Chapter 538

Unfortunately, Axi Bao's act of 'holding out' is merely just 'holding out'.

No way, these guys' superpowers are just too weird; stacked together, relying on him alone really is a bit hard to withstand.

Especially that red‑haired woman in tight clothing— not being able to see her attack trajectory is one thing, but even the inexplicably appearing obstacles are invisible!

As he ran, he would suddenly be blocked by an invisible wall of air, crashing into it like a fool, so he hardly dared to maintain ultra‑high speed.

Pioneers (glossary)

Until Axi Bao felt his forehead about to swell, he pulled out a sharp battle axe and began frantically tearing down, only then regaining a bit of agility.

Too bad his keyword for tonight seems to be merely 'however'.

Russian Empire

Thus he quickly realized what he needed to worry about wasn't some compressed air at all, but a strong wave of music.

Eight Trigrams Wandering Body

Watching the golden‑haired old man slowly descend from mid‑air, seeming to already carry a touch of divinity, Axi Bao inexplicably felt his rear tighten.

And while he was getting along swimmingly with a few old White Eagle friends, fiercely exchanging opinions, the two Beast Kings were also sought out by the Pioneers.

The Fox King faced a multinational alliance centered on the Europa Alliance and the Russian Empire, with a throng of male witches, female witches, necromantic warlocks, and dragon‑blood battle mages queuing up to duel her.

Although the Fox King was a booming spell‑cannon, in the end two fists can't fight four hands—cover the front and the rear suffers, cover the top and the bottom suffers; the gang left him drenched in sweat.

The Ox King then encountered Huaxia's Cold‑Iron God 【Eight Trigrams Body‑Flow】, as well as four righteous qi masters from the Huaxia ancient martial sect of Wu Family Gully.

Positive Qi Nurturing Body Technique

As a result, while giving birth to an immensely powerful righteous qi master named Tun Tian Hua, it also brought the players a nearly universal copy of the 'Righteous Qi Cultivation Technique'.

Moreover, since the people of Wu Family Gully have practiced this technique since childhood, upon entering the game and completing the judgment of high‑dimensional influence, their basic light values are considerably higher than Ji Ming's, who is only a half‑trained outsider.

Wu Shuo

Jingang

Seeing the Eight Trigrams incarnation water droplet, using a high‑speed charge it successfully drove back the Ox King.

As the senior brother, Tun Tian Lun wielded an immensely heavy alloy great rod, bringing it down on the old ox's head.

The Ox King's weapon is an extravagantly shaped great hammer; seeing the situation, he did not dodge but instead lifted the thing in his hands and met it head‑on.

One smashed down, the other thrust up; the two heavyweights collided in mid‑air, producing a clangorous roar loud enough to drown out even distant explosions.

Moreover, this was only the beginning; the two went back and forth, going all out, and actually fought head‑to‑head for a full ten rounds.

Even the asphalt road beneath Niuwang's feet was blasted into a booming collapse, cracking open, yet still no victor emerged.

However, in the contest of strength, the naturally gifted Niuwang eventually gained the upper hand, while the stamina‑lacking Tuntian could only retreat after expending his force.

Hmph, trying to escape?

Niuwang flew into a rage, lifted his leg to give chase, but before he could take two steps a human blocked him, and without a word slammed a fist strike into his abdomen.

Such a sneak attack is truly despicable, but running with the Wolf King, that iron beast, even the seemingly honest Niuwang is no saint.

Moreover, when it came to speed he still had the edge; he gripped the hammer handle, struck first despite moving second, and actually intended to slam the hammerhead into the man's fist.

Yet unlike his expectation of crushing the opponent with ease, the man, though blown several meters by the brute force, still managed to catch his hammer squarely.

Impressive, truly worthy of being a beast‑race expert!

This is Wu Shu, the second son of the Wu family's fire generation, nicknamed Jingang; with a flick of his arms he can throw thirty tons, and his fleshly strength is as solid as bronze‑cast iron.

But it wasn't over yet; just as Niuwang had not exhausted his rear power, had not yet released his front power, and was still in the follow‑through phase, a gust of force struck from behind.

Second Brother, I'll help you!

Ah!

Before he could turn to block, Niuwang felt his lower back as if struck by a wife's elbow, from muscle to bone emitting a sound of being overloaded.

This is an absolute weak point for vertebrates; frightened, Niuwang didn't even bother with his hammer, and a big hand shot back like a grappling hook.

Unfortunately, the man's fighting style was rather underhanded; seeing his blow fail, he didn't follow up but slipped away, merely grazing Niuwang's fingertips on his sleeve.

Only when Niuwang turned his head did he realize that his sneak attacker was actually a bald man, his pate gleaming like polished tile, flashing even in the darkness.

It's a pity that, although he bears the surname Wu, the man's name is not Wu Ke.

He is Wu Zhuo, the third son of the Wu family's fire generation, nicknamed Tiezui; able to harvest five hundred mu of corn a day as a fiery farming king, he excels at Iron Head Technique, with steel tendons and an iron brain.

So the question arises: why would a cultivator of the Iron Head Technique who is also a farmhand have the nickname "Tiezui"?

Of course, it's because……

You're getting worked up again—looks like my big brother was right to call you a beast‑born freak; take a look, do you still even resemble an ox?

At breakneck speed he hurled a torrent of abuse at Niuwang from head to toe, his pronunciation and logic crystal clear, downright terrifying.

"... There's no helping it; from childhood he's been sparring with village aunties, honing his skill to perfection."

Moreover, that blow was just too solid; although Niuwang still looks burly, he constantly feels his waist muscles twitching.

All he can do is yell at his throat to seek an opening.

Damn it, four against one—what kind of hero is that!!

At the same time he was trying to buy time, hoping to find the enemy's flaw and crush him in one strike.

However, if his trash talk fails, he shouldn't waste it; he not only failed to slap a 【Shame】 buff on the foe, but instead had everyone laughing.

Now it was Niuwang's turn to be dazed; he gripped his huge hammer, his face fierce.

You! What are you laughing at!!

The Bagua Wanderings retreated from the water‑droplet mode amidst the scattered ice crystal shards, pointing a finger at Niuwang from afar.

We're certainly laughing at you……

Hardly had the words left his mouth when Niuwang felt his heart as if someone had given it a squeeze.

This is the terrible intuition shared by all beast‑race powerhouses—it feels as if something capable of challenging his mighty presence has appeared!

Thus, like Ahxibao, at the critical moment he chose to follow his instinct, swinging his hammer toward the air diagonally above him.

The facts proved that this might have been the most correct decision of his life.

Because his hammer had just swung into place, he saw countless sparks splash onto his face amidst the intense metallic collision sounds.

Moreover, the collision wasn't once or twice, not even three or four times, but fifty times per second!

Frightened, the Bull King hastily adjusted his stance, gave it his all, and barely managed to withstand such high-intensity consecutive strikes.

"Damn it, what the hell is this thing?"

The Bull King's expression was priceless; he was genuinely terrified by this horde of demons and monsters.

Not daring to continue playing with the enemy, his qi and blood surged throughout his body, his skin flushed, mist sprayed from his mouth and nose, and he entered the berserk state.

He roared, gave a mighty heave, and flung the thing straight away.

However, the opponent did not fly out in a fluster; instead, he gracefully traced an arc in the air and landed steadily on the ground.

Taking a closer look, it turned out to be a girl wielding twin blades.

Of the Wu family's fire generation, the younger sister Wu Yan, nicknamed Little Soldier because she had just enlisted last year.

She specialized in light-body techniques, her body light as a swallow, agile as a startled swan, capable of fifty backflips per second—enough to rip apart someone else's house cat.

With the aid of righteous qi, she could even produce an attack effect like just now, resembling a high-speed cutting disc.

Only such tremendous force, like a flying brick, could break the Bull King's defense and force him to use his one-time berserk trump card in a short span.

"I will correct your two mistakes: first, we are not just four here, but five in total, and we can still add more if needed!"

Bagua Walking Body stepped forward, releasing a chill that helped cool Wu Yan's forged twin blades, which had turned red from the ultra‑high‑speed impact.

"Second, this place isn't only for heroes; there are also heroines, and even more heroes and heroines."

"As for you—either surrender or die; the path is under your feet, the fate is in your hands, choose for yourself!"

But the Bull King obviously wouldn't swallow that threat; instead he cursed, his berserk posture maddened, and charged again swinging his hammer.

Thus the White Eagle fights the Wolf Prince, Huaxia fights the Bull King, and the Europa Alliance and the Russian Empire fight the Fox King.

At this point some might ask, where is our eye‑catching packet Tianzhu, and who is the old immortal fighting?

The answer is: what fight are we talking about?

How can one cultivate immortality with all this fighting and killing?

Immortals formed a guard, divine lizards cleared the way, and the old immortal with the magic flute led his divine court to descend upon Han City immediately.

Yet he neither threatened nor attacked, but instead spoke his gospel to the countless panicked beast‑folk before him.

"Fellow Daoist, please stay!"

He then gave a slight smile.

"How defiled this world is! You would be better off following me to gain an insight, how about it?"

Beast‑folk: "Holy shit, there's a… a legendary supreme god coming!!!"

In this way, the players spent only a short hour to firmly grasp the entire situation of Han City in their hands.

Then the question arises: why, over the past two weeks, did they let the royal court's great army rampage unchecked across the barbarian plains, seizing five cities in one go?

The answer to the question is simple—baiting.

Question: Why, before the advent of the Maxim gun, whether in East or West, whether prosperous or declining, did almost all agrarian peoples feel troubled by the surrounding nomadic tribes?

The answer is simple: you have hit points, they do not.

If they get hungry or thirsty, they can immediately mount their horses and charge down; moreover, as a primitive mechanized unit, each individual's mobility is absurdly high.

When you spread out to sweep and clear, they instead besiege key strongholds.

When you focus on defense, they raid the rural villages,

When you pursue eastward, they run westward.

When you guard the south, they loot in the north.

So when the royal army arrives, it will surely be the same: they bypass the hard bones, pick only the soft persimmons to crush, until they rot half of the barbarian plains.

This is also the fundamental reason why Huaxia's dynasties throughout history built the Great Wall—to restrict their southward advance; otherwise they'd be like a swarm of cockroaches!

Whether people climb over the wall or not is actually irrelevant; at worst they'd fight on the wall, just don't let the horses come through, otherwise the initiative in war will always lie with them.

As for changing our approach, we would use offense as defense…

Forget it—first, don't even mention the small tribes on the steppe's fringe running wherever they please; even if you captured them, there wouldn't be much gain, not even enough to cover the cost of thousands of armored cavalry eating horses.

The large tribes that cannot flee are all deep in the steppe; aside from a few prosperous eras, hardly any dynasty possessed the strength to organize a deep incursion into the steppe.

What's worse, you also don't know exactly what the road conditions are over there; if you accidentally pay tribute to the legendary flying general, getting lost in the wilderness and missing the schedule would be downright hilarious.

This is also one of the players' concerns, and after repeated consideration they still abandoned the plan to strike first, which would likely have lost them even the bitter tea.

But a fixed defense plan isn't suitable either, for even if the players' infrastructure strength were great, they could not spend vast sums of money and manpower to build a Great Wall along the barbarian steppe's border.

Moreover, the Maginot Line is long gone, everyone's technology has advanced to the atomic age, so please don't still think of using WWI trench tactics to fight—this is far too outdated!

Therefore, after the High Tower Council convened and deliberated all day, they finally decided to take wisdom from the fishing folk and dig a huge bait‑pit on the frontier,

scatter the most fragrant, fattest bait, firmly securing all the 'fish' at one or several points, then ruthlessly drop the neutral and live wires!

As LaoZhao would put it: "We want to eat this pastry in the most dignified way—no oil on our hands, no scraps on the ground!"

Although the Fox King and Bull King surely cannot outwit humans in mind games, the Wolf father‑son pair are extremely cunning, a pair that absolutely cannot be underestimated.

If we want them to also believe that this lively, wriggling earthworm is not bait but a spoil they earned through hard work and sweat…

…we would have to pay a great… no, a very great price!

At this point someone might think it should be the great powers joining forces, pressing the small official entities like Silla at the United Nations conference to sacrifice themselves.

Ha, don't rush to lament the injustice of the world; well, the world is indeed unjust, but compared to 'unjust,' its biggest feature is still 'complex'.

Because there is no coercion, no inducement, and even the very feasibility of the 'bait‑and‑pit' scheme is still amid tense, heated debate.

The first to propose this plan and actively suggest using the Silla capital as bait was none other than Prince Piao Renshuang of the hidden Silla royal house of the Park family.

(End of chapter)