Ellora City Wall!
Soldiers ran across it, taking up positions, concentrated primarily in the direction facing the Angan River. The wall had been reinforced and elevated to a height of two hundred metres.
It was over forty metres thick, creating a large enough room for the soldiers to run around and position themselves. The wall wasn't vertical but had an incline to ensure it didn't collapse upon its own weight.
Gudora personally used his powers to erect this crystal wall. Hence, it was ridiculously tough. At present, soldiers littered the place, brimming with fighting spirit.
Ellora City had a population close to ninety thousand people. After Gudora's announcement, the people from the nearby three towns fled to the city to take refuge.
Each town had around twenty thousand people, adding to a collective sixty thousand people from the towns alone.
After that were villages that were within Ellora City's sphere of influence. Every village had anywhere from a thousand to two thousand people living in it, primarily reliant on farming and animal husbandry.
The Ganrimb Kingdom consisted of seven Cities, 19 Towns, and over 200 villages. Currently, the people from three Towns and thirty-five Villages have gathered in Ellora City, raising its overall population to over two hundred thousand.
Such a massive population granted Ellora City a large pool of strength to draw upon. Currently, the number of soldiers crossed twenty thousand, all of whom were at the Body Stage.
The number originally was smaller. But as it was a time of war, Gudora didn't stint on resources and hurriedly elevated the strength of any soldier who showed talent, bringing them to the Body Stage.
According to their tactics, the soldiers were given minerals to build Human Avatars. A week's time wasn't enough to consolidate much strength, but the soldiers managed to cement their foundation.
A good number of them were at the early phase of the Body Stage. But that was only among the lower levels of the city's power.
Many captains were at the peak of the Body Stage and in charge of elite raid squads were cultivators at the Life Stage.
Ellora City currently had over a hundred cultivators at the Life Stage, eighty of whom were at the 2-Life Stage while the remainder were at the 3-Life Stage.
Gudora's children were at the 4-Life Stage, numbering six in total. The City Councillor was at the 6-Life Stage. There were three organisation heads at the same cultivation level too.
Though their battle strength was limited, the large merchants were all at the 6-Life Stage, serving as a reserve force whose only task was to chuck out large attacks at the targets. As they weren't fighters, that was the limit to what they could be counted upon.
Finally, standing at their peak at the 8-Life Stage was Gudora, the Ellora City Lord. He stared with a solemn gaze and observed the Slump Lizards bombarding the city wall, announcing calmly, "Don't bother attacking them."
"They'll serve as a buffer and use up more of the Centingers' strength!" His words eased up the tense hearts of the soldiers. He kept watch, observing large shadows loom over the horizon, "They're coming. Be ready!"
'Why hasn't Hanya erected the shield yet?' Gudora stared up and frowned, failing to see the sludge dome that should have appeared by now. He turned around and stared at the City Lord Estate, turning serious upon noticing more than half of it was in rubble, "Why hasn't anyone told me about it?"
Only then did the soldiers near him turn around and stare at the City Lord Estate. They had been busy with their preparations to keep an eye on the City Lord Estate. It couldn't be helped since everyone was nervous due to the claim that the Centingers this time would be the most numerous in history.
Also, no one dared to attack the City Lord Estate, as powerful guards had been posted all around it. Even though a good portion of them had arrived at the walls, there were still enough at the estate to thwart anyone who dared to do so.
"Sir, every cultivator above the Spirit Stage is here." One of the soldiers said, "And with Lady Hanya there, the City Lord Estate is still the safest."
'No, there's one more that's above the Spirit Stage.' Gudora frowned and leapt, making a beeline to his home while leaving behind a command, "Execute as planned. I'll return shortly!"
"Yes, City Lord!" The cultivators at the Life Stage took charge of the situation and controlled the large army.
Gudora landed on the ground and caused a crystal spike to jut out with force, shooting him straight to the City Lord Estate. He landed on the estate's garden and looked around solemnly at the dead ground bereft of life, "This is Hanya's Sludge Explosion Skill. Was she cornered enough to use this?"
He hurriedly rushed in the direction where waves of Prana were emanating from, arriving at a large crater filled with hundreds of mini craters, "No…NO!"
He stared at Hanya's corpse whose head had been rendered into floor graffiti, 'Don't lose your cool. She's only lost one life…'
His thoughts came to a halt upon seeing a second corpse of Hanya that was lodged with enough Prana Bomb spears to resemble a porcupine. A bad feeling welled up in his heart as he rushed forward, skidding on the sludgy ground and ended up colliding into a wall.
The wall shattered and revealed Hanya's third corpse, one that had been cleanly decapitated. By this point, despair set in him as his body wobbled forward, slowly walking towards the last location generating Prana waves.
There, slumped on the wall, lacking a head was her last corpse, withered, sucked out of all its Prana and Lifeforce. Strewn on her lap and the ground beside was her brain matter, an absolutely brutal final death. "Hanya…"
He collapsed to the ground and teared up, "How…why?"
"How did this happen?" He extended his hand and gently touched her shoulder, erupting in rage when her body slid into a nearby crater and crumbled, "Inala!"
"WHEREVER YOU ARE, I'LL BUTCHER YOU!" Blood dripped out of his eyes in anger and he bellowed like a crazy beast, "Arghhh!"
Prana billowed out of him in fury, causing sonic booms as waves of vapour cones were generated everywhere, levelling the region. He wanted to do nothing else but slaughter the cause behind his dear wife's death.
"Idiot!" There was a sudden shout from behind him, causing him to turn around and unleash his attack. He stopped upon seeing a puppet head, unrealistic, made with crude workmanship. It opened its mouth as Inala's voice resounded, "It's good and all that you're unleashing your anger, but don't you realise the situation?"
"By now, I would have crossed the Sandy-Grey Void ring. So, finding me is impossible. Rather, sensing the strength displayed by your raging eruption, the Centingers will rush here, happy to accept the challenge." The mouth moved up and down, laughing, "You'll have to face more Centingers than you had expected, because of your mistake. So, have fun dying."
The puppet stared at Gudora, dead in the eyes, "Yes, it was your mistake antagonising me. And now,"
"You pay the price."
