Yun Chengxuan had led fifty Shadow Dragon Guards to silently reach the base of the city wall without a sound.
Due to the drought, the moat around Spring Glory County had long since dried up, greatly easing their movements.
Jiang Jin stood a few dozen meters from the wall, watching as the Shadow Dragon Guards took their positions. She turned and waved at Zhou Sui.
Zhou Sui pressed his lips together—he could see everything with perfect clarity.
He led his men to a spot roughly two to three hundred meters from the wall, where the grappling bolts on the eight-ox crossbows were already loaded and ready.
Zhou Sui, binoculars in hand, had already adjusted the angles based on the required placements.
They had only brought twenty eight-ox crossbows this time, but that was more than enough.
“Release!” Zhou Sui commanded.
Swoosh, swoosh, swoosh.
The arrows streaked like lightning, striking Spring Glory County’s wall with an unstoppable, devastating force.
Gripping his Dragon Feather Crossbow, Zhou Sui switched his binoculars to night vision mode, and every soldier on the wall was as clear as day to him.
A squad leader stared into the pitch-black sky. Under the faint moonlight, the glint of metal caught his eye, making him squint.
A chill shot through him, but before he could shout a warning, a pounding sound erupted along the wall. Even the ground trembled slightly, a testament to the arrows’ power.
“Ambush! Sound the—!” he screamed hoarsely.
Thwip.
Before he could finish, an arrow pierced his throat.
His trusted subordinate was splattered with blood, a wave of cold dread surging from his feet to the top of his head.
Thwip.
Before he could react, his neck was also skewered.
Zhou Sui pressed his lips tight, his hands impossibly steady. The arrow’s aim shifted to the two Quzhao soldiers sprinting toward the alarm drum…
Jiang Jin also wielded a Dragon Feather Crossbow. Arrows flew in rapid succession, picking off one Quzhao soldier after another from behind the wall’s crenellations, buying time for Yun Chengxuan and the Shadow Dragon Guards.
Binoculars on, Yun Chengxuan clearly saw the “ladder” formed by the grappling bolts. He led his men sprinting toward it.
Three such “ladders” had been set up in total.
As Yun Chengxuan passed the first one, he waved his hand, and a small squad of Shadow Dragon Guards halted immediately. Following his pointed direction, they found the grappling bolts and began climbing swiftly.
Then came the second squad.
Yun Chengxuan stopped at the third “ladder.”
With a light leap, his hand caught a bolt shaft two meters above the ground, while his foot stepped onto another shaft. With a slight push, he climbed up two more rungs.
He moved with the agility of a monkey scaling a tree, and thanks to his night-vision device, he could see clearly. Though he was the last to start climbing, he was the first to reach the top.
The seven- or eight-meter-high wall took him just a few moves. With a light push, he was inside the city wall.
Stepping over the Quzhao soldiers Jiang Jin and Zhou Sui had killed, he couldn’t resist showing off: “Watch out, watch out—there’s crap on the ground, don’t step in it.”
The Shadow Dragon Guard behind him took a moment to realize “crap” meant the corpses. They couldn’t help but roll their eyes inwardly: Sure, you’re cute, but we still envy you for no reason.
“Yun Chengxuan, open the gate!” Jiang Jin shouted, taking down two more Quzhao soldiers rushing over from the wall to reinforce.
Yun Chengxuan swung his Buddha’s Heart blade and charged toward the ramp: “Don’t worry, Auntie! I’ll beat the crap out of them first, then open the gate.”
Jiang Jin: “…” This unreliable kid.
Fortunately, the Shadow Dragon Guards were reliable. By now, most had scaled the wall.
Two squads clashed with the Quzhao soldiers. With the darkness so thick that anything beyond a short distance was invisible, they fought in close quarters, abandoning their Dragon Feather Crossbows.
One squad split off: two members lowered the drawbridge, while the rest raced toward the ramp, quickly joining forces with Yun Chengxuan to kill the enemy.
The night was still. Though the Quzhao soldiers hadn’t had a chance to beat the city drum, the anguished screams and shouts had already alerted the town.
Patrolling soldiers within the city and guards on the walls all converged on the South Gate.
Having taken down twenty Quzhao soldiers and expended all twenty arrows, Jiang Jin quickly slung her Dragon Feather Crossbow into the quiver on her back, pulled the Great Demon from the ground, and sprinted toward the wall.
Zhou Sui had already swapped to another Dragon Feather Crossbow and continued firing, while ordering the Jinyang Army: “Attack!”
The Jinyang Army surged toward the city gate. The soldiers manning the eight-ox crossbows pushed their weapons forward, advancing rapidly toward the entrance.
Yun Chengxuan understood the urgency. He stopped aiming to “split crap” and simply killed outright.
By then, he had reached the ramp and encountered a group of patrol soldiers rushing to reinforce.
He showed no fear. Raising his blade, he cut them down in a flurry.
A dozen Shadow Dragon Guards followed, elite among elites, each capable of taking on several enemies. They helped Yun Chengxuan quickly dispatch the patrol.
Soon, Yun Chengxuan led them to the city gate. With a single swing, his blade split a gate-guarding soldier—man and sword—clean in two.
Blood splattered over the remaining gate guards. But these were seasoned soldiers; ignoring the gore, they raised their swords and charged at Yun Chengxuan.
Yun Chengxuan kicked out.
Boom. A Quzhao soldier flew backward two dozen feet, slammed into the heavy gate, bounced off, and crashed to the ground.
The soldier coughed up blood, convulsed a few times, and lay still.
The other Quzhao guards were quickly dealt with by the Shadow Dragon Guards.
Yun Chengxuan looked at the bodies blocking his way to open the gate. He kicked.
Thump, thump, thump…
Corpses flew everywhere. In an instant, the area behind the gate was spotless.
Yun Chengxuan shouted in excitement: “Open the gate!”
Jiang Jin moved with agility, scaling the wall in mere moments. By then, all the Quzhao soldiers on the gate tower had been killed.
She yelled: “Dragon Feather Crossbow!”
The two Shadow Dragon Guards who had lowered the drawbridge quickly pulled out their own crossbows and tossed them to her, one after another.
Jiang Jin stabbed the Great Demon into the ground. Thunk—the blade sank into a crack in the wall’s stone surface, standing firm.
At the same time, she raised both hands and caught the two crossbows.
Bam. She set one crossbow at her feet, then aimed the other at the reinforcements charging toward them in the distance.
Crack, crack, crack…
Arrows fired in an unbroken stream, like a machine gun. The advancing soldiers fell one by one, never understanding where the arrows were coming from before they were slain.
At that moment, the Jinyang Army had just reached the moat. They crossed the drawbridge and charged toward the city gate.
The gate was slowly opening. The Jinyang Army poured in like a flood.
