I Forged the Myth of the Ancient Overlords
Chapter 268 - 268 267. Firewood_1

Chapter 268: 267. Firewood_1 Chapter 268: 267. Firewood_1 The pale fire scorched the exposed skin of the mages, their once normal skin now fissured, revealing grotesque wounds beneath where their blood boiled and was devoured by the flames.

The flames burned quietly as if the mages were nothing but firewood, sustaining a bonfire.

It must be excruciating torture, Lu Ban thought. The expressions on the mages’ faces were even more terrifying than those of the demonic beasts, conveying the fear of humans who had been ravaged by extreme pain. Their limbs trembled ceaselessly, and the flames seemed to burst forth from inside them, pouring out of their wounds and igniting between their bones.

Lu Ban had seen documentaries featuring people wrapped in flames, dying in agony. In reality, many didn’t actually die from the burning itself; rather, it was suffocation from the lack of oxygen that killed them before they were burned alive.

Even if they escaped the flames, the infections from extensive skin burns could be lethal, and the victims would die embittered in endless torture and pain.

Now, these mages were undergoing such inhuman torment.

At the same time, Lu Ban saw that their armor was emitting a faint light.

However, the armor wasn’t there to shield them from the onslaught of the flames but to firmly imprison their bodies on the high-backed chairs, preventing them from leaving their seats due to unbearable pain.

“Is this the fate of a mage?”

Lu Ban couldn’t help but sigh.

“You might not know, an hour as defined by Gray Tower, is the time it takes for a mage to completely burn up from sitting on the Spirit Torch.”

Jonah looked at his tormented colleagues, the firelight casting an eerie glow on his face.

“When we chose the path of mages, we had already foreseen such an end.”

It seemed a mage could no longer bear the torment. He opened his mouth to scream, but his throat had already been burnt away; the flesh of his neck had turned to char, and only the air passing through intensified the flames.

“In the large fortress, a Spirit Torch comprised of three mages can withstand the demonic beasts for an hour. In smaller outposts, a Spirit Torch of a single mage can hold for an hour.”

Jonah was doing simple arithmetic.

A Demonic Tide lasting three days, at Black Keep Fortress, every hour three mages would die.

And there were hundreds, if not thousands, of such fortresses.

With each Demonic Tide, the Night Country might lose tens of thousands of mages.

Such tides occurred at least once a year and had continued for a thousand years.

Lu Ban didn’t bother to calculate just how many mages had died in the process.

These possessors of extraordinary powers, seen as Transcendents in other Foreign Domains, were merely treated as expendables during the onslaught of the Demonic Tide, like firewood to be consumed.

If the Forest Rangers of Hei Tower are commoners struggling to grasp their destinies, then the mages of Gray Tower are Transcendents whose fates were already decided.

What’s more despairing is that despite such sacrifices, the lands of the Night Country continued to shrink year by year, as the Black Forest gradually covered the entire continent. And with the emergence of three Demonic Tides at once, the defense line of Hei Tower might completely collapse.

A millennium of sacrifices had only delayed the inevitable destruction by a sliver.

Just like the resistance at this moment in Black Keep Fortress.

Even if they could resist once, resist twice, this fortress would ultimately fall.

It was all futile.

Suddenly, a wolf howl sounded.

This wolf howl was louder than any other heard before, causing a tremor in one’s heart and instinctively invoking fear.

Lu Ban hurriedly left the hall and approached the window.

The stationed Forest Rangers were already trembling so much they could hardly stand.

Through the gaps in the stone window, Lu Ban saw that thing.

In that Eternal Night, beneath the Blood Moon, there stood a giant wolf.

The size of this wolf had surpassed the imagination of ordinary people.

Soaring like a mountain range, its very existence was as if it were an eternal fixture of this world; merely glimpsing its silhouette was enough to make one abandon any thought of resistance.

It was an incomparable presence, one that was meant to exist in this world.

From Lu Ban’s perspective, the giant wolf’s back already appeared to press against the Blood Moon; its entire body was silvery, shining brightly in the everlasting darkness. It possessed a captivating visage that, though clearly lupine, bore a hint of human expression.

Those dark red eyes were like the red moon suspended high in the sky, radiating a demonic, enchanting light.

The Winter Wolf, the lord of Frost!

“Am I supposed to fight this creature and take its heart?”

Instantly, Lu Ban felt this task was utter nonsense.

Such a vast creature’s heart would likely be larger than Lu Ban himself, and even if he could devise a way to immobilize it with a blast, where would he find the time to extract its heart?

Not to mention there were two other Demonic Tides.

If it were just Frost, Lu Ban thought he might stand a chance, but neither Eternal Night nor the plague were issues he could easily resolve.

He saw countless flecks of dust falling from the enormous body of the Winter Wolf.

What seemed like small dust particles from a distance were, in fact, each a giant wolf.

These Winter Wolves were as tall as small buildings, with silver-grey fur and four eyes.

From those lesser Winter Wolves sprung even more smaller wolves.

In the blink of an eye, the Winter Wolves had formed a silver-white tidal wave.

This wave was not merely in front of Lu Ban’s eyes, but was simultaneously occurring across the entire Night Country, throughout the entire Black Forest.

If one were to look down from a great height outside of this world at this moment, they would see a line of silver frost forming on the dark, profound earth, converging towards the last remnants of human civilization.

Wherever the silver frost passed, all things froze, with even the air turning into ice crystals.

Lu Ban’s breath had become a pure white weapon; he saw frost spreading inward from the fortress windows before the Winter Wolves even reached the Black Keep Fortress, possibly sealing the outer layer completely in ice.

At that moment, Lu Ban heard a horn blow.

It was a horn sound from the dome; it started off shaky, but as it was blown, it grew louder and more piercing, giving one the impression of the howling of the Winter Wolves.

The next moment, Lu Ban saw enormous boulders being hurled from above the fortress.

These boulders glowed, illuminating the perpetual night surrounding them.

Boom—

The stones hit the ground, landed in the midst of the Frost’s surge, and immediately caused several gaps in the tide.

But the gaps were quickly filled, undiminished.

And the Winter Wolves were not just a single wave charging forward in unison.

In places covered by Frost, those ice crystals were growing more Winter Wolves, endlessly.

At this moment, many could not imagine that the area of the silver-white part of the Black Forest had already far exceeded the area of unpolluted land remaining to the humans of the Night Country.

Billions of Winter Wolves were charging towards the bastion of human civilization.