Chapter 683 – Plants vs. Zombies (2/2)

However, basically every single Qi Practitioner of the Clear River prefecture was in possession of bronze bangles for controlling corpses. The enemy had used explosive corpses and corpse poison right off the bat, so he clearly practised a cultivation method that was relevant to corpse refining, which allowed him to control even more zombies.

“I swear that I will butcher the entire Crouching Ox village today, leaving none alive. I will avenge my father. It’s not too late for you to escape right now, or once you fall into a tight encirclement, all that awaits you is death!”

Xiong Batian was like a general. With a great wave of his hand, the army advanced, slamming against the huts and buildings. With a rumble, the earthen walls were directly pushed over, unable to stop this flood of corpses. He actually wanted to flatten the entire Crouching Ox village!

Liu Hong’s face changed drastically. He had witnessed the trials and hardships present in the jianghu, but never had he seen something so terrifying. It was as if a colossal, terrifying beast was lunging towards him from the darkness. As for Wang Lei, he was completely frightened out of his wits. His legs trembled as he yelled at the sky, “Junior brother!”

“Be careful, everyone!” Li Long said before flying off towards the zombie army.

At this exact moment, the disciples of the Iron Fist school who had been poisoned to death suddenly opened their eyes and slowly crawled up from the ground. Everyone around them scattered immediately. Li Hu and Li Bao basically scrambled away desperately for their lives.

Liu Hong bellowed out and unleashed his “Charge of the Heaven Cavalry”, hurling a fist at a corpse’s head. With a thunk, the corpse’s head split open like a watermelon, and it collapsed on the ground again.

He leapt about, throwing his fists like the wind and unleashing his martial arts to the limit. He struck a head with each punch, making the rising corpses collapse on the ground again.

These were merely regular walking corpses converted by the corpse poison. Although they possessed great strength and did not fear death, their reactions were delayed, so they did not pose a threat to masters of the jianghu like Liu Hong.

The disciples of the Iron Fist school erupted with cheers. Liu Hong stood imposingly among the corpses, but his back was already drenched with cold sweat. He composed himself. “Everyone, don’t be afraid! There’s just a few corpses!”

However, what Li Long faced right now were not only a few corpses, but thousands of them, covering all demographics. They pushed and shoved each other, even producing meaningless growls, which merged together into a terrifying cacophony.

Before he knew it, the unending autumn rain had already stopped. The clouds dispersed, and the moon shone with cool light, illuminating a small part of the village. However, it was a nightmarish scene.

The wave of corpses ignored all obstacles, rapidly pushing forward. Some walking corpses even fell over, trampled and crushed by the corpses behind them, returning to a pile of flesh in the blink of an eye. Cries and screams rang out of the collapsed houses, but they immediately came to a halt, having been ripped apart by the zombies.

Li Long’s palms were sweaty, but after going through the Exhibition Matches of the Nine Prefectures, his mental tolerance for things like this had increased greatly. Although his life would not be in much danger today, he could only take a very small number of people with him away from here if he could not stop the zombie horde. His other family would all have to die. He took out a handful of seeds, and with a wave of his hand, they scattered out.

The buildings in Crouching Ox village were not particularly packed. There was a lot of empty ground between the houses, turned into vegetable patches. A seed landed in a vegetable patch and immediately began to sprout, growing up rapidly and turning into a black thistle. It continued to grow and spread rapidly, covering the entire vegetable patch in the blink of an eye.

The other seeds were the same. Thistles crew endlessly, weaving together into a wall of thistles. The black thistles were different from regular thorns. Every single spine was long and sharp, glistening with a metallic lustre.

Xiong Batian did not take notice of it. The zombies were not even afraid of death, let alone pain. They dove head-first into the thistle wall. Originally, with the terrifying strength of the zombie army, they definitely could have ripped through it with ease.

However, the roots to every thistle plant extended several meters underground, and they continued to spread. The thistles themselves were as tough as iron. As they were tugged at, they produced a metallic, grating sound.

The thistle bushes were like monsters that had sprung alive, dancing about madly. The regular walking corpses would directly be pierced and torn apart as the thistles coiled and moved about, reducing the corpses to chunks of flesh. The thistles were like meat grinders working at full capacity. Even when they came across the refined zombies, they could keep them firmly entangled, drawing them in.

The school of Agriculture was not skilled with battle, but they had their own ways to vanquish enemies, which involved wondrous plants. First, they would gather offensive plants and nurture their seeds over long periods of time so that they possessed great life force. That way, they could rapidly grow as soon as they touched soil. What Li Long sprinkled earlier were seeds to “Iron Blood Thistles”.

However, plants all needed to be rooted to the ground, so most of the time, they could only be used to defend. And, they could not distinguish between friend and foe, making them very difficult to control. Apart from the person who nurtured them, anyone who entered the thistle bushes would be under attack, but they were perfect for a situation like this.

Li Long riled up with vigour, becoming a little more confident. He took out another handful of seeds and scattered them, but this time, nothing happened on the ground.

“I’d like to see how much longer you can stop them!”

Xiong Batian mobilised the army to concentrate their attacks on places where the thistle bushes were thinner. At the same time, he took out a bronze bell and swung it forcefully. The bell rung frantically, and the zombies became even more frenzied, pushing forward without any regard and forcefully tearing apart the thistles.

Although the thistle bushes had killed many walking corpses, the corpse qi in their bodies were fatal to plants too. The thistles all withered away.

The zombie army burst through the thistle bushes like a flood that had breached a dam. They were about to annihilate the tiny Crouching Ox village.

A leading zombie stepped down with his left foot, and the pressure passed through the ground. Before anyone had realised it, a tuber shaped like a sweet potato had already formed underneath. Sensing the pressure, it exploded loudly and blasted the zombie away, causing the zombies in the surroundings to suffer collateral damage.

Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!

The zombie army advanced mindlessly, leading to a string of explosions. The seeds that Li Long had just scattered were known as “Sweet Potato Mines”. Ancient disciples of the school of Agriculture regularly buried them in the surroundings of their fields to prevent wild beasts from destroying their crops.