"Three…"
That scouting Gu Master used the last strength of his life to leave behind this despair-inducing warning.
Before the great hall, the clan elders who had been resting turned pale as paper in an instant.
The view then pulled back, passing over Black Blood Stockade and casting toward the depths of the mountains.
At this moment, on the outskirts of Black Wind Ridge, the second erupted wave of the beast tide was already like a black, oppressive ocean, utterly blanketing vast swathes of mountain and wilderness.
And within those frenzied, disordered beast herds, three herds that were obviously far more massive were pressing forward with a suffocating sense of pressure!
The first was a Thousand Beast Deer King, enormous in build yet with an exceedingly slender, graceful form.
Its fur showed a strange grey-green hue, and the massive pair of antlers atop its head were like great sprawling, exceedingly sharp branches of withered wood.
Every time it ran or leapt through the forest, its speed was fast enough to raise a fierce, cutting gale.
That astonishing speed even left the deer herd following behind it visibly struggling, falling far to its rear.
This was precisely that Thousand Beast Deer King whose traces Lin Mu and Lin Wuxie had once detected from afar back when they were scouting the depths of Black Wind Ridge — and which, out of too much wariness, they had exceedingly wisely chosen to circle around!
Back then, Lin Mu had assessed it in his heart with utter composure.
With his abilities at the Rank 2 stage at the time, if he had truly run into this Thousand Beast King, whose strengths lay in agility and speed, out in the wild, it would have been all but a hopeless situation with ten deaths and no chance of life.
The second was an "old acquaintance" of everyone in Black Blood Stockade — the Crimson Armored Giant Lizard King.
Its enormous body, four or five zhang long, was like a moving crimson hill, lying heavily amid the countless giant lizards of its herd.
With every step it crawled forward, the earth gave off a muffled tremor.
Upon its crimson-brown scaled armor, thick as lava, the dense cracks and not yet fully healed wounds left from the last battle remained clearly visible.
Even on one of its thick hind legs, there remained the bloody marks where Lin Mu's Iron Chain Gu had cut into it.
Last time, three full Rank 3 clan elders had joined forces, exhausting every trump card, and even paid the price of one among them being gravely wounded — yet all they achieved was forcing it back. They had been utterly powerless to slay it.
And the third was a Thousand Beast Tiger King that had never once shown itself in the earlier beast tide!
This Tiger King's build was perhaps not so exaggeratedly hill-like as the Crimson Armored Giant Lizard King's, but the exceedingly pure, tyrannical aura of ferocity radiating from it was all the more soul-shaking!
Its brilliantly striped hide was covered with countless ghastly old wounds left from slaughter within the Hundred Thousand Great Mountains.
Two thick, long fangs like peerless curved sabers jutted out, glinting with a light that chilled the gall.
It walked at the very front of the beast herd it commanded, and every so often it let out an utterly low roar that nonetheless shook the heavens and pierced through the mountain ranges.
Everywhere it passed, even those ordinary wild beasts already fallen into agitation were instinctively cowed by that thick ferocious might, giving way to either side.
Three separate Thousand Beast Kings, three entirely different threats.
The Deer King was the most agile, its speed unmatched on the entire field; the Giant Lizard King was the hardest to slay, its scaled armor like an iron wall; and the Tiger King was the most adept at head-on slaughter, its ferocious might astonishing!
By the common knowledge of the Southern Border, any single Thousand Beast King picked out at random already required several Rank 3 clan elders, or several mature elite squads, to handle in concert.
And now.
All three Thousand Beast Kings were bearing down at once!
"Hoo…"
Before the great deliberation hall.
Patriarch Lin Cang drew a deep breath, and on that resolute, cold-hard face he could not help but knit his brows.
For the first time since the war began, he had truly fallen into a difficult choice.
His first reaction was naturally to set out at once and personally suppress those three Thousand Beast Kings.
After all, a Rank 4 powerhouse against a Thousand Beast King held, in the end, an obvious advantage.
So long as he held the very front as the main force, with the other clan elders coordinating from the sides, there was at least a chance to swiftly cripple or even slay one of them, and stabilize the beast tide — the most dangerous of all the fronts.
"Wuuu—wuuu—wuuu!"
However, in the very instant Lin Cang was about to set out.
From among the distant mountain ranges, those shrill, murderous White Bone horns exceedingly abruptly rose into the sky once more!
"Report—!"
A scout drenched in blood came stumbling and tumbling up the steps of the great hall, shouting hoarsely:
"Patriarch! Li Mang… that old dog Li Mang has made his move!"
"The White Bone Alliance's main force has pressed forward across the entire front!"
"It's not just those subordinate minor stockades — several Rank 3 clan elders of White Bone Stockade proper, and even Li Mang himself, have already appeared in person on the frontal battlefield!"
This news forcibly halted the step Lin Cang had just taken, freezing him where he stood.
He turned his head.
His gaze fell once more upon the sand table before him.
On one side were the three Thousand Beast herds closing in on Black Blood Stockade.
On the other was the White Bone Alliance's grand army, pressing forward without cease.
Lin Cang held back from issuing the order to strike at the beast tide.
He knew that old fox Li Mang far too well.
The three Thousand Beast Kings were savage and violent, true, but in the end they were only beasts driven by instinct.
But the White Bone Alliance— they were men!
They could read the situation, they could circle around, they could probe, and they could, like venomous serpents, seek out precisely the weakest point of Black Blood Stockade's defensive line to bite.
The moment Lin Cang was dragged into the deep mountains for a prolonged period in order to deal with the Thousand Beast Kings, Li Mang would seize that opportunity of Black Blood Stockade's hollowed-out interior without the slightest hesitation, and lead his grand army in to bite down viciously!
"I cannot move…"
Lin Cang clenched both fists tightly.
His knuckles paled faintly from the excessive force.
The commander could not move rashly.
Yet three Thousand Beast Kings could not be left unattended either.
It was all but unsolvable.
And within this suffocating silence.
"Elder Brother."
An exceedingly steady voice sounded.
Grand Clan Elder Lin Zhen stepped past the assembled clan elders and took the initiative to stand before Lin Cang.
He reached out and clapped Lin Cang heavily on the shoulder.
Within those old eyes that had witnessed every vicissitude burned an unbending will to fight.
"You go to the frontal battlefield."
"Go block that old dog Li Mang."
Lin Zhen turned his head.
His gaze looked coldly and sternly toward the distant mountain wilds rolling with smoke and dust.
"These three brainless brutes—"
"Leave them to me."
Though Lin Zhen had yet to break through to Rank 4, he was after all a veteran powerhouse of exceedingly deep seniority, one who had remained at Rank 3 peak stage for many years.
For him to command the remaining clan elders and elite Gu Masters in a head-on confrontation with three Thousand Beast Kings was, without question, the most fitting arrangement under such extreme circumstances.
Lin Cang looked quietly at this brother who had shared life and death with him for so many years.
Within those cold, hard eyes, an exceedingly rare and nearly imperceptible flicker of emotion passed.
He spoke no sentimental nonsense.
He only nodded, with the utmost gravity.
"Come back alive."
Then he abruptly raised his head.
"Lin Zhen, select your commanders!"
"Yes!"
Lin Zhen turned around.
His sharp gaze swept over those Rank 3 clan elders present, every one of whom bore wounds to a greater or lesser degree.
Just as he was about to open his mouth and call out names—
"Grand Clan Elder!"
A figure draped in a blood-stained long robe, face pale yet eyes exceedingly clear, stepped decisively forward from the rear of the crowd.
Volunteering of his own accord.
It was precisely Lin Mu.