Foolish play of the gods

Chapter 6: Desperate situation! · Xia Wan was the first to sense the enemies closing in from behind. · Her eyes suddenly narrowed, glowing with a rich, verdant light of Life. With a flick of her left hand, she summoned a lush green longbow; her right hand plucked an arrow from thin air. She spun and fired in one fluid motion, sending a bolt of emerald radiance shrieking into the sky. · Boom! · The arrow detonated mid-air, releasing a cloud of spores that blanketed the sky. · The army of Dreadfiends didn’t hesitate, charging headlong into the drifting haze. · The moment the spores touched flesh, they transformed into countless dodder-like filaments. They lashed around every Dreadfiend that had entered the zone, binding them into tight "cocoons." · Plummeting like stones as their wings ceased to beat, the Dreadfiends slammed violently into the ground. · The earth below was already littered with 【Creation Grass Seeds】. Upon contact, the Dreadfiends' bellies bloated at a terrifying rate. Within a few breaths, something inside their abdomens began to thrash violently, desperate to claw its way out. · The Hunter’s trap combo was seamless, and the dual-control effect was immediate. The Dreadfiend vanguard failed to reach the group in that initial surge. · But even as Xia Wan rained down arrows, she could only hold back so many. · The enemy was legion. Like a plague of locusts, the swarming shadows soon exhausted the spores in the air and surged toward the group once more. · "No more time! Assassins, protect yourselves! Everyone else, get behind me!" · Chen Chong bellowed, tossing Cao Sansui from his back over to Nangong. He tore his massive shield free and slammed it into the earth, driving the tip deep into the gravel. · "Order endures!" he roared, eyes wide with intensity. · The faint shimmer of the giant shield erupted into a blinding glare. Searing holy light surged upward like a reversed waterfall, arcing perfectly across the sky before cascading down to the flanks of the group. · The light traced the silhouette of a massive wall, sealing Cheng Shi and the others safely within its perimeter. · Screee— · Thud— Thud— Thud— Thud— · The Dreadfiend horde, blotting out the sun, crashed into the barrier. Impact after impact thundered against the wall of light, but the screen didn't flinch. Inside, the group remained as steady as a mountain. · Chen Chong’s expression was grim. Veins bulged in his arms as he pressed against the shield, not daring to move an inch. · "There are too many of them! The Great Wall of Holy Light can only hold for five minutes. With a double Priest buff, I can stretch it to fifteen at most. Think of something fast, or forget twenty-four hours—we’re all dead in fifteen minutes!" · The urgency in Chen Chong’s voice was palpable, but panic was useless now. The enemy was simply too numerous. · Nangong worked nearby, restoring Cao Sansui’s mental energy. Her healing was effective; Cao Sansui was already shaking off his lethargy. · "A Progeny Priest has a massive healing output," Cao Sansui said, trying to bolster morale despite the cold dread in his own chest. "As long as you keep 'The Newborn' on you under control, we should be able to hold out a bit longer." · In truth, his heart was sinking. He hadn't expected the tempo of this trial to be so relentless, or the enemies so ferocious. Even in the 2,000-point trials he’d matched into before, it had never been this brutal. · The highest-ranked person here was himself, and he was barely at 1,900. Some were below 1,400. How on earth had they attracted a Dreadfiend army of this scale? If he didn't know better, he'd swear he'd stumbled into a 2,100-rank hellscape. · Every face was etched with gravity. Now shielded by the wall of light, Xia Wan stopped firing and focused on recovering her strength. · Nangong, her face pale, looked toward Xia Wan with a strange glint in her eyes. She frowned and cast another healing spell on the Hunter. · Xia Wan looked up, slightly surprised, and nodded her thanks to Nangong. Feeling the surge of restorative power, she reached out and manifested several more spore arrows. · Meanwhile, the other Priest, Cheng Shi, just sat on the ground, glancing around aimlessly like a total deadweight. · To be honest, Cheng Shi was also feeling the headache. He’d seen scenes like this before, but never with teammates at such a low rank. He was racking his brain, trying to figure out how to play the hand he’d been dealt to escape this trap. · In high-rank games, everyone’s combat power was top-tier. When things got desperate, people pulled out more tricks than a magician, always finding a way to slip through the cracks. Beyond their experience, the most important thing was their foundation—their raw capability. · This was why the ranking on the 【Road to Divinity】 (The Ladder) mattered so much. · At the end of every month, the Ladder conducted a settlement. Players in different tiers received different rewards—everything from resources and equipment to talents and skills. The higher the rank, the better the odds of pulling high-grade rewards. · Since basic skills for the same class were almost identical, the only way players distinguished their builds was through the unique talents, skills, and gear they acquired. Chen Chong’s Shield-Sword, a dual-purpose weapon with a special bonus to barrier defense, was an A-rank reward from the Ladder. · Chen Chong, bracing the shield, watched as the Dreadfiends outside swarmed so thick they blocked out the light, turning the interior of the barrier pitch black. His anxiety spiked. · The others gritted their teeth, tightening their grip on their weapons as they prepared for the worst. · They were backed into a corner. And the trial had been active for less than an hour. · "Are we... going to die?" Nangong’s knuckles were white. · No one answered. Even Chen Chong was focusing every ounce of his will on maintaining the Great Wall of Holy Light, trying to buy them just a few more seconds to find a solution. · Yet those minutes felt less like a strategic window and more like the final gasps of the condemned. · The atmosphere bottomed out. Silence fell within the shield as they all searched for an exit that didn't seem to exist. · Then, Cheng Shi spoke. · "Where’s Song Yawen? Is he still alive?" · Song Yawen was using Shadow Concealment and didn't need the shield's protection. However, the skill wasn't infinite; the slightest movement would spit him out of the shadow plane and expose him. That said, a seasoned Assassin could stay under for a considerable time—at least longer than five minutes. · Song Yawen didn't answer. It wasn't that he didn't want to; he didn't dare. · He was currently crouched beneath a crumbling wall just outside the Great Wall of Holy Light. The wall above him was crawling with at least eighteen bloodthirsty Dreadfiends. · He shouldn’t be dead... · Cheng Shi wasn't asking out of concern; he was calculating. · He knew that the exclusive skill for a 【Death】 Assassin was "Death Funeral." If Song Yawen was still alive, they might actually have a chance to break out. · Just as the "Great Wall of Holy Light" was a signature of Order knights, "Death Funeral" was the ultimate gift bestowed upon those who followed the path of Death. The skill summoned a massive scythe within a "Death Domain," delivering a guaranteed fatal blow to every target within range. · However, the requirements for a "Death Domain" were incredibly strict. It required gathering a massive amount of "freshly deceased" energy within a confined space. Consequently, few Death Assassins ever used it. To pull it off, they couldn't strike and vanish like other Assassins; they had to lurk in the shadows, creating a continuous cycle of slaughter before ending it with one final blow. · Remaining in such close proximity to the killing floor was high-risk for an Assassin. But the payoff was equally high. · Death Funeral never missed. · It was why Assassins of Death were called "Death Weavers"—a name they truly earned. · But against a horde this size, Song Yawen had no opening to cast it. The moment he showed his face, he wouldn't be killing Dreadfiends; he’d be the one ending up dead. · So, Song Yawen stayed frozen in the shadows. · But just because he didn't dare to move didn't mean Cheng Shi wouldn't. · [END]