Chapter 946: The Behemoths Attack!
Chapter 946: The Behemoths Attack!
Translated by: Hypersheep325
Edited by: Michyrr
Rooooar! With this savage bellow, the earth began to quake, and the air was instantly saturated with tension. Boom! The mountain of a Behemoth spread apart its four legs and began to charge like a lightning bolt at the two defense lines, its golden horn glimmering in the sunlight.
Squish! The enormous hooves thundered down, and one fearful Arab soldier too slow to move was instantly smashed into a metal pancake. The Behemoth continued its charge unperturbed and unimpeded.
Rumble! The battlefield of Talas became like a plank on the ocean, tossing and turning as it was ravaged by winds. Horses neighed in panic, their manes blowing in the wind, and they became much more uneasy and harder to control.
“Hold!”
“Get a handle on the warhorses! Everyone, stay in position! Hold formation!”
“Ballistae, get ready to fire!”
Behind the defense line, the army was in turmoil, the charge of that enormous and savage beast causing an atmosphere of terror to sweep through the world. Even the veteran and resolved Tang warriors couldn’t help but feel a deep dread, much less the warhorses.
This battle had already surpassed the bounds of their imagination. This was no longer man versus man, but man versus Behemoth.
“Everyone, get ready!”
A thunderous shout rang in everyone’s ears, and in a flash of light, a black silhouette jumped down from the high walls. Leaping Dragon Art! Even a martial artist would die if they jumped down from the lofty walls of Talas, so this technique of Wang Chong’s was perfect for such a situation.
Bang! Wang Chong spun in the air several times before landing firmly on one of the steel walls below.
Wang Chong’s appearance had a calming effect on the army, and even the panicked mercenaries seemed to find their backbone and go back to preparing for battle. But only Wang Chong knew that his mind was just as astonished and surprised as his soldiers’. After all, he knew that the Behemoth Army should have never appeared on this battlefield. But he showed none of this shock, and his sharp eyes were locked on to the distant charging Behemoth.
The Arabs, the Tang, and the tens of thousands of Tibetans and Turks were watching as this dreadful monster charged. Dalun Ruozan and Huoshu Huicang held their breaths and squinted.
This battle was directly related to the fates of the two empires of the east and west. If Arabia won, the continent would undergo an unprecedented transformation. The Tibetans and Turks, as stakeholders in this struggle, would naturally be drawn into such an upheaval.
“Too powerful! Such powerful vitality! That’s not something a human can have, not even Great Generals!”
“Now it’s time to see how the Great Tang deals with it. No ordinary methods can stop that!”
“It’s a formidable killing blow! The Anxi Protectorate army might end up finished today!”
Huoshu Huicang, Dusong Mangpoje, Duwu Sili, and Dalun Ruozan stood in a row, their clothes flapping in the wind as they watched from the hills.
In the distance, the rhino-shaped Behemoth was getting closer and closer, exuding a stifling wave of dread.
Three thousand zhang, two thousand zhang, one thousand zhang…
The Tang soldiers and mercenaries tightly grasped their weapons, their breathing heavy and their eyes nervous, the stench of death dominating all else.
Wang Chong stood on the steel wall, his hair and clothes being tossed and turned by the wind, his mind unprecedentedly focused.
“Master archer unit, fire!”
Wang Chong’s cold voice echoed over the battlefield.
Creakcreak!
The armored master archers standing behind the first defense line pulled their bowstrings to their maximum extent, their muscular physiques and energetic auras indicating that they were all elites of the Anxi Protectorate army. In the era of the Sage Emperor, the Great Tang had placed an unparalleled focus on the Western Regions. The six hundred thousand soldiers of the Great Tang were carefully picked through, with only the best and strongest being sent to the Western Regions to become soldiers of the Anxi Protectorate army.
An archer unit made purely of master archers was something that could only be found in the Anxi Protectorate army. Not even Wang Chong had such a force under him.
Boomboomboom!
The air exploded as thousands of arrows instantly filled the air. The master archers of the Anxi Protectorate army could each fire five to ten arrows at once, and could fire two to three times a second. A hundred-man unit of such master archers was equivalent to three to four thousand regular archers, perhaps even more.
Whooshwhooshwhoosh! The rain of arrows drew a massive arc through the air before descending on the rhino-shaped beast.
But to their stupefaction, of the nearly ten thousand arrows, more than ninety percent bounced off the Behemoth’s hide.
Not even the arm strength of a master archer was able to pierce the thick hide of that Behemoth.
“!!!”
Everyone was stunned by this sight. The master archers of the Anxi Protectorate army were the best of the best, and though they were mass-firing, the power of each arrow could shatter stone at a distance of one thousand zhang, and even ordinary armor wouldn’t be able to stop one. Yet this beast’s hide had managed to repel more than ninety percent of these arrows.
“Impossible!”
Even the spectating Duwu Sili was flabbergasted by this sight.
On the steel wall, Wang Chong’s mind was in a state of turmoil—this animal was overturning everything he knew. This beast’s body might not have been as hard as steel, but it was far more pliable. Of the arrows that had made no impact, eighty to ninety percent had just bounced off the skin.
This Behemoth’s hide is equivalent to a steel wall half a foot thick. The master archers alone won’t be enough to deal any effective damage.
Wang Chong’s mind whirred as he attempted to calculate the strength of this Behemoth.
The winds around him were only getting fiercer as the Behemoth got closer and closer.
The Tang soldiers were growing more and more panicked, the Behemoth’s power making them all tremble in fear.
“Fire again! Reduce the number of arrows fired to only two!” Wang Chong once more ordered to his uneasy army.
“Huang Botian! Get ready! Earthquake Art!
“All other officers, stand ready! Prepare for the Lion’s Roar!”
As the tension thickened, Wang Chong’s voice was the sole thing holding the army together. Wang Chong issued a string of orders, and the entire Tang army, including the Anxi Protectorate army, began to move.
Twangtwangtwang!
Another thick volley of arrows was fired, crossing the western battlefield to fall upon the Behemoth. After taking in the lesson of the first volley, the archers had reduced the number of arrows so that each arrow had more power.
The effects were immediately apparent. Swishswishswish! They could all hear the sound of the metal arrows plunging into the hide. The several thousand arrows had all entered the Behemoth’s body, not a single one being deflected.
But before they could cheer, they were silenced by the beast’s reaction.
Even though it had thousands of arrows rising from its skin, the Behemoth showed no reaction whatsoever. Let alone slow its speed, it didn’t even blink. It was like the arrows had never been fired.
“This massive beast… what, what thick skin!” one of the Qixi soldiers said with wide eyes, his throat gurgling.
Around him, countless soldiers similarly showed fear in their eyes. Normal animals had only thin hides, but this was clearly not the case with this massive beast. The thickness of its skin seemed to even exceed the length of the arrows, which were three feet long.
This was merely the Behemoth’s first layer of defense, but this alone was enough to render many of their attacks ineffective.
At this moment, Wang Chong was the only person who maintained his calm. As he stared at the distant creature, his mind constantly calculated.
Fifteen hundred zhang!
One thousand zhang!
It was getting closer and closer, the shaking causing the ground to rise and fall by half a foot. At this distance, the soldiers felt like they were ants looking up at an elephant. The psychological impact of this sight was difficult to describe. Even Wang Chong began to feel an intense danger, the stench of death surging at him in waves, threatening to overtake him at any moment.
Eight, seven, six, five, four…
Wang Chong silently counted down, and at ‘one’, he immediately gave the order.
“Begin!”
“Okay!”
All the officers of the Tang army, including Wang Chong and Gao Xianzhi, totaling more than fifteen hundred, bellowed as one with the Lion’s Roar. In an instant, invisible waves of sound began to spread out from the steel walls, rapidly merging into a torrential wave that swept over the western battlefield, including the rhino-shaped Behemoth.