Chapter 429: Dragon-Horned Catfish’s Performance,
Glorious Achievements, Meat Harvest (2)
Translator: Dragon Boat Translation Editor: Dragon Boat Translation
The Dragon-Horned Catfish, a Tier 5, 4-star unit, commands a recruitment price of a staggering 1,950 units of rare resources per unit, double that of the Water Nymph Archer, and only slightly less expensive than the mightiest unit, the Tyrant Azure Dragon.
Just the first wave of recruitment, bringing forth one hundred and forty Dragon-Horned Catfish, amounted to a total of 273,000 units of rare resources. Such a hefty expense was exchanged for an extremely terrifying spell output capability.
Unlike the Silver Sea Pixies, the Dragon-Horned Catfish couldn’t cast spells immediately after a short chant. They often required a significant amount of time to prepare their magic.
Red lightning orbs, twinkling on their crystalline horns, grew larger as energy acc.u.mulated. In watery environments, their lethality was greatly amplified.
Once the energy was fully charged, red lightning orbs, over a meter in diameter, were launched, evenly landing amidst the sea beast horde.
After a brief delay, over a hundred circular red electric fields suddenly appeared on the battlefield. Lightning, with a voltage reaching up to a million volts, rapidly spread from the explosion points. The high-energy current instantly turned the surrounding sea beasts into charred remains, and not even the increasingly intense rain could prevent the smell of scorched flesh from spreading.
After killing the nearby sea beasts, the electric current continued to spread through the seawater, paralyzing and causing convulsions in the bodies of more distant sea beasts.
A single lightning orb could kill dozens of sea beasts and paralyze and rout hundreds more.
Just one round of attack from the one hundred and forty Dragon-Horned Catfish temporarily incapacitated tens of thousands of sea beasts.
Ji Chen, standing atop the cliff, witnessed the entire process and couldn’t help but nod in approval at the output and battle achievements.
He thought to himself that this expenditure of resources was incredibly worthwhile. By comparison, the Silver Sea Pixies, the traditional magic wielders of the Crown of the Ocean, seemed somewhat inferior.
After a long battle, the sea beast horde on the ocean surface finally thinned out a bit, no longer giving that suffocating, overwhelming feeling.
And the defensive line, from the start of the battle, had not retreated an inch, showing remarkable resilience.
This sight brought great satisfaction to Ji Chen.
This battle undoubtedly showcased the formidable military strength of the Crown of the Ocean. Although their numbers were far fewer than those of kingdom-level powers, the quality of each unit had caught up remarkably.
Such a performance bolstered his confidence for the upcoming battle with the Ba.s.s Kingdom.
Previously, the Ba.s.s Kingdom’s fleet had nearly destroyed a large part of the Crown of the Ocean, a devastation from which they had yet to fully recover. Ji Chen had etched this grudge deep in his heart.
When the time came for the Lienhardt Grand Duchy to wage war against the Ba.s.s Kingdom, the Crown of the Ocean would seize this opportunity for revenge… perhaps even utterly crushing the Ba.s.s Kingdom to the point of no return!
His thoughts whirled and turned.
From day to night, the battle raged on.
The situation on the battlefield became increasingly clear.
The onslaught of the sea beast horde was terrifying, but the troops of the Crown of the Ocean were even more fearsome. Like an unyielding wall, they repelled every a.s.sault, resulting in countless deaths and injuries among the beasts.
Amidst such horrific casualties, many sea beasts regained their senses, fear gradually appearing in their eyes, hesitating to advance.
Roars and howls echoed.
The leaders of various tribes standing behind the sea beast horde, witnessing the inability of so many beasts to break through and instead being slaughtered in large numbers, began to contemplate retreat.
After hearing weird roars, the sea beasts that were now fully awake started biting the dead bodies of their own kind. They followed their leaders and went around the New Moon Islands to make their escape.
Before long, the crowded battlefield thinned out further. Apart from a few sea beasts that had lost their sanity in the killing frenzy, the rest had all departed.
When the Naga Guardian split the last beast into two, there were no more living sea beasts in the ocean. Only a ma.s.s of corpses were floating on the water.
However, Ji Chen’s expression remained tense. As he looked at the sky, which was becoming darker and more oppressive instead of clearing, he felt a deep sense of seriousness.
It seemed this was only the first wave of the Sea Beast Tide. At least a second wave was imminent.
And in this second wave, both the number and quality of the sea beasts would significantly increase.
The Sea Beast Tide was so named because they surged like waves, one after another. If one wave couldn’t be withstood, it would engulf everything, leaving not even bones behind.
But now, it seemed that the Crown of the Ocean still possessed considerable resilience in resistance.
Soon, reports on military casualties and material consumption were presented.
“Naga Legion: 4 dead, 6 critically injured, 297 lightly injured; Dragon Blood Murlocs death is… The main army corps in total… 35 dead, 98 critically injured, 468 lightly injured.”
“The Guardian Legion, having not engaged in battle yet, suffered no casualties.”
“Various types of alchemical ammunition have depleted two-thirds of our stockpile, and the Black Hawk Arrow Towers have used up a third of their arrows.”
After hearing the report, Ji Chen breathed a sigh of relief.
These casualty figures were nothing short of remarkable.
Over six thousand troops of the Crown of the Ocean faced two hundred thousand sea beasts, yet only thirty-five had died, with just over a hundred critically injured and less than a thousand lightly wounded.
And they had slain at least one hundred and eighty thousand sea beasts.
Estimating roughly, the casualty ratio was an astonishing 1:5142. Such a figure, if released, would likely be met with disbelief.
But upon careful consideration, Ji Chen found all this to be quite reasonable.
Firstly, this wave of defense wasn’t solely reliant on the military. Various defense installations, dozens of wooden warships, and several steel warships also contributed significantly to the offensive, accounting for a large number of slain sea beasts, not much less than the army.
Secondly, the partic.i.p.ating troops were all from the main army corps, averaging Tier 5, with levels reaching 35, except for the Dragon Horn Catfish.
It was like an army of all strong men.
An organized scale, coupled with excellent coordination and rich combat experience, facing a sea beast horde of mixed quality, unorganized and relying solely on brute force, with the highest only at Tier 4, was like a dimensional strike.
If they had suffered more casualties under these circ.u.mstances, he would have started to question life itself.
Thinking of such a splendid victory, Ji Chen couldn’t help but smile.
But then, remembering the thirty-five fallen units, each worth tens of thousands of rare resources, his smile gradually faded.
However—with the existence of the Resurrection Altar, this issue was no longer a problem.
The Resurrection Altar, although not labeled as divine, was undoubtedly a divine-level structure, its formidable nature becoming increasingly apparent in the later stages.
For a mere few thousand resources, one could resurrect units worth tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, or even millions of rare resources. This was truly a blessing for lords following the elite troop strategy.
With the ability to resurrect up to ten thousand units of troops twice a month, its value was comparable to that of a divine artifact!
With this thought, Ji Chen refocused on the present situation.
“Issue my command: all troops are to rest temporarily, recover from injuries, and reload the alchemical ammunition!
Dispatch scouting teams to locate the next wave of sea beasts!”
“Yes!”
After a moment’s thought, Ji Chen added, “Send someone to the Great Luminescent Sea Mystic Realm, and instruct Sonia to lead the Coral Palace troops for support if necessary!”
“Understood!”
Although the Great Luminescent Sea was not yet completely stable, with remnants of the Dragon King City still lurking and waiting for opportunities, Ji Chen couldn’t concern himself with that now. If the Crown of the Ocean were to be breached by the sea beast tide, the stability of the Great Luminescent Sea would be meaningless.
Over ten thousand Coral Palace troops, averaging around Tier 4, 9-star level, would be a formidable force anywhere, capable of turning the tide of battle.
However, if possible, he didn’t want to deploy them just yet.
But having such a force as a backup gave Ji Chen some peace of mind.
Scouting teams hurriedly set out to locate and a.s.sess the scale of the next wave of the sea beast tide.
After half a day of fierce battle, the New Moon Islands suddenly entered a brief period of calm.
The Guardian Legion, which had stayed in the rear until now, took on the role of cleaners, beginning to clear the sea beast corpses floating on the sea. Over a hundred thousand sea beast bodies densely covered the entire southern sea area of the main island, their blood staining the water red for several meters deep.
The task of clearing so many bodies was extraordinarily difficult, but Wilus, the chief steward, was incredibly excited upon hearing the news.
Such a large number of sea beast corpses were all food, and moreover, they were a type of meat supply that was not abundant in the Crown of the Ocean.
With Ji Chen’s permission, Wilus immediately led a large group of physically strong residents to hastily clear the abandoned Kobold caves, digging new ones to serve as storage for the meat. Otherwise, given the climate of the Stormy Sea, the meat would spoil and rot in just a couple of days.
The Kobold caves, located underground with low temperatures, served as a natural cold storage, suitable for temporarily storing the meat.
After the battle was over, it wouldn’t be too late to excavate a proper cold storage facility..