Depthless Hunger

Chapter 105: The Unstoppable Oversights

As the last of the monsters in the north died, Zae Zin Nim wondered why she was still fighting. The fun had drained out of the combat with Kai missing and there were no longer any threats capable of climbing or damaging the wall. Since the extended fighting had drained her, both in terms of qi and mentally, she began to retreat closer to the city walls.

Overhead, the flying ship continued to circle. She interpreted that as a somewhat positive sign, but if Kai had gained control, he would have used it to defend his little city. It meandered over the center now and she doubted that she could reach it, even if she leapt from atop the wall.

Instead, she began moving around the outer edge, mostly just observing. Despite the battle plan's obvious weaknesses, the middle portion did seem to be working. As the monsters scrabbled around the walls of the city, searching for human targets, they were slowly killed off by projectiles and attacks from above. If their average citizen had a stronger cultivation base, they could have wiped out the majority of the horde then.

Lacking that, the monsters that got past were allowed to accumulate near the gates. Zae Zin Nim noticed that more seemed to have gone wide, only later curving back toward the city. Perhaps some of those should have drawn her attention, but she was growing apathetic. She didn't really want to fight vermin anymore, she was just curious to see the gates.

There, she saw that the strategy wasn't going so well.

While the number of bodies around the gates showed that the defenders had kept them off for some time, their mana was running low and they struggled to keep up with the tide. Most of them were mediocre vermin, but there were several giant ape monsters who ran through most attacks. They danced up to the gates and clawed at both wood and metal with their bare hands. Bit by bit, they were tearing down the entrance to the city.

Something about their movements was rather strange. Monsters could never be sensed as easily as qi, but Zae Zin Nim's vision for them had been improving due to her training with Kai. Something was strange about the hideous monkeys... their tails lashed unusually swiftly, enough that she expected attacks from them that never came.

The gates began to come down and other monsters crawled in between the monkeys. It looked as though the city might fall, then a wall of solid rock erupted in the gap. When the monkeys ran in to batter it, they were struck from the sides by defenders who had been waiting for that exact purpose.

Still, they resisted enough of the mana that it seemed they would break down the new barriers. While watching them, Zae Zin Nim suddenly realized what she had been seeing.

She stepped closer and then fired one precise qi attack. It severed the tail of one monkey and then both pieces shrieked in pain. Instead of a tail, the back half proved to be a furred worm that thrashed wildly with its head severed. The bulk of the giant monkey died even faster, shriveling up as its source of energy was destroyed.

To their credit, the hunters on the walls noticed what she had done and began redirecting their fire. Even though the monsters attempted to hide underneath their generated bodies, Class systems were adept at hitting precise targets. Several warriors jumped down from the walls to strike with melee weapons and they quickly cut down the monsters pounding against the new gate.

In their absence, the earthen wall was quickly restored. The plates of stone shifted aside to allow the warriors to enter and Zae Zin Nim wondered if she should go as well. It seemed that many of the peasants on the walls were waving at her, perhaps cheering...

No, they didn't sound jubilant. She realized that they were urging her to hurry and pointing at something behind her.

An enormous monster almost the height of the city wall lumbered closer. Its body appeared to be made of nothing but armored plates, from the spiked segments of its tail to the mess of angles that formed its face. As it neared the city it slowly reared back on two legs, revealing that the underside was just more armored plates. The upper limbs were somewhat longer with sharp edges, but they ended in heavy chunks of armor.

Zae Zin Nim absently identified it as an arthropod-imitating monster while the rest of her mind spun uselessly. This one was far more powerful than the others. She didn't know how the locals might rate it, but it was the sort of beast that made Body Refinement stage cultivators run in terror. Clearly, in ordinary times the warriors at the Frontier would have stopped it.

Most of the defenders began focusing on it, but bursts of flame and ice skittered off the armored plates just as uselessly as arrows or rocks. She wasn't sure if anything had harmed it even slightly. As it reached the wall, the monster raised a limb with terrible slowness and struck the stone barrier. It shuddered and many defenders were thrown from the edge to the monsters below.

Perhaps this was the sort of challenge she had claimed to desire. As she began moving toward it, Zae Zin Nim formally rescinded her request to fate.

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She was completely certain that the monster's armor would deflect a qi attack, so instead she jumped up onto the monster's back. There were enough plate edges and spikes for her to get a grip easily enough, then she waited to see if it would try to reach back to strike her. It didn't notice her at all, simply smashing its other arm into the wall.

While it battered the gate, Zae Zin Nim carefully made her way up the monster's back. Its movements were growing wilder the higher she went, so she first found the place where she guessed its heart might be. Then, after a deep breath and a gathering of her remaining qi, she slammed her palm down against one of the armored plates.

Her palm strike passed through the armor, twisting the inner organs of the monster. It let out a screech of pain but it was too massive for her qi to penetrate deep. Now it began swinging one arm behind its back, trying to swipe her off.

As the clumsy limb came closer, she pushed from her position, leapt off the beast's arm, and redirected herself to its head. Between two of the armored plates, dark eyes gleamed out at her. She released a pinpoint blast directly into them and leapt away to join the defenders on the wall.

Had her blast done any good? She thought she might have damaged the eyes, but the blood oozing from between the plates was barely visible from a distance. The monster continued striking mindlessly and its next blow sent chunks of stone falling from the wall. Zae Zin Nim realized that even if she could harm the behemoth, her blows were no more than pinpricks.

Finally one of the burly cultivators in armor leapt out to attack. He swung a hammer against the monster's chest hard enough to make it fall back, but failed to crack the armor. As it stumbled back, its heavy tail lashed out and the wall finally crumbled.

Zae Zin Nim leapt away from her position and landed on the roof of a nearby house, but many other defenders weren't so lucky. A significant portion of the wall collapsed, and though the largest monster had fallen on its back, others were beginning to rush forward. The defenders generating the earth did their best to close the new gap, but the defenses were rapidly collapsing.

From her position, she saw many workers who had been assisting the walls scream and run in terror. The most vulnerable were those assisting in the medical clinic that had been set up not far from the wall.

Most likely they were going to die. Zae Zin Nim had already proved that she couldn't kill the largest threat and she couldn't hold the monsters once they spread out between the streets of the city. The logical decision was definitely to retreat. Before she could make her decision, she noticed a woman trying to help one of the warriors retreat and pouring a potion over his wounds.

The woman Kai had embraced earlier. Juray.

As she began to move, Zae Zin Nim reflected that even a year ago she would no doubt have watched Juray die. The change wasn't necessarily a wise one, but she had been infected by Kai's strange beliefs. Zae Zin Nim landed on a monster's back, killing it with the impact, and then leapt to meet Juray.

"You need to retreat more quickly," she said. "They breached the wall."

"But there are still wounded here..." Juray looked up from the man she was treating with a desperate expression.

"You do not understand. The outer defenses are lost."

As soon as other retreating warriors arrived, with monsters hot behind them, Zae Zin Nim decided to simply take matters into her own hands. She scooped up the other woman and raced down the street with her, toward the inner wall. It wouldn't hold much longer than the outer one, if the largest monster got up again, but Kai would want the woman as safe as she could be in the city.

"I have something for you." Even while being carried, Juray fumbled in her healer's bag and pulled out a strange purple vial. "I can't create the energy you possess, but I made this based on your constitution. It might be able to help."

"Yes, thank you." Zae Zin Nim barely looked at the concoction, since it would surely be only another mana potion. Once they reached the defenders by the inner wall, she took the vial and tucked it into one of her pockets.

"Where's Kai? I have something for him too..." Juray looked around with sudden fear, forcing Zae Zin Nim to interrupt her.

"Last I saw him, he was on the flying boat. I don't know where he'll come down, so you should keep it for him."

"I will. Thank you, so much."

Zae Zin Nim nodded to her and instead looked to the outer wall. Not only had the earth mana users faltered and let more monsters in, the largest abomination was back on its feet. She saw no further sign of any damage to its body and the hunter who had knocked it over was dangling from one of its spikes. Blind or not, the beast began lurching into the city, ignoring the hail of attacks from the surviving walls.

Something flashed across her vision and Zae Zin Nim realized that another monster had arrived. It looked something like a hawk the size of a carriage, with four wings ending in sharp talons. In one swoop it had cleared an entire portion of the wall of defenders. Some were flattened, some fell or jumped, and a few dangled from its talons as it rose back into the air.

That beast would ruin the remaining defenses in a matter of minutes. Zae Zin Nim drew on what qi she had remaining and intercepted its next dive with a bolt trailing blue flames, the best she could manage. She could only watch in despair as the monster's body twisted, opening a hole through which her qi flew harmlessly.

So it had been tainted by the force beneath the pit. Between the flying beast and the armored giant, the defenses would soon collapse completely. From her position at the second wall, Zae Zin Nim could see that many defenders were rushing up the central streets and would arrive in time, but many more would be trapped within the city. It was only a matter of time before the monsters got inside and began killing.

Unless someone could bring down the two greatest threats, all attempts at defenses were useless. Zae Zin Nim took a deep breath as she accepted that she was unable to eliminate them. As impossible as it seemed, her only chance was to move beyond the Body Refinement stage.

Normally she cultivated in qi-dense caverns or fine palaces. As she retreated from the battle, Zae Zin Nim decided that it was time to try the barbarian way and see if she could advance in the midst of battle.

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