Volume 10 Call from the Sea Route Chapter 15 Clearing Out the Murlocs

In the blink of an eye, a whole day had passed. The number of evil temple murlocs Li Bin had faced at one time had reached thirteen companies. Counting more than ten thousand of them alone would have taken a long while.

But Li Bin was beaming with excitement. At last, he had spotted five enormous murlocs marked “BOSS” amid the enemy ranks.

“This has to be the last wave,” he told himself. “Once I finish them off, I’m leaving at once, whether or not more enemies show up.”

Behind him stood six companies of seventh-level death evil temple murlocs. They were the greatest spoils he had gained from the battles so far—and his last resort. If he proved unable to hold back the murlocs this time, he would send them out to stall the entire enemy force while he escaped with the huge haul of corpses.

Li Bin had prepared for battle, but this time the evil temple murlocs did not charge straight at him as they had before. After the five hulking murlocs conferred, the enemy advanced in separate groups, moving to encircle him from several directions.

The sight gave Li Bin a headache. Splitting up diluted their numbers, true, but it also made them less dangerous. His curse mages would be unable to make full use of their wide-area curses.

With no other choice, Li Bin targeted the two strongest enemy groups, ordering his curse mages to hold them back with blindness and slow spells. Then he led his cannon fodder to meet the weakest of the five groups himself.

The other two groups were entirely in the hands of the liches. They did not disappoint him. Having replenished their magic, they swiftly cast the spell Sea of the Undead.

The level-one corpses scattered across the seabed promptly rose as countless wraiths and surged toward the other two groups of evil temple murlocs. From experience, Li Bin knew the spell could keep going as long as there were corpses, but the liches had only enough magic to hold back one company of murlocs for an hour—or kill one company’s worth.

Now, four companies of evil temple murlocs were trapped within the Sea of the Undead. That left Li Bin less than fifteen minutes to deal with the enemies facing him—or to find some way to greatly reduce the number caught in the spell.

He watched the murlocs drifting slowly through the Sea of the Undead, then glanced at the two largest groups, held at bay for the moment. Gritting his teeth, he ordered, “All curse mages, cast the Recklessness Curse on the murlocs near the bosses inside the Sea of the Undead!”

The curse mages on the floating island obeyed at once, redirecting all their curses toward the murlocs trapped in the spell.

Unable to reach Li Bin’s forces quickly, the murlocs afflicted by the Recklessness Curse could only vent their fury on the companions beside them. As chaos spread through the Sea of the Undead, Li Bin suddenly heard a scream, followed by two roars.

He looked up and saw that the bosses leading the two largest murloc groups had somehow woken.

Their eyes shone red as they bellowed at him.

Li Bin’s heart lurched. He had no idea how the two murloc bosses had regained consciousness, and hurriedly ordered the curse mages to curse them again. But it seemed he was too late. Both bosses charged straight at him.

Li Bin frowned. Underwater, there was no escaping the murlocs. Gritting his teeth, he charged to meet them head-on.

Fortunately, this was only the first line of defense in the evil temple waters, and the troops were not especially strong. The two murloc bosses were only fifth-tier units. Li Bin had to work for it, but he managed to take them both down.

What he did not expect was that, once the bosses were dead, the two groups they had commanded snapped awake at the same time. Li Bin was terrified. His smallest group had not even finished its fight yet. If those two forces charged him together, there was no way he could win.

At that moment, Reed, who had been watching from the floating island, could no longer sit still. He and his subordinates let out a mighty roar. The sound of dragons roaring traveled through the water and reached every evil temple murloc.

The murlocs trembled all over, as though crushed beneath the force of the dragons’ presence.

“Master!” Reed shouted. “Hurry! Something’s wrong with them. My dragon aura can only suppress them for twenty minutes!”

“Twenty minutes is plenty!” Li Bin shouted. “Brothers, no more holding back! All archers, get out here! Find a way to kill every last enemy!”

He himself plunged into the enemy ranks and began slaughtering the murlocs. No one noticed that after all five murloc bosses were killed, the attack power of every evil temple murloc had weakened considerably. Li Bin, too, failed to see the message that appeared in his system notifications:

“The Evil Temple Murloc Village has been cleared. Its level will increase by one the next time it refreshes.”

It took him half the night to wipe out the remaining murlocs. Only then did Li Bin gather his troops. After counting the losses from the day and night of fighting, he found that the cannon fodder he had brought with him had been wiped out, while the liches and curse mages had exhausted all their magic.

But he had gained eight companies of seventh-level death evil temple murlocs, one company of fresh cannon fodder, nearly ten thousand corpses, fifty units of metal extracted from the many battered weapons, sixty-four units of wood, three soldier-class magic items, and two eighth-tier treasures.

Li Bin gave the three magic items taken from the murloc bosses to the death evil temple murlocs who had fought hardest. He kept the two strange eighth-tier treasures for himself.

One of them, a rotten fish tail, could be put to use right away. It would increase Li Bin’s speed underwater by ten percent. The other, a curious stone statue, left him baffled.

The statue was carved in the shape of an evil temple murloc, but Li Bin could not figure out what it did. Even the system’s description showed nothing but question marks.

In the end, he could only stow it in his pack and lead his troops away at a leisurely pace. Before leaving, his curiosity got the better of him, and he knocked down one more building. When no evil temple murlocs appeared, he felt reasonably sure the area had been cleared.

Li Bin had no idea that within half an hour of his departure, thirteen companies of evil temple murlocs would reappear in the waters. Their level, once below three, would rise to below five. As soon as they emerged, the murlocs would frantically search for enemies.

But there would be nothing for them to find…