Chapter 290: The Despair of the Golden Dragon Maiden (Part 1)

"Not good, enemy attack!"

Li Hao's roar echoed across the smoke-filled battlefield; his Wind Wolf martial soul surged, and the pressure made the gravel beneath his feet rustle.

The scene of them being surrounded near Mingdu three days ago still lingered before his eyes. At this moment, looking at the dust cloud rising at the edge of the sky that blotted out the sun, a bitterness welled up in his throat—that was the whistling sound of the City Defense Army's specialized Flying Soul Guidance Devices, and the rumbling coming faintly from the ground was like the footsteps of the Grim Reaper, striking the hearts of everyone one by one.

"Li Hao, how much further?" Blood seeped from the palm of Wang Qiu Er's hand as she gripped the Golden Dragon Spear; the patterns on the spear shaft were shockingly hot, as if responding to the sinister soul power fluctuations coming from afar.

Days of fighting had already left Wang Qiu Er with some minor injuries. In the distance, over a thousand City Defense Army soldiers were advancing slowly in formation, the Soul Guidance Armor of each person refracting a cold metallic luster under the sunlight. The air was filled with a pungent, scorched smell, as if foretelling that an impending catastrophe was about to descend.

"Three thousand meters, but they are waiting!" Li Hao wiped the blood foam from the corner of his mouth. After his martial soul possessed him, a pair of blood-red wolf pupils stared fixedly at the enemy formation. He knew deep down that this was a meticulously planned hunt.

The City Defense Army had expanded several times, and with their weapons and equipment upgraded one after another, the strength of some City Defense Army units was not even lower than certain elite legions of the Three Great Empires. Previously, the only Seven-ring Soul Saint in their team had been held back by those four people from the Holy Spirit Cult on the way to retreat; now their life or death was unknown, and with three days having passed, there was a high probability they would not be coming back.

And the enemies before them clearly wanted to exhaust them to death right here. "Captain, how much longer until reinforcements arrive..." In Li Hao's hoarse voice, there was a trace of imperceptible trembling. He knew the current situation was dire, and the only thing they could do was to survive no matter what.

The squad, originally numbering over thirty, now had only twenty left after experiencing several breakouts. Listening to the information Li Hao had scouted, the faces of the remaining team members were all grave. The high-intensity combat made the team members' breathing heavy and rapid; sweat slid down their cheeks and dripped onto the dry ground, evaporating instantly.

They all knew clearly that on this open plain, facing the well-equipped and numerous City Defense Army, they had almost no advantage. Even if they could defeat the opposition, they themselves would suffer heavy losses. In the current situation, every time a combatant was lost, the probability of breaking out decreased by a fraction.

The Holy Spirit Cult's support troops were hidden behind the City Defense Army formation. A pitch-black aura, like ink, faintly leaked from beneath their black robes, causing an instinctive disgust like a venomous snake flicking its tongue. They did not attempt to intercept Wang Qiu Er's breakout before the City Defense Army because they knew Wang Qiu Er's strength was extremely formidable; that overbearing and scorching power was the very nemesis of their evil Soul Masters.

Once Wang Qiu Er was allowed to erupt with all her might regardless of the consequences, even if they could capture her, the resulting casualties would be far beyond imagination, not to mention that the Sun Moon Empire's requirement was to capture her alive. If any casualties were caused, it would be even harder to answer for.

Therefore, their best method was to boil the frog in warm water, coordinating with the City Defense Army to continuously consume the soul power of the group from the Three Great Empires until their soul power was exhausted and they completely lost the ability to resist.

Wang Qiu Er took a deep breath, feeling the circulation of soul power within her body. She knew she had to take the initiative to attack and look for an opportunity to break out. The Soul Guidance Thruster on her back bloomed with light once again; that light appeared exceptionally dazzling in the night, like a bright lamp in the dark night.

Like a golden bolt of lightning, she quickly arrived before the gap in the yet-to-be-formed encirclement. Under everyone's gaze, the Golden Dragon Spear was swung out fiercely. An invisible shockwave spread in all directions with the dragon spear as the center; the air emitted bursts of explosions, and the City Defense Army was shaken into disarray, their formation showing a trace of loosening.

"While they haven't succeeded in closing the encirclement, hurry and charge out with me!"

Following the Soul Guidance Device, Wang Qiu Er's calm voice rang in everyone's ears. In this moment of crisis, Wang Qiu Er knew she had to do something.

Wang Qiu Er let out an angry shout, the dragon's roar as loud as a great bell, echoing across the battlefield. Every time the spear thrust out, it carried an indomitable momentum. Her figure appeared and disappeared within the spear shadows, as if the Golden Dragon had come to life.

Because the Sun Moon Empire City Defense Army's goal was primarily to exhaust them, the speed of the encirclement was not fast, making it extremely easy for gaps to form.

Wang Qiu Er and the others knew clearly that as long as they broke through this heavy encirclement and headed to the forest behind this defensive line, the Sun Moon Empire's City Defense Army would not be able to organize enough scale to surround them. They could use the forest's terrain for cover and evacuation.

However, the City Defense Army was only the vanguard. They also understood that if they missed the opportunity before them, once the Sun Moon Empire's reinforcements arrived, they would never be able to escape the encirclement and could only be trapped to death on this plain. Therefore, they must not continue to delay; once their soul power was overly consumed, their hope of breaking out would become increasingly slim!

Golden light bloomed, and the Golden Dragon Roar sounded incessantly. Combat always required seizing opportunities; while the opponent had not yet fully stood their ground, it was the best moment to break out.

Brilliant golden light erupted from Wang Qiu Er's body, and a layer of fine dragon scales rapidly covered her entire body. If not for that face of stunning beauty still being normal, looking from afar, one would have thought this was a golden humanoid soul beast.

The terrifying aura climbed continuously. This kind of aura was particularly similar to the secondary evolution of a martial soul. Previously, Long Aotian of the Body Sect had also displayed a similar strange aura in battle; one could tentatively attribute it to a problem with the Body Sect's secret techniques, but for Wang Qiu Er, she was not from the Body Sect.

On the city wall, Lu Jiuyu used an observation Soul Guidance Device to watch Wang Qiu Er breaking out, the corner of his mouth curling into a sinister sneer: "It's a pity, her strength is not yet enough to turn the tide; after all, she is only a Six-Ring Soul Emperor. Let them break out; the plan is still proceeding anyway. The captain is still dealing with the matter of Number Three over there, it's just that Su Yu is not easy to handle."

"How to explain things to Su Yu? Are we really going to hand Wang Qiu Er over to the Holy Spirit Cult?" Yan Lingshu pursed her red lips and frowned slightly. Honestly, she actually wanted to kill her directly, or detain Wang Qiu Er. Falling into the hands of the Holy Spirit Cult would surely add to their combat power again.

Leiqier continued: "Don't worry about that. Wang Qiu Er's identity is far more special than you imagine. Before we set off, the captain told me about the uniqueness of her having no martial soul. To put it simply, her martial soul could not possibly appear on a human being at all. Just like, do you think it's possible for a human to be born with a martial soul like the one honored as the Beast God Di Tian?" His voice was calm and steady, as if he had long been confident of success.

"That's not necessarily true. Just like Huo Yuhao from the last tournament, his martial soul was the Ice Jade Scorpion, which was almost honored as impossible for a human to awaken, but the captain told me that his martial soul was not formed congenitally to begin with. Although I don't know how the captain knew, I believe in the captain's judgment," Yan Lingshu said thoughtfully.

On the battlefield, the fighting became increasingly intense. The City Defense Army adjusted their attack strategy and began to concentrate firepower on the main forces like Wang Qiu Er. The energy beams of the Soul Guidance Cannons also fell like meteors, bombarding toward them. Violent roars sounded continuously on the open ground, and one soul skill after another was constantly deflected, shattered, and exploded among the City Defense Army.

Suddenly, a team member within the Protective Barrier stopped abruptly and began to cough violently, the blood spilling from the corner of his mouth mixed with some shattered internal organs. That was an injury caused by the City Defense Army's Soul Guidance Device, and because it could not be treated, the injury was deteriorating rapidly.

"Sorry everyone, it looks like I have to go first..." the team member said weakly, his eyes full of despair. His body was trembling constantly, and the aura of life was gradually dissipating.

Sacrifice had always been happening. From the initial breakout of Mingdu to the current battle of breaking out on the plain, everyone had long since lost the time for sorrow. All they could do was control their own soul power consumption as much as possible in order to find a suitable opportunity to break out of the encirclement.

As the enemy continued to close in, Wang Qiu Er felt unprecedented pressure. She could clearly perceive that this time the enemy's lineup was even larger than before, and their strength was also stronger. The Holy Spirit Cult had dispatched, in addition to those people hidden behind the City Defense Army, several powerful Soul Saints hidden in the dark, and there might even be powerhouses at the Soul Douluo level.

On the side of the City Defense Army, they had even dispatched a large number of well-equipped soldiers, and the number of Soul Guidance Cannons was more than double what it was before. These Soul Guidance Cannons had undergone special modifications, and the blue light emitted from the muzzles carried a trace of strange patterns, as if containing even greater power, making one's hair stand on end.

After this battle, everyone had a brand-new understanding of the Sun Moon Empire's strength, because only by personally experiencing that dazzling coordination of Soul Guidance Devices and group combat did they realize that Great Soul Masters and Soul Elders, whom they could kill with a casual strike on ordinary days, now had a sharply increased difficulty of being killed under the coordination of the enemy's small squads.

Countless arrows shot toward Wang Qiu Er and the others like locusts. At the same time, the energy beams of the Soul Guidance Cannons also tore through the noise of the battlefield and bombarded toward them. Wang Qiu Er's Golden Dragon Spear danced into a golden curtain of light, blocking the arrows one after another. Facing the attack of the Soul Guidance Cannons, she met them head-on; the Golden Dragon Maiden was best at frontal confrontation, and as the absolute main force, what she needed most was to carry the first wave of impact for the team.

"Ang—" The Golden Dragon Spear seemed to melt, turning into liquid that merged into Wang Qiu Er's palms, and in an instant, it circulated throughout Wang Qiu Er's entire body. At the same time, the Fifth Soul Ring on Wang Qiu Er's body also lit up accordingly.

Fifth Soul Skill—Golden Dragon Roar, Wang Qiu Er's strongest attack soul skill!