Chapter Sixty-Seven: Dawn Will Never Come

While organizing the construction of defensive fortifications, the white-haired elder also dispatched a number of vanguard scouts to keep watch on those ghastly pale creatures.

To know oneself and one's enemy is the only path to a hundred victories in a hundred battles.

Such is the truth and wisdom handed down by the Sage of Sages, weathered by the passage of countless ages, still awakening the minds of people today—a sentiment with which he deeply agreed.

In the clash of armies, only by seizing the initiative through prior knowledge of the foe can one carve out opportunities and increase the odds of choosing the most advantageous course of action for one’s own side.

Similarly, only by constantly tracking the movements of those monsters could they prepare in advance, making their defenses ever more precise.

...

Under the cloak of night that shrouded the entire continent,

A dozen agile cultivators, all skilled in lightfoot techniques, eagerly volunteered and, torches in hand, crept up the mountain occupied by the pale spore creatures.

Their mastery of lightfoot was unmatched across the land; even as they moved through mossy forests blanketed in fallen leaves, their steps were preternaturally silent.

Such abilities made them born scouts.

Yet, unfortunately, their opponents were those wicked and terrifying pale spore creatures.

Though the intellect of these spore beings was underdeveloped and they mostly functioned on the hunting instincts of wild beasts, their sense of territory and division of roles within the group were exceptionally strong.

Moreover, they possessed special sensory abilities, with hearing and smell both highly acute.

Most terrifying of all was their sense of smell, so keen that even across endless mountains they could distinguish advantageous or harmful scents from countless others.

No matter how perfectly the ancient ape scouts concealed their forms, they could not hide their scent.

To the Kers, such unique odors were as conspicuous as beacons in the night; even if the scouts smeared themselves head to toe in mud, it made no difference.

Their olfactory prowess was simply too overwhelming, able to pierce through any disguise—enough to drive one to despair.

Thus, the moment these ancient ape scouts set foot in the forest, their presence was already betrayed.

What followed was an unending pursuit.

Only when they became food in the bellies of the pale spore creatures would the hunt cease.

It is worth noting that,

When a female Sphinx successfully conceived, by the third day, her gaping abdominal maw would begin to ooze a viscous, foul-smelling, dark gray substance of unknown composition.

The instant this secretion touched the ground, it would emit faint, corrosive crackling sounds.

After fertilization, the female Sphinx’s body would experience a meteoric surge in various hormones.

...

Along with this, her body would briefly secrete a special mucus.

This secretion was not especially lethal—its corrosive power was mild and thin—but it mainly served to alter the surrounding environment, destroying the balance of acids and alkalis, transforming the area into a habitat more suitable for the growth and development of juvenile spores.

Of course, not every spore offspring received such treatment; only the legitimate descendants bearing the Sphinx bloodline were entitled to it. Even ordinary offspring of the female Sphinx were excluded.

Natural selection, survival of the fittest—strength and bloodline determined everything.

Here, this law played out to the extreme.

...

Sixth Year of the Eternal Night.

Within the Kingdom of Li, at Zhongli, before the grand city gates,

The feverish preparations for fortification were nearing completion.

After more than a year of effort, especially with tens of thousands of craftsmen laboring through day and night, nearly all the defensive works had been finished.

On this day,

In the boundless, impenetrable night, a cacophony of sharp, mournful howls suddenly erupted from the sunless depths of the forest...

With the sounds,

The very next moment,

Countless pale monsters burst forth from the darkness...

After years spent recuperating, these spore beings—born to feed on flesh and drink blood—were once again ready to launch their assault upon the Kingdom of Li...

Under a twilight as black as spilled ink,

A seething mass of pallid spore soldiers surged madly from the forest, as densely packed as swarming ants.

They formed the vanguard, all ordinary Kers, with not a single Sphinx among them.

Yet even so, this force was enough to strike terror and panic into the heart of every ancient ape citizen.

“Form up!” came the command.

Before the capital of Li,

Assailed by the fetid, blood-reeking wind, the white-haired elder remained unruffled, neither alarmed nor much surprised.

After all,

For years, they had been quietly observing these creatures, and all the while preparing for this second wave of attack.

...

Years of meticulous planning had rendered the approaches to the capital impregnable.

Moreover, during this time, the white-haired elder had poured all his insights and experiences from decades of cultivation into books, distributing them to the ordinary defenders atop the walls.

Famed from his youth, blessed with extraordinary talent, he had reached this day not as the world’s unrivaled cultivator, but certainly among the elite of the continent.

His understanding and wisdom were treasures as precious as heaven’s rarest gifts to the average cultivator.

In these years, under his careful tutelage, nearly one in ten among the ten thousand defenders had managed to break through their previous limitations.

Most importantly, a handful among them had reached levels of strength sufficient to form their own factions, thus making up for the previous dearth of high-level combatants.

In terms of both manpower and resources, they had done all that could be done; in the elder’s eyes, this time, they had every chance to halt and even defeat the hideous, abominable horde.

When bitter enemies meet, their eyes blaze with fury.

“Attack!” he thundered.

When the pale monsters were within a hundred meters of the city gates,

The white-haired elder gave his order.

Empowered by his profound cultivation, his voice rang out like thunder, echoing clearly in the ears of every defender present.

“Swish, swish, swish—”

“Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh—”

As soon as his command fell,

In midair,

There appeared, visible to the naked eye,

Countless streaks of “shooting stars” gleaming with fire.

These dazzling lights, as splendid and radiant as meteors, tore through the night like falling stars, tracing arcs in the air before plunging down upon the advancing pale spores.

They were wooden stakes.

Their tips had been sharpened to deadly points with fire and stone, and before use, they had been specially baked for hours.

Though the baking reduced their hardness, the elder’s aim was not to pierce the monsters’ tough hides by force.

What he sought was the inferno that would erupt as the red-hot, carbonized wood met the dry leaves and twigs—an all-consuming blaze.