It wasn’t long after Benton sensed the last of the rank five beasts near the village dying that he received the notifications. Yang Xiu advanced her attack technique to Large Success. Even better, Yang Ru did the same for both his primary techniques.
There was no similar notification for Kang Lin, but that lack was fine. Benton already felt better about the village’s chances for a successful defense with the twins’ powerup.
Not long after—way too short a time, actually—the rank six beasts appeared to his spiritual sense. The good news was that there were only thirty-one of them. The bad news was that they were spread out over at least a half mile instead of being grouped together. Killing all of them before they reached the village was going to be a chore and a half.
Best get to it, then.
Benton Quickstepped to one end of the line of beasts and triggered Chain Lighting. Since gaining the ability to form Concepts that supercharged his qi upon reaching Golden Core, he didn’t need to worry about using an opposing aspect to overwhelm a shield. Rank six beasts, the equivalent to the peak of Foundation Establishment, were no match for his Lightning.
The technique also held an important advantage over his Void arrows—it left most of the bodies intact. Not undamaged, obviously. But intact. Even better, the all-important core wasn’t harmed in most cases.
To achieve a better result, he would have to target arrows with a tiny bit of qi in order to selectively penetrate a beast’s body with just the minimum amount necessary to kill it. The monetary benefit of leaving intact skins, more meat, and risking less damage to other valuable materials would be great. The cost, however, would be in time.
Dedicating that much effort to each creature would mean that some, perhaps a lot, would get past him, making him choose between going back to eliminate them or continuing forward. Too many rank sixes chanced overwhelming the defenders and trusting the static defense of the shield with their lives. If he instead retreated back to the village, he risked the very real chance of the next wave catching him there and having to engage Golden Core equivalent enemies in close proximity to the people he was trying to protect.
Frankly, he just wasn’t all that worried about preserving every single tael. Benton electrocuted the beasts with abandon.
The only real disadvantage of the technique was that it required line of sight to target, meaning he had to move to the beast, find it with his eyes, and then trigger the lightning. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.
That procedure quickly revealed the problem with his plan. As beasts increased in rank, the disparities between physical characteristics grew. Some were focused on Strength. Some Toughness. Some Stealth or Perception. Others Speed.
As soon as his first attack landed, the fastest among the horde stopped maintaining pace with their fellows. They scattered, all making for the village with haste.
There was no way to prevent all of them from getting past him. He ended up killing twenty-nine of them. Not a bad number. Well over ninety percent.
More importantly, he’d only let two through, and both the ones who’d slipped containment were obviously focused on Speed, meaning their Strength and Toughness would suffer. Benton felt that the twins and Kang Lin should be able to handle two rank sixes, especially with their recent advances.
Even if they couldn’t, the combination of the wall and the shield should be enough to hold the beasts off. There was no way just two of them could overwhelm both barriers.
Concluding that there was no need to abort his original mission, he Quickstepped closer to the mountain, moving only a tenth of a mile at a time and stopping to fully explore the area with his spiritual sense before moving forward again. It was imperative that the rank sevens not get past him.
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He just wished he had some way of warning the village to expect two attackers.
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As soon as Yang Xiu felt her attack technique, Slippery Arrow, advance to Large Success, she ended her meditation and leaped back up to the allure. She and the rest of the defenders—well, mainly Kang Lin and her brother—had beaten the remnants of the last wave without Master overseeing them, but his finger had still been on the scale. He had, after all, specifically picked which beasts to leave alive for them to fight.
For the upcoming wave, she had no idea what to expect. The plan was for him to kill all the beasts, but no one knew what he would encounter on his way to confront what he called the Big Boss.
She and the other two Foundation Establishment cultivators might face no enemies, or they might have to fight an entire wave with each member at the equivalent of the peak of their realm. If the defenders did have to fight, it would be contrary to the plan, meaning that they would not be against foes specifically chosen by Master. They’d be effectively and in fact all by themselves.
Which was why she watched the forest from behind the palisade, her senses expanded to their maximum.
Of the defenders, no one besides her had gotten a perception technique to Mastery. There was definitely no one who had access to spiritual sense who had access to any kind of perception technique besides her.
Zou Tian, Ye Zan, and a couple of the guards with a perception technique at Small Success were next to her, all watching just as intently. Yang Xiu knew, however, that, if the village were to have to fight against a sixth wave, it was up to her to detect the beasts approaching, and she took that role seriously.
Minutes passed as she kept watch. There was no telling how long it would take for beasts to show, if they did at all.
When they finally did arrive, she barely sensed them before they were upon the village. One moment, she felt a presence at the very extent of her range, and the next a large creature was slamming into the wall. And then another.
A cheetah and a mongoose.
She drew and loosed an arrow at the cat.
It dodged.
She drew another. Concentrating as hard as she ever had in her life on making her qi speed the arrow to its target, she loosed.
The cheetah hopped to the side, and the arrow plunged into the ground.
At the height of its jump, Kang Lin leaped down from the allure. She’d timed the attack perfectly to catch the cat off guard and in a position where it was least likely to be able to react in time. But her tactical acumen didn’t seem to matter.
The cat simply moved out of the way of the spear thrust and countered with a vicious swipe of its paw that Kang Lin was barely able to dodge.
With the cat occupied, Yang Xiu switched targets. The mongoose didn’t even bother to hop. It simply arched its back, and the arrow impaled the dirt instead of its flesh.
She turned her attention back to the cheetah and, with her bowstring drawn back to her cheek, waited for the perfect moment.
Kang Lin was having a hard time of things. The beast was simply too fast and too powerful for her. In a series of three quick exchanges, she barely managed to keep herself out of the reach of its teeth and claws.
Yang Xiu had hoped to find a perfect moment while the cat was distracted to finally get a hit. Instead, she had to use her arrow to keep it off Kang Lin as the girl stumbled.
Finally, though, Yang Ru entered the fight. He came over the wall with all the power of a fifty-foot-tall Orange Vigor Spirit Wood tree crashing to the ground.
With Kang Lin pressing the cheetah with her spear and Yang Xiu harassing it from above, she thought there was a possibility for him to hit and kill the beast, especially with his newfound ability to convert part of his Momentum into speed.
As he neared the cat, his body blurred as he used his technique to quicken his strike. Yang Xiu tensed, hoping.
It was not to be, however. The cheetah skipped backward out of reach, snarling.
Unnoticed in the commotion, the mongoose slipped in and took a bite out of Kang Lin’s leg.
The girl screamed.
“Retreat! Retreat!” Ye Zan yelled. “Retreat!”
Yang Xiu did all she could to keep the two spirit beasts off her friend, but seeing the blood sent them into a frenzy. Both lunged at the girl.
Yang Ru interceded, getting scratched deeply despite his Stone Skin and Body Cultivation. As the mongoose latched on to his calf, an arrow finally landed.
Though the arrow didn’t penetrate the beast’s skin, it had a definite impact. The mongoose let go, staggering to the side.
Yang Xiu would have loved to take advantage of its momentary vulnerability, but she was forced to focus on the cheetah, making it dodge instead of clawing Kang Lin.
The twins gave her enough time to gather herself and leap back over the wall, landing with a thud as her injured leg failed her.
In addition to the bite, Yang Ru took a swipe from the cheetah, but his enhanced body shook off the blow. He was able to extricate himself from the beasts by jumping back over the wall.
The cheetah tried to follow, but the shield put a stop to that.
“Well,” Ye Zan said. “That didn’t work.”