Chapter 953: War of Wealth and Strength (5)

Li Ergouzi stood up, panting heavily.

His foot, crushed by the crossbow bolt, had already finished regenerating in just a few breaths.

He stood by the giant crossbow, narrowed his eyes, glanced in the direction of Yin Wushuang, and then muttered: "You thieving bird, you ran that fast? Dog Grandpa hasn't even exerted himself yet, and you already fled?"

He snorted coldly, Li Ergouzi drew a dagger and waved it at his left wrist.

He waved it, then waved it again.

After waving it several times, Li Ergouzi turned around and shouted at a handsome personal guard beside him: "Come here!"

The handsome and slender personal guard stared blankly, and a mist instantly filled their eye sockets.

Li Ergouzi showed no pity, grabbed the personal guard's neck with one hand, and sent her to the giant crossbow, muttering and gesturing.

The personal guard, eyes brimming with tears and trembling, waved the dagger at her left wrist several times; under Li Ergouzi's constant urging, she finally gritted her teeth and lightly slit her wrist with the dagger.

A drop of fresh blood fell on the giant crossbow, which instantly burst forth with a sky-filling Blood Light that even enveloped the entire city.

The personal guard gritted her teeth, and under Li Ergouzi's "guidance," her gaze swiftly swept over the twenty-seven giant magic puppets outside the city.

"Livestock!" Yin Wushuang muttered lowly: "What a beast… but if I hadn't already resolved to kill him, this kid would still be a fine seed of my Demonic Path."

"Tsk, unwilling to spill even this bit of blood, having his maid shed blood instead!" Yin Wushuang clapped her hands and sighed: "Talent, what talent!"

Further away, on a verdant hilltop, a gold-armored youth of the Fufeng Divine Dynasty, together with several dozen subordinates, hid in the forest, gazing toward the city.

Seeing the giant crossbow, a silver-armored burly man said coldly: "What use is this thing? And to have a little girl operate it…"

Before the silver-armored man's words even faded, Li Ergouzi shoved aside the personal guard in his hand and kicked the giant crossbow.

A tremendous roar rang out, clearly audible within a thousand-li radius.

Waves of air explosions spread outward; a blade of Blood Light tore through the void, and the twenty-seven giant magic puppets outside the city howled in unison, then, before everyone's eyes, they crumbled piece by piece into fragments.

Including Yin Wushuang, no one could see how this bolt achieved its effect.

The twenty-seven magic puppets, whose strength rivaled the perfected tenth level of the Divine Realm, were cast from rare materials and were extraordinarily sturdy, yet they shattered into debris scattered across the ground.

Twenty-seven magic blades crashed to the ground, their long blades planted in the earth, towering far above the city walls.

The giant crossbow's light dimmed; the originally blood-red crossbow seemed overtaxed, its whole body faintly turning pale.

Li Ergouzi painfully stroked the giant crossbow again and again, then waved his hand to put it away, hurried to the city wall, and shouted hoarsely at Yin Wushuang a thousand li away: "Did you see that? Dog Grandpa's might!"

"Hey… grandson, come on, come attack the city—just now you weren't all fierce and vowing to attack the city yourself?"

Li Ergouzi vigorously hooked his finger at Yin Wushuang: "Come on, come on, Dog Grandpa will shoot you with an arrow—if you don't die, Dog Grandpa will call your son my grandson!"

Yin Wushuang stared blankly for a moment.

"Calling his son my grandson? Huh?" Yin Wushuang came to his senses.

"Slick and oily, someone like this actually controls a city… this Wuguo, if it doesn't perish, there's no justice." Yin Wushuang said gloomily: "But with such immense wealth… tsk, one can see this Wuguo is dripping with fat."

"Mine, mine, all mine." Yin Wushuang hissed: "Why haven't the rear troops arrived yet? Breaking the city, breaking Wuguo—everything is mine, everything is mine!"

As Yin Wushuang roared hoarsely, wave after wave of demonic troops clad in black armor, their bodies surging with killing intent, poured out from the teleportation array set up earlier by his personal guard demonic forces, like a rushing river.

The mighty millions of demonic troops swiftly formed ranks before the city.

Various large siege engines, accompanied by a low rumbling, emerged from the teleportation array, each surrounded by a sea of black-clad demonic soldiers, as if ants lifting a huge worm.

The ground trembled slightly; the Supreme Demonic State governs through the Demonic Path, the demons' nature being wanton and lawless, and the siege engines they craft also embody that nature.

Large, huge, tremendously massive.

Appearing before Li Ergouzi was a heavy ghost-head siege hammer: its main body was a gigantic metal wagon tens of zhang wide, two li high, and four to five li long; in the wagon's center, three thick iron chains hung a ghost-head striking rod a dozen zhang thick and three li long.

The city walls of the Hundred and Eighth Slay-Ghost City were also only two li high.

This siege hammer already matched the height of the city walls; the demonic soldiers standing on the wagon could even look level with the defenders on the walls.

Such siege hammers were lined up in a row, a hundred of them, each packed above and below with thirty to fifty thousand troops and laborers.

Aside from the black-armored demonic soldiers, these laborers were each like beasts—naked, their skin pitch black, unknown what drug they'd taken; each stood fifteen or sixteen feet tall, muscles bulging, beneath the skin faint reddish patterns glimmered with Blood Light.

These laborers had blank expressions, dazed eyes; they tensed their bodies, gripping tightly the metal rods on either side of the siege hammer, and strained to push it inch by inch toward the city wall.

On the city walls, countless defending soldiers panicked, drawing bows and loosing arrows.

The arrows fell like the feeble stream of urine from an old man—sparse, crooked, intermittent, weak and powerless.

The performance of the city-defense soldiers under Li Ergouzi's command was speechless—arrows that struck the siege hammer were blocked by heavy shields, as expected, but many arrows that hit the laborers pushing the wagon bounced right off their pitch-black skin.

The performance of the city-defense soldiers under Li Ergouzi is truly speechless—arrows that landed on the siege ram being blocked by heavy shields is one thing, but many arrows fell on the laborers pushing the carts below, and they actually all bounced off their pitch-black skin.

"Sir… they can't pierce through!" a hulking man resembling a butcher, with a pair of rat eyes and two tufts of rat whiskers on his face, wearing a "thievish mousy" look, shouted at Li Ergouzi: "Sir, these demon spawn have thick skin and tough flesh—our arrows…"

"Shut up!" Li Ergouzi retorted with a slap, swallowing the man's next words back into his throat.

In a dozen breaths, several dozen arrows that had fallen on the city walls were delivered into Yin Wushuang's hands.

Yin Wushuang examined these arrows seriously, then couldn't help but smirk.

These arrows looked oily and smooth, gleaming, but they were forged entirely from ordinary scrap iron, their quality abysmal. The various penetrating, toughening, etc., auxiliary runes they should have were merely scratched onto the surface with a small knife—pure decoration, utterly ineffective.

A single rune arrow capable of threatening cultivators of the Chonglou Realm and Life Pool Realm on the battlefield costs roughly a hundred ordinary origin crystals.

Whereas these inferior scrap-iron arrows, lacking even a single effective auxiliary rune, one origin crystal exchanged for secular silver and gold could forge about a thousand of them; if costs were cut further, one origin crystal could possibly yield two or three thousand.

And this kind of inferior mixed-iron arrow, the mixed-iron arrow lacking even an effective auxiliary rune, one yuan crystal exchanged for secular gold and silver can roughly forge up to a thousand. If we further deduct some remuneration, one yuan crystal forging two or three thousand is also possible.

Yin Wushuang laughed: "As commander, I now know where this brat's wealth comes from."

Such a great city would require at least ten million troops to garrison.

Even if three-tenths were archers, that would be three million archers, each carrying a thousand rune arrows; the cost of the arrows alone would be around three hundred billion origin crystals.

This is just ordinary rune arrows; if we add some powerful specially-made arrows capable of threatening even Womb Storage Realm or Divine Realm masters, the cost could multiply by dozens.

This is still just ordinary rune arrows; if we add some powerful specially-made arrows, high-level rune arrows capable of threatening even experts at the Embryonic Treasury realm or even the Divine Brightness realm, then the cost could increase by dozens of times.

The cost of the arrows would be a mere three million.

From three hundred billion down to three million…

From three hundred billion down to three million…

Of course, Wuguo and the Supreme Demon State have different market conditions; this price will fluctuate somewhat, but generally it's this principle, this number.

Yin Wu Shuang quickly tallied this account; the arrow in his hand shattered with a "pop", he stared at Li Er Gouzi on the city wall with a strange light in his eyes, muttering: "These rune arrows are consumables, they wear out in daily training and need replenishing each year... this bastard, how many years has he served as garrison commander in this city?"

"Just the arrows alone embezzle three billion ordinary Primordial Crystals a year... plus other armor, weapons, pills, city defense equipment, large light cannons, even the City Defense Grand Formation..." Yin Wu Shuang's hairs stood on end from excitement.

He led troops in battle, burning, killing, looting all the way, committing heinous sins in the Fufeng Divine Dynasty, countless killings and arson; yet his net worth is still less than the amount of Primordial Crystals Li Er Gouzi could embezzle from a year's worth of arrows!

After all, Yin Wu Shuang must support his personal troops, death warriors, clansmen, his own cultivation, and various luxuries; the bulk of the wealth he looted must be handed over to the Supreme Demon State, so how much can he keep?

Thus, Yin Wu Shuang's whole body ignited with the fire of greed.

He screamed hoarsely: "Storm this city, no matter the casualties, storm him. This brat isn't human; he is... he is a mountain piled of Primordial Crystals!"

On another distant hilltop, the golden-armored youth of the Fufeng Divine Dynasty likewise obtained several arrows fired by the troops under Li Er Gouzi.

He also reached roughly the same judgment as Yin Wu Shuang.

The golden-armored youth's breathing also grew ragged... the Fufeng Divine Dynasty has been driven to the brink by the Supreme Demon State, and the pressure on military finances keeps growing.

But Li Er Gouzi truly isn't a person; he is a humanoid mine!

"Find a way; when the city falls, I only want that brat." The golden-armored youth clenched his teeth and said in a low voice: "No, that's not right... hurry and send word home to see if we can summon two Old Ancestors to hand over the treasury of Wuguo..."

The golden-armored youth grew excited, his face flushing red.

A southern border city of Wuguo, its garrison commander can be this extravagant—just how wealthy can Wuguo be?

If we could loot Wuguo's treasury... for the financially exhausted Fufeng Divine Dynasty, it would undoubtedly be a shot of adrenaline!

On the city wall, Li Er Gouzi slapped the rat-eyed man, sending him spinning in place several times.

He then thrust half his body out from the battlements, roaring hoarsely at the ever-approaching siege hammers outside: "Do you think you've already won? Do you think you've already won? Nonsense, dream on!"

"Dog Grandfather throws caution to the wind, throws caution to the wind, I'm done for, I'm done for!"

"Dog Grandfather's entire fortune, his entire fortune!"

"Someone, bring the God-Slaying Soul-Destroying Cannon!"

Li Er Gouzi screamed hoarsely, he swept his wide sleeve, and twenty jet-black cannon platforms, each several zhang in size, fell onto the city wall.

Compared to the standard large cannon platforms on the walls of Slay Ghost City 108 before, these twenty small cannon platforms are dozens of times smaller in volume, but their ferocious appearance, with countless writhing runes inside the jet-black barrels rolling like clouds, gives an impression of endless, eternal continuity.

The rune formation inside the barrel of each so-called God-Slaying Soul-Destroying Cannon numbers at least a thousand times that of the standard large cannon platforms.

Yin Wu Shuang's face darkened.

These twenty small cannon platforms give him a bad feeling. After careful thought, it seems that even in the Supreme Demon State there are no light cannons with rune formation density reaching this level.

Even the few main cannons of greatest power stationed on the walls of the Demon Capital of the Supreme Demon State, used to defend the capital, seem to have rune formation density only one-tenth that of these twenty small cannon platforms.

One-tenth?

One-tenth?

One-tenth?

Countless hairs on Yin Wu Shuang's back stood up one by one, and beneath each hair a tiny bead of white sweat slowly seeped out.

"This bastard!" Yin Wu Shuang's eyes flashed repeatedly: "This bastard!"

These small light cannons are his, Yin Wu Shuang's, definitely his!

Just how destructive can these small light cannons be? Eh, eh, this, this... Yin Wu Shuang inexplicably feels a bit of anticipation, anticipating that these light cannons will demonstrate their might on the demon troops under his command.

On the city wall, patches of metal-cast ground tiles slid open silently, and metallic conduits gleaming with crystal light extended from the wall; with a "clang", these conduits of varying thickness, like living things, flexibly connected to the twenty small light cannons.

Apart from the three weapon platforms Li Er Gouzi threw out, the entire City Defense Grand Formation of Slay Ghost City 108 vanished.

All the energy of the City Defense Grand Formation—whether from burning Primordial Crystals or drawn from the earth veins—turned into piercing torrents of energy that flowed along the metallic conduits into the twenty small light cannons.

The jet-black small light cannons began to emit a faint black phosphorescent glow.

Like a thin mist, the black phosphorescent glow swirled and floated on the cannons; gradually the small light cannons emitted a "clang" roar, and twenty spear-shaped crystal barrels seven to eight zhang long slowly extended from the platforms.

After a moment of charging, twenty thick-as-fist beams of black crystal light burst forth.

Twenty mushroom clouds rose into the air outside the city, the black crystal light striking twenty enormous siege hammers.