After confirming once more that there were no problems with the Mecha Soldier squad, Feng Xiao turned around. "Prepare to engage. Activate the Eight-Gate Ship Cannons and set their power to 25%. Concentrate fire on the Orc army!"
Ilde acknowledged and immediately turned to operate the controls.
Roar!
Nearly ten thousand vanguard kobolds were the first to storm the walls. Three thousand swordsmen killed two waves of enemies right away, then the two sides became locked in a melee!
"Kill!"
The swordsmen and nearby soldiers roared as they clashed with the kobold troops that had already begun landing in small numbers. Limbs immediately started flying everywhere.
The unarmed kobolds easily tore through ordinary soldiers' leather armor with their claws, pulling out their entrails. Before they could instinctively stuff them into their mouths, a flash of blades cut through the air, and ugly heads flew.
More than a dozen soldiers thrust out their spears at once. After killing quite a few kobolds, they were instantly torn apart by an elite kobold that shattered their formation!
Flesh and blood flew everywhere!
From the very first clash, the battle between the two sides had reached a ferociously bloody fever pitch.
It was either death or no injury at all. Against the Orcs' claws, lined with barbed grooves, and their crude weapons, there was practically no such thing as being wounded and surviving.
Just as the vanguard was making its way onto the walls in small numbers and engaging the defenders, a piercing wolf howl suddenly rang out. The commander, who had been watching the battle, immediately turned grave.
Fear even appeared on the faces of some soldiers.
Wolf Cavalry—the most common shock troops among the Orc tribes. Though they were not among the finest cavalry in the Orc ranks, their infamy was unrivaled.
They were numerous, ferocious in battle, indifferent to death and pain, and utterly savage. Their combat prowess was formidable.
They had brought countless people nightmares of terror.
Sure enough, as the howls faded, more than fifty thousand hyena-men riding three-meter-tall direwolves charged out from the rear, waving all kinds of weapons.
Their ranks were completely disordered, yet they exuded a frenzied, bloodthirsty aura.
The direwolves galloped on all fours, their sharp claws scattering broken stones with every bound. Their mouths gaped to reveal foul-smelling fangs, and horrid saliva dripped from them.
"The Black Cliff Knights!"
The commander immediately turned and gave the order. The next moment, two thousand powerful knights clad head to toe in silver armor charged out of an open passage.
Even their massive horses were covered in dense layers of iron armor, faint, simple magic runes shimmering across it.
The knights radiated level-10 energy, while their steeds were level 5. With their specially made armor, they could even hold their own against level-15 foes.
"Knights! Our homes are right behind us!"
"Kill!"
The two thousand knights surged with Battle Qi as they charged toward the distant, savage Wolf Cavalry in a crescent-shaped formation.
Before the knights had even advanced three kilometers, a glimmer of light suddenly appeared in the sky. The mage commander and the knights' commander inside Black Cliff City both turned pale!
The Shaman in the center of the Orc army also looked up in terror.
An extreme fluctuation of magical power!
Unheard of!
It was coming from... the sky!
That was right. The Star Origin's cannons were charging up without any attempt at concealment, and every powerful native in the area sensed it.
"Stop! Fall back! Fall back!"
The knights' commander shouted frantically. His warrior's instinct told him that if the knights kept advancing, not one of them would survive!
In a flash, eight dazzling beams tore through the clouds and struck the Orc army and the Wolf Cavalry that had broken away from it.
The magical energy between heaven and earth seemed to freeze, then began to gather frantically.
Rumble!
Terrifying energy, flames, and shockwaves spread together. The massive explosions made the entire plain tremble.
After the extreme energy surge passed, the hundred-mile plain, once blackened with blood, had vanished completely. Eight enormous craters were scattered across the land!
The Orc army had disappeared without a trace. In its place were raging flames and thick smoke, with countless charred chunks mixed in with dirt and stone.
Black Cliff City fell silent. Everyone stared at the scene, dumbstruck, disbelief plain on their faces.
Even the surviving kobold vanguard that had made it onto the walls stood frozen, gazing at the vast plain shrouded in rising smoke.
The knights' commander and the mage commander, who had retreated first, seemed to sense something. They looked up at the sky, their pupils abruptly contracting.
More and more people noticed the strange sight in the sky. The city erupted into an uproar!
At around two thousand meters long, the Star Origin slowly emerged from the clouds like a steel mountain range. Its streamlined hull, bristling with the imposing might of alloy, was shrouded in mist.
An utterly terrifying energy fluctuation filled the entire plain. Star energy, far surpassing ordinary natural energy like magic, sent a shiver through everyone.
"That is... an extraordinarily powerful Alchemist construct! Its combat power far surpasses that of ninth-rank professionals. It has even reached the Saint rank!"
The mage commander spoke in shock, his voice full of disbelief.
Alchemists were a rare branch of mages with a wide range of abilities. The constructs they created were incredibly powerful, but advancing in rank was exceptionally difficult.
An Alchemist capable of creating such a powerful construct was usually known as an—Alchemical Grandmaster!
The commander reacted as well, his expression turning uneasy. "There are only four Alchemical Grandmasters among humanity, and they're all spread across the three great empires.
"So which race does the Alchemical Grandmaster behind this construct belong to?"
A gnome? Or a dwarf?
Or did it come from the legendary holy land of mages: Sky City?
Unlike the leaders, the low-ranking soldiers knew it was an Alchemist construct but were still so overwhelmed that many of them dropped to their knees and prostrated themselves.
They believed it was a divine construct sent by the gods to save them.
Feng Xiao and the others felt an indescribable oddness at the sight, but they did not stick around to show off. Instead, they quickly left.
It had only taken a single volley of cannon fire. It seemed a little ridiculous to linger just to show off. Finding treasures that could raise their ability levels was what mattered.
Still, Feng Xiao released several invisible monitoring machines to record the data.
A1 Starport had given them plenty of those.
Watching the Star Origin disappear into the clouds again before roaring away, the commander finally relaxed. He shook his head with a bitter smile.
The Autses Continent was home to countless races. The weakest had populations of less than a million.
The strongest were always those races.
The three peak races: the Dragon Race, the High Elf Race, and the Titan Race.
Next came the ten great races, which included the Beast Demon Race, gnomes, dwarves, Nature Elves, humans, and others.
But because of their infighting, the three human empires were constantly at war, leaving humanity ranked at the bottom among the ten great races.
Even the most outstanding ordinary races could suppress humanity.
That would not have been a problem on its own. But humanity occupied one of the fifteen richest regions on the Autses Continent: the Central Plains.
As humanity grew weaker, trouble arrived.
The Orc tribes and the Heavenly Demon Empire, one of the ten great races, had both launched wars against humanity.
The commander of Black Cliff knew that it was not just this border fortress that had been attacked. Nearly every major city was under a frenzied assault.
Quite a few had already fallen. The kingdom's reinforcements were probably being held up for the same reason.
"Alas... humanity... Could it be that we really have no racial gifts?"
The commander muttered to himself.
By chance, Feng Xiao and the others heard him through their monitoring equipment.
"Of course we do... souls and minds that can evolve without limit, along with an extraordinary capacity for acceptance, inspiration, and creativity..."
Feng Xiao watched the powerful magical beasts fleeing in panic around them. His expression was calm, as though he were answering himself.
Most important of all was...
The resolve to rise from the ashes!
Before you continue