Chapter 150: Eight Demons Crossing the Wall
At the hour of the Ox, Mo Lin looked at Ningjiang County, merely a mile away, and at the vast, black mass of the army beside him.
The demons had arrived at the city’s gates.
The entire Ningjiang County had already been surrounded by the demonic beasts of Falcon Beak. All nearby spies were unable to relay any information once they encountered the Falcon Beak forces.
At that moment, the Earth-Rank demonic beasts were holding their final discussion.
To avoid complications from delay, they were preparing to attack the city immediately.
With Falcon Beak’s current strength, capturing a single Ningjiang County was more than easy.
However, merely taking one city was not enough to satisfy Falcon Beak. They needed a sufficiently bloody massacre to make the voice of the demonic beasts heard.
Not allowing a single human within the city to escape—not from any gate—had become their goal.
Thus, Falcon Beak decided to launch simultaneous assaults on Ningjiang’s five city gates—east, south, west, north, and the extra west gate—each led by two powerful core members.
Nine Earth-Rank demonic beasts exchanged glances and quickly came to a decision:
Spirit Monkey and Crystal-Scaled Venomous Python — East Gate;
Mo Lin and Mist-Hidden Spider — South Gate;
Mountain Lord and Silver-Winged Eagle King — West Gate;
Ghost Toad and Iron-Armored Rock Rhino — North Gate;
The Corrosive-Gold Ant Queen, who commanded three thousand ant soldiers, would remain to oversee the horde and coordinate their movements.
Moreover, aside from these nine prominent beasts, over ten weaker Earth-Rank demonic beasts were also assigned to the five gates.
Mo Lin glanced at the plan with thoughtful amusement.
This arrangement… was quite interesting.
Clearly, even though there were nine core demonic beasts, they themselves divided their own ranks by strength and trust.
Mo Lin and the Iron-Armored Rock Rhino—both mid-tier among the Earth Rank—were not stationed together, but rather assigned to the opposite South and North gates.
Meanwhile, at the East and West gates, they placed the most mobile ones—the Silver-Winged Eagle King and the Spirit Monkey.
If something were to go wrong at the South or North gates under Mo Lin or Iron-Armored Rock Rhino’s watch, and the two upper-tier Earth-Rank beasts couldn’t handle it in time, then the Silver-Winged Eagle King and Spirit Monkey would be able to provide rapid support.
So, in the end, they still didn’t trust the mid-tier ranks, did they?
Mo Lin glanced at his current “teammate,” the Mist-Hidden Spider. According to earlier introductions, it possessed the abilities of mind-clouding fog and soul-entangling silk—he wondered if he would have the chance to witness it in action later.
Soon, his thought came true.
Before departing, the Mist-Hidden Spider handed out eight strands of spider silk to all the other beasts except itself:
“Wrap these silks around your bodies. Even if we’re separated into five different directions, we’ll still be able to communicate with one another.”
To Mo Lin’s surprise, that voice did not come from the Mist-Hidden Spider’s mouth—it appeared directly in his mind.
So this so-called “Silk-Entangling Soul” wasn’t just a killing art—it could also be used for communication?
The other seven beasts didn’t seem surprised like Mo Lin was—they clearly already knew of the Mist-Hidden Spider’s unique ability.
After taking the silks, all the demonic beasts headed to their respective gates, preparing to launch a simultaneous assault on Ningjiang’s five gates at the appointed moment, leaving the humans unable to respond to all fronts.
As one of Yongzhou’s major cities, Ningjiang’s east, south, west, north, and secondary west gates were heavily fortified and well-defended.
A direct assault, even if successful, would come at great cost. Hence, Falcon Beak did not send the full horde charging ahead immediately. Instead, the eight core demonic beasts first approached the base of the city walls.
Once the eight had taken control of the gates, the horde would surge into Ningjiang like a tide.
Perhaps the city’s watchtowers had failed to send out a warning—or perhaps humans simply never imagined that, during the height of the “Locust” Operation, a massive demon army would be plotting such a grand assault.
In any case, the eight beasts successfully reached the walls of their assigned gates.
At that moment, Mo Lin and the Mist-Hidden Spider crouched beneath the southern wall, listening to the soul fluctuations traveling through the spider silk.
“Everyone, prepare.”
“Attack!”
With a command from the Corrosive-Gold Ant Queen, who oversaw the demon army, the eight beasts moved at once.
Due to certain considerations, Mo Lin didn’t spread his wings to fly up and seize the southern gate directly. This, in turn, gave him a good view of the other demons’ methods.
East Gate.
Ningjiang’s city walls were a hundred zhang tall, dense and smooth, without even a single crack between the stones.
Its grand and elegant construction rivaled that of Yongzhou’s greatest city, Yongchang County, once earning the praise: “Even apes and monkeys would despair to climb it.”
Yet, this very wall—celebrated by a poet of the Great Qian Dynasty—could not stop the Spirit Monkey’s ascent.
Though smooth as glass, the Spirit Monkey still found tiny gaps to grip. With its fingers lodged in those crevices, it climbed effortlessly up the wall.
The Crystal-Scaled Venomous Python coiled around the monkey’s body, ascending with it.
West Gate.
The Mountain Lord unsheathed its claws, plunging them into the wall like stabbing into tofu. With a few swift leaps, it was atop the rampart.
“Hmph, child’s play.”
The Silver-Winged Eagle King cast a disdainful glance at the towering wall, spread its wings, and with a light flap, shot into the sky—then folded them back as it landed beside the Mountain Lord.
North Gate.
If the speed of the East and West gate demons had already impressed Mo Lin, then what happened at the North Gate shocked him even more.
Through the Mist-Hidden Spider’s silk-linked senses, Mo Lin heard the Iron-Armored Rock Rhino roar:
“Thousand-Zhang Form—Open!”
Even from the opposite southern gate, in the depths of night, Mo Lin could see the enormous head of a rhinoceros emerging on the far side of Ningjiang.
How could such commotion fail to alarm the guards atop the wall?
Yet, the swelling Iron-Armored Rock Rhino ignored their shouts and terror.
It pawed the ground with its massive hooves—then charged straight at the northern gate.
“Boom—!!!”
In the next instant, under the rhino’s devastating impact, the wall—once deemed unbreakable—shattered completely.
Stones larger than carriages were sent flying into the air, crashing down heavily into the residential areas within Ningjiang.
For some reason, a thought suddenly surfaced in Mo Lin’s mind:
That day, humanity would once again remember the fear of being ruled by demonic beasts.