course, he knew that this conclusion might also blow up in his face just like the previous one.

But unlike before, it was different.

No, it had to be different.

Those who followed Allah's will had to be victorious.

More importantly, they could not retreat without gaining anything.

"The avatar of the Evil God is exhausted! All forces! Charge!!"

Zayd issued the order to the remaining soldiers in the main army, but an awkward atmosphere lingered somewhere.

Zayd looked at his soldiers, then turned his gaze toward the wall.

Specifically, toward the imperial soldiers near it.

Every single one of them was terrified out of their wits.

"This won't do. Hassan!"

"Give the order, Amir!"

Hearing his lieutenant's booming voice right behind him, Zayd ordered, "Gather the rest of the men. We’re leading this charge ourselves! Right at the front!"

"I will follow your command!"

Zayd readily leaped down from the command platform and ran toward the enemy lines.

"All forces!! Advance!!"

"What are you waiting for!! Move at once!!"

As he continuously infused aether into his shouts, Hassan executed his order and ordered the men.

Seeing their Amir risk his own neck at the front line was all the motivation they needed.

One by one, the terrified soldiers in the main camp forced their feet to move.

That surge of momentum rapidly rippled outward, pulling the remaining stragglers on the left and right flanks into the charge.

It was an all-out strike of the Khalas Empire’s army.

Zayd advanced toward the wall while encouraging his remaining soldiers, only to find his path blocked by soldiers either advancing toward the wall or standing in place due to fear.

Instead of killing the soldiers or shouting to make them stand their ground. Zayd chose another method.

Tap!

He launched himself into the air and walked in the sky by using his aether as footholds.

Some of the terrified soldiers on the ground caught sight of Zayd.

"The Amir!!"

"The Amir has taken the field himself!"

Slowly but surely, life returned to the dead eyes of the soldiers who had been broken by those apocalyptic explosions. 

The avatar of the Evil God was still rampantly running amok atop that wall, and precisely because of that reason they were able to muster courage.

The Amir had personally stepped forward to vanquish that avatar of the Evil God.

That was enough reason for them to reignite their flames.

"This is Jihad!!"

"We must repel the avatar of the Evil God!!"

"We must help the Amir!!"

As the madness named religious faith slowly began to spread once more, Zayd finally set foot onto the enemy's wall via Sky Walk.

He came face to face with Il-mok.

"Avatar of the Evil God! Today I shall behead you and be reborn as a true warrior of Allah!!"

Listening to this incredibly dramatic speech, Il-mok just let out an exhausted sigh.

"What the hell is this crazy zealot yelling about now?"

His Sixth Brother was on a different wall, and his usual translators were doing crowd control in the back.

Right then, one of the ordinary soldiers thrust his spear at Zayd.

Il-mok shouted and flung his body forward. "Step back!!"

Immediately afterward, the place right where the soldier who had thrust the spear stood was cut.

Slash.

The soldier who had thrown the spear subconsciously swallowed dry saliva at the sight of his spear shaft cleanly severed.

Gulp.

Had the Grand Preceptor not pulled him back by his armor in the nick of time, he would have been walking away in two separate pieces.

"I'll deal with this bastard. Step back into your formation.”

Il-mok stared at Zayd while pointing the Ascension Sword at him.

He knew from Zayd's use of Sky Walk just now that he was not an easy opponent.

If Il-mok were to compare him to his past enemies, he would categorize him as someone on par with the dead Alliance Leader Cheok Pae-myeong.

Il-mok had managed to kill the Alliance Leader back when he was way weaker than he was now, but the circumstances were a little different today. 

Il-mok examined his internal condition and groaned inwardly. ‘This is going to be annoying.’

Even if he scraped together the dregs of his Middle and Lower Dantians, he barely had a single full cycle’s worth of internal energy left.

The fact that even this much remained was thanks to him absorbing Blood Qi with the Ascension Sword while killing enemy soldiers who climbed the wall.

At that moment, Zayd shattered their standoff and swung his scimitar forward.

"Return to hell! Avatar of the Evil God!"

Watching the crescent of Saber Force cleaving through the air toward him, Il-mok clicked his tongue in annoyance.

"Tsk."

Il-mok wrapped his Ascension Sword in Sword Force and swung it to cancel out the Saber Force.

But from Il-mok's perspective, the exchange just now was a huge loss.

He was already short on internal energy, and he just had to waste precious internal energy blocking an attack he could have sidestepped in his sleep. The problem for him was that if he dodged, the soldiers on the wall would be swept away by the attack.

‘Well, this is a pretty terrible matchup right now.’

Il-mok dodged the saber strikes with minimal movements as his brain started to spin for a solution.

"Haah!"

A few more exchanges ensued, and Il-mok only narrowly dodged the man's consecutive strikes as if his energy was completely spent.

"Uwahaha! As I thought, he is exhausted!"

The emboldened Zayd shouted and swung his saber once more.

And this time, Il-mok swung his Ascension Sword to meet it.

Boom!

As the Ascension Sword and the saber clashed, a loud explosion burst forth.

Il-mok unleashed a surprise palm strike with his left hand, and Zayd also thrust his left hand forward to block the palm strike.

At least, he thought he intercepted it.

Grab.

But just as their palms were about to clash, Il-mok twisted his hand to perform a grappling technique and seized the man's wrist.

"!?"

While Zayd scowled at the situation, Il-mok simply threw his center of gravity forward for a shoulder throw and threw his body down below the wall.

From the start of the exchange, Il-mok had feigned his weakness to lure the man to the edge of the wall.

Thinking this lunatic was trying to pull a murder-suicide, Zayd frantically moved his limbs to free himself from the entanglement.

He tried pushing his opponent away by maneuvering their locked weapon and hands to swing his legs to attack or attempting to Sky Walk.

But Il-mok clung to him tenaciously and doubled down with a mid-air shoulder throw while using the principle of Thousand-Jin Strike and finally crashed down to the ground with him.

Boom!!

A violent explosive sound erupted, but Zayd was unscathed thanks to narrowly breaking free from Il-mok's binds at the very last moment.

"Uwahaha! You arrogant fool, you just jumped straight into your own grave!"

With his soldiers beside him, Zayd was confident that they could slay the avatar of the Evil God.

Whoosh.

But as the cloud of dust from their impact finally settled, Zayd was greeted by an incredibly unsettling sight.

The avatar’s face from the start of their exchange until now remained unchanged.

Instead of panicking, the avatar slowly turned his eyes on the soldiers of the Khalas Empire.

"Well, if I'm running low on energy, I guess I'll just have to rip it out of you guys."

And the look in his eyes was like a predator looking at its prey.