Chapter 979 Mercury’s Fight
Every minute felt like like an hour to the human army.
The unexpected rain of treasures, elixirs and formations from the powerful families and inst.i.tutions was a blessing that saved them from a quick loss against the abyssals.
But the fight didn"t get easier.
By all metrics, the abyssals were winning. Their onslaught was slowed for sure, but the end result didn"t really change.
While abyssals felt irritated that humans who were supposed to be destroyed in three or four days could now hold up for a whole month, humans panicked that they all might go extinct in a month.
No one was safe. From Mercury to Neptune, each planet"s army was being slowly crushed.
Besides the strengthening of the abyssals, the treasures the Abyss Emperor granted them was another major factor.
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Mercury has perhaps the most cohesive army of all. They"re more co-ordinated, more rigorous and more cold-blooded compared to their peers on other planets.
A big part of the credit goes to Sovereign Albert who"s as militaristic as a human can get.
Rumors say that even his daughter-in-law died a few years ago, he stayed silent for a few minutes and then got back to work.
The most consolation he gave his son Evander was a few minutes of talk. Forget staying with him for a while or being there for him, Sovereign Albert didn"t even talk to him more than usual.
Trained under such a man, naturally, mercury army was as tough as it could get.
That"s the reason that even when a very elite abyss legion attacked Gyrum, one of the strategically critical planetoid, the soldiers weren"t demoralized.
For the past three days, Gyrum has seen an increasing bloodshed.
A hundred thousand abyssals fought hard to break the defenses of the human fortifications.
Gyrum"s fortifications were in the form of multiple giant castles standing on top of wide mountain ranges.
So far, the aggressive abyssal army failed to make any substantial gains on these castles.
But the abyssals overall were very close to destroying a castle.
The reason was that this castle was exclusively attacked by a single abyssal legion. These 6,000 abyssals, the elites, had only one difference from the rest—they all had a shining golden bracelet.
Whenever the attacks fell on them, the pain and damage be transferred evenly to everyone. The same went for the impact of the attacks as well as the mental attacks.
As a result, the castle under siege had a hard time destroying this legion.
The only saving grace was—
"Kill!" A black dot appeared high in the sky and slapped down. The air was twisted into the shape of a palm and exploded toward the ground like a tornado.
The palm was several miles above the clouds but everyone on the ground felt a huge weight on their shoulders. The ground cracked under the pressure and all the soldiers sank into the soil.
As the palm approached the clouds, some of the weaker soldiers were already bleeding from their noses.
It"s clear that once the palm fell, everyone would die.
"Focus on your battle." A snort that sounded like thunder resounded from the sky and a huge tail slapped the air.
The palm that was fast approaching the ground collided with it and exploded into pieces.
The shockwaves from the collision reached the ground and swept nearly fifty thousand abyssals off their feet.
Since they were in the castles, humans were safe. But the castles too shook violently under the shockwaves.
From the Outer s.p.a.ce, Albert noticed that the elite abyssals were also blown back by the shockwaves and his tense brows relaxed.
The shockwaves themselves were powerful and would stall the battle by at least an hour.
Since his palm was originally intended for the elite abyssals, they were the most affected by the shockwaves too. They"d take at least three hours to rea.s.semble.
The crumbling castle gained three more hours of life.
By intervening as frequently as he could, this was the highest support Albert could provide.
Of course, his moves were ruthless. If the Sin King didn"t intervene, then everyone on the planetoid would be killed. And even if he did intervene, humans would end up gaining some more time.
Such exchange had been going on since three days already and despite every support it got, the castle"s defenses were down by 50%.
It"s only a matter of time before the first castle of the first planetoid of the first planet fell.
And fell it did.
After the sacrifice of nearly seven thousand human lives, and the destruction of a very precious defense array, the castle crumbled a day later.
The human side predicted it to last for at least three more days and mark a week of resistance. But it couldn"t even finish the fourth day and collapsed in the afternoon.
The earth shook violently as the castle began to vibrate and started. A huge white mist leaked out of the castle and enveloped the mountain it was on. In doing so, it also covered the elite abyssal army.
The next second, the castle, the mountain and everything in the surrounding three miles exploded.
Stones and soil shot out like tsunami and terrifying shockwaves spread out at a breathtaking pace, wiping away all the resistance in their path.
Once the dust cleared, the humans observed that three thousand out of the six thousand died.
The remaining three thousand were on their knees, panting heavily as they coughed out blood. Their faces were pale but their bracelets were still glowing.
Just now, the bracelets themselves made a decision to protect half by sacrificing half.
But this was a one time thing. Abyssals wouldn"t fall for this trick again.
So, humans were successful in slashing the elite army by half but failed to destroy them completely.
As a result, the elite army struck again. They attacked with vengeance. Since they"re attacking a castle that"s already under attack by other abyssals and coordinating with them, the second castle fell in just two days.
As humans feared, the fall of the castle triggered a domino effect. Whenever a castle fell, disproportionate amount of humans died. As a result, abyssals got some extra manpower.
So, the third fell in one and a half day. The fourth took only one day.
Even though they tried their best, the war was going in an irreversible direction.
Mercury had ten planetoids, the lowest of all. The low number of planetoids allowed Albert to protect them easily in the past. But now, even the experienced marshal wished mercury had more planetoids.
At least that way, its fall would be slow.