It wasn’t until the fortress gate slowly rose with the creak of the winch that the young Stone Descendants finally snapped back to attention, when ranks of leather-armored Slime guards, each carrying a short wooden spear, hopped out in neat formation to greet them.
Curious, they followed Nilly as she led them slowly into the brightly lit fortress.
“Leon, when you did the trials before, did you ever see this fortress?” the broad-shouldered Max leaned toward his friend and lowered his voice to ask.
Leon shook his head, scanning the interior layout of the fortress with his eyes. “No. I’m sure of it. After the last trial ended, there was nothing here except that row of silent guardian knight statues.”
“Unbelievable… How did those Slimes manage to move an entire fortress here in such a short time without anyone noticing?” Max muttered.
Word of the Slime Kingdom had already spread through Stone Fortress town, and these young Stone Descendants were more curious than shocked by Slimes who clearly showed high discipline and social organization.
But the fortress appearing out of nowhere exceeded their understanding;
they couldn’t come up with a reasonable explanation no matter how they wracked their brains.
As they moved deeper inside, they could see squads of poison-stinger wasps with dark red carapaces flying over the fortress in strict formations, silently patrolling every corner.
This bridgehead, named the Thorn Outpost, covered roughly the area of a standard human manor.
Along the walls, wooden watchtowers stood at intervals, each mounting four Goblin Rippers that shimmered with mysterious arcane light.
At the base of the walls, Slimes were hard at work, using their gel bodies to smear special adhesive mud into the last cracks of the wall, smoothing them over carefully.
Now the young Stone Descendants finally understood how the fortress had risen in just a few days.
“My goodness, these Slimes are incredible,” Elara exclaimed, eyes wide with genuine awe.
Leon stepped forward a few paces and approached Yano, asking in a low voice, “Uncle Yano, do you know why Auntie specifically brought us here?”
Yano, still mulling over the Gargoyle lair and the duke’s secret, came back to the present and shrugged. “Probably… she just wanted you to see something of the world.”
He knew the real reason but did not say it outright.
Their scheming aunt most likely wanted to use the pretense of “friendly exchange” to assess the actual combat strength of the boss’s legion and the fortress’s defenses in person.
Judging by her relaxed posture, she seemed quite pleased with what she saw.
Even the faint ancestral shadows around them steadied, their murmured objections gradually falling silent.
Yano felt relieved inwardly.
As a knight of the Slime Kingdom and a Stone Descendant, he was glad to see such promising cooperation taking shape.
Soon Yano found an excuse to slip away from the group and wandered the fortress alone.
The familiar architectural style and the busy, orderly atmosphere stirred a warm nostalgia in him, as if he had returned home.
When he passed the small training ground, a peculiar oak tree caught his eye.
It was unlike any oak found in the forest;
every leaf was a pure silver, and under the fortress’s magical lights they sparkled like finely wrought metalwork, as if crafted by the most skilled silversmith.
When did the Boss learn to relax so much?
He actually planted an ornamental tree in the fortress?
Yano scratched his head, puzzled.
At that moment, the fortress bell on the wall was struck hard by a Slime guard, its heavy, urgent toll instantly ripping the calm atmosphere apart.
Dong! Dong! Dong!
The fortress felt like a pond hit by a stone, the mood changing in an instant.
Magical creatures patrolling, Slimes at work, everyone froze mid-action, then moved quickly and orderly toward the walls like a well-drilled army.
“What’s happening?” The Stone Descendant youngsters who had seemed on a spring outing went alert at once;
relaxed faces hardened into tension.
Nilly closed her eyes briefly to sense, then opened them and said immediately,
“Goblins. All Shadow Assassins, get up on the wall with me. Everyone else find cover.”
“Goblins?!”
“How did they get here?!”
The uninformed Stone Descendants were stunned.
The depths of the Fluorescent Forest had always been Stone Descendant territory, guarded by patrolling Gargoyles—how had goblins sneaked in silently?
There was no time to answer their questions. Nilly straightened, shedding any trace of leisure for focused competence.
Before she finished speaking, she, Yano, and three other veteran Stone Descendant Shadow Assassins were already on the high wall.
They peered into the deep darkness beyond the guardian knight statues.
Though the eye could not pierce the night, the chaotic roars and the sounds of many feet made it clear that a substantial goblin force was approaching.
“Fire!”
On the wall, the Slime chief gunner swung his gel hand with force.
The Goblin Rippers instantly lit with complex runes, a ten-pointed star phantom flashed before each barrel, silver light coalesced into spheres, and then they launched silver beams.
Like blades tearing the night, they stabbed into the distant darkness.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!!
Silver light exploded in the dark, successive detonations briefly illuminating the scene and revealing countless goblin faces twisted in feral greed, and the stunned victims of the attack.
“Ah! Those damned Slimes again.”
Some goblins who had survived swamp battles recognized the attack and cursed.
Grumg, the ogre mage embedded in the goblin force, wore a look of shock on his face.
What?
How did those pesky Slimes get here? Fear made him step back instinctively.
But then he remembered the demon standing behind him and regained his composure.
“Forward! Don’t retreat!”
He snatched up a skinny goblin nearby, and amid its shrieks he swallowed it whole, then glared viciously at the frightened goblins around him.
“Move aside!”
Bulkier Bugbear overseers shoved smaller goblins from the path.
They grabbed massive sling ropes and spun like a gyroscope, hurling one heavy boulder after another toward the fortress walls with whistling wind.
The four Goblin Rippers opened fire at full power, spewing silver beams that intercepted and shattered most of the incoming boulders in midair.
Yet a handful of stones slipped past the fire and smashed into the shields generated by the Magic Leaves.
Bang!
The shields rippled wildly, humming under the strain before shattering like glass.
A battering stone rocked the wall.
Immediately, a surging green tide parted to the sides as a dozen tall goblins pushed six metal cannons out of the darkness.
Magic Crystal Cannons!
The goblin army had clearly learned painful lessons from its last encounter with the Slimes and spared no expense smuggling these human-made weapons from the Misty Bay Harbor Trade Alliance.
“Hahaha, let’s let these sticky things taste the Magic Crystal Cannon!”
Under Grumg’s orders, a few goblins fumbled to load glittering magic crystals into the breeches and activate the ignition devices.
Hum—!!
A charging hum rose, and six thick element streams roared from the cannons, slamming into the fortress walls.
Rumble—!!
The shield regenerated and shattered again;
the element streams scorched the walls, leaving charred black marks and faint cracks in the masonry.
And that wasn’t all.
Some goblins were thrown forward like human bombs clutching alchemical bombs;
they crashed into the walls and detonated.
Though less powerful than the cannons, the explosions left pitted scars and cratered the walls.
This goblin firepower was far fiercer than during the Eastern Swamp battles.
At this rate, the hastily built outpost wouldn’t hold for long.
“Magic Crystal Cannons? Alchemical bombs?” Nilly’s brow tightened;
she hadn’t expected the goblin legion to field weapons of this caliber.
“Auntie, what should we do? Do we engage?” a Stone Descendant assassin crouched in shadow asked respectfully.
Nilly thought fast.
This chaotic battlefield was an ideal stage for Shadow Assassins to shine.
But it also meant that once exposed, even with petrified skin they wouldn’t withstand a goblin onslaught.
Any mishap could cost the Stone Descendants dearly in casualties.
If only she alone acted, they might have a chance.
Her gaze fixed on Grumg, ready to strike, when Sweet Beet’s voice echoed through the gel network.
“Blood Legion, attack!”
“Blood Legion?” Nilly flinched.
Why did that name sound so vampiric?
Before she could finish puzzled thoughts, a dense, low hum rose inside the fortress.
To the Stone Descendants’ surprise, a large swarm of dark-red, huge poison-stinger wasps arranged into neat combat formations like a blood-red cloud. They rose from the fortress’s assembly area and flew to hover above the walls, waiting.
Blood Baptism
At the same moment, Nilly sensed a flash of blood light behind her;
a faint red domain with a heavy metallic scent of blood rapidly expanded, enveloping the wall segment and the hovering Blood Legion above it.
“This aura… vampire clan magic?”
“Are vampires hiding here?”
The Stone Descendants exchanged bewildered looks and instinctively scanned for vampires.
Before they could pinpoint any traces, the wasps in midair began to bloom with dazzling bloodlight.
Blood Molding
The blood energy within the domain was quickly drawn together, converging toward each Blood Poison Wasp to form dozens of blood spheres in front of each of them.
“How can these creatures use vampire clan magic?” The Stone Descendants were dumbfounded.
Even well-seasoned Nilly looked astonished.
“Spells! It’s spells!”
“So many spells!!”
Tens of ominous blood-lit energy orbs formed simultaneously, a spectacle on par with a human mage circle collectively chanting war magic.
More terrifyingly, in front of one much larger wasp, the blood sphere’s diameter was nearly as long as an adult’s arm, flashing with lethal blood energy.
“Casaric above!”
Grumg’s eyes popped wide. Without hesitation, he turned and ran.
Swoosh! Swoosh! Swoosh!
Blood spheres rained down on the battlefield, slamming into goblins and exploding. Though the blasts seemed moderate, the splattered blood corroded everything and sent the goblins into agonized screams.
“Ah—! My eyes!”
“It’s corroding! The blood’s eating through my armor!”
“Help—help!”
Goblins who had surged past the guardian knight statues fell in swaths like harvested grain, keening as they collapsed.
A massive blood orb launched by Sweet Beet seemed to have a will of its own;
it chased inward and struck the rear of a goblin formation, hitting one Magic Crystal Cannon.
Boom!!!
The expensive cannon toppled, its delicate magical engravings corroded beyond recognition and utterly ruined.
The sprayed blood washed over nearby goblins, who screamed as their bodies smoked and sizzled under the corrosive blood energy.
Grumg cowered behind a boulder, feeling the sting of blood droplets eating at his cheek, cursing inwardly.
Damn, how have those Slimes changed tactics again?
He had planned to rely on the goblin legion and their newly bought weapons to take Stone Fortress and earn favor from Lord Ea.
Now those damned Slimes were once more blocking his path.
Seeing the goblin assault falter and formations break, he hissed curses in goblin tongue.
“Advance! All of you push forward! Overwhelm this damn fortress!”
At his command, a denser rustling and hissing rose from the rear as a black tide of Filthy Descendants surged forward.
But after giving the order, Grumg quietly took a few steps back, hiding himself further behind the lines—clearly spooked by the terrifying blood spheres.
The dreadful commotion of the Filthy Descendants poured out and drew the attention of everyone on the wall.
“A demon’s aura?!”
“It’s a demon offspring!”
Yano froze, finally understanding why the goblins had started war everywhere after occupying the elemental plane.
There was a demon backing them.
But they had a backer as well.
More precisely, it was the Slimes.
Yano glanced reflexively at his shoulder;
the small green Slime sleeping there seemed to sense the demon’s presence and blinked its drowsy eyes open.