Chapter 92: Battle Beneath Momona Village (Part IV)

Shortly thereafter.

The Sun God once again projected some fine, fragmented rays of divine power down from the sky, rewarding all the Sun God Priests present—and even including Jier, a "fake" who hadn't even offered a prayer to notify the deity—with a massive amount of Sun God Divine Power in one go.

Jier felt warm all over; he sensed that the power of the Sun God Divine Power in his mind had increased by about half, and the other Sun God Priests on the scene had clearly also received a generous reward from the deity.

He didn't know exactly how much each person's divine power had improved, but the smiles on their faces indicated that everyone was clearly very satisfied with the deity's reward.

After all, they hadn't really done anything, yet they had received such a great benefit for nothing; anyone would be happy for a long time after that.

Priests from other factions rose from the ground with regret, looking with envy, jealousy, and hatred at the Sun God Church priests who had received the deity's commendation. Many had just seen Jier also receive a ray of divine power from the Sun God, and they all felt that Jier's luck was truly excellent.

"This is what I deserve! I've been controlling these vines to fight the whole time. Without my assistance, the battle wouldn't have been so easy just now."

Just as Jier finished defending himself, those thick vines fighting on the front lines collapsed to the ground one by one, rapidly withering, but some scattered green light spots emerged from the completely motionless thick vines and poured into the blue axe head of the 【Yueshui Skull】 in Jier's hand.

"Ah, I guess the duration of this special skill has ended. What a pity, I was planning to control these vines all the way to the Evil God and give it a taste of its own medicine."

Without the support and assistance of those thick vines, the pressure from the surrounding parasitic monsters suddenly increased significantly.

Jier waved his hand, signaling his subordinate warriors, who had rested for a while, to step forward and assist the Town Guard and Armed Civilians in the fight.

Those youths from the Knight Family under Bell's command were clearly looking to compete with Jier's elite warriors, especially the agile Weier and the fierce-moving Sipulu; their performances were seen by everyone, and the two sides intentionally began to compete in secret.

The female youth who had experienced something with Weier two nights ago also stood by Weier's side, competing with him in the number of enemies killed.

At this moment, from the direction of the towering tree outside the village, the sound of three horns rang out in unison.

The wailing sound of the horns even suppressed the sounds of the intense battle within the village.

"It is time. Those who intend to go and crusade against the Evil God, follow me!"

Bell stepped out and shouted loudly.

Jier immediately stood by Bell's side, looking impatient and excited; being able to personally participate in dealing with a deity—although Jier had had similar experiences before—was different from completely killing a deity versus destroying a deity's dependency.

In terms of the result, it was quite different.

But contrary to expectations, not all church priests were willing to participate in this crusade against the Alien Evil God.

Many young priests, though full of blood and wanting to take the opportunity to earn merit, clearly had a clear understanding of their own true strength. In such a high-difficulty battle, one mistake could easily lead to death. They were not poor warriors with nothing; each had a bright future, so how could they die in such an unnecessary and dangerous battle?

Therefore, although there were more than twenty church personnel present, only ten priests who had the ability, or believed they had the ability, were willing to join this crusade. The other priests remained there, assisting Jier's warriors, the Town Guard, and the Armed Civilians to maintain the battle, firmly pinning the hundreds of parasitic monsters near the center of the village.

"Move! Be quick! Follow me, we will bypass the combat zone through the houses."

Bell led the team, Jier followed closely, and with ten Four Gods Church priests wearing armed priestly equipment, they directly smashed through the walls of the villagers' houses to avoid the obstruction of monsters in the combat zone. Surprisingly, although only ten priests had the courage to follow, three of them were priests from the Church of the God of the Dead.

Although they had the fewest people coming to support this time, they had all followed along in one go.

Don't look at how they were so few in number before the battle that they couldn't perform a Battle Divine Art, but they were actually quite strong; the Divine Power Light Balls they easily cast could turn the bodies parasitized by the parasitic monsters—those already dead hosts—directly into a puddle of rotting black mud.

And more importantly, if this operation to hunt the Alien Evil God succeeded, then as priests of the Church of the God of the Dead, they would inevitably witness the death of a deity, even if it was an Alien Evil God.

This was not an opportunity everyone was lucky enough to see, and witnessing the fall of a deity with one's own eyes—no one could say for sure what kind of ideological or realm-level changes this would bring to the priests of the Church of the God of the Dead.

Outside the village, three Hunting God Church priests blew the horns in their hands together, and then, led by the three of them, they took more than thirty Church Hunters straight toward the towering wooden wall in front of them.

Behind the wall was a taller, larger tree that relied on the wall for its existence.

On the thick trunk, which required several people to embrace, there was a tree hole more than a person wide, several meters above the ground, leading straight down. Parasitic monsters, either strong or weak, were constantly crawling out of the tree hole in a disheveled manner, jumping down after exiting the hole to join the battle against the humans in the distance.

But they clearly did not expect that the seemingly tall and safe Momona Village wall could not actually stop prepared people and organizations.

Especially this group from the Hunting God Church.

"Little War Bear, blast open the village wall blocking our way."

The Old Priest 'The Grand One' Xibe-Kang-Maerduo, who was walking in the center of everyone, gave the order in a sonorous tone.

A tall and sturdy Church Hunter, who looked like a humanoid Earth Grizzly Bear, responded loudly in embarrassment. He took down the large Hunting Bow he had made from monster materials from his back, then took out an Explosive Magic Arrow—known for its easy-to-find materials and simple, quick production—from his special protective quiver, and held it carefully.

This hunter, codenamed War Bear, was responsible for heavy firepower bombardment in Priest Maerduo's team and was especially skilled at dealing with large Magic Beasts and monsters. He carried several Explosive Magic Arrows of different power levels, ranging from those that could collapse a building with one shot to those that could destroy a small town, all of which he carried with him.

Because he carried such terrifying weapons at all times, other hunters who knew the situation were very careful to keep a distance when communicating with him.

Of course, to break through quickly and blast open a wooden wall, there was no need for a more powerful Explosive Magic Arrow, so he chose the one with the least power.

The words of their respective lead priests were orders; the hunter codenamed War Bear nocked an arrow and drew the bow, shouting the secret phrase to activate the magic arrow in his hand: "Bang-bang-dong-ka!"

Then he let go and fired the arrow.

The obsidian arrowhead at the tip of the overall black-red Explosive Magic Arrow immediately turned red and hot, and after flying over dozens of meters, it instantly collided with the wall of Momona Village, directly triggering a violent explosion.

The violent explosion erupted from this side of the village, and the Hunting God Church priests and hunters lay down in advance to avoid the shockwave and high-heat flames generated by the explosion.

Don't look at it as just the smallest power model of the Explosive Magic Arrow; its actual lethal range far exceeded the size of a building. At the very least, the rolling flames would burn nearby people to death, and the shockwave generated by the expanding fireball could also blow away and shake ordinary people to death over a wider range.

A large amount of scattered wooden wall debris fell from the sky, glowing with fire, as if a strange rain of fire had fallen.

Priest Clark stood up and looked; the towering wooden wall that had originally blocked their group was already missing a large section of more than twenty meters, and even the towering tree near the wall, as well as the villagers' wooden houses in the surrounding village, had been largely destroyed as well.

The tree hole that had been constantly spewing parasitic monsters was also deformed over a large area by the vibrations caused by the explosion just now. The entire tree tilted toward the village by more than ten degrees, and the parasitic monsters crawling out from inside were clearly crushed to death in large numbers by the squeeze, and the tree's canopy was also ignited by the flames in the air, burning over a large area.

"Very good, let's go!"

The young priest shouted and rushed forward, taking his people with him.

After the three priests gathered all the Church Hunters, they each cast Battle Divine Arts to increase movement speed, strength, and stamina on the hunters and themselves. At this moment, even the priests themselves, who didn't need to fight, were running much faster than an average person running at full speed on flat ground.

But when the three of them led the large number of hunters through the still-hot, broken wooden wall, they saw Bell, Jier, and the others already fighting the parasitic monsters that hadn't died yet.

"Do not stop, rush into the tree hole where the monsters are emerging, and move all the way along the internal passage! Knight Bell, Knight Jier, please, you two reliable knights, charge at the very front!" Priest Maerduo said.

Jier and Bell nodded. Jier took out the knight's arc-shaped shield captured from Knight Hartna, held the shield in one hand and the axe in the other, jumped up several meters, and crashed into the tree hole.

Just then, another new parasitic monster wanted to crawl out, but Jier kicked it back in with a flying kick, then split its shoulder with his axe, reaching its chest, absorbing the Refining Qi from its body while stepping on it to descend.

The tree trunk, tilted at a certain angle, had simply turned into a downward slide, not to mention that the vibrations from the magic arrow explosion had crushed several parasitic monsters crawling in the passage, turning the plant juices in their bodies into lubricant for this 'slide'.

"Haha, this is interesting."

Jier slid down while stepping on the monster's body, and after sliding down about twenty meters, he truly reached the bottom.

It was not spacious here, and the explosion above had not affected this place in the slightest. At the same time, there was almost no light for illumination, but it didn't matter; Jier himself was shining brightly at this moment because of the Sun God Church's Battle Divine Art.

Therefore, what Jier saw upon landing was the 'eyes' of more than a dozen parasitic monsters in the three-meter-wide rock passage, looking at him coldly.

If these parasitic monsters' eyes could still be used, that is.

"Ha, a lively party has begun! Let us start dancing!"

Jier shouted nonsensically, and regardless of whether the parasitic Monsters could understand his humor, he immediately leaned sideways against the wall, moving forward while using his Shield to protect himself first, while simultaneously swinging his axe in a circle above his head with his right hand, smashing it down onto the top of the nearest Monster's head.

These foreign parasitic Monsters, summoned from the Altar by the Evil God, were not native creatures of the Saint Hors Kingdom, so they could not even exert fifty percent of their strength, far inferior to those Humans and beasts that had re-parasitized locally.

Jier could easily split a Monster in two with a single axe strike, but doing so would conversely prevent the axe from absorbing the Monsters' essence.

Therefore, Jier deliberately avoided using excessive force while fighting, fearing that a single axe strike would cut the enemy directly in half. He still wanted to display the original special ability of the tree Spirit soul within the axe once more.

The Monsters also did not expect that a Human like Jier would penetrate this deep; after witnessing Jier hack one of their companions to death, they froze for a moment, then surged over one after another, attempting to rely on their numerical advantage to suppress Jier and then directly parasitize his robust body.

But the battle had only just begun when another person slid down from the downward-sloping passage.

It was Bell-Sasi; the moment he landed and saw so many parasitic Monsters surrounding Jier alone, he immediately brandished his sword to step forward and assist, rapidly executing the Knight martial arts taught within his family, either holding a Long Sword in one hand to pierce a Monster's chest, letting the 【Radiant Weapon】 imbued on the blade burn the Monster's interior, or holding a Long Sword with both hands, his two wrists flexibly twisting the heavy Knight Sword, paired with the precise footwork he had practiced, while dodging the Monsters' attacks, he successively severed the limbs of the Monsters attacking him.

Subsequently, Bell spun to approach the Monsters, taking advantage of the momentum to swing and slash, splitting three closely standing parasitic Monsters with one sword strike.

Jier also kicked off with his feet, fearing that Bell would kill all the parasitic Monsters he was absorbing essence from, so he also accelerated his fighting speed.

The next person to slide down was the young Hunting God Church Priest.

As soon as Priest Clark landed, he joined the battle directly; he swung the Priest's Metal Long Staff with both hands, and although the weapon lacked the imbuement of a 【Radiant Weapon】, his sturdy physique could easily smash the heavy staff head into the Monsters' chests, and he precisely controlled his own Divine Power to instantly burst and expand at the staff head, directly using the spread-out Hunting God Amulet to explode the torsos of the parasitic Monsters he struck.

And the person who jumped down afterward was the Hunter, a subordinate of Priest Clark.

After this capable Hunter landed, his gaze scanned the situation in an instant, then he rolled sideways to clear the passage behind him, and after the roll ended, he crouched down to nock an Arrow and draw his bow, instantly firing three special Arrows capable of automatic tracking.

Each Arrow precisely bypassed the fighting of Jier and the others in front, flying over everyone's heads and successively piercing into the knee and ankle joints of the new parasitic Monsters that continued to appear behind.

Using this special method to block and slow down the Monsters' reinforcements.

And after one Church Hunter came down, the Hunters behind slid down in a queue like dumplings, not stopping their feet as they cleared the passage entrance, stepping over the corpses of parasitic Monsters covering the ground, following the few people fighting in front, advancing rapidly while fighting.

And the people appearing from the passage entrance did not stop thereafter.

After all of Priest Clark's direct subordinate Hunters had entered, the 'Defender of the Grass Sea' Priest Fei-Jierkesi himself, as well as his numerous Church Hunters, also entered one after another.

At this time, the front-line battle had already advanced a distance from the passage entrance, so these newly arrived personnel could tidy up their formation slightly, then advance forward in an orderly manner.

The personnel who came down next were the Old Priest Mardo and his men, and finally, there were ten personnel from the Four Gods Church: three Priests from the Church of the God of the Dead, three Priests from the Sun God Church, two Farming Priests, and two Priests of the God of Wealth.

These ten people were all the backbone of the church in their thirties; after entering, they did not stop and immediately jogged forward to catch up.

At the same time, the Farming Priest walking at the very back, following the instructions just given by Priest Mardo, scattered some Bean Seeds he carried with him and performed a Prayer, causing these Beans to rapidly sprout and swell into a large pile of intertwined, sturdy Bean Stems, temporarily blocking this only passage for entry and exit.

In this way, even if the Warriors in the center of the Cunzi failed to successfully intercept the large number of parasitic Monsters within the Cunzi, those Monsters would be blocked here, unable to go and support their god.

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