Unas followed the scouts and rushed to the scene. There, he saw Oakleaf, two young Elves, and two strangers casting a spell around a tree that would take three people to encircle. Green light shone from the Druids ' raised hands and shot towards the trunk of the tree, causing the entire tree to tremble.
Five female Elves stood guard around them, preventing any soldiers from approaching. It seemed that all ten Night Elves had finally arrived.
Everyone knew that Nightmoon and the Warden had a close relationship, and thanks to her intervention with the soldiers, no violent conflict occurred.
Unas dismounted and approached the female Elves, his eyes seemingly spitting fire. "You are hindering our operations! You all deserve to be beheaded! Stop right now!"
Nightmoon quickly advised, "My lord, please don't be impatient. This is just an experiment. Please observe the results first. It will be over in a few minutes. You should be able to wait that long, right?"
"I'll only wait five minutes," Unas held up five fingers, "After five minutes, you must stop."
The Druids, who were casting spells, seemed to have heard the Warden's words and immediately increased their mana output. Five green beams of light, like water jets, poured into the trunk of the tree, and a tooth-grinding cracking sound came from the entire tree.
Branches danced wildly, leaves fluttered, and a dozen thick roots, like octopus tentacles, struggled out of the soil and twisted into two short, thick legs. Smaller branches fell off the tree, leaving only the two thicker ones.
Master Oakleaf was the mastermind behind the spell. After reciting a lengthy incantation, he flicked two green droplets from a small bottle, which, like two emeralds, were set at the top of the tree trunk.
At this point, the Treant's limbs and eyes were depicted. Oakleaf shouted, the spell ended, the green light disappeared, the Treant stopped trembling, and a horizontal crack appeared below its two eyes, from which came a howl like that of a newborn.
The Treant blinked, wobbled a few steps, and almost fell to the ground. The Druids excitedly high-fived each other; in their eyes, the spell had been a great success.
But Unas didn't see it that way. How could someone who could barely stand help in a fight? He felt he'd been fooled by that old scoundrel Oakleaf and questioned, "How can someone like this, who can be pushed over with one hand, deal with the enemy?"
Oakleaf snapped out of his reverie, "He's just an ordinary sycamore tree, lacking the necessary qualities to fight."
"I see. How much more discount do you want on the hundred Treant you mentioned?" Unas became increasingly dissatisfied.
"Although he's not suited for combat, he naturally possesses a healing aura that can accelerate the growth of surrounding plants," Oakleaf quickly added, trying to quell the fire. "He's so tall that he's not suitable for the Mushroom Cave, but didn't you want to cultivate the land, sir?"
Unas immediately asked, "How large is the area, and how much time can it speed up?"
"The range isn't an issue; he can move around. Patrolling around farmland can increase the yield of large areas of grain, and the time required should be reduced by at least one-fifth."
The wheat growing cycle is about six months, so shortening it by one-fifth is a significant improvement. This thing is indeed a powerful tool for farming.
Seeing Unas's eyes light up with interest, Oakleaf seized the opportunity to make a deal. "If you stop burning the trees, I promise to give you a hundred Treant like these."
Unas was now truly tempted. A hundred ripening agents would guarantee a bountiful harvest in the future. In any case, the number of spiders spawned by burning the forest today had been greatly reduced, so the fire attack was actually somewhat useless. He might as well agree.
"Three hundred." But they still needed to haggle, so Unas immediately tripled the amount.
"No problem!"
Oakleaf readily agreed, and the Druids cheered, considering themselves the great heroes who saved the forest.
The Warden's attitude had been too firm before, but now that he had finally relented, there was no reason not to agree immediately. So Oakleaf agreed without thinking, completely disregarding the number of Treants. After all, he had plenty of time; he could simply convert them slowly after the war.
Now it was Unas's turn to be surprised. He felt like he had been taken advantage of. Druids weren't businessmen after all; they weren't always prepared to haggle. Unas even regretted it a little, wishing he had asked for several times more.
The Warden immediately ordered the entire army to cease fire attacks and dispatched a squad of Dwarves to protect several Druids. They were to set off immediately to find their next target, and no casualties could be allowed to occur.
That ugly Treant is now a treasure and must be protected. His intelligence is only equivalent to that of a three-year-old child, making him easy to tame. Unas ordered his men to take him back to the Red Stone Stele.
Since they couldn't burn the trees, they had to rely on manpower to search for spiders that might be hiding in the forest. This inevitably slowed down the troops' advance, but they still reached the narrowest part of the Canyon — Blue Rock Pass —at dusk.
Sure enough, a swarm of spiders appeared here in large numbers. Giant Spiders of all colors—black, purple, blue, red, and green—gathered densely in front of us, giving us goosebumps.
Even when the Molten Giant was still two hundred meters away, all sorts of poisonous stingers, venom, and flames rained down from the sky.
Although the giants' obsidian bodies could ignore most attacks, as the saying goes, "constant dripping wears away a stone," and quantitative changes can lead to qualitative changes. Layer upon layer of venom covered them, and the high temperature on the giants' bodies could not evaporate it in time. Gradually, the venom stains turned the giants green, and the Molten Giants became the Hulk.
The drop in body temperature naturally affected their combat effectiveness. Some of the Iron Golems were also unable to withstand the corrosive effects of the venom, with burn-like marks appearing on the shoulders and chests of some golems, and their armor becoming much weaker.
However, Unas did not order a retreat. There was still some time before nightfall, so they could launch a probing attack to assess the enemy's strength.
Despite the intense ranged attacks, the Hulk and the puppets fought back with flames and lightning, advancing slowly, inch by inch. The Giant Spiders showed no signs of retreating and even appeared to be charging forward.
As Bael'Gar began his charge, a deafening howl erupted from the spider swarm, and three enormous, jet-black creatures, resembling chariots, leaped out from the enemy ranks.
Good heavens, three Overlord Spiders have appeared at once! Unas's heart tightened. He remembered how powerful the Overlord Spiders were. He wondered how they compared to the Molten Giant.
Bael'Gar was still several times the size of the Overlord Spider, and the unusual three-headed spider in front of him startled him; this was a natural wariness when encountering a king.
So his first move was his strongest attack. Bael'Gar leaped up—a miracle considering the weight of a fused giant—his fists and legs slamming down from the sky like four heavy cannons.
Even the most arrogant of the three-headed Overlord Spiders wouldn't be foolish enough to take the hit head-on; they immediately scatter in all directions.