Chapter 34: The Battle of Duoduogongti Village (Part 5)

Jier rode his horse quickly back to the west gate of the village.

Upon seeing Jier enter, Aoni immediately had the Warriors close the wooden village gate from the inside, and ordered everyone to pile up heavy objects they had found behind the gate.

Jier turned his head on horseback to take a look, but said nothing; he knew this plan of Aoni's would be of little use.

The Monsters had great strength, and such a small amount of heavy objects could not stop the village gate from being forced open. Therefore, while Jier jumped off Tianxuecao and let it wait in an empty space to the side, he took over command of the scene, ordering the Warriors holding two-handed weapons or using individual weapons to stay on top of the gate, while the others assembled inside the gate—especially all the Warriors carrying Shields—having them gather and stand by his side, facing the gate passage head-on.

"In a moment, this flimsy wooden gate surely won't be able to hold back the Monsters, so the real battle will take place in this narrow gateway. Everyone, pick up your Shields and prepare for intense combat! Everyone stay close, shoulder to shoulder, and keep your weapons raised on your shoulders."

Jier stood at the very front of everyone, holding the Yueshui Skull Two-Handed Axe, waiting for the climax of the battle.

Waiting for a battle to begin like this was a first for many of the Warriors, especially those from Changmai Village who had joined not long ago and were participating in their first fight. They were extremely nervous; in the previous battle, many of them had mostly followed behind others—when the person in front swung their sword, they followed suit—so it was hard to say how much actual effect they had.

But it was different now; every Warrior, regardless of their skill level, held their Shield and stood shoulder to shoulder, forming a tight formation of three rows with five people in each.

The five men blocked the village gate passage completely, and Aoni, the Warrior Captain, stood bravely in the very center of the first row; in front of them stood Jier, alone in the gate passage.

"They're coming. Don't be nervous; just use your Shields to hold back the lunging Monsters, then swing your swords and axes to smash their heads and bodies. With me here, we won't lose; we will only welcome victory once again!"

Jier turned around and said loudly.

Then, the whistling sound of Arrows flying through the air rang out from above, letting everyone know: those Monsters were coming!

At this moment, the sun was about to set; if one were in the wilderness outside the village, the lighting conditions would barely be enough to see things around, but inside the village gate passage, the light was somewhat insufficient.

Jier pondered for a moment and beckoned with his left hand toward his warhorse; the Hunting Sword automatically unsheathed and flew over.

Jier grasped the sword in his hand, and after it emitted a bright white light sufficient to illuminate the entire passage, he thrust his right hand upward, causing the Long Sword to be stuck upside down into the thick wooden planks at the top of the passage.

With a brighter light source, the Warriors felt more at ease, because they could see Jier in front at any time, and with this young Knight present, it seemed they would not lose this battle.

No, they would definitely not lose.

"They are just some dull and weak Parasitic Vine Monsters, let them come and meet their death!" Aoni shouted, striking his Shield with his Long Sword, making a clattering sound.

Seeing this, the others followed suit: "Right! We've already beaten two waves, they're nothing special."

The clanging sounds of impact rang out chaotically, then quickly unified, creating a rhythmic and heart-stirring battle 'soundtrack'; Jier did not stop their actions.

Soon after, the roars of Warriors came from above, along with Bawei's excited shouting: "Come on, climb up one by one, and let Daddy give you bad children a taste of what's coming!"

"Heya!" Bawei shouted with effort, and then there was the dull thud of a Monster's body being knocked down and hitting the ground in front.

Even though the Parasitic Monsters had more tenacious vitality than ordinary people, such a fall was still troublesome. The impact would affect the parasitic human face inside the body that served as the core, making these Parasitic Monsters that remotely controlled human bodies struggle to climb up from the ground, swaying as if they were drunk.

The Monsters soon began to ram the wooden gate from the outside, as they still remembered that they had come out from here, and that they should re-enter from here. Moreover, they could also sense that behind this thin wooden gate, many Humans were hiding.

Boom!

Boom—boom!

The heavy objects piled up inside the wooden gate were only found temporarily, and were far less heavy or suitable as obstacles than sandbags filled with dirt. Furthermore, the gate of Duoduogongti Village had basically never been used to defend against any formidable enemies, and the wild beasts that had been active outside the village in earlier years could not tear apart the wooden gate that looked decent enough.

But under the hands of the Parasitic Vine Monsters, the gate only withstood three impacts before the gate bolt was broken, and the heavy objects blocking the back were pushed aside all at once, crashing loudly against the two sides of the passage inside the gate.

However, because of the presence and obstruction of these heavy objects, the breached gate only revealed a narrow opening less than two meters wide; a dozen Parasitic Monsters were squeezed behind the gate, and for a moment, not a single one could rush in.

Seeing this, Jier sneered. He lowered the steel Faceplate of his Helmet, gripped the blue Two-handed Axe with both hands, took two quick steps forward, and followed up with a Heavy Cleave.

Whoosh—

The axe roared like a fierce beast; once Jier swung it with force, it emitted a terrifying sense of power and the sound of tearing through the air.

With a squelch, the Parasitic Monster squeezed at the very front was split directly in two from head to leg by Jier.

This actually made it easier for the Monsters behind to pour in; they lunged inward with claws and fangs in an instant. Jier dodged two of them, then lifted his leg and kicked, sending the most aggressive Monster flying against the wooden wall of the passage on the other side.

As for the other Monsters pouring in from behind, Jier swept his axe horizontally, severing their limbs and smashing their empty skulls.

And so, the Monsters collided fiercely and chaotically with the Warriors.

Thump, thump, thump! That was the sound of the parasitic human limbs colliding heavily with the wooden Shields. The Monsters' wrists and fingers broke immediately, but they clearly did not care about this, instead using their wrists and elbows to ram and push against the line of Humans who were blocking them firmly.

"Hah!"

Aoni took a step back after the impact, but a Warrior behind him immediately used his Shield to firmly support his back, giving him strong backing. As the three rows of men exerted force in sequence, Aoni returned to his previous position, then swung his Long Sword forward with all his might, severing the pair of hands that were reaching for his face.

"Ha!"

He then exerted force with his left arm, pushing the frustrated Monster forward and down.

The others in the first row beside him were the same; after being pushed back a step or half a step by the Monsters' lunging and ramming, they immediately pushed back with the support of their companions. Even though the Parasitic Vine Monsters had greater strength than ordinary people, the Warriors had three rows of men standing together; plus, everyone was clad in armor and steel weapons—just by these Warriors standing still, it was a difficult task for the Monsters to push them away.

"Hold your positions! Not one step back!" Jier shouted loudly while continuing to swing his axe to inflict damage on the Monsters pouring in.

The Warriors also roared in unison: "No retreat!"

Then they swung their right-hand weapons, smashing the heads of the Monsters held back by their left-hand Shields into pieces.

However, head injuries that would be fatal to Humans were not a life-threatening problem for these empty-headed Parasitic Monsters; their vital points were in their torsos. It was just that after their heads were smashed and their faces ruined, they would still be unable to see things clearly.

These most common Parasitic Monsters were not like those whose parasitic bodies had undergone lignification, where their perception of the outside world shifted from relying on the parasitized Human to perceiving the outside world through the branches they extended after lignification.

In the narrow passage, Jier continuously swung the Two-handed Axe in his hands, accurately either severing an arm of the Monsters rushing in or cutting off half their shoulders, preventing these guys from using their full strength.

"Warriors in the first row, stomp your feet hard on the ground! Use your feet to stomp those fallen Monsters to death too!"

Jier saw that some fallen Monsters were trying to use their heads, hands, or severed limbs—which could still paralyze through parasitism—to grab the Warriors' legs. So, Jier immediately gave the order.

The Warriors were in a brief panic, but they quickly reacted and followed the order immediately, regardless of why they had to do so. They lifted their feet left and right, then stomped down heavily, first shaking off the Monsters' grasp, and then stomping the Monsters' hands and feet into the ground, repeatedly trampling them, letting these long-dead parasitized Human bodies be crushed, mangled, and finally shattered.

Those fragile, paralyzing, slender rootlets and vines broke in large numbers, spilling sap and emitting a fresh, pleasant fragrance.

To be honest, if their opponents were not in human form, who would have thought, just by smelling the scent here—the fresh plant fragrance filling everyone's nose—that they were in the middle of a fierce battle against a group of Parasitic Monsters?

The most critical moment of the battle was the entry of the Flowering Monster, which was acting as the reserve force.

It mingled among the other Monsters, keeping its head down as it tried to rush in and break the current stalemate in one fell swoop.

But Jier had long been guarding against it; seeing it rush into the gate passage, he immediately abandoned the other entangled Monsters, headed straight for it, and after rudely knocking aside the surrounding Monsters, he kicked the Flowering Monster out of the gate passage with a whip kick.

But then, Jier's body was also covered in several Monsters that were hissing at him, trying to parasitize him.

The mouths of these parasitized Humans were wide open, and from between their already shriveled or even fallen-out teeth and gums, a large mass of emerald green vines full of tiny rootlets surged out from their throats.

But Jier ignored these Monsters, letting them bite and drill uselessly against the thick Metal Armor Plates on his body, and dragged them along as he charged straight forward.

The Flowering Monster that had been kicked out of the village gate had not yet recovered or climbed up from the ground when it 'saw' Jier appear in front of it again.

The Blue Axe swung upward with force; even though the flowering monster tried hard to tilt its head to dodge, half of its face was still sliced open by the sharp edge of the axe. In the process, it also shattered a large cluster of flowering branches emerging from the monster's mouth.

During the continuous fighting just now, the Spirit head of the tree demon on the surface of the Blue Axe felt as if it were becoming fuller as the battle persisted; at this moment, it was baring its fangs and brandishing its claws back and forth on the axe surface, striving to use its own power to add extra might to the Water-Crossing Skull.

The result was that Jier's axe only slightly brushed across the monster's face, causing not only half of its face to be sliced open, but also causing it to rapidly wrinkle, dry out, and crack as if its life force had been drained.

It was like a field that hadn't been rained on or watered for half a year, or like skin cracking after being frostbitten.

"Hiss—ah!" This parasitic monster let out a rare hiss; it seemed to have been stunned by this incredible scene?

Seeing this, Jier directly reached out his left hand, grabbed a parasitic monster still entangled on his back, thrust it in front of him, and randomly struck the monster's torso twice with the axe in his right hand.

Unexpectedly, these two random strikes, while failing to hit the well-hidden Human Face Core of the monster, caused the entire monster to rapidly shrink and twist together as if its life force had been drained.

When Jier forcefully inserted the entire Water-Crossing Skull into the torso of the parasitic monster, the entire human structure of the monster, like a deflated human-shaped doll, bizarrely shrank into a wrinkled ball the size of a basketball.

This scene terrified the parasitic monsters on Jier's body and those on the ground in front of him trying to hide.

Jier raised his eyebrows, then grabbed another parasitic monster trying to escape from his right leg and smashed it right into the center of its torso with one axe blow.

As expected, the entire parasitic monster that had parasitized a human body shrank rapidly, leaving only a wrinkled ball the size of a basketball after losing a large amount of life force.

"Interesting, it actually has a specialized killing ability?" Jier looked up at the flowering monster in front of him that was constantly trying to retreat, and gave a ferocious smile: "Then you guys are really unlucky today."

The battle in the gateway of the Cunzi continued; without Jier there to inflict damage on the rear ranks of the monsters, the remaining ten or so monsters entangled their arms together and exerted force together to slam against the solid shield formation of the Humans, attempting to engage in a test of strength with the Humans.

The Human Warriors were not afraid of the provocation at all; roaring, they stepped on the slippery, blood-soaked ground and exerted force together from back to front, fifteen people exerting force in unison, striving to compete with the monsters in terms of strength.

This battle was simple but direct; whoever was pushed down would eventually fall to the ground and lose the possibility of fighting, so this was a battle that could not be lost.

But the arms of the monsters, twisted and gripped together, cracked in the process of exerting force, and the flesh and blood of the Humans came into contact with each other, being connected by the sticky resin secreted by the large number of slender plant roots emerging from these flesh and blood. Therefore, their strength was also mixed together as if they were one body.

This was terrifying; the Warriors were individual entities, and although they were united at this moment, they were after all separate people. But once the monsters were connected, it was as if they had turned into a terrifying flesh-and-blood monster with twenty legs, ten heads, and a pair of twisted arms.

If it weren't for the fact that every Warrior in the first row was concentrating on exerting force at this moment, if they had seen this monster at another time or place, they would probably have vomited the food in their stomachs in disgust.

"I—I can't hold on!" One Warrior's face was flushed red from the exertion, while another Warrior's face had already turned pale.

"Hold on! We will definitely win!" Aoni gritted his teeth, squeezing these words that he hoped would boost morale through his teeth.

Just at this moment, the words from the companions above the passage were like dew, allowing the Warriors to see a chance for victory.

"Hey! Do you want us to come down and help you? There are no monsters outside!"

It was the voice of Bawei.

The Blood Vessels on Aoni's forehead were bulging from the exertion, and he roared: "Quick! F***ing quick! Don't talk nonsense!"

"Coming!" This sound was the joint answer of several people.

Clearly, the people above also heard the urgency of the situation below from Aoni's response.

The next moment, several Warriors jumped down from the front, back, inside, and outside of the passage.

The Warriors who arrived inside the Cunzi immediately dropped their weapons, pushed their hands against the backs of the front-row Warriors, and added their own strength to the process of the tug-of-war. The few Warriors who were bolder and landed outside the Cunzi saw for the first time the tragic scene of the gateway passage covered in flesh and blood and monster limbs.

Weier's mind wavered, and he seemed to see once again an imaginative scene of his family relatives being slaughtered, while Sipulu and Bawei thought of the memory of the thrilling and cruel night they experienced not long after they first left the White Stone Pass when they joined the Refugee Team.

However, they were all qualified Warriors; they were only dazed for a moment, and then they came to their senses and used their weapons to attack the backs of the connected monsters.

Bawei's Double-handed Steel Axe was the most effective, while Weier had a sharp eye and could spot the subtle flaws in the monsters' bodies, find the possible location of the monsters' core, and thrust his sword out to break the Human Face Core hidden inside the monsters' torsos.

Sipulu was more direct; he used his Battle Knife for wide-range Horizontal Slashes, let the Battle Knife press against the monsters' bodies to exert force with both hands, and used the dragging cut of the blade to continuously inflict large-scale damage to the body tissues of the connected monsters.

But these were not the key to victory.

A Blue Axe flew in from outside the gate, like a blue storm, and slashed into a torso in the middle of the monsters.

The next moment, a magical scene appeared; all the connected parasitic monsters showed expressions of terror, their bodies seemed to be emptied, constantly shrinking, drying out, and cracking, and their entire life force was absorbed into the Blue Axe as if that Blue Axe had opened a dimensional rift and was crazily absorbing the life force of the human world.

But in fact, it was just the tree demon inside the axe eating and feasting, forcibly taking away the life force of these plant monsters, which were far inferior to it, to fill the damage to its Spirit.

Of course, the life force of these monsters was naturally enough for it to recover, so the excess life force became a Chip for it to bargain with other 'prison mates' inside the axe.

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