On the rock wall creep, a newborn Puchi broke free from mycelial restraints.
The instant its form completed, its short fungal legs gave a light push. Its body obeyed gravity and fell downward.
The howling valley wind filled its mushroom cap violently, making pulu-pulu sounds.
It wasn't alone. In the night sky, countless Puchi of various forms were falling together.
Below, demon arrows and magic wove into a net of death, surging upward.
A scale-armored Puchi beside it was instantly carbonized by jumping arcs. A bloated mutant was pierced by several sharp arrows, falling crookedly like a broken sack. Even individuals entering stealth were accidentally ignited by a fireball that missed its target, turning into charred wreckage.
This newborn Puchi couldn't escape either.
An arrow pierced through its fragile fungal body, ending its brief life. From birth to death, the average lifespan of Puchi at the valley entrance was only six seconds.
But its mission was already complete.
The Puchi's corpse heavily smashed to the ground, mycelium scattering. Bursting out simultaneously was a large cloud of purple hallucinogenic spore fog!
...
"Intercept! Don't let a single one down! They'll explode!"
"At your feet! Watch the holes at your feet!"
"Mages! Where are the purification spells?! Quickly disperse these poison fogs!"
"They're everywhere—how do we purify?"
"Gale winds! No good—these Puchi corpses keep releasing poison fog, can't blow it all away!"
Since stepping into this valley entrance occupied by mushrooms, the demon warriors felt as if they'd fallen into a nightmare abyss.
Puchi fell like torrential rain from above. New attackers continuously surged from ground holes... endless!
These Puchi not only self-destructed on contact—even if killed early, their wreckage became new poison fog sources.
Only by thoroughly burning them with flames could spore spread be stopped.
However, the army's flame mages faced this overwhelming Puchi tide and were also powerless.
Couldn't burn them all—simply couldn't burn them all!
Those with high resistance like trolls were fine, unaffected.
Next were troops under Sigmund's command. They were more or less equipped with antidote potions and could hold out a bit longer.
Most miserable were the goblins under Veralith's command.
Precious potions naturally weren't for their use. Their small stature placed them right in the poison fog's highest concentration zone.
So far, the vast majority who'd fallen were these green-skinned small fries.
And after falling unconscious, they'd often be trampled into blurry pulp by allied forces' chaotic footsteps before dying from poison.
Watching the scene before him, Sigmund felt his eyelids twitch. They hadn't even engaged the humans yet and this was happening?
He looked up at those half-finished Puchi still hanging on the rock wall creep, feeling only absurdity in his heart—all this grew in one day?!
A troop type with such terrifying production speed, and those damned intelligence departments only classified it as "ordinary threat"?!
This was clearly strategic-level power!
Sigmund had no way of knowing what error the intelligence departments made, but the current tricky battle situation forced him to respond immediately: "Veralith! Release the dark stalkers!"
Following the command, large numbers of dark stalkers bound by low-level contracts surged from the formation like a tide.
These eyeless crawling creatures used sharp limbs to firmly grip the rock walls, climbing upward at astonishing speed.
At the same time, elite blood clan warriors transformed into bats and took to the air.
This tactical combination was originally prepared for capturing those troublesome walkways on rock walls, but now had to be used early to clear Puchi attached to rock wall creep.
However, the effect wasn't ideal. The blood clan was fine—blood manipulation killed those unformed Puchi one by one. They occasionally suffered Puchi counterattacks but casualties weren't large.
The dark stalkers encountered total disaster.
As melee units, no matter how fast they were, they had to get close to rock walls covered in creep and Puchi to attack.
Thus, amid a series of explosions, large numbers of dark stalkers turned into mixed fungal wreckage and shredded meat, falling from rock walls.
In the distance, in the eyes of human defenders witnessing this scene, that patch of creep emitting ghostly glow seemed to ignite flames of hope!
Against the rampaging blood clan in the air, human archers and mages from walkways further back began targeted sniping.
These walkway positions were tricky. Demon ground forces below had difficulty providing effective support.
Unless...
...
A diamond-rank human mage floated in midair. One shockwave tore through a blood clan member's blood shield. The next second, two sharp arrows seized the opening and pierced through the vampire's body, making him fall powerlessly.
The mage panted slightly. A trace of smile had just appeared on his face when urgent warning came from comrades behind.
He whipped his head around, only catching a glimpse of a ghost-like shadow before his vision spun.
Beheading the mage with one slash, Veralith's speed didn't reduce at all. She landed on the rock wall, kicked off while grazing incoming arrows, and crashed directly into a walkway.
After brief metallic clashing and screams, the four human warriors in the walkway had all been cut to pieces.
Just as she gathered strength to pounce toward another walkway, several whistling giant rock cannons forced her to change trajectory and fall back to her original position.
"How can I let you wreak havoc?" Lorenzo walked slowly out from the opposite walkway holding longsword and staff, beard and hair all standing. "This time the terrain favors me."
"Heh—"
Veralith had no waste words. Her feet exerted force. Her form shot out like lightning. The two instantly tangled in combat.
Despite being in midair lacking leverage points and constantly having cold arrows from soldiers on both sides interfering, Veralith still held the advantage. Just this time Lorenzo held out more tenaciously than last time, not quickly falling to defeat.
Below, Sigmund gazed at Arama who similarly commanded from the center. He didn't personally act. He calmly observed the entire battle situation. After a moment, he actually ordered the retreat horn blown.
"That damned fat bat!" Veralith, who'd been killing enthusiastically, glared viciously at the somewhat disheveled Lorenzo. Cursing and swearing, she was forced to retreat.
Witnessing the demons recede like a tide, the human positions erupted in deafening cheers!
And among countless gazes of survivors, excited beyond measure, most attention wasn't cast toward Lorenzo who'd resisted the strong enemy, nor toward Duke Arama commanding from the center, but gathered uniformly on that pink-haired girl who'd always stayed at the very rear of the line—Inanna.
Those gazes mixed incredulous amazement, gratitude for narrow escape from death, and... a trace of fervor as if viewing the embodiment of hope.
...
"Fat bat! Why did you retreat?!" Veralith who'd chased over led with a slash.
The blood shield floating around Sigmund easily blocked her venting strike. His tone remained steady: "You should also care about the army's actual situation. Though current casualties aren't severe, consumption far exceeds expectations. Even forcing through those mushroom defense lines, subsequent battle with Arama's main force would cost even more."
"So you're giving up?" Veralith narrowed her eyes and sneered. "Delayed so many days—how will you explain to the Prince?"
"The war will naturally continue. I already have a way to deal with those Puchi."
"Good! Then I'll wait!"
"Your colleagues are all trash!" After she left angrily, the roommate's voice rang in Sigmund's consciousness. "Little West, you asked the right... person. Nobody knows Puchi better than me! We cut off the creep outside the valley. Without magic power supply, Puchi are rootless duckweed, nothing to worry about!"
"Hope your intelligence is reliable." Sigmund's trust clearly still had reservations.
"Relax—helping you is ultimately helping myself! Besides, the Puchi Handler weakness was discovered by someone on the human side long ago. Easy to verify. You just suffered from late contact!" The roommate's tone was incomparably sincere.
Sigmund nodded. Thinking about it, that made sense too.
Taking out his personal canister, he sipped a small mouthful of fresh blood. Rarely obtaining help beyond delicious blood from his roommate, even today's fruitless attack's gloom dissipated somewhat.
(End of Chapter)
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