Chapter 1047 - 866: Making a Move

On the fence, Uncle Tie was the first to react, suddenly leaping to the edge of the fence and shouted down below.

His voice cracked with extreme shock and urgency, veins bulging on his forehead, his whole face flushed red.

Several villagers behind Uncle Tie also poked their heads out, seeing Duke standing empty-handed outside the fence, less than ten paces from the nearest demon, all gasping in disbelief.

Ella pushed a wooden stick into Uncle Tie’s hand, gripped the top of the fence with both hands, leaned out halfway, and, disregarding any restraint or politeness, shouted in anxiety: "Are you crazy?! Come back! You don’t even have a weapon!"

Duke turned his head back, smiled at the villagers on the fence, then turned around and walked towards a dense cluster of dark red eyeballs.

His steps were unhurried, very composed, as if he were strolling in his backyard.

The first demon closest to Duke lunged directly at him. He didn’t even make a move to dodge, simply raised his right hand from his side, fingers clenched into a fist, and in the moonlight, his knuckles emitted a faint dark golden glow.

The demon opened its tooth-filled mouth and leaped forward.

Duke’s fist swung upward from its jaw, the move so simple it was almost plain, without any energy fluctuations, just a straightforward uppercut.

The fist landed on the most fragile joint of the demon’s lower jaw, the sound of bones fracturing echoed across the wilderness, and the demon’s jaw, along with half of its face, was instantly smashed into a deformity, its limbs twitching in mid-air before its huge body fell heavily to the ground like a bag of loose sand, making a shallow dent in the muddy earth.

Dark red blood gushed from its shattered mouth and nose, steaming in the moonlight.

On the fence, a young villager widened his eyes, his lips moved a few times, squeezing a voice of disbelief from his throat.

His companion beside him opened his mouth, almost dropping his hunting bow in surprise.

Since they could remember, they’ve dealt with these demons, fully aware of how thick-skinned these beasts are, unable to pierce them with pitchforks, needing multiple arrows to take down one with a hunting bow.

Yet this outsider, not even as tall as most of their shoulders, shattered a demon’s head with one punch.

Duke did not stop, he stepped forward this time, using his left fist.

The fist swept across from the side, striking a demon attempting a flank attack on the temple, the demon’s body flew horizontally, rolling several times mid-air, crashing into another demon lunging at Duke, both demons entangled, rolling more than ten meters away, struggled a bit then ceased to move.

Another demon seized the opportunity as Duke withdrew his fist to lunge at him from the front, placing its front claws on his shoulder, opening its fangs aiming for his throat.

Duke didn’t even bother to dodge, allowing those rows of fangs to bite into his neck.

The demon’s teeth bit into his skin, producing a sound reminiscent of biting into steel, several fangs shattered on the spot, shards splattered across the demon’s own face.

The demon froze, an emotion not belonging to a predator emerged in its dark red eyes for the first time.

Duke smoothly grasped its upper and lower jaws, forcefully pulling apart with his ten fingers. After a teeth-grinding tearing sound, the demon’s mouth was brutally torn in two, its massive body collapsing limply to the ground.

In less than a moment, the wilderness was already littered with the corpses of seven or eight demons.

On the fence, the villagers’ expressions shifted from shock to stupor.

Uncle Tie’s hands clenched at the edge of the fence, his robust fingers gouged out wood shavings, his mouth slightly open, unable to utter a single word.

Ella, who had been anxiously shouting earlier, now quieted down, clasping a pitchfork to her chest, her long legs slightly tiptoeing as if trying to see more clearly.

The remaining demons began to retreat.

They formed a loose and distorted circle around Duke, their dark red eyes fixed on him, but their steps continued to shuffle backward.

Several demons nearest to the corpses even began to whimper softly, tails tucked between their hind legs, bodies nearly pressed to the ground as they crawled backward.

Though demons possess low intelligence, a predator’s instinct told them that this two-legged creature before them was not prey but something they could not comprehend at all.

Had it not been for the will dwelling in the depths of the dense forest weighing on their hearts, they would have scattered in fear.

That will tightened abruptly when Duke killed the first demon, now finally emerging slowly from the shadows of the dense forest.

It was a leader, far larger than the other demons.

Its shoulder height approached two meters, its body covered with iron-like hard dark gray scale armor, with several varying sizes of dark red eyeballs on either side of its head, not frenzied and scattered like common demons, but rotating in a near-calm rhythm, each rotation locking onto Duke.

Its limbs were thicker than ordinary demons, claws deeply embedded in the mud, each step left a deep print on the ground.

Level 1 Peak.

In this small village that didn’t even have a Level 1 Extraordinary, it was the top of the food chain.

It stopped at the forefront of the demon horde, several eyes simultaneously focused on Duke, emitting a deeply low and long growl from its throat, as if questioning, or evaluating.