Chapter 9 - Cthulhu Gonfalon

It was late at night, and it was gradually getting colder.

During this cold night, a desperate battle was taking place.

One side of the battle was an army of skeletons that seemed to be the embodiment of the endless evil of the black woods; the other side was a group of villagers who settled in the black woods, and made every effort to protect their homeland and their lives.

The fighting process was somewhat dull and monotonous. The skeletons rushed forward continuously in an attempt to undermine the wooden fences surrounding the village, while the villagers slung burning sticks out through the gaps in the fences, beating and burning the approaching skeletons. They dispersed the magic on their bodies with flames, so that they temporarily became harmless bones.

Seen from Sui Xiong’s side, the black tide was constantly surging toward the village surrounded by wooden fences, and then it was stopped by the red flame. The tide constantly fluctuated. With every fluctuation, there would be one or several skeletons reduced to bones, then scattered on the ground to form small gaps. Other skeletons soon followed up to fill up the gaps and continued their assault.

This was a simple and repetitive process. At first glance, the villagers’ defenses seemed impeccable. No matter how many skeletons came, they could only be stopped outside the wooden fences and rolled all the way back underground after sunrise. However, Sui Xiong did know that the balance of victory had completely tilted, and the failure of the villagers was impending.

The reason was simple; they were tired.

They needed to push back the skeletons that had rushed in front of the fence with every round of assault, and this was the only way they could prevent the skeleton’s attack on their defences. The strength of skeletons was, however, not to be underestimated. Each time they were pushed back, a lot of effort was exerted. Villagers had probably pushed their troops back hundreds of times since the skeleton army came to their fences.

More than a hundred of times did not seem to be much, but in fact, pushing back so many times was more than enough to tire an ordinary muscular man and make his body sore. Before the space travel, Sui Xiong had done physical workouts, and he could do fourteen to fifteen barbell presses for every set. But he only did four sets per day and no more than sixty reps, and it was almost his limit. However, these villagers must have had a higher “exercise intensity” than he did. Given the large numbers of repetitions and no rest, their stamina was quite admirable for Sui Xiong because, until now, no one had collapsed because of exhaustion. However, these villagers were not men of bizzare strength, and now they were sweating. They were now only dragging on.

But looking at the sky, Sui found that although the moon was to the west, it was still long before the sunrise.

“It seems that it is almost time for me to present myself?” Sui Xiong announced to himself. As he planned to suddenly emerge and make an impressive debut, things changed again. The atmosphere that Sui Xiong hated and shrouded the village every night had become powerful. Without warning, it rushed to the skeleton army like a wave from the sea.

The crackling sound came together, and all the skeletons close to the fences were instantly disintegrated, and turned to pale-colored bones that spilled over. At the same time, Sui Xiong heard prayers. Many prayers joined together in a strange rhythm to promote the atmosphere’s growth.

He was surprised, and only recovered after a long while; This world was not the earth, so it had supernatural forces such as those skeletons. In the face of the attack of these forces, of course, it should be the supernatural forces that should be used to defend.

Perhaps this was the real defense of the village, right?

Facts proved that Sui Xiong was wrong again.

Just when he was shocked, four young girls wearing black robes walked out of the stone house, each carrying a wooden cage covered with black cloth. They each walked to one side of the village, leaving the wooden cage to the four bulky men who had been there for a while. They cautiously took the cage, and forcibly threw it out over the fences and into the army of skeletons.

Moments later, a shrilling roar sounded in the skeleton army. Four monsters, whose origin was unknown, unexpectedly appeared in the skeleton army, crazily raging.

These monsters had the heads and wings of chickens, but had human-like torsos. Their sturdy limbs showed that they had an extraordinary strength, and their chicken-like hands and feet were very sharp. When they touched the skeletons, the skeletons fell and were broken as though they were frail! The monsters were also very tall, with the shortest being the height of three strong men combined and the tallest one even being the height of five people combined.

“Strange! Where did these monsters come from?” Sui Xiong was stunned as he watched what was happening. He could swear to Marx. When he observed this village over the past times, he never found any traces of these four monsters. He would have to have been blind to miss something so big! So, where did these four big guys come from?

No, this was not the point. The point of the problem was that with the four big guys guarding the gate, the skeleton army seemed to be incapable of doing anything to this village.

Sui Xiong did not have much fighting experience, and could not accurately evaluate how strong the four monsters were. But as they seemed invincible among the skeletons, and the monsters seemed to have gained the upper hand in battle. Although the skeletons had sufficient support in that they were endless, the skeletons of infinite numbers could not win against the four powerful monsters that could defeat a large amount of skeletons by simply waving their arms.

Sui Xiong could not help but sigh. After all, he had underestimated these villagers who could settle down in the black woods! But within a short time, he found that his previous estimation was correct; this village was not actually that strong.

Within about half an hour, the four monsters suddenly screamed shrilly, and their bodies, mostly intact since the battle began, began to tremble violently. A moment later, they were reduced into four pools of blood with four explosions. Seeing this scene, the villagers seemed a bit disappointed, while Sui was feeling relieved. It was still early, so Sui would still have time to implement his original plan to make an impressive debut as a savior.

No, in fact, the situation was even better now. Because of the struggle from the four monsters, the number of skeletons had been cut by a lot. They were no longer as dense a tide like they were before. Although reinforcements from underground were still emerging, it would take some time to restore them to their former number. In contrast, the villagers, after this period of rest, had recovered much of their physical strength. Even if they were unable to hold the skeletons back, at least the entire line of defense would not suddenly collapse, so Sui Xiong could be sure of saving all the people when he made his debut.

It was good, and it was nothing more than scaring the villagers. But after all, there would be no danger.

Sui Xiong was confident that as long as he jumped to the village and circled around the fence, he could destroy over eighty percent of the skeleton army. He could leave two or three to attack in the future.

No problem, everything was going according to his plan.

The destruction of the four monsters was apparently something the villagers had been expecting. They simply sighed in disappointment, and continued to devote themselves to defending their homeland.

The situation was no different from before. The skeletons rushed to the fences, and the villagers beat them back with burning wooden sticks. They burned again and again until the skeletons collapsed.

But soon, Sui Xiong saw the problem.The strength of the villagers was far worse now!After all, they had been exhausted and failed to recover much despite the over-thirty-minute rest.

After all, they had been exhausted and failed to recover much despite the over-thirty-minute rest. However, this was a small matter at the moment. When facing the moment of life or death, even a pig would exert the last bit of strength and fight until the end, let alone a person. Even though these villagers were out of breath, Sui Xiong bet that they could at least insist on fighting for another hour or more!

In contrast to their determination, another crisis was imminent. The wooden fences could not hold against the skeletons much longer! The wood fences around the village were indeed solid, but they were just wood. In this night, they were being constantly attacked by the skeletons, and they were burnt innumerable times by the burning wood sticks. They were almost beyond their limit. If this world was a strategy game, perhaps the durability bars of the wooden fences would have turned from yellow to red, and they would collapse completely if the attacks did not let up. Once the fences were destroyed, the village’s line of defense would be gone.

It was at this time that the gate of the village, which had been closed, was opened. As if someone in the dark was controlling it in the distance, the skeleton army, crazily attacking the fences, stopped and rushed toward the opened gate.

Sui Xiong was stunned. He could not understand the way these skeletons thought. The skeletons had struggled most of the night, and were about to destroy the entire wooden fences and to occupy the village, how could they drop the wood fences and rush to the gate when it was opened? What logic was this!?

Sui Xiong reckoned that only in those old games at enlightenment levels would there be such a level of artificial intelligence, and that it would be considered a mentally handicapped level.

Oh? These skeletons had been dead since long ago. And they were not artificial, let alone intelligent.

As he secretly complained, the skeletons, originally surrounding the entire village, gathered at the gate and rushed forward. Those who were responsible for fighting against them were some strong men who were recuperating before.

They were wearing armor made of beast leather and wielding heavy weapons such as axes and hammers, and they crushed the skeletons that rushed forward. Their strong bodies, thanks to years of logging, had an unusual power unmatched by those black skeletons, many of which fell apart.

However, such fierce fighting meant an amazing physical consumption for the strong men. After around ten minutes, those strong men, who had logged for years, began panting.

The bald janitor waved his hand, directing them to retreat, while he himself continued to block the skeletons’ entry by leading two or three strong men into the fray. He was obviously much stronger than the lumberjacks. As he waved his axe, a few skeletons crumbled, as if he was mowing tall grass.

Sui Xiong could not help but secretly feel surprised; This bald man did not seem to be particularly stronger than those lumberjacks, but his combat effectiveness obviously exceeded theirs, as if they were not the same species. What exactly did he eat to become so strong?

He thought that after he had a good relationship with the people in this village, he must communicate with him properly. If he could learn from the janitor’s strength, he could become stunningly strong through improving his physical capabilities!