As the warships carried the Celestials' army onto the shores of the Eastern River on the Desolates' territory, the ground was still soaked in water and littered with Desolate corpses.
Even Warriors who wielded Totems couldn't fight against a natural disaster. As the tsunami crashed down on them, the immense water pressure instantly killed a majority of the Desolates, only a few who had unique Totems managed to survive.
Since the Eastern River Fortress was meant to be a faux display, all the troops stationed here were just for show. Although there was a Grand Shaman here to help defend, he was still helpless against the attack of the Celestial race as a whole.
Still wrapped in bandages, Killer J took a stroll while carrying a severed head with a shocked expression. This was the Grand Shaman sent here to help defend the fortress, one of very few individuals in this world who had completely fused their Inward Aspect with Outward Aspect to obtain relatively high combat prowess.
Due to their own natural shortcomings, the Celestials found it extremely difficult to release their [Origins]. Even though they could depict their own Totems and bypass the Totem's natural limit to be stronger compared to the Desolates, they couldn't fuse their Inward and Outward aspects.
In other words, the Celestials didn't have even a single Grand Shaman, and their technology hadn't reached a level that could make up for this difference, so the Celestials were severely lacking when it came to combat power at the highest level.
During many of their skirmishes, while the Celestials had been able to completely crush the Desolates with an overwhelming difference in personal strength and advanced technology, all it took was a Grand Shaman, or someone close to becoming a Grand Shaman to turn the entire situation around.
This was one of the reasons why the two races had been able to remain in a tug of war for so long.
Of course, the other reason was the [Protagonist] Meng Luo. While he fell for Negary's ploy and had a part of his [Protagonist Aura] stripped away by The Unreachable Gate, and a part of his luck was slowly pouring towards Yun Yi, most of the [Protagonist Aura] remained with him.
Unless Negary or Noah's trio personally plotted or participated in a battle against him, he would generally be the winner.
Naturally, it wasn't as if the Celestials had zero high-tier combat strength. Noah, Killer J, and Lan Shan were all slowly manifesting their Pathways, all of them had strength that surpassed that of a Grand Shaman; but to train the Celestials, they would not personally act most of the time. Additionally, the one who acted the most among them, Killer J, was usually more of a liability rather than support.
Other than them, there were also some people from the Impure Hermit Order. However, they were still outsiders who entered this world through the [Origin] Transmigration method; all of them had already signed covenants with the world spirit that prevented them from interfering with this conflict unless they wanted the situation to worsen.
This meant that under normal circumstances, these Desolate Grand Shamans could do anything and everything without being punished. They were worshipped by the Desolates like idols of power, and they were indeed capable of exerting their fused Totem to defeat a large number of Celestials in one fell sweep and pronounce the Celestials' technology to be dishonest reliance on outside objects.
However, when this Grand Shaman wanted to exert his power and make an entrance like always against Noah's Divine Word, thus forcefully taking on the full brunt of the Eastern River's water, he was stabbed by Killer J's nearby hostility blade and swiftly beheaded.
While Killer J was unreliable, liked to seek death, liked to mess everything up, he was still a bonafide assassin. When he perfectly grasped the opportunity to finish things in one strike while being stronger than the Grand Shaman, the other party didn't even get a chance to struggle.
…
"Has this Killer J not shown my strength for so long that you think I'm a Hello Kitty?"
Picking his nose, Killer J casually tossed the severed head in his hand away.
This so-called Grand Shaman was deluded by his own title of being the highest level of combat prowess, trying to tank Noah's Divine Word like that.
While he didn't want to admit it, Noah was indeed the one who had walked the furthest among the three of them, becoming the closest existence to Negary.
Him being the perfect Righteous wasn't just a title, so when the Grand Shaman wanted to forcefully endure the power of Divine Word, he easily showed an opening, otherwise, he might have been able to struggle somewhat.
As Noah approached, his power began to exert itself and caused everything around him to change following his will.
As the sustainer of Negary's Pathway, as long as something was under Negary's domination, he could easily take control of it. His will was also the wish of his God, his words were the orders of his God, and he himself was an entity that existed with his God.
After obtaining the World Tree, Noah had gradually gotten a clearer picture of his own Pathway. Once Negary had taken his Divine Throne and manifested his Pathway, Noah would most likely be able to manifest his own Pathway very quickly as well.
The geography of the entire Eastern River Fortress was being modified following Noah's will. The Eastern River water rapidly receded, the water-logged muddy land quickly revealed a solid dry path for the Celestials army to swiftly disembark. Various robots began their rapid construction to turn this place into a supply station.
"All troops forward, let us show the Desolates the power of a more advanced civilization"
…
During small skirmishes, individual power was indeed more important, and it was a fact that the Desolates had greater combat prowess compared to the Celestials at the highest level, but the Celestials far surpassed the Desolates when it came to the middle and lower level of combat prowess.
Following Noah's orders, a large number of Celestials' weapons of war were mobilized, which moved rapidly across the land. Fighter jets also began to take off one by one, carrying their explosive loads deep into the Desolates' territory.
Armored vehicles and snake-like mechanical armors swiftly followed the fighter jets into the distance. Technology was meant to be replicated, one of its main strengths was the fact that as long as there were enough resources, any of them could be mass-produced.
…
Within the Desolates' territory, inferior Desolates who were not fit for combat were all doing hard labor to create and supply resources. Compared to Warriors, they were considered an inferior race that even paled in comparison to the Celestials, and if they couldn't even do such menial tasks, they would be demoted to slaves, targets that could be killed without question.
Warriors were the upper class who didn't need to care about production or daily resources, all they needed to do was hone their combat skills.
The difference between the social classes was terrifying, causing inferior Desolates to want to become Warriors at all cost, which ended up with there being more people waiting for resources compared to those who produced resources, and the majority exploiting the minority.
It could be said that the Desolate race had begun to become abnormal under the control of the Desolate Spirit to rapidly grow. If this wasn't a unique situation in a time of war with plenty of resources to maintain the Warriors class thanks to the Desolate Spirit's authority, the social structure of the Desolates would have already undergone an internal revolution.
As a sharp howling noise reverberated, the inferior Desolates who were focused on production didn't even have the courage to look up. After the authority was taken away by Negary, the amount of resources within the Desolates' territory had slowly decreased to a normal level. If these inferior Desolates didn't focus everything they had into production, then many Warriors might not even have a meal to eat.
At least they had a basic level of rights as an inferior Desolate, while slaves had nothing like that at all and would be coerced to work at production through threats of death.
It could be predicted that even if the Desolates managed to win this war, their civilization would devolve instead of evolving. There would also be plenty of chaos within their internal structure due to the fact that many Warriors who enjoyed privileged treatment would now be forced to also participate in production work.
After victory in war, not only would they not gain any privileges, but their existing privileges would also be revoked. That would be a fuse that was just waiting to blow.
Of course, they would have to actually win first before this needed to be considered, and from how things currently seemed, their chances of that were slim.
The howling projectiles bloomed as flowers of fire and explosions, followed by a large number of attacking Celestial soldiers. Victory against Desolates who was on the receiving end of an airstrike was exceptionally easy.
