Chapter 428: Shunning and breaking off
Translator: Editor:
Though the Sturmbeest’s charge retained a ferocious madness, with every passing black shadows, arcs of mournful blood trails splashed into the air. As it dashed onwards with great intensity, all sounds were drowned out; a silence enhancing the dismal solemness of the moment.
After charging forth for barely 50 metres, mangled flesh and blood drenched the Sturmbeest’s physique; every minute movement revealed another round of peeling flesh, another splintering of bones……....however, not a single harrowing cry came out from the Sturmbeest. It remained steadfast in its crestfallen charge; all because the moment it started accelerating in this direction, it had been instilled with this belief:
“You must charge forward!”
“Fight for Mother Nature Eywa!”
Unceasing assaults lacerated against the Sturmbeest, releasing layers over layers of blood rain; dyeing surrounding creatures from head to toe. So much so that the impression it gave off, was that of a giant sprinkler truck; employing its own blood to irrigate rocks and soil.
This gigantuous beast trembled with acute anguish, as loads of fresh blood spilled excessively. It wasn’t merely the superficial wounds, but also its brazen wild charge leading to an increased rate of blood loss! Yet right when its charge was only 200 metres away from the arachnid base, 2 Ultralisks that had just spawned speared in with astonishing pace. Instantly, the air rumbled with an intense collision.
4 devastating crescent sharp bone-scythes pierced deep into the Sturmbeest’s body. Following the inertia of the Sturmbeest, two profound blood ravines were carved out from its body; seemingly threatening to spew out the guts of the Sturmbeest.
Closely following, as that Sturmbeest slumped to the ground, 6 lurkers buried underground unleashed simultaneous impales. The ear-piercing sounds of metal chafing pierced into the air, as 6 stunning lethal spikes drilled out like waves, jabbing towards the Sturmbeest; dissecting it live, as dismembered flesh chunks brandished into the air.
Nevertheless, the Sturmbeest had become the vanguard arrow for the beast horde; spearing into the arachnid sea as the wild beasts swamped in crazily from behind, causing a substantial depression into the defensive line of the arachnids. A Thanator snarled and bolted in with unrivalled agility, crunching down on several lurkers underground and pulling them out, before flinging them into the sky. Instead, those few lurkers never made it to the ground, exploding into blood mist by the concentrated firepower of the slingers.
Clearly, the arachnid defence line had already been slowly pressured back to a basic 50 metres from their base. Multitudes of ruthless viperwolves continued to surge in relentless. At this moment, Queen-zerg Jenny finally floated in, prioritizing her aiming towards the spearheading Thanator, and shot out her fatal ‘Spore Fission’ ability!
This ability could deal a terrorizing imminent death effect to most creatures. Instead, when that fatal spore landed onto the Thanator, it rolled off sadly, and left nothing but a stain.
Immunity!
The blessing of Mother Nature Eywa was indeed not in vain.
Nevertheless, this arachnid queen-zerg contracted once again, and shot forth a greenish net that covered the skies and the earth; rustling like the sound of rain, it enveloped over hundreds of square metres of the wild beasts ahead. Though those wild beasts retained their savage ferocity, their movement speed and attack speed had greatly declined.
With such stalling tactics, yet another batch of newly hatched zerglings and ultralisks maliciously trampled forward to mend the gaps. From head to toe, every single stem cell of theirs were living for the sake of war. Storming the frontlines with vigor! Though this 50 metres gap was exceedingly close, it felt vaguely like the other end of the world! Clearly, the arachnid organ structures were within reach, sadly not even an inch could be breached!
The state of war had once again sunk into a stalemate, yet such a war of attrition was indeed unfavourable for Mother Nature Eywa! That was because the Blackthorn Tribe was an innate wartribe forged through hundreds and thousands of interstellar battles. Though they were bounded by certain unit quota, their forces flourished with constant replenishment through Pandora crystals and vespene gas; birthing out arachnid seedlings would merely require 2-3 minutes to join the battle, or at most 10 minutes!! Yet how many years would Mother Nature Eywa need to procreate and multiply her creatures to this state? 1 year, 10 years? 20 years?
It is true that, according to theory, the entire planet’s resources except for humankind, could be utilized as chess pieces by Eywa in her conquest for suppression. However, Eywa’s individual control of creatures was also limited. Apart from that, Eywa had to further consider the problem of ecology sustenance!
Hence, such a to-and-fro tussle persisted for scarcely 10 minutes before proclaiming its conclusion – the beast horde had very bluntly withdrawn. Obviously, Eywa had realized her nemesis’s understanding of warfare tactics had far exceeded herself. She could even perceive that her nemesis was fully exploiting her withdrawal to exhaust more of her military forces.
Sheyan sighed emphatically as he observed the current situation.
“There shouldn’t be anything else we can do now.”
Spectating the current scene, Brother black released an exhalation. In truth, amidst such a situation with layers upon layers of conflicting, it was simply inconceivable for them to attempt luring a legendary creature in as hunting it for gains. Such intensified and chaotic war was essentially a ludicrous whirlpool of meat grinders. Just by nearing it, one could face the possibility of being drawn in by inertia, and face untold treachery!
Instead, Reef hesitated as he voiced his worry.
“But are we really not going to stay here? What if something crops up and requires our help?”
However after he finished speaking, he himself shook his head and laughed despondently. Individual might was virtually shrunk to the bottommost limits of weakness when facing such scales of war. Even the combined might of the trio would barely stir up minimal influence towards this battle, but instead resulted in fatal risks. It could be said that the odds of participating and surviving, was far too low.
Sheyan heard him and similarly shook his head.
“Remaining here is pretty much useless. Since Mother Nature Eywa couldn’t manage to level the Blackthorn tribe today, then her chances would be even lower by tomorrow. The only weakness of my plot resided in the moment the two drones begun constructing the initial hatcheries of the arachnid base, all the way till upgrading to class ‘II’ base and finally building the Queen-zerg tower. Once the Queen-zerg tower emerges, and connection between the Blackthorn tribe and I is established, then our business would be practically finalized; or perhaps I should say, resigning ourselves to fate.”
(TN: fun fact, Queen-zerg is actually produced from the hatchery/lair/hive. So author probably refers to the research for spawning queen-zerg.)
“Then what should we do now?” Brother Black started adjusting his belt before slapping his old pal – that Golden AK.
Sheyan replied without hesitation.
“Since the feral beasts of wild nearby have all been assembled by the divinity Eywa, this signifies that mishaps resulting from encountering wildlife would be as good as zero. Thus, we naturally have to pay the Mosake Clan a visit, and probe the terrain around there to gather first hand information. Honing a hatchet wouldn’t delay chopping firewood*. Although I have 18 days to stay, I can’t help feeling panic from a lack of time!”
(TN: chinese idiom which means: Ample preparations results in faster completion of tasks)
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Night time, within the forest of Pandora. The atmosphere clouded psychedelic obscurities, host to monstrously vibrant and multi-colored sceneries. Thousands of unique insect cries permeated the air, alongside a piercing nature fragrance. Such splendor was something the rainforest on earth could never portray.
Trekking forward through this area were 3 humans. If it was their first time arriving in Pandora, they would undoubtedly stop for the night before making plans for daylight. However, the trio had already accumulated plenty of experiences of jungle living. Thus, they continued probing forward with steadily slow speeds.
Their current location in this primitive rainforest, was already within 5 kilometres of the Windstone Highland. Sheyan and the rest were initially ferried by a Blackthorn overlord, but after not even 300 metres travelled, they realized such a conduct had instantly incurred the merciless wrath of the nature divinity, Eywa – 3 Mountain Banshees had swooped in while baring claws and widened fangs, causing Sheyan and the rest to flee in hurry.
After brief discussions, they could only employ one of their 3 remaining overlord eggs; attempting to ride in an overlord that belonged to themselves. This time, they smoothly succeeded, which was probably due to Eywa calculating that the humans probably offered no threat or disruption to the current pandora habitat. Hence, they were gloriously ignored.
According to the RDA report, Windstone highland was a flat plateau that encompassed nearly 20 - 30 square kilometres wide. Its shape resembled a short severed stump, but of course magnified by a million folds. Decorative vegetation grew over it that appeared identical to the meadows of high mountains, and the place could be described as an expansively spacious horizon. As a result, approaching it by air recklessly, would sustain tremendous risks. Thus, Sheyan and buddies planned to disembark inside the primitive jungle below first, before stealthily ascending to the summit.
According to their estimations, though there was still 5-6 kilometres to the Windstone Highland, the fierce wildlife inhabitants had already been summoned by Eywa as cannon fodder. Thus, it would only require about an hour before climbing up the plateau, to commence spying onto the devilishly powerful na'vi clan, the Mosake clan.
Instead, 2 full hours had already elapsed from them traversing this 5-6 kilometre journey. That was because they had encountered a devastating ambush! The ambushers originated from the forest, and were exceedingly thorny and unreasonable. Haggling them, were a bunch that seemed related to common chimpanzee monkeys, but possessed shocking levels of intelligence. They actually knew how to mount slingers! Observing the two inseparable creatures working together, one could tell they were more or less sinister sentinels groomed by the Mosake clan; a clan adept at taming wild beasts.
Such a creature wasn’t recorded inside the RDA report, and they had seemingly only heard of its identity from the Takji clan – known as the Betami-ghost ape. In the face of these monkeys, Sheyan was the one that suffered the worst setback. During a moment of carelessness, in order to evade the venomous sting of the slinger, his left leg was unexpectedly pinched by a Betami-ghost ape; which instantly and illogically left half of his body turning numb. He could only search for a relatively safe and empty place to defend himself and take a breather.
(TN: The Betami-ghost ape is a made up creature by the author. There is another monkey in avatar called Prolemuris but the description doesn’t match up.)
But at this instant, Sheyan focused his mind and immediately discovered that his surroundings had been encircled by 6 Betami-ghost apes. These native inhabitants were exceptionally vicious. When they mounted onto the slingers, their heights would absolutely not exceed 1.4 metres. They were coated in dark skin, with two streaks of grey down their backs. Such creatures would normally not live beyond 3 years.