Chapter 2683: Chapter 2683: The Grand River Fortress

Led by Zen, everyone flew down hard in a huge arc.

They had done their best to avoid these strange black birds but they could not seem to shake them. They were getting closer and closer to the ground now and running out of space fast.

A little over 2 minutes later and they were almost forced to the ground now, still with the black birds hovering above them like grim reapers awaiting their moment.

“Dig into the ground!” someone suggested in a panic.

“That's suicide!” another yelled, shutting the idea down immediately.

Not only would it be hard to move underground, any black bird could just come into the hole and kill whoever was down there. It was like digging one's own grave.

“We fight!”

“We'll kill all these mongrel birds!”

The warriors were beginning to lose their minds. They wielded their swords and swung them in the air viciously. Their sword radiance began interweaving and forming a thin net.

This began to injure and kill some of the strange black birds. At least, they had mounted some sort of defense for the time being.

But if one bird were to escape through the sword net, many would die from the explosion it would cause.

In such a short time, so many of their group had died.

Zen had an idea of his own. He flew close to the ground and kicked himself off a rock, shooting himself into the air. He swung his sword, radiating a tiny white light around himself.

“Puff! Puff! Puff...”

With just his one attack, it seemed hundreds of these menacing birds had been killed.

But it was just a drop in the ocean.

“What?” Zen exclaimed, disappointed at how little of a difference he had made.

A black bird managed to escape and landed not far from Zen.

Zen felt the power within the black bird and knew he was in trouble. He rushed to get away from it, jumping wildly and falling into multiple somersaults.

“Bang!”

A terrifying stream of energy exploded behind Zen, sending a huge shockwave to hit him square in the back.

That was the power of over a hundred divine megatons.

Zen successfully avoided the energy stream, but the shockwave still hit him at close range. It felt like having whole mountains crash into him.

He was sent flying a thousand feet away, which sent a searing pain into his back and the taste of blood in his throat.

His injuries might not have been too severe, but this was only the power of one of these strange birds. If a dozen or more had come at him, he'd have died on the spot. What was even more terrifying was the thought that there were probably hundreds of thousands of strange black birds above him. ʀ𝘢ΝỌ𝔟Е𝘴

“Ahhh!”

When Zen got to his feet, he could see Gant in the distance, waving his sword and roaring in anguish.

Gant was being surrounded by the strange black birds, more and more flocking in every second. It looked as though he would not be able to hold on much longer.

“Bang!”

“Bang!”

“Boom!”

A din of the explosions came from close by, and dozens of warriors were killed. Bodies were dropping all around Zen in a terrifying and gruesome scene.

The strange black birds obscured the sun, casting darkness over everything. There was so much going on that Zen struggled to see anyone else.

He exerted the sword light to its max to defend himself. It killed a good few birds, their corpses fluttering down into a huge heap on the ground.

This was barely any kind of victory. It would be impossible to kill them all and leaving even one alive meant death still lurked.

Zen was overtaken with angst. Even if he were to activate the Imperial Sword Seal, it wouldn't be much help. Although the Imperial Sword Seal could activate sword threads to solve the immediate problem, it was impossible for them to kill this many black birds. All hope appeared to be lost.

Zen was at his end, ready to give in, when suddenly he heard a whistling.

“Whoosh!”

A dark green spot of light emitted from the dark cloud.

“Whoosh!”

Then came a second dot of green light.

Then a third, and a fourth...

The green light struck the cloud of black birds with a deadly crash.

Just then, a strange sound echoed from the sky.

The sound was not loud but it fell harsh in Zen's ears and left a ringing that was tough to bear.

He was very uncomfortable, but didn't get any hurt by that. The pain was within his tolerance.

A miraculous scene occurred next.

The dense dark cloud above him began to collapse as the strange black birds began to faint and plummet from the sky.

Some black birds saw this and fled as fast as they could. However, they could not escape the piercing noise ringing in the air. It slowed them greatly and caused a stumble in their flight. They couldn't even tell which direction they were going and some flew in aimless circles.

Zen, Gant and the other survivors stood exhausted, getting buried under the rainfall of fainted birds.

All those warriors desperately hurried away, not wanting to be anywhere near those birds after what had just happened, whether they were dead or not.

Those floating in the air looked at each other, exchanging looks of pure relief.

In so little time, half of their group had died.

“What's that sound?”

Gant poked his fingers in his ears. He could barely hear himself speak.

“I don't know, but I do know it has a miraculous effect on these strange black birds,” Zen said.

Birds were extremely sensitive to sound. Some special sounds were indeed capable of startling birds.

The humans of the Mountain Viewing Province might have done everything to fight against the Sun Crow race and figured this method out.

“Hurry!”

“If these strange birds wake up, we won't be able to get away.”

They wanted nothing more in the world than to leave this place.

At that moment, several white boats appeared in the distance.

They were flying boats, coming over at a considerable speed. A dozen people exited the boats. They were wearing military uniforms and were surrounded by a murderous aura.

Only those who lived to kill carried an aura such as this, and Zen could sense a killing intent in them as well. He raised his eyebrows, staring at them warily.

Without paying any attention to Zen and the others, they took out palm-sized beads from their backs and threw them into the mounds of black birds.

“Wow!”

The fainted black birds immediately caught fire. In the blink of an eye, hundreds of thousands of these birds had ignited into a sea of blazing inferno, burning to nothingness.

“The Grand River Fortress is right up ahead. Come with us!”

They left their words hanging as they turned and galloped, back to the boats with no intention of helping anyone else get there.

Everyone followed closely behind the boats, struggling to hide their feeling of disrespect from their faces.

They had flown thousands of miles to the Mountain Viewing Province and fought for the human race, but ended up in the clutches of these black birds. They didn't even receive any words of comfort or reassurance that they were fine.

Zen maintained a state of calm.

No matter what, he was still alive, and that was good enough.

But it seemed that the situation in the Mountain Viewing Province was far more complicated than he had expected.

Gant too remained calm despite what had just happened. But he had survived. He lowered his head and thought about something else to keep his mind from the life-threatening situation he had been in just now.

After flying for five hundred miles, a magnificent fortress appeared in front of everyone, greeted with many pairs of dazzled eyes.

However, the most attractive thing was not the fortress itself, but the nine gigantic swords inserted at the back of it!

Zen had seen such swords before. They were the same as the Lofty Sword in the Sword Light Palace. The difference was that there were nine swords here!