Chapter 844: New Defense Line

Dozens of massive war chariots drove out from the rear, driving directly into the blasted trenches.

These chariots were all equipped with the latest three-cylinder engines and used high-quality Dao foundations as fuel, providing powerful propulsion. Special shovels were mounted at the front of the chariots; as they moved along the bottom of the trench, they dug up and leveled the loose soil, carving out a wide trench with a flat bottom.

Dozens of engineering vehicles were deployed simultaneously, each responsible for less than two *li*, and it took less than an hour to finish pushing.

At the same time, thousands of cargo trucks surged toward the construction site, each loaded with several pre-cast concrete structural components, which were then picked up by Dao foundation cultivators and installed into the trenches.

Ordinary people could not move the thousands-of-jin components, but for two template Dao foundations, it was sufficient. Yu Zhizhuo himself had thousands of template craftsmen under his command, and he had temporarily mobilized another five thousand template Dao foundations, so the speed of trench installation was unprecedented.

Once the concrete components were installed, human craftsmen rushed up to weld the exposed steel bars at both ends of the components together, then erected baffles to pour concrete. This way, only a little over a foot of concrete needed to be poured on-site.

Thus, several processes followed one after another, in perfect order.

Several hours later, when two well-rested Shaman tribe members and Liulan appeared on the front line, they were stunned to see a hundred-*li*-long concrete trench defense line that had appeared out of thin air on the earth!

"What is going on? Where did this defense line come from?" The voice of the Shaman tribe member on the left became somewhat distorted.

Several Great Shamans on the front line did not even dare to breathe loudly. One bit the bullet and replied: "Last night, the human race blasted the earth and used some strange machinery. Also, their number of Dao foundations is as numerous as aphids! As a result, overnight, it... was built."

"You didn't go to stop them? Didn't I give you troops?"

That Great Shaman bit the bullet and said: "We stopped them, fought all night, and suffered sixty thousand casualties, but we couldn't break through Wei Yuan's defense line."

The Shaman on the right shouted sternly: "Failure to stop them, why didn't you tell us!?"

The Great Shamans looked at each other in dismay. Both lords had said they wanted to rest and that nothing should disturb them; who would dare to disturb their rest with such a small matter?

Seeing no one answer, the Shaman on the right was even more furious. He grabbed the Great Shaman who spoke first and lifted him up. Then, his pupils changed from silver to black. The Great Shaman showed an expression of extreme terror on his face, his body shriveled rapidly like a deflated ball, and in the blink of an eye, he turned into a skin.

"Trash!" The Shaman on the right threw the skin onto the ground casually.

The Great Shamans could not help but start trembling. A Great Shaman at the late stage of Dharma Form, gone just like that?

The two Shamans looked at the thousands of cargo trucks shuttling back and forth on the Qingming side, their expressions very gloomy. They said to Liulan: "Start the attack now! You command the front line section!"

Liulan smiled apologetically, but in his heart, he was cursing. The mobilization of millions of troops, is it something you can just say 'attack' and do? Moreover, there wasn't even a plan; it was just thrown to him directly. These two guys were indeed as stupid as the rumors said.

But no matter how much he complained in his heart, Liulan had to endure it and immediately began to deploy the attack. The problem was that he didn't even know the commanders of the various units and had to temporarily notify them to come for a meeting.

In the midst of the chaos, the concrete low walls at the rear of the Qingming defense line also began to be built. At the same time, every *li* or so, fortresses began to be built. The fortresses were all made of large cast steel plates, which were pulled over and welded on the spot, and then concrete was poured on top. After the concrete dried, a circle of steel plates was nailed to the key parts.

Having fought the Shaman tribe for so long, Yu Zhizhuo, who studied the properties of matter, had long discovered that steel plates were not very effective against the Shaman tribe's corrosive curse techniques, but concrete was quite durable. So now, the fortresses had changed from having steel plates on the outside to having steel plates on the inside. The steel plates at the key parts had higher hardness, which was to defend against armor-piercing heavy arrows, and they were consumables.

A heavy arrow shot by a Shaman tribe ordinary Dao foundation warrior could also penetrate a foot deep into the concrete. Pure concrete could not withstand the pounding of heavy hammers, so not only did steel bars need to be added inside, but steel plates also needed to be temporarily added outside.

The speed of building the fortresses was even more astonishing, basically equal to the time it took for the concrete to solidify. The Qingming cultivators were not just waiting for the concrete to solidify; instead, several Fire-attribute Dao foundation cultivators surrounded it to increase the temperature, while a Water-attribute Dao foundation cultivator accelerated the evaporation of moisture. In less than two hours, it could be completely solidified.

Liulan led dozens of Great Shamans to appear on the front line again, while several Shaman tribe legions walked out of the camp and headed to different positions, preparing to attack. Coordinating a million-level offensive in such a short time, Liulan was indeed a capable general.

The Great Shamans looked at the human race working like ants on the opposite side. A Great Shaman suddenly said: "Where did they get so much steel?" All the Shamans were shocked. After a careful calculation, they found that just building this defense line, Qingming had consumed at least one hundred million *jin* of steel, and all their faces looked ugly.

A Great Shaman smiled reluctantly: "Maybe they turned out all their old assets at home!"

The Great Shamans could only accept this explanation.

A new round of fighting began, and the Shaman tribe's attack fell into a quagmire from the beginning. There were landmines everywhere on the ground, which were not fatal but caused disability; artillery fire in the air never ceased, and even dozens of missiles were fired to bombard the altars in the rear.

However, this time it was the altar that was attacked, so the Shaman tribe spared no cost and directly deployed dozens of Great Shamans who were good at curse techniques to defend, instantly cursing the guinea pigs in the missile warheads to death, causing all the missiles to miss their targets.

On the ground, all Qingming troops retreated into the fortifications, relying on the fortifications to contend with the Shaman tribe. With the cover of the fortifications, artillery shells could even land twenty or thirty *zhang* in front of the position, building a line of fire to block the attack.

The two sides engaged in slaughter along the long front line. When the Shaman tribe army swept over the line, the casualties on both sides began to surge. Qingming began hand-to-hand combat and melee fighting, while the Shaman tribe had to face crossfire from all directions.

The current Qingming was much larger than when it fought the Rain Kingdom, making encirclement basically impossible. Even a simple deployment on both wings would take a long time. Therefore, both sides were currently locked in a tug-of-war on the frontal battlefield, turning into a quagmire-style battle again.

Suddenly, a roar sounded, deafening, even drowning out the artillery fire and shouts of killing on the front line. Dust rose into the sky behind the first defense line; Wei Yuan had actually started to blast the second defense line.

In the Shaman tribe camp, the two Shamans who looked almost exactly the same now had expressions that were also exactly the same, both extremely ugly. The one on the right said: "Fighting like this probably won't work."

"Indeed, the human race's reserves are much more than imagined."

"Liulan didn't report this matter, this idiot!"

"Now is not the time to blame him; changing to others would only be stupider. Should we use that?"

"The master hasn't sent any news yet. Presumably, this game is not going smoothly, and unexpected interference has appeared."

"Did the human race have other immortals take action?"

"Don't know. Let's wait for news first. Send a unit to the east to cut off the connection between Qingming and Xijin, so as to prevent it from obtaining supplies from Xijin again."

"Good idea!"

In an absolutely dark space, a beam of light descended from the sky, illuminating the young man sitting cross-legged in the center and Xu Waner kneeling in front of him.

The young man opened his eyes and said slowly: "A Shaman tribe legion is coming toward Hanyang Pass."

"I have already strengthened the city defense, but the troop strength is somewhat insufficient. The elite of the clan are all in the north."

The young man said: "Don't all the families and houses have many private retainers and guards? These are the elites. Let each family contribute some and hand them over to you."

"This... I'm afraid the elders will have complaints. Moreover, the Shaman tribe coming here may not necessarily be to attack Hanyang Pass."

The young man said lightly: "Whether they really want to attack or not is not important. We will treat it as if they have already attacked."

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 845 =====