Liu Bei: I Think You Two Have a Problem

"Heavy crossbows? And no Mental Talent to provide lock-on or power amplification?"

Sun Wu's first reaction was one of confusion.

Archers with talent-based calibration could hit whatever they aimed at, with terrifying lethality. But without such talents, wasn't this level of power and accuracy just a joke?

The Deflection Formation activated, and the Cloud Qi Armament Formation followed suit.

Cloud Qi descended upon a portion of the soldiers, constructing a layer of protection over their shields and torsos.

Moments later, the arrows arrived.

Most of the incoming projectiles were deflected into the gaps within the formation, and even the few that weren't fully diverted landed harmlessly against the soldiers.

But Sun Wu had long since prepared defenses for these men.

With Cloud Qi combined with wooden shields and leather armor, they had more than enough protection to withstand these arrows.

If not for the occasional unlucky soul who only had a single layer of Cloud Qi Armament and happened to be struck directly, Sun Wu would have taken these ordinary arrows without suffering a single casualty.

The only things causing real losses to Sun Wu's formation were the arrows as thick as a forearm.

The power behind these projectiles made them quite difficult for the Deflection Formation to divert, and the Cloud Qi Armament could not withstand them either.

The soldiers struck, along with several men behind them, were skewered like kebabs on the spot.

However, the accuracy of these things was not high.

Hitting ten out of every hundred arrows was about the limit.

Yet, even with such killing efficiency, the enemy's crossbows never ceased.

It was as if the arrows cost nothing at all.

Sun Wu once again felt the overwhelming scent of money radiating from the junior on the other side.

(Qi Fei: You're saying I can exhaust the Cloud Qi of a God of War's army with crossbow bolts while dealing damage on the side? Then what are we waiting for? Fire! Fire!)

"It seems I cannot wait any longer."

Watching the seemingly infinite barrage of arrows, Sun Wu sighed.

The consumption required to deflect arrows and maintain the Cloud Qi Armament was still within his tolerance.

However, the loss of morale caused by being on the receiving end of a one-sided beating was not so easy to control.

Continuing to adjust the army now might ensure the further improvement of the conscripts' strength, but if morale collapsed, those gains would be meaningless.

Of course, Sun Wu had actually brought archers with him.

But after seeing the heavy armor on the other side, he had decisively broken up his archer legions and integrated them into the main army.

The lethality of a single-talent archer was simply insufficient against those iron lumps.

It was better to use them to consolidate the conscripts and bolster the army's structure.

Therefore, the current situation was somewhat within his expectations.

Under Sun Wu's guidance, the Cloud Qi in the sky swirled once more, and another military formation was nested atop the previous one.

This time, the reinforcement focused on the legion's marching speed.

"Charge."

Following Sun Wu's command, the thirty thousand men moved as if they were a single entity.

They launched an assault toward Qi Fei at an astonishing speed.

Once these men began to move, the already low hit rate of Qi Fei's side dropped even further.

As the distance closed, Sun Wu even controlled the Cloud Qi to form an inclined plane in front of his formation, directly deflecting all arrows except those from the heavy crossbows.

He had reduced the lethality of the crossbow bolts to the absolute minimum.

"Enemy force exhaustion strategy successful. Prepare to switch to melee formation."

Under Qi Fei's command, the heavy crossbowmen at the front of the formation retreated to rest and swap out their weapons.

As for those hundred-odd Huangfu Personal Guards, their crossbows were taken away by the retreating men, and they in turn received man-sized shields from their teammates.

The Huangfu Personal Guards who had swapped out their shields then equipped long-handled battle axes with heads larger than standard carriage wheels.

Sun Wu no longer had the heart to complain about this.

He was single-mindedly focused on adjusting his soldiers, preparing to surround these Metal Dumplings and crush them.

He would make this junior understand that in battles between large-scale armies, one could not rely on a single legion to handle everything.

Of course, Qi Fei's actions were not yet finished.

Civil Official No. 1, the only one who had successfully formed a Mental Talent, assisted Qi Fei by manipulating the Cloud Qi in the sky.

A pre-prepared Cloud Qi formation took shape rapidly.

However, this Cloud Qi formation did not produce any effect at all.

This left Sun Wu feeling somewhat perplexed.

Could this little guy be planning something big?

As the two armies were about to engage in close-quarters combat, Qi Fei's actions confirmed Sun Wu's suspicions.

A pitch-black power erupted from Qi Fei, completely enveloping nearly twenty thousand soldiers; at the same time, the Cloud Qi formation in the sky began frantically drawing in Heaven and Earth Essence from the surroundings.

The next moment, the leader of the Metal Dumplings broke through from Internal Qi Separation to Boundary Breaker.

Then, starting with him, every soldier covered by the black power began to break through.

Ordinary soldiers at the Internal Qi Condensation level advanced to Qi Solidification, the backbone soldiers at Qi Solidification reached Internal Qi Separation, and as for the four Internal Qi Separation legion leaders, they broke through to Boundary Breaker on the spot.

After their breakthroughs, the surge in Internal Qi brought about by the advancement further increased the density and coverage of the Cloud Qi.

Consequently, the Cloud Qi directly engulfed the majority of Sun Wu's vanguard.

"Hahaha, Your Excellency, do you like the surprise I've prepared?"

Qi Fei shouted loudly toward Sun Wu.

Over the past year, he had developed a military formation centered around his own Mental Talent and his unformed Legion Talent.

This military formation had only one effect: drawing in Heaven and Earth Essence.

For an ordinary person to use this formation anywhere other than at sea would be suicide.

Because drawing in external Heaven and Earth Essence consumes one's own Cloud Qi, it leads to a simultaneous decline in one's own strength and the ability to suppress the enemy.

Furthermore, the drawn-in Heaven and Earth Essence forms a dense concentration zone.

In this dense zone, during close-quarters combat, the strength of both sides increases due to the elevated Heaven and Earth Essence.

Moreover, the opponent is spared the Cloud Qi consumption.

It is equivalent to everyone adding water to a swimming pool, but one's own pool is simultaneously draining.

It would be a miracle not to get crushed by the opponent.

However, when used in conjunction with his Mental Talent and Legion Talent, this result could be achieved.

Everyone's level increased by one.

Of course, their Internal Qi cultivation would still be restricted by the enemy's Cloud Qi, preventing them from exerting their full potential.

But it was enough to change the course of the battle.

Sun Wu's mouth twitched.

Isn't this junior's ability a bit too terrifying?

On my side, the strongest experts have only just begun to manifest Internal Qi, while on his side, they are using Qi Solidification soldiers as mere grunts.

If I had known you had this trick up your sleeve, I wouldn't have bothered fighting you at all.

However, it was too late to retreat now; he had to break Qi Fei's momentum to have any chance of withdrawing safely.

Sun Wu drew power from his rear soldiers and channeled it into the vanguard that was about to engage the enemy.

At the same time, the Cloud Qi flowed, and an incredibly complex Cloud Qi formation was manipulated by Sun Wu.

The potential of the vanguard was forcibly unearthed, allowing them to successfully withstand the power from the rear and promote into Imperial Guard on the spot.

Even for Sun Wu, this was all he could manage in such a short amount of time.

(Liu Bei, acting as the referee, was nearly scared senseless by the maneuvers of both sides.)

After Sun Wu finished all this, the soldiers of the two armies officially began to clash.

The first to show their might were the Huangfu Personal Guards.

With heavy weapons like giant axes combined with powerful Internal Qi cultivation, a single swing shattered both Cloud Qi armaments and metal armor alike.

It was ferociously terrifying.

Yet, the attacks of the Imperial Guard catalyzed by Sun Wu were blocked by their own teammates.

Thus, the scene turned into a one-sided slaughter.

But that didn't matter.

No matter how fierce the Huangfu Personal Guards were, there were only a hundred or so of them; I will drag you into an encirclement and destroy you piece by piece.

At this moment, Sun Wu displayed the terrifying and absurd command ability of a God of War.

He not only commanded his own troops but also guided his enemy, Qi Fei.

Not long after the two armies clashed, Qi Fei's battle line was split apart by Sun Wu.

The formation of the Huangfu Personal Guards consequently shifted into a cone shape.

If not for the fact that Qi Fei strictly remembered that "the flaws in a God of War's formation are not for mortals to exploit," never greedily seeking merit or advancing rashly, and keeping his side acting according to standard square formations as much as possible, the Huangfu Personal Guards would have long since been lured into a long line and slaughtered by Sun Wu's army from both sides.

Not only that, but Qi Fei's other legions were also surrounded by Sun Wu.

Even though the raw strength of every soldier was completely outclassed by the opponent, Sun Wu used his command ability to keep all these legions under control.

He precisely made every soldier he needed unleash the peak power of an Imperial Guard to parry the soldiers of Qi Fei.

After a brief burst of power, they would immediately swap out, letting the next group continue the assault.

At the same time, they would toss out bait at just the right spots, with strength perfectly calibrated to be killed by the enemy.

If it were any other commander, even if they could resist the temptation themselves, they wouldn't be able to fully control their soldiers.

Because for the soldiers, they were simply doing what they were supposed to do.

But Qi Fei was different.

Qi Fei treated every flaw of the God of War as bait; even those tough nuts that seemed to require real strength to crack were just bait.

Forget about opportunities; he couldn't see them, and he didn't care—he just wanted to clash head-on.

Yet even so, Qi Fei's legions were irreversibly being drawn toward the formation of Sun Wu.

The two weakest legions were already being pulled toward the center of the enemy lines.

That was where the enemy's Cloud Qi was thickest, and where the suppression on Qi Fei's legions was at its peak.

It seemed that the great Sun Wu intended to start his feast with those two legions.

"In other words, the command has been completely taken over by him."

Qi Fei sighed helplessly.

Even though he kept his operational standards in mind and occasionally issued orders to stop his soldiers from advancing.

Those two legions were still dragged into that position.

Clearly, his command authority had already been seized by the big shot on the other side.

It looked like he was the one thinking about how to act, but every order he sent out resulted in exactly what the big shot wanted.

Moreover, Qi Fei's command was not entirely reliant on external tools like signal flags or war drums.

He also had long-distance communication provided by his Mental Talent, which shared mental energy.

Even though this method of communication fluctuated wildly due to the influence of the Cloud Qi, it still gave Qi Fei the chance to contact his legions in an instant.

Meanwhile, the big shot on the other side could only use traditional command methods.

To use a modern analogy, it was like playing StarCraft against an artificial intelligence while using a senior citizen's flip phone and dealing with a ping of over two hundred.

And yet, he was still slightly holding the advantage.

It really is terrifying, this creature known as the God of War.

"However, this was also within my expectations."

Qi Fei transmitted the instructions he had prepared long ago to the two legions.

These two legions were also specifically prepared by Qi Fei for this battle.

The two thousand in the front were used as the Pathfinding Legion; their Elite Talent was Instant Power Burst, capable of unleashing terrifying output in a single moment.

As for the other legion, which seemed somewhat mediocre because they hadn't killed many enemies, they were called the Crimson Blood Guard, numbering three thousand in total.

As for their talent, the big shot should find out soon enough.

Upon receiving Qi Fei's orders, the Pathfinding Legion erupted instantly, punching through the legion Sun Wu had left to block them, and charged straight toward the big shot's center.

However, they did not directly kill the soldiers in front of them.

They simply knocked them over with a hammer and left it at that.

By the time those soldiers scrambled to their feet, the Crimson Blood Guard following closely behind would strike them down.

The essence, energy, and spirit of the fallen were instantly drained and funneled into the bodies of the Crimson Blood Guard.

This was the Slaughter Absorption talent Qi Fei had been researching for Zhao Yun.

Its effect was to kill enemies and absorb their essence, energy, spirit, killing intent, baleful aura... and all sorts of chaotic powers to grow stronger.

However, during this process, the negative consciousness of the dying enemy would also be absorbed by the soldiers, and at the same time, the soldiers themselves would generate a massive amount of negative consciousness.

Therefore, generally speaking, they would go insane after only a few kills.

However, both Zhao Yun and Qi Fei had ways to solve that.

Qi Fei urged his unformed Legion Talent a bit further.

Born under the influence of the power of the Supreme God of Destruction, the Legion Talent easily suppressed these negative consciousnesses, allowing the Crimson Blood Guard to continue killing.

Originally, Qi Fei had planned to activate his Mental Talent in reverse, having the Crimson Blood Guard share the negative consciousness with him.

But after discovering that his own unformed Legion Talent could suppress this stuff, Qi Fei changed his mind.

After all, these negative consciousnesses were still useful.

Just like that, the Crimson Blood Guard followed the Pathfinding Legion and slaughtered their way through.

After only a few exchanges, the second talent Qi Fei had long since paved the way for manifested in the Crimson Blood Guard.

Berserk.

Its effect was to completely lift the brain's restrictions on the muscles, releasing the body's power to the maximum extent.

This talent was slightly different from the second talent of the original Crimson Blood Cavalry.

The main issue was that Qi Fei still hadn't fully grasped the Blood Fiend Heavenly Demon technique, so he could only cobble together something similar based on his own understanding of the human body.

But it was close enough; both were super-negative talents that dealt a thousand points of damage to the enemy while suffering eight hundred themselves.

Consequently, the situation on the battlefield shifted abruptly.

The Crimson Blood Guard, having entered their Berserk state, replaced the Pathfinding Legion, easily crushing the enemies before them with a single blow while simultaneously wrecking their own muscles and bones.

However, the constitution granted by Qi Solidification combined with the life Essence siphoned through Slaughter Absorption meant that injuries which would normally leave a person bedridden for months healed instantly, even leaving the Crimson Blood Guard stronger than before.

Then, they continued to swing their hammers and kill.

During this, Sun Wu attempted to project his power into the center of the army to stop this legion that clearly grew stronger the more they killed.

But it was useless.

Aside from the Huangfu Personal Guards, the Pathfinding Legion possessed the toughest strength in Qi Fei's army, and they were further bolstered by the Instant Power Burst talent.

Under the current Cloud Qi, only top-tier legions with three talents could hold them back.

And Sun Wu, who needed to fend off Qi Fei's vanguard, simply could not spare enough power to do so.

By the time the Crimson Blood Guard's second talent fully manifested, the Pathfinding Legion officially stepped down, and the Crimson Blood Guard became the main force.

And this bunch was even harder to deal with.

Furthermore, at this moment, Qi Fei abandoned his previous conservative approach, and all his legions launched a full-scale assault on Sun Wu's grand army.

Sun Wu had no choice but to command his front lines to resist while simultaneously attempting to cast the Crimson Blood Guard aside.

Qi Fei naturally would not allow Sun Wu to do such a thing.

The Crimson Blood Guard could only grow stronger by killing; if they weren't killing, they were nothing but small fry.

Therefore, he specifically directed the Crimson Blood Guard toward the most densely packed areas.

Regardless of how strong the opposition was, they would trade injury for life and force a kill.

Just like that, the Crimson Blood Guard continuously slaughtered their way through Sun Wu's center and rear armies.

Finally, after killing twice their own number in enemies, smoke began to rise from the bodies of the Crimson Blood Guard.