Chapter 223: with translation of chapter title

"Kill!"

As Su Hao gave an order, the Bone Dragon immediately fell from the sky to the ground.

The Pale Skeleton Warriors and Pale Skeleton Mages climbed down from the Bone Dragon's back.

Behind Su Hao, they formed a neat formation and marched mightily toward the ruins ahead.

Crystal Monsters are creatures with extremely strong territorial instincts, and they also live in groups.

Generally, they reach Supernatural Grade First Rank, with some attaining Second Rank and Third Tier; their defense is high, and they can speed up recovery from injuries by farming.

Therefore, whenever outsiders approach their territory, they are attacked by large numbers of Crystal Monsters.

When the Pale Undead Creature Army entered the ruins, large numbers of Crystal Monsters burst from the ground and attacked the leading Pale Skeleton Warriors.

These Crystal Monsters look somewhat like pangolins, standing nearly a meter tall, their bodies made of blue crystal, with sharp claws on their two forelimbs.

The length of these claws equals their arms, emitting a chilling cold light, and they can easily dig into the ground.

This is why they can burrow underground; even the hardest rock is as soft as tofu under their claws.

Their claws, which can easily dig through rock and let them shuttle freely underground, are naturally extremely sharp—even the body of a First-Rank Supernatural being risks being torn apart.

However, facing the numerous Crystal Monster attacks, the leading Pale Skeleton Warriors acted as if they hadn't seen them, their steps unchanged, continuing forward at a steady pace.

"Be careful, Boss Su Hao, don't be careless—these stone monsters have strong defense, their attack is not weak either, their claws are extremely sharp and can shred low-quality First-Rank Supernatural gear."

"Moreover, among these stone monsters there are many Second-Rank and Third-Rank Supernatural fighters; if we are careless and underestimate them, the boss could suffer significant losses."

Seeing Su Hao so careless, not letting the Undead Army pause to resist, Tie Geda instantly grew anxious and couldn't help shouting a reminder.

Failing to capture this ruin is trivial; if Su Hao's army suffers heavy losses here, it could affect his relationship with the Dwarf Tribe—that's what Tie Geda worries about most.

Blazing Flame Dragon Fruit and Purple Gold Coiling Dragon Bamboo are extremely important to the Dwarf Tribe; Tie Geda truly does not want any rift to arise between him and Su Hao.

This place was brought by Tie Geda; if Su Hao's army suffers heavy losses here, narrow-minded people might think he deliberately led Su Hao into this dangerous spot.

However, Su Hao is clearly not petty; his reason for not letting the Undead pause to resist is simply that he looks down on the enemy.

"No need to worry; this handful of Crystal Monsters can't threaten my Undead Army."

Su Hao waved his hand, paying no heed.

In terms of numbers, this batch of Crystal Monsters is about a thousand, roughly equal to the number of Pale Skeleton Warriors.

In terms of combat power, Pale Skeleton Warriors are capable of single-handedly slaying a Third-Rank Tyrant Devil Cow.

Among all Third-Rank Supernatural beings, their individual strength may not be top-tier, but it is still excellent.

By contrast, hardly any of these Crystal Monsters reach Third-Rank Supernatural strength—what right do they have to make the Pale Skeleton Warriors stop and seriously defend?

On the battlefield.

The Crystal Monsters' emergence points from underground are not far from the Pale Skeleton Warriors.

After a brief charge, they had reached the Pale Skeleton Warriors' front, raising their sharp claws to strike down.

At that moment, the Pale Skeleton Warriors, as if finally seeing their opponent, lifted their long blades wreathed in green flame and chopped down at the Crystal Monsters before them.

The Pale Skeleton Warriors are Third-Rank Supernatural beings, excelling in physique; their speed is beyond what the Crystal Monsters can match.

Even if they act later, they can easily achieve a strike that lands first, delivering a heavy blow to the Crystal Monsters' bodies.

The Crystal Monsters' bodies, so hard as to make Tie Geda despair, become like tofu under the Pale Skeleton Warriors' blades.

As the blades swept through, whether First-Rank or Second-Rank, their bodies were easily cut in half.

Only Supernatural Upper-Rank Crystal Monsters could block a Pale Skeleton Warrior's strike; they weren't cleaved in half but were instead sent flying by a heavy blow.

Even so, their situation is hardly any better.

All Undead creatures summoned by the Undead Summoning Technique possess the passive skill Ghost Fire, which is the green flame wreathed around their long blades.

Any enemy struck by their attacks has their body ignited by a strand of green Ghost Fire, causing their soul to suffer continual burning.

Although Crystal Monsters have extremely strong physical defenses, their soul strength is not impressive; under the continual burning of Ghost Fire, they will likely die soon as their souls extinguish.

However, the Pale Skeleton Warriors are not satisfied with this result.

After seeing that they could not kill a Third-Rank Crystal Monster with a single blow, merely sending it flying,

the Soul Fire in the Pale Skeleton Warriors' heads twitched slightly; they then lifted their remaining three arms, and after a brief pause, swiftly rushed to the fallen Third-Rank Crystal Monster.

They unleashed Furious Blade Wild Slash, a technique only Third-Rank Pale Skeleton Warriors can use, launching a fierce attack at the downed Third-Rank Crystal Monster.

On the Pale Skeleton Warriors' long blades, besides the Ghost Fire, there is also Withering Power.

Once afflicted with the Withering state, their attack and speed decrease; how could the Crystal Monsters possibly evade the Pale Skeleton Warriors' attacks then?

They had just waved their claws, dug a small pit in the ground, and were already struck by the Pale Skeleton Warriors with over a dozen blows.

Furious Blade Wild Slash not only increases attack speed, but also greatly enhances the sharpness of the long blade.

Originally, the Pale Skeleton Warriors could indeed not cleave a Third-Rank Crystal Monster's body with a single strike.

But after using Furious Blade Wild Slash, any random strike leaves a deep wound on them.

Furthermore, the attack speed of Furious Blade Wild Slash is extremely fast; in a short while, the Third-Rank Crystal Monsters' bodies are chopped into dozens of pieces, scattered on the ground, dead beyond revival.

Under the Pale Skeleton Warriors' counterattack, this wave of about a thousand Crystal Monsters instantly turned into heaps of broken crystal fragments of various sizes, scattered across the ruins.

"That's it..."

Seeing the battlefield, with not a single intact Crystal Monster corpse, Tie Geda's eyes widened like copper bells, his expression turning stiff.

Just a moment ago, he was still worried that Su Hao's carelessness would cause severe losses to the Undead creatures.

But in the next moment, after just a brief clash, all the Crystal Monsters—whether First-Rank, Second-Rank, or Third-Rank—were easily slain by the Pale Skeleton Warriors.

Their deaths were clean and swift; if one glanced away for a moment, they might not even know how the enemy died. Remember, the Dwarf Tribe once suffered heavy losses at the hands of these Crystal Monsters.

By rights, Undead creatures should be relatively weak in strength.

Yet Su Hao's Undead Army could so easily and swiftly kill these Crystal Monsters, which truly left Tie Geda shocked and bewildered.

"No way—among these Crystal Monsters, there are several whose Supernatural Grade reaches Third Rank, and even those Third-Rank Supernatural Crystal Monsters can be easily killed; this would mean..."

Thinking of this, Tie Gedua's eyes widened even more, as if they were about to pop out of their sockets.

If it were only one or two third-rank undead creatures, that would still be understandable.

But if these several thousand undead creatures all reached Supernatural Grade Third Tier, that would be too frightening.

Damn, is that called bringing a little force out? Recalling Su Hao's words when he just arrived at the dwarf tribe, Tie Geda felt numb.

If such a force really is just a little troop, then how terrifying must Su Hao's army be? 'It's not over yet; the crystal stone monsters at this ruin are far more than this.'

Su Hao did not heed Tie Geda's thoughts, nor did he give much explanation.

After killing this batch of crystal stone monsters, he then commanded the army of ten-thousand-year creatures to continue advancing.

According to his memory from his previous life, Su Hao had a relatively good understanding of the crystal stone monsters.

Crystal stone monsters are a gregarious species with extremely fast reproduction; they can occupy such a large ruin and even include the Nengyuan Shuijing Kuang in their territory, so their numbers absolutely cannot be just this little.

However, Su Hao also did not worry that they would hide underground and not come out, which would increase the difficulty of killing them.

Their strong defense and reproductive ability result in the crystal stone monsters having very low intelligence.

As soon as any invader enters their territory, they will launch an all-out attack.

Therefore, as long as Su Hao continues forward, he need not worry about the crystal stone monsters not appearing.

Indeed, the pale skeleton warriors just instantly killed this batch of crystal stone monsters, showing their formidable combat power.

However, the pale skeleton warriors had not advanced even a few hundred meters before more crystal stone monsters burst out from the ground.

They waved the claws in their hands and launched an all-out attack on the pale skeleton warriors.

However, this time their performance was even worse than the previous round.

At least in the previous round, the attacking crystal stone monsters could still get close to the pale skeleton warriors.

But this round's crystal stone monsters cannot even manage that.

As the pale skeleton mage army raised their wands, the long-prepared magic burst forth instantly.

Instantly, sharp bone spikes sprouted from the ground, easily piercing the bodies of first- and second-rank crystal stone monsters and pinning them in midair.

The situation of third-rank crystal stone monsters was slightly better; they were not instantly killed.

After being struck by a bone spike, their bodies merely showed a crack neither big nor small.

But that was only at the beginning; the situation was slightly better.

If there were only a dozen or so bone spikes, trying to kill third-rank crystal stone monsters this way would obviously be unrealistic; even piercing their bodies would be difficult.

But the problem is that this round's bone spikes were emitted jointly by over a thousand skeleton warriors; this number is not just one or two, but as many as ten thousand bone spikes.

Moreover, these bone spikes are entwined with green ghost fire and the power of withering.

Once struck by a bone spike, the pain from the spirit-searing burn and the decline in strength and speed caused by the withering state make third-rank crystal stone monsters lose their ability to resist on the spot.

The final result is being hit by one bone spike after another, causing the cracks on their bodies to grow larger and larger.

Finally, with a 'bang,' the sturdy bodies of the third-rank crystal stone monsters shattered into countless fragments under the relentless bone spikes, scattering across the surrounding ground.

Thus, as the undead army continually advances, crystal stone monsters keep bursting from the ground, attempting to kill these invaders.

But the result is either being hacked to death by the pale skeleton warriors or being taken away by a spell from the pale skeleton mages.

Moreover, some relatively fortunate crystal stone monsters fell beneath the breath of the bone dragon.

In less than an hour, this ruin that made the dwarf tribe hesitate has been mostly cleared by the undead army.

At this moment, Su Hao, accompanied by Tie Geda and others, stood among the skeleton mages and arrived before an abandoned palace.

This palace is huge, resembling the ruins of a giant; it appears to have only one story, but its height is nearly a hundred meters.

According to Su Hao's memory, the boss of this ruin is located inside this palace.

It is a colossal crystal stone behemoth with Supernatural Fourth Rank combat power.

Through that battle in the Wangling Hai, Su Hao clearly understands how vast the gap is between third and fourth ranks.

Even though the pale skeleton warriors are top-tier among third-rank Supernatural beings, before a fourth-rank Supernatural they can only get beaten.

Currently, the scale of the undead army within the territory has not yet grown; Su Hao does not want these pale undead creatures to suffer heavy losses.

So after a moment's thought, he abandoned the idea of letting the undead army continue advancing.

"I feel a strong aura inside this palace; there may very well be a fourth-rank Supernatural being in there. In the upcoming battle, I might not be able to look after you, so I suggest you wait outside."

Although Su Hao's current strength does not make him particularly afraid of a fourth-rank Supernatural, he cannot guarantee the safety of Tie Geda and these dwarves.

If Tie Geda and the others follow him inside, they might well be killed by the battle's aftermath.

"What? A fourth-rank Supernatural! Boss Su Hao, maybe we should retreat; we can find the Nengyuan Shuijing Kuang elsewhere, there's no need to take this risk."

Upon hearing that there might be a fourth-rank Supernatural in this palace, Tie Geda's first thought was to stay away from here.

In this vast new world, finding an energy crystal mine is not particularly difficult.

Rather than risking a battle with a fourth-rank Supernatural, it would be better to spend a little more time searching for a new energy crystal mine.

This time, Su Hao is eager to boost his combat power; how could he let this energy crystal mine slip away? (End of chapter)