The Dungeon Attacks

Throughout the wilderness, whether rabbits running over the ground or worms wriggling through the soil beneath it, everything lay exposed to the Evil Eye's scan like a living radar.

The Evil Eye slowly turned its view, bringing a wider area into sight.

More than ten seconds later, the Evil Eye stopped. By then, it had turned its view through more than a hundred degrees.

Out in the wilderness, roughly two li from the village, a somewhat familiar group of monsters was advancing cautiously.

"The dungeon's legion!" Lin Xu's brow was tightly furrowed. "Just as I thought, they've come to attack."

It was too early to call it a war, though. The group numbered only fifty or sixty monsters, making it look more like a scouting party than the legion's main force.

A dozen or so goblins led the way. Even with weapons in hand and standard-issue leather armor on their backs, the little green-skinned creatures looked timid and shifty, like a band of irregulars.

Skeleton soldiers made up the largest contingent. These animated skeletons, each carrying a bone sword, were evidently the dungeon's basic troops and accounted for nearly half the entire monster group.

Five black-robed mages, two or three dark ladies in revealing leather armor, and seven or eight dark elf archers armed with longbows surrounded three fully armed dark warriors. That was the entirety of this dungeon legion.

About three hundred meters behind the monster group, a militia patrol lay in pools of blood.

The militiamen's orders were to retreat and raise the alarm immediately upon spotting an enemy.

But the attackers had appeared too suddenly and were far too powerful. Not one of the five militiamen in the patrol had managed to escape back.

Lin Xu fixed his gaze on the large flies buzzing above the monster group:

Name: Demon Fly · White

Race: demon

Level: 2

Strength: 3

Agility: 13

Constitution: 4

Spirit: 6

Intelligence: 6

Health: 32/32

Mana: 60/60

Skills: Rapid Flight · White (intermediate): able to dart through the air at a relatively high speed

Compound Eyes · Azure (intermediate): 360-degree panoramic vision; can observe targets in different locations in every direction

Darkvision · Azure (advanced): vision unaffected in dimly lit environments

Evaluation: an excellent dungeon scout, always fond of racing through clusters of stalagmites

Aside from these large flies, five enormous eyeballs floated eerily in midair, constantly scanning their surroundings.

In the hills about half a li from the monster group, a militia patrol was still going about its rounds, completely unaware.

At the current rate, the two sides would run into each other in just a few minutes.

"Get back to the village, quickly!" With a thought, Lin Xu conveyed the order through the Evil Eye's ocular technique.

The patrolling militiamen paused, then ran toward the village without the slightest hesitation.

This was another advantage of NPCs: they weren't curious, and they wouldn't disobey orders because of their own judgment.

After pulling back the patrols closest to the enemy one by one, Lin Xu turned his attention to the steadily approaching monster group.

"It looks like Xuanwei Monastery has already started fighting the dungeon. This squad was sent by the other side to gather intelligence on the monastery..."

Lin Xu studied the makeup of the monster group and quickly adjusted his side's battle plan. "Since you're here, don't even think about going back!"

Although the dungeon's monster group appeared stronger than his own forces in overall combat ability, he was confident he could win in the end by relying on the terrain.

The militia patrols scattered across the territory hurried back one after another and were assigned to the village's defensive line.

The most elite Dao soldiers were gathered and stood silently at the most critical combat positions.

A dozen or so Daoists from Xuanwei Monastery formed an impromptu mage corps and stood atop the watchtowers, ready to provide support.

Even the villagers were hastily assembled to handle logistics.

Time passed in silence. It was clear that the dungeon monster legion's commander was another brainless NPC; at no point did it think to send out fast reconnaissance units like the Demon Flies to scout the battlefield over a wide area.

Lin Xu thought for a moment, then set his sights on those flying units.

Anyone who had seen a modern battlefield would know what the mobility advantage of air units over ground units meant in war.

Because Xuanwei Monastery was an entirely human force, it was at an absolute disadvantage in aerial strength.

The Evil Eye's pupil rapidly contracted, focusing on another of its kind 1.5 kilometers away. It waved its feelers as it constantly scanned in every direction.

In the Spirit Realm, NPCs belonging to different factions did not share vision.

For example, to the people of Xuanwei Monastery, the mist had already been dispelled within an area three li across centered on the village. Apart from terrain blocking their view, what they saw resembled the real world.

But to the dungeon's side, Spirit Realm Mist still blanketed the entire area. Even though they had already entered enemy territory, mist still shrouded everything before them.

So even though the village was not far away, the monster legion, close as it was, stumbled forward like travelers making their way through the night.

The advantage in vision was displayed even more vividly in a special creature like the Evil Eye.

The Evil Eye that had been enlightened into a guardian deity used the advantage of its vision, which reached several times farther, to lock onto another of its kind first.

An invisible gaze pierced through space and locked onto the other Evil Eye.

The monster from the dungeon keenly sensed the danger. It twisted its tentacles uneasily and swayed constantly in the air, trying to shake off the lock that prickled at its back.

But it was meaningless. In the next instant, an invisible force erupted.

Boom!

Like a bomb going off, an invisible shockwave spread out from the Evil Eye.

Soul Shock Blast!

This combat skill, upgraded from Mind Shock Blast, immediately displayed astonishing power.

The nearby Evil Eyes caught in the shockwave swayed like drunks, waving their tentacles as they tried to keep themselves steady.

One unlucky Demon Fly was too close and was caught directly in the shockwave.

Pop!

With a crisp bursting sound, the Demon Fly's entire head exploded like green jam.

Its mangled body fell to the ground, and a few of its claws twitched.

At the center of the Soul Shock Blast, the Evil Eye that had taken a direct hit suffered an even worse fate.

Its entire plump oval body was torn apart as if by an imploding bomb, fragments of flesh flying like rain.

The shattered flesh rained down, immediately throwing the monster legion into an uproar.

After making one kill, however, Lin Xu stopped.

Special monsters like Evil Eyes had souls and mental strength far more powerful than ordinary monsters. A single Soul Shock Blast had consumed fifteen points of mana, far too much.

The Evil Eye's sudden death threw the monster legion into confusion.

Only after more than ten minutes did the suspicious and fearful monster legion move again, advancing cautiously.

By then, however, the monsters had drawn close to the village, and the Evil Eyes flying in the sky had already spotted the fields outside it.