Chapter 1149 – First Snow (2/2)

Some time had passed but no coffin lid had been placed, making Zhexiu even more suspicious.

He stretched his fingers out of the young noble's wound and pushed the clothes to the side so he could look outside the pit.

His range of vision was still limited, and the first thing he saw was still a black monolith.

Somewhat closer up, he could finally see that this was a square monolith, but its head tapered into a point which was aimed at the sky.

Zhexiu's gaze followed the tip of the monolith up into the sky.

In the past, on the snowy plains, he would often use this angle to view the sky. When he was hunting down his foe to wear them down and needed to hide himself, he would often bury himself in the snow and gaze at the overcast sky with eyes wide open. One look would last for a very long time, so he knew that looking for too long would result in a sort of misperception. Height would seem to invert and the sky would become an abyss. He would be floating in a void, overcome with anxiety. It was the same feeling now.

This feeling of emptiness grew more and more intense, ultimately becoming a sort of omen.

On the other side of the sky, the bottom of the abyss, an eye seemed to be watching him as well.

Zhexiu felt like he had lost control of his body. Cold sweat slowly seeped out from his skin, taking all his courage with it.

At the summit of the green hill, where Zhexiu couldn't see, Black Robe looked up to the sky, surrounded by several thousand black monoliths.

Suddenly, Black Robe tore her gaze from the sky and swept it over the monoliths.

At this moment, Zhexiu's heart suddenly beat out of step with his normal pulse.

At this crucial moment, his old illness, the Tide Rush of Blood, had let him wake from this nightmare that contained nothing real and realize that someone was observing him.

He closed his eyes, and his breathing gradually came to a stop. He seemed to become an actual corpse.

Suddenly, snow began to fall from deep in the overcast skies. It fell on the green hill and pits, gradually burying all the demon corpses.

……

……

The war between the humans and demons had entered the most unbearable stalemate phase. The plains to the south of Xuelao City were fraught with battle, with not one square of clean earth to be found within a radius of one thousand li. Deaths were piling up at every moment, and both sides were exhausted and numb, waiting to see who would crumble first.

The Sacred Light arrows of the human armies were nearly exhausted and the supplies from the rear had begun to lag behind the advance starting from ten-some days ago. As for the replenishments of other weapons and objects like crystals, they had not been resupplied for quite a few more days than that. As for the Western Army, which was currently sweeping the demon bases on the periphery, there had not been any good news. The demons were faring no better. The weapons used to defend the city were mostly in an irreparable state, and a few parties of the Human race's bravest cavalry were occasionally able to penetrate as close as three li from the city walls.

One early morning, a chorus of elated shouts suddenly rose from the plains of the north, following closely by singing. Gradually, the shouts and singing began to spread southward, and when they reached Xuelao City, they transformed into thunderous cheers. Finally, they came to the tens of thousands of tribal warriors encamped outside the city, who joined them with crazed roars.

At the start, the human armies had observed the demons with wariness and confusion, unaware of what had happened.

As the cheers of the demon soldiers grew louder and louder, the human soldiers grew more and more nervous.

Divine General He Ming looked at the overcast sky, finally understanding what was happening.

He stretched out his hand to catch a drifting snowflake.

It was snowing.

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1. 'Giant Gruel', 庞大固埃, is the Chinese transliteration for 'Pantagruel', a character from a series of satirical and obscene French novels written in the 16th century, 'The Life of Gargantua and Pantagruel'. Gargantua and Pantagruel, both giants, are father and son.