Chapter 69: Intermediate Bow Art
"Monkey! Quickly, we do not have much time left! The zombies are amassing once more!" Kong Xian the Tortoise wanted to assist Shi Zuo the Monkey up the Great Wall but the latter was too occupied by the horde of zombies surrounding them.
"Damn, and here I thought I can look cool in front of Luo Bo instead of impressing the guys," Shi Zuo gritted his teeth and gathered his chi out into his arms and legs. His cultivation of two monkey silhouettes appeared right above him screaming. He knew he could have just taken the offer from Kong Xian and joined his teammates. However, that would probably put Tortoise very vulnerable to zombie attacks after the lift assist.
"Axe Art! Frenzy Fury of the Mad Monkey!"
The surroundings around Shi Zuo turned hotter as the chi of the Mad Monkey Style emanated out of his body. Without hesitation, zombies dived towards him, hungry for his chi energy. He, however, was grinning at the change of situation.
"Bin Yong! Jump now, I will catch up later!" Shi Zuo positioned his axe at the tip of his shoulder and bent his knees forward. The instant a zombie came into his reach, a vicious vertical force was released from Shi Zuo's axe blade causing the zombie to be divided into two pieces.
Shi Zuo glanced upwards and saw multiple zombies behind the first were sliced into two pieces too. He smirked and did the same with the zombie at his left and this time it was a horizontal slash attack. All zombies within the range of 10 metres were killed instantly.
At this point, he heard hollers from the top of the Great Wall. "Shi Zuo! Come up now!" Bin Yong the Beetle was beckoning him to head over.
"Haha, today I will let you be the hero of the day for the ladies Bro," Shi Zuo whispered to himself and gave a V sign with his left hand and move forward towards Yue Han the Bat.
"Damn it, Bro! Why are you acting like this!" Bin Yong cursed under his breath and redirected his focus to the current objective.
"Beetle Cultivator, do not leave yet!" A Panda foot soldier with a Sergeant rank insignia on his right chest came towards him with a small ornament box. "Take this white gem infused with the magic of the West. Headquarters said that it contained an area of effect spell Turn Undead. Place it at the top of the watchtower and use it to disperse this evil."
"Understood." Bin Yong opened the ornament box and kept the white gem in his storage ring. The Panda Sergeant then signalled its troops and the panda foot soldiers packed their wall shields to form a wall at the rear of Squad A. "GO! We will cover your back!" Panda Sergeant gave a hot-tempered war cry and the other pandas shouted in unison to attract the attention of the zombies.
The Zombies started to rush from both sides of the wall body. "Let me handle this, Bin Bin. I have a favour to pay back." Luo Bo went to the front and aimed her bow at the incoming horde that was occupying the watchtower.
"This is for you Mister Panda. Intermediate Bow Art! Charge Tornado Puncture of the Rabbit!" Luo Bo portrayed her cultivation, the Illusive Rabbit Style and surprisingly three rabbit silhouettes jumped above her. She knelt with one knee on the ground to steady herself as chi began swirling around her chi energised arrow. She nocked the arrow and aimed towards the incoming horde from afar.
"Luo Bo! You broke through and using a higher level Bow Art too?" Bin Yong was shocked by Luo Bo revelation of her cultivation.
"I had received some training from my family members." Luo Bo kept her answer short as she focused her aim. "I need to shoot when they are nearer but I do not know if I had enough energy stored in my arrow for these many zombies."
"Rabbit, let me assist! Kunai Art! Entrapping Fields of Bellflower!" Jia Le said as if she knew what was in Luo Bo's mind. She portrayed her cultivation, Breathtaking Bellflower Style and two bellflower silhouettes bloomed in mid-air above her.
She plunged her kunai to the stone floor of the Great Wall and brownish green roots creeped out from her kunai. The speed of the roots emerging from the kunai increases and it hastened to the speed of a flying arrow.
As one of the roots touched a zombie, it sprouted more branch roots trapping the zombie from moving. Eventually, many other zombies were also trapped and it slowed down the progression of the assault by the horde since a number of them were blocked by the trapped zombies.
The winds around Luo Bo quivered and she finally loosed the arrow and was knocked back by the recoil. Bin Yong managed to catch Luo Bo before she fell to the ground. At this moment, Luo Bo felt that Bin Yong changed a little. Previously, Bin Yong would have been conscientious towards Luo Bo but this time around, he had his eyes on Jia Le too. "I am glad he might have found the one." She smiled a little at this small change of attitude of him towards her.
As the energised arrow screamed and pierced through the horde, the swirling chi energy created a centrifugal force equivalent to a mini tornado and cut each and every zombie in its range. Meanwhile, some other zombies were being blasted away from the arrow and flew off the Great Wall. The distance they were thrown off was sufficient to cause immobility or even death.
"Weird, did the arrow not detonate?" Luo Bo panted as she crouched with the support of her bow.
"Still, that was an amazing shot." Jia Le praised Luo Bo.
"No, Thank you. That entrapment support was right on time. I could not have gone full power if not for you." Luo Bo expressed her gratitude to Jia Le.
"You two were fantastic. Come. Let's head in the watchtower before more zombies encroach the tower." Bin Yong helped Luo Bo up and they started moving forward into the watchtower.
"Pandas! Stay alive!" Luo Bo shouted as she headed forth.
"Fighting! Do your best" Jia Le added in and followed behind Bin Yong.
"Sleepyheads! Did you hear that? Two cute ladies just gave you encouragement. How do you all respond!?" The Panda Sergeant yelled at the Panda foot soldiers and they responded with a resounding growl. The morale of the troops shot up and became even more determined to continue the fight against the zombies.
Things were going suspiciously well until a loud blast was suddenly heard away from the Great Wall.
"Oh my gosh!! What is that?!!" Yue Han the Bat and Shi Zuo the Monkey turned to the direction and started to have cold sweats.
"Something we have to defeat." Bu Dong the Ape swung his sword downwards to remove the zombie blood.
"Ohohoho, a challenge eh?" Xiong Da the Hippo picked up his war club from the remnants of a smashed brain and tried to look at the direction of the blast.
While they were in the dungeon instance, the crowd outside was going crazy as usual. Because of the magic eye technology, they knew what was coming for Squad B and Monkey.
"Interesting, I thought the zombie dungeon will be exclusively Grade 1. I did not expect it to modify the difficulty to a higher grade." Jin thoughts were heard by Yun.
"We did discuss how the grade based dungeons like Goblin Dungeon and Zither Mistress Dungeon were quite harsh to the modern cultivators. While it was a sort of benchmark for our customers, it was not the best cultivating solution for our customers." Yun said as she was tending to an unconscious cultivator in the Recovery Bay service instance.
"Agreed, we should be more proactive in engaging the customers to something they can handle with a minor notch up in difficulty. Definitely not to the extent of holding their hands to the end of the dungeon. The old model of grade based dungeons is just not for everyone." Jin nodded his head slightly.
Minor notch up? If Bu Dong and the rest heard what Jin had said after they saw what was coming for them, they would personally put a notch into Jin's face.