Xyrin Empire

Chapter 258: Chapter 258 Meat Grinder Chapter 258: Chapter 258 Meat Grinder This was the largest counter-attack launched in Azeroth since the Undead Catastrophe struck, involving Humans, Dwarves, Gnomes, High Elves, and later joined by Dark Night Elves, Beastmen, Trolls, Tauren, the Dragon Clan, and even the Naga Clan, who appeared on the continent for the first time. Various vassal and neutral races: Fish Humans, Kobolds, Bear Monsters, Forest Spirits, residents of the Elemental Plane… Almost every imaginable and unimaginable race from the world of Azeroth converged toward the same goal. The thunderous war drums scattered the dark clouds over the Eastern Kingdom’s sky, the tremors of the earth even caused the oceans to shudder, the finest warriors from all races were amassed, battling on the undead-infested lands of the Eastern Continent, the Ghost Land, Silverpine Forest, East and West Plague—every area with the presence of undead was set ablaze by warfare. Multiple bodies fell for every square meter of land; warm blood didn’t have time to congeal on the ground before being washed away once more, the lively and the decaying limbs grotesquely intertwined. Many among them rose again only to be annihilated once more, turning into even more scattered debris fragments…

Tens of thousands? Hundreds of thousands?

It didn’t matter; gigantic numbers seemed trivial here, as if they were just an insignificant base. The best soldiers from both sides had become the cheapest commodities, turned into irretrievable remains under the meat grinder of magic and steel. One side fought for the continued existence of their deeply cherished world, while the other was nothing but thoughtless puppets, moving only under the command of the highest will. No one had room for fear, for here retreat meant eternal silence.

The whole western region of the Eastern Continent had turned into a massive grinder of flesh, where the soldiers of both sides were systematically ground into dust.

Even we did not anticipate that this counter-attack would escalate with such ferocity. Both armies had long been ready and waiting, needing only a small trigger to set off an unprecedented decisive battle. Our sudden assault on the East Plague Land successfully played the role of the catalyst.

Looking back now, it all seemed to have started with Dingdang’s confused burst of divine power. If she hadn’t managed to mobilize millions of undead in the Ghost Land and drawn most of the enemy’s attention, the scale of the battle might have not expanded so alarmingly.

The millions of undead revolting in the Ghost Land had successfully torn a huge gap in the East Plague Land. Although the enemy dispatched a large number of Assembled Demons at the swiftest speed to plug this breach, the highly mobile Imperial Air Force had already been in wait. The Assembled Demons, created by the Fallen Apostles to be even mightier than the elite Xyrin Soldiers, suffered heavy losses under the concentrated bombardment of the warship’s main cannons. They were forced to abandon the ever-widening breakthrough in the East Plague and retreat to a Xyrin Fortress (established by the Fallen Apostles) located in the middle of the East Plague to resist stubbornly, while our ground forces stormed unimpeded into the vast land of the East Plague, the area most severely contaminated by the undead.

“They won’t last long.”

Standing on the command tower of the Floating Fortress, Sandora looked at the enemy Xyrin Fortress in the distance, which was tottering under the concentrated bombardment of the Imperial Fleet, and said in an indifferent tone.

“I didn’t expect the enemy to give up the entire East Plague Land so readily,” I said, watching the white flashes that kept lighting up the distant horizon, my voice tinged with evident puzzlement, “I thought they placed great importance on the troops here.”

“To them, Assembled Demons are merely tools, tools to stop our advance. When these tools can no longer bear the task of halting our progress, the Fallen Apostles will not hesitate to abandon them,” Sandora said naturally, unfazed by such realities.

Xyrin Apostles are a race with a very strong sense of purpose. At the very least, the Fallen Apostles had preserved this tradition of the race well. Their goal was to hinder us, complete the construction and activation of the World Loop, and for that purpose, they would not hesitate to stop supporting any peripheral forces and use them all as cannon fodder to block the enemy. Once the mighty Salvation Army launched a joint offensive against every line of defense in the Undead Zone, the Fallen Apostles abandoned the extensive and difficult-to-defend border lines without hesitation. Leaving behind countless undead and demons as roadblocks, they decisively contracted all their forces. This was one of the reasons why, despite making huge sacrifices, the Alliance Army of various races was able to gain the upper hand in the battle against such a powerful enemy: they had not yet faced the real Fallen Apostles.

“Sylvanas can probably stop now,” I said, observing a gradually thinning group of special undead troops on the ground, speaking with a hint of regret, “They’re almost all dead…”
Sandora rolled her eyes in exasperation, sneering, “What do you expect from this cannon fodder? It’s a miracle that they could help us break through the defense lines of the East Plague Land. You still expect them to take down a fortress armed with Xyrin Technology?”

Having successfully taken control of millions of undead cannon fodder in the Ghost Land, Sylvanas stayed in Silver Moon City to direct our new cannon fodder troops. Meanwhile, we used Space Transmission to return immediately to Sandora’s side and joined the subsequent battle. Looking at it now, Sylvanas’s cannon fodder troops were probably about to meet their end.

As Sandora and I idly witnessed the fireworks show on the horizon, a conspicuous white luminescent object suddenly flew by from the side.

“Lord Brother, the Second Fleet has broken through the spatial interference; the eastern barrier has disappeared.”

Although they abandoned this area, the enemy didn’t give up leaving us a huge mess. Before the Fallen Apostles withdrew their main forces from the East Plague Land, they left a large number of space interference devices here, causing the entire Eastern Plague Region’s space to be cut into chaotic fragments. At first, our radar didn’t detect this, and as a result, one-third of the Undead Cannon Fodder that Sylvanas had hoodwinked into acting as minesweepers disappeared into thin air. And the reason we had to launch such a fierce attack on this isolated fortress was because the damned spatial interference control center was inside that fortress.

“What is Pandora doing?” I did a quick search and discovered that Pandora was not staying put inside the Air Fortress as she should have been, which made me ask out of curiosity, but in fact, I had already roughly guessed the answer.

The one who answered me wasn’t Alaya, but Qianqian, who had just come over from the platform.

“She’s commanding the ground troops in their final assault on the enemy’s fortress. It seems that because the fleet in the skies took the credit prematurely, that girl went a bit berserk. She insists on leading her own Personal Guard to be the first to rush into the outpost to reclaim the credit… and says she wants to show those green recruits fresh off the production line what real Imperial Soldiers are like.”

“… That silly girl, can’t she cause me less trouble… By the way, Qianqian, are you feeling better now?”

“Don’t remind me…”

Yes, just moments ago, Qianqian had accidentally activated her Ability again, resulting in her spiritedly fighting the enemy outside for over thirty minutes. Now, she had just returned from vomiting…

Regarding Pandora once again going AWOL and handing over command to her deputy officer, I truly had no solution, and could only express my confusion mildly, “That girl… why is she so single-minded? I really don’t know how she became a General…”

To my query, Sandora offered an immediate response:
“That’s why she has an exceptionally good deputy officer…”

Turned upside down, huh? Shouldn’t it be the other way around? That’s because a certain General is a hot-blooded fool that her deputy officer has to be so excellent, right?

Just then, an unprecedentedly intense burst of light suddenly shone from afar, capturing my attention. I turned my head and saw that at the forefront of the battlefield, a massive white Light Ball, like another sun, was slowly rising. The clouds above the Light Ball formed an unnatural vortex-like distortion, and then countless lumps of soil and rock lifted by the explosion began to be drawn into the retracting Light Ball. Even the clouds in the sky showed signs of being sucked in by a powerful gravitational force, creating a funnel effect as if even space itself had been thrown into chaos by the explosion.

Sandora’s eyebrows suddenly raised, her tone tinged with mild surprise, “A Miniature Space Internal Explosion Bomb? That girl had such a thing on her?”

Right? Right? Even you think it’s excessive for Pandora to carry around such a thing, don’t you? A twelve-year-old Loli really shouldn’t be carrying around weapons of mass destruction, should she?

The Xyrin Fortress, which had been teetering under the crossfire of the airborne fleet and ground troops, was hit directly by one of Pandora’s heavy bombs, finally crumbling to the ground. The Assembled Demons, who wanted to come out and fight us desperately, hadn’t even the chance to strike a heroic pose before they were sucked into the Twisted Void by the collapsing space. The agile Demons that managed to escape by luck were also completely wiped out by the interception of the Alliance Army’s races. Meanwhile, the space turbulence that had been pervasive around the Imperial Fleet finally began to calm down, signaling the collapse of the last stronghold in the Eastern Plague.

I had been waiting for this moment for a good while, and now without needing Sandora’s reminder, I knew what to do next, “Alaya, instruct all fleets to recall their vassal forces, ground troops and the Alliance of Azeroth will sweep through for any remnants of the enemy forces, Mother Ship level spaceships…”

“Sudden evasion for all forces!” Lin Xue’s voice suddenly rang out over the fortress, the broadcast also reaching every Mother Ship interior, “Emergency evasion! Incoming attack! Get out of the way…”

The broadcast vanished without warning, leaving only a series of crackling, radio interference-like noises. Just as I was about to say something, a strong white light suddenly filled my entire vision.