Chapter 485 - The Battle Rages

Samael dove straight through the Player lines, he preferred to hunt down the small fries, the players with the least HP, priests, archers, bards, and even beast tamers as they relied heavily on their animals to battle for them, they had a low health base.

Samael's claws dug deep, slicing throats, ripping chests and dismembering players in matters of seconds. He didn't even bother with players who used invulnerability skills to protect themselves. As he switched to softer, tender, and easy to crunch meat. He would switch from player to player, either killing them off or scaring them into using their high cooldown protection skills. And once he switched to other players, the timer on the invulnerability would have ended, and he would come back to kill off the players.

He ignored tanks, paladins, and any player with a high HP base as swordmasters or Heaven Dawn's berserkers. Those were not worth his time.

Samael's advance caused even greater havoc in the player ranks, and minutes later the Taurus demons within the Undead rank would all be culled to death.

The Death Knights firepower was imposing, a Taurus Demon could last at most a minute under the concentrated assault of the Death Knights surrounding it. And after about five minutes, all the Taurus Demons were slain.

Zhang Shi didn't look too disturbed, even if he was in the middle of the Death Knight ranks. He used [Blood Escape], and got himself out of the sticky situation he was in. No player would want to find himself in what amounted to ten thousand Death Knights.

"Blood Ragers A unit! Advance!" Zhang Shi gave the command, and hundreds if not thousands of players burst out from within the passage leading to the Ash King's Keep.

These were all, best of the best, the highest-level players of the Blood Ragers guild. And they were coming with a vengeance in their eyes.

Dave noticed that they had split their forces in two. The front row charged at the marching Death Knights and the second row made a circle. Most of the second row were priests, casters, and archers.

Dave didn't like this position men, something was not right there he believed.

Soon, the front row of the Blood Ragers A rank team clashed into the Death Knights row. It was here where Dave anticipated that the damage to his Death Knights will be the highest.

Flares of Legacy Skills, all, deities with demonic horns now came to life. Dave wondered if the Ash King had subdued the Deities of the players, or just their avatars is now showing the demonic persona of every god that is bound to players by legacy.

Eye blinding spells shot out everywhere of these spells, A Silver hammer that dropped from the skies to break the Undead Forces, a deity that drew a golden bow shot thousands of arrows. Another deity called the power of the wind, slicing bits and pieces of the Death Knights. Another deity called cavalry to charge at their ranks, and even more, powerful legacies used with utter abandon to any sense of future planning. To Dave's eyes, this looked wistful, as Zhang Shi should consider the fact that Dave might have something up his sleeves that he could use on the chance he survives this full-frontal assault.

This attack was clearly dumb, but thinking again, White Ghost was in cahoots with Zhang Shi, and he will not allow such a waste of legacy skills to kill off Death Knights that could be replenished or could be discarded since the Keep was being attacked from four sides, and even if they managed to kill off Dave's entire army, it won't change the fact that the Undead King had more Death Knights at is disposal.

the battle wasn't to defeat Dave alone, and Zhang Shi should know this, this was a battle of survival. So why would they dumbly attack this way, Dave thought. And the answer soon came to him.

It was a distraction, a very expensive distraction that needed Zhang Shi to go all out. Dave spotted the group of the A rankers that didn't join the fray and grinned, he believed he had correctly guessed Zhang Shi's plan.

"Bud. Stay close."

The reply came from Dave's shadow, a grim fanged jaw answered, "As the lord commands, I am by your side."

"Good," Dave said.

Dave gave another set of command, this way, Zhang Shi will have to commit to his plan.

He ordered half of the Doom Knights that were guarding the flanks of Dave's legion to group up with the front line, this way he'll have more sustainable soldiers, and will be able to shake up the Legacy wielders a bit.

This action proved to be the correct one to force Zhang Shi's hand.

The one thousand Doom Knight Dave sent had reinforced the front row and made the Legacies have a far worse yield than when they were aimed at the Death Knights alone.

In this scenario, the legacy users began to die, trading death with the Doom Knights. But for every player lost, Zhang Shi's assault power lessened. Thus, he was forced to play his hidden ace.

There was no time to waste, as the Doom Knights will now be focused on the front line, Dave should be unable to defend himself from Zhang Shi's upcoming twist.

"Cervantes! Now!" Zhang Shi called.

"As you command, replied a player wearing pirate drabs."

The player disappeared from where he stood and appeared right behind Dave. He made sure he was not heard when he arrived behind Dave, and the moment his hand was about to touch Dave's back, a ghoulish hand grabbed his arm and tugged at it tightly.

"I knew you would have tried that," Dave grinned without turning.

The player panicked, the last time he attempted this technique, he pulled Dave into the backline of the players, he had wanted to do the same trick, as White Ghost had come up with an even greater capture plan than before. But when Dave had seen the trick, all of Zhang Shi and White Ghost's planning went to waste.

Bud grabbed Cervantes and pulled him down. The player wanted to teleport out, but was unable to. He then tried to teleport Bud along with him, but the shadow ghoul jerked the player and trapped him under the ground.

Being trapped with a Doom Knight was not a sight to be remembered. Especially if the latter as a ghoul. Cervantes's struggle ended as soon as it began, Bud's claws had found flesh, broke bone and carved meat. All that remained of Cervantes were mots of lights that surged out from underground.

Zhang Shi cursed, his actions proved useless, but at the same time, Dave had to lessen the numbers of Doom Knights protecting his flank.

Gargoyles by the hundreds burst out of the Ash King's keep. And riding them were players and demons that joined the battle. Raining down spells and arrows at the Death Knights. Another player force came charging at Dave's side. These were another group of the A rankers, but seeing their guild tags, they were mostly from Heaven's Dawn guild.

"So all the big guns are out. I'm garnering a lot of attention." Dave grumbled.

"How is the situation at your side?" Dave asked in the party chat.

"We're doing good, the player and demon resistance isn't much to worry about, but it should take time to break through at this speed." Blaster said.

"Same here, we're assisting the Undead King, but he himself has yet to act. He seems to be waiting for something." Lone said.

"Hmm. I'm getting a lot of o heat here. I believe that they're more focused on killing me than winning this fight. Tell Marik I need some Arial support."

"I have one of Lilith's bats nearby, I'll rally the info. Are you holding up well though?" Lone said.

"Yeah, so far, It's manageable, but I'm at a deadlock. I won't be able to move any further if the stress on my troops is not lessened." Dave said.

It was true, the players had decided to attack from the front, sides, and from the skies. Dave's troops, through powerful, will not sustain this continuous attack in the long run.

One of Lilith's Bats soon came to Dave, it was a small bat, with a devilish face. It spoke in the words of its mistress, the Duchess of Blood and Carnage.

"Your majesty," spoke the bat, the sound was sweet and feminine, if one didn't know that Lilith was the one controlling it, they would have been creeped out.

"Marik has sent forces to help you gain areal superiority. I also informed Dortha of your predicament, he will be sending in the big hammer to lessen the strain on your side."

"Thank you, Lilith, tell his majesty that once Dortha's forces start advancing, he could also join the fray. The Ash King is powerful, and as long as the Undead King remains put, that demon will remain in cowardly hiding. We want to lure him out."

"Young prince, you wish to use his majesty, the Undead King as bait?"

"Yes, otherwise we'll be forced to fight the Ash King inside his own terrain, we want to lure him out where we'll have the upper hand. Once we take the four entrances to the Keep, the Ash King will have nowhere to hide, and seeing the Undead King about to bust his door open, will have him come out as fast as he can."

"I will relay your message. May your battle be bloody, young prince."

Dave nodded at the bat that flew away.

Soon, the message had arrived to Dortha's ears, clearly deduced by the sound of the Wendigos screech that sounded from all over the underworld.

The wendigos were the big muscles of the Undead Legion, and their appearance forced the appearance of the Sworn Stalwarts. As these creatures were the only thing that could contend with the Wendigos' power.

Once Dortha's forces piled on the pressure, the Undead King's own forces began marching stronger.

The howl of an ancient creature resounded through the battlefield, looking up, Dave could see in the distance a dragon made entirely out of bones. And right on its back, the Undead King, with a throne of his own strapped to the dragon's back.

An explosion of black matter shot at the ranks of the players; the Black Skeletal Dragon started the fight with his Black Fire Breath. And it incinerated a huge portion of the demonic army.

Marik's forces soon came to assist Dave in fending off the gargoyles. Ghosts and banshees, even Shark Chariots flew in the skies, hunting down the gargoyles and any other demonic flying creature.

Dave pulled back five hundred Doom Knights from his flanks, leaving them with two hundred and fifty for each side. The five hundred he had ordered to intercept the charging A team of the Heaven's Dawn.

Dave's forces were thinned down, but that didn't mean that they lost all power. The five hundred Doom Knights proved a great hurdle for the players to bypass, and even if they did manage to, they won't go unscathed and a lot of casualties were bound to happen in the player ranks.

The battle never turned against the Undead's favor. So far, all of the players planning had gone to waste. And they were losing numbers at a rate too high to control or contain. More desertion happened; more players decided to give up the fight. There was no obvious sign of victory in sight.

And Dave made use of that. Whenever he saw deserters, he focused more of his troops to assault the deserting side. This way, even more players would give up, turning the situation into a snowball effect.

An explosion of fire and sound echoed right where the Undead King's forces were concentrated.

"What's happening?" Dave asked. And the reply came from the bat.

"Your plan worked; the Ash King has shown up on the battle. The Undead King is going to face him now."

"No! it's too early!" Dave called, even if the Undead King was strong, Dave knew that he was no match for the Ash King, the latter was a half-god, and he was a powerful one too.

But before he could even finish his sentence, another loud explosion echoed in the battlefield, fire surged from within the inner depths of the Ash King's keep, and the skies turned from red to crimson, to the darkest shades of red. Fire began raining, as the skies wept tears of flames.

The Ash King has taken the battle to the legion, and here and now, was when the fate of the Underworld will be decided.

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