The City of Terror
chapter-436

 Wei Xiao Bei felt like the Dark Priest was somewhat similar to himself. The only difference between the two of them was that the Dark Priest used dirt to create the Gargoyles, while he used some flesh for his creations.

 Speaking of which, there was dirt right beneath this grey ash. Why did these Gargoyles need to be made with dirt transported from a distant location?

 Could it be that there were special requirements for the dirt used to make these Gargoyles?

 Furthermore, why did the Black Church come here? Weren’t there several hills near the county?

 Of course, this might have been because the Dark Priest had been beaten by the Shing Wong Temple and expelled from the place. The Dark Priest could be hiding here for his safety while accumulating his strength for future retaliation.

Wei Xiao Bei didn’t know this, but his random guesses had hit the nail on the head.

As time passed, more and more Gargoyles started circling in the skies. Together with the Gargoyles that were first here, there were more than six hundred of them in total.

These Gargoyles flew into the distance, most probably to haul dirt.

Upon seeing this, he ordered the High-Temperature Birds to investigate the path of the Gargoyles while also hunting down any that strayed from the group.

However, the investigation process wasn’t very successful. The birds were not very intelligent to begin with and could not hide as well as Wei Xiao Bei could. They very quickly ran into a few Gargoyles.

After a bit of fighting, the Gargoyles were exterminated but most of the High-Temperature Birds had been injured as well.

This was inevitable. The Gargoyles were somewhat of a counter to the birds anyway. Moreover, they were 2-Star Terror Creatures, making them more powerful than the High-Temperature Birds. The fact that the birds could deal with three Gargoyles and suffer zero casualties could already be considered excellent performance.

Now, Wei Xiao Bei had no choice but to retreat several hundred meters away and recall the birds.

The High-Temperature Birds returned very quickly. They landed on the ground, feathers in a mess, bodies covered in blood as if they were defeated soldiers scrambling away from a battle.

Wei Xiao Bei extended his left hand and a cluster of flesh strands spilled forth, enveloping one of the birds. Some flesh was then transferred into the body of the bird through these strands.

The wounds of the bird healed at a rapid pace, visible to the naked eye.

The treatment of the fifty High-Temperature birds didn’t take long, but it did consume quite a lot of flesh.

Then, Wei Xiao Bei commanded the birds to intercept and hunt down more Gargoyles. He decided to wait here.

This time, the High-Temperature Birds performed much better, returning after hunting down four of the Gargoyles. However, by the third time they returned, they had already lost three of their members.

Wei Xiao Bei could faintly sense the combat techniques of the High-Temperature Birds improve as they continued to fight. Moreover, the High-Temperature Birds he recreated had inherited these combat techniques upon birth.

There was no doubt about it. These changes had to do with the Fledgling Life Altar.

After several hunts and reaping over a thousand evolution points for Xiao Wei Bei, the birds appeared to have attracted the attention of the Dark Priest.

Soon, hundreds of Gargoyles lunged forward along the path where their brethren had been intercepted and ambushed. Wei Xiao Bei was terrified and quickly dug a ditch to hide himself in. Meanwhile, the birds had no other option but to scatter and flee with all they had.

This was something that couldn’t be helped either. The High-Temperature Birds could deal with a few Gargoyles when they attacked in a pack. However, if the numbers of the Gargoyles were ever more than five or six, the casualty rate of the birds would skyrocket. If there were more than ten Gargoyles in a group, the birds would be sending themselves to their deaths, regardless of how exceptional their combat technique was.

The birds’ attempts to flee didn’t seem to be effective at all. The Gargoyles were not slower than the High-Temperature Birds and even worse, they were incredibly stubborn and persistent in their pursuit.

Wei Xiao Bei, still lying in his ditch, could feel strand after strand of spiritual links snapping instantly. Every link that broke off meant the death of another High-Temperature Bird.

In the end, Wei Xiao Bei poked his head out from the ditch with a bitter expression on his face. He looked at the Black Church. All of the spiritual links had been severed as all the High-Temperature Birds had died.

This truly frustrated Wei Xiao Bei.

Seeing that the Black Church was not paying attention to his location, Wei Xiao Bei started searching through his treasures to see if there was anything suitable to feed to the Fledgling Life Altar.

It didn’t matter whether it was for the sake of improving the Life Altar, or for treating Zhao Yun’s wounds. This Life Altar had to continue evolving.

Bai Ta Storage Bag, Divine White Mist Great Spear, Yong’s Plume, Damaged Sacred Beetle Ovary, Woodman Hearts, Monster Tree Roots, Ordinary Storage Bag, Ming Lun Envoy’s Proof, Hard Metal Jian, Lesser Spring Water of Youth, Stegosaurus’ Plates, Tyrannosaurus Rex’s Teeth, The Extremely Broken Dust World Stone, Fiendish Man Fish, Scarlet Pheasant Feathers, Thousand Eyed Devil Tentacles, Tentacles Sauteed in Reed and Pickles, Core of the Thousand Eyed Devil, Eye of Desire, Eye of Terror, Eye of Slaughter, Black Beetle, Fried Tentacles, Bi Fang’s Heart Blood, Bi Fang’s Blood, Plague of Misfortune Powder…..

Good stuff. You have no idea what you have before you clean up your things. Xiao Bei realized that he had plenty of possessions after he dug through all of it.

Naturally, things like the Bai Ta Storage Bag, the Divine White Mist Spear and the Hard Metal Jian couldn’t be fed to the Life Altar, even if it seemed particularly interested in these things.

After some organizing, Wei Xiao Bei took out the items one by one and shook them on his left hand to see if the Fledging Life Altar would devour it.

Yong’s Plume, weak devouring force.

It made sense. This item’s value wasn’t high to begin with.

Two Woodman Hearts, ordinary devouring force. Wei Xiao Bei immediately returned the hearts to the storage bag. He didn’t need them anymore, but it was still a decent reward for his subordinates.

Lesser Spring Water of Youth, intense reaction! Wei Xiao Bei decided to stop it there. The Lesser Spring Water of Youth was a fairly valuable item. If possible, he didn’t want to feed it to the Fledgling Life Altar.

Meanwhile, things like the Fiending Man Fish and the Thousand Eyed Devil’s Tentacles were all pretty useless and could only serve as materials to replenish the Altar’s flesh reserves. Feeding it to the Altar would be more of a waste.

…

In all honesty, the item that provoked the greatest reaction from the Altar was the Dust World Stone, the Core of the Thousand Eyed Devil and Bi Fang’s Heart Blood. On the other hand, the Altar even expressed sentiments of disgust when Xiao Bei presented it with the Plague of Misfortune Powder.

Meanwhile, the three eye crystals, Eye of Desire, Terror, and Slaughter along with the Damaged Sacred Beetle Ovary caused the Altar to have a relatively strange reaction. It was almost as if it both wanted to eat the items and not do so at the same time.

The Dust World Stone was undoubtedly the most valuable item and the one with the strongest reaction. Meanwhile, though Bi Fang’s Heart Blood wasn’t as valuable as the Devil’s Core, Wei Xiao Bei intended to use it to improve his [Flame Resistance] ability. As such, he had to keep it to himself.

In the end, Wei Xiao Bei placed an Eye of Desire into the gap on his palm. Still, he could always feed the Altar with the Thousand Eyed Devil’s Core.

After all, though the core’s illusion abilities were decent, they had far too many limitations. Most of Wei Xiao Bei’s current enemies would not fall prey to the core’s illusory effects.

Not the Flying Divine Monster Spear nor the Black Church.

The Eye of Desire was instantly dragged into the crack and the speed of its digestion exceeded even Wei Xiao Bei’s imagination. It was almost as if it vanished the instant it disappeared down the crack. The Fledgling Life Altar promptly sent more requests for food.

Wei Xiao Bei didn’t hesitate either. He quickly took out several Eyes of Desire and stuffed them into the crack on his palm.

Apart from the twenty Eyes of Desire that he reserved to be rewarded to his subordinates in the future, the remaining 180 Eyes of Desire were all devoured by the Life Altar in less than thirty minutes. However, even this feast didn’t seem to satisfy it.

With that being the case, Wei Xiao Bei took out the Eyes of Terror and put them into the crack.

He kept only ten Eyes of Terror and fed the rest to the Altar.

There were only eight Eyes of Slaughter to begin with, which made Wei Xiao Bei reluctant to use any more of them. Instead, he grits his teeth and stuffed the Thousand Eyed Devil’s core into the crack on his palm.

Compared to those eye crystals, the digestion of the core took much longer. Moreover, the Fledgling Life Altar also indicated that it was satisfied, quickly falling into a deep slumber and not responding to any further stimuli.

Wei Xiao Bei had no idea when the Altar would awaken and chose to simply move toward the Black Church.

It was only when he got close that he realized that the place had turned into a battlefield in the hour he was absent.

A thousand Gargoyles formed a constantly moving circle with the Black Church at the center, fending off the attacks of hundreds of soldiers.

Xiao Bei took a good look at the enemies and realized that the soldiers were subordinates of Shing Wong Temple. The Shing Wong’s Border Patroller held a red longsword in his hand, which radiated a red light that engulfed the troops.

Supposedly, these soldiers might have regressed tremendously upon leaving the territory of Shing Wong Temple. However, they remained courageous and mighty under the red light. Their power didn’t seem to have been reduced and they continued to fire arrows and spears at the Gargoyles without stop.

Even so, the Gargoyles held the flight advantage. They gathered in flocks, constantly assaulting the army from the flanks, tearing soldier after soldier into shreds.

Of course, the Gargoyles that dared to launch these assaults were very easily smashed to pieces as well.

Wei Xiao Bei shook his head after observing the battle for a while. Compared to the subordinates of Zhao Yun, these Shing Wong soldiers were far too weak.

The weakness he was referring to wasn’t just in terms of individual ability, but strategy, discipline, and many other factors as well.

If Zhao Yun’s soldiers were elites, then these Shing Wong troops were only at the level of a militia.

Of course, there were some fairly exceptional individuals amongst them as well. For example, that tall and muscular executioner led the prisoners under his charge to hunt down the Gargoyles, killing them with extreme ease.

However, from an overall perspective, the advantage was on the Black Church’s side.

The Black Priest was no longer on the plaza and plumes of black smoke were surging out of the Black Church. The Gargoyles became increasingly powerful within the radius of the black smoke. Even when half of their body had been smashed to pieces, they would be able to regenerate just by escaping into the smoke.