Rise of The Demon General

Chapter 664: Chapter 664. The Alpha and Beta Puppets

When Shou Zou entered the battle, the Royal Puppet Army was forced to focus its attention on him even when he was just one person. Its collective analysis concluded that the Kazhan King was more dangerous than his army. This relieved a lot of pressure from the Kazhan Army, allowing them to somewhat contend against Echos’ soldiers, the tribal warriors, and the human puppets.

Shou Zou’s stone axe swung left and right unceasingly. The axe seemed like a primitive weapon crafted from the most rudimentary material, but its words of power were complex. Its grade was low-tier runic.

Among his many slashes, a few conjured sharp winds. These winds blew in a large area and were sharp enough to cut the battle puppets’ hard bodies. This was his axe’s power. It could unleash attacks using one of the infernal elements. The winds were invisible. They were also undetectable by Faxien Radars, which detected movements. This made the wind attacks practically undodgeable.

”Hehe, you people think you can seize my kingdom with numbers and tactics? I will make you all understand there is something or someone that is insurmountable, no matter your efforts!!”

Shou Zou combined his arcane art into his axe’s power. A stream of water materialized and merged with the winds generated by his axe swing. The water removed the wind’s invisibility advantage, but increased the area the attack encompassed.

One couldn’t perform elemental support between the divine and infernal elements, so the wind and water didn’t merge perfectly. Even so, their combined power was enough to boost the destruction they caused. The water crushed, and the winds cut. When the water and wind subsided, a wide area around Shou Zou was empty. All the battle puppets lay on the ground in broken pieces.

Shou Zou noticed a shadow loomed over him. He looked up and saw an enormous battle puppet in the shape of a centipede. This centipede was descending toward him.

”Oh? What’s this?” Shou Zou asked amusingly.

He crouched, and the ground under him exploded. He vanished and appeared above the centipede with his stone axe lifted high.

”A centipede’s place is in the ground!” He bellowed before bringing his axe down.

The stone axe hit an invisible barrier produced by the words of power along the body of the centipede. The barrier held, but only for a second. It dimmed before shattering with a loud crashing sound. The axe proceeded downward and bit into the centipede’s body. The struck part exploded into tiny fragments.

The centipede didn’t stop moving despite being split into two. It ejected the broken segment. After that, all other segments detached and became smaller flying units that spun with propeller blades. These units assaulted Shou Zou from different directions.

”Haha, interesting! I didn’t know that Echos had such a fancy plaything.” Shou Zou threw his axe. A stream of water snatched the axe mid-air. The water carried the axe and whirled it around him at high speed. All the centipede segments that approached were struck before they could reach him. Each strike turned a segment into scraps.

”Hm...?” Shou Zou moved his hand and caught a tiny knife that was heading for his right eye.

He observed a suspiciously colored liquid at the tip of the knife. ”Poison?” He muttered. While he was surprised by someone trying to assassinate him using poison, he was more amazed by the fact that this knife managed to come so close to him, even when his axe was whirling around him at high speed. The thrower of this knife was an uncanny expert who could spot an open path and even accurately target his seemingly weak point.

He turned his gaze down. His Lord Sense quickly located the perpetrator. However, he didn’t see anyone down there. He remembered then about the invisible person responsible for summoning this puppet army out of thin air.

He forgot about this invisible person because he didn’t care. His Lord Sense identified the person’s cultivation level to be at the Intermediate Spirit Stage. A veil was shrouding the aura, which meant the person was using a concealment art, but this concealment art was not strong enough to fool the cultivation sense of a Lord Stage Cultivator.

”Hmph,” he harrumphed. The knife in his hand was ground to dust. He then waved his hand lightly. A pillar of water shot out and struck the spot where he sensed the invisible person.

When he was about to redirect his attention back to the centipede, which only had half its segments still functional, he was stumped to learn that his Lord Sense informed him that the invisible person was still alive.

He gazed back down and saw that the invisible person was beside the hole in the ground caused by his pillar of water. He didn’t understand how this happened. Although his movement seemed light, the speed he injected into his pillar of water was not one a normal Intermediate Spirit Stage cultivator could dodge.

The invisible person revealed himself then. The person was an imposing, bald man with black eyes. In his hand was a talisman that soon turned into dust.

This bald man made a gesture, and Shou Zou noticed that the centipede puppet, or what’s left of it, stopped assaulting him and moved away. Most of the battle puppets did the same. They returned their attention to Kazhan’s army near the capital wall and only left a garrison standing around the bald man.

Shou Zou didn’t want the puppet army returning to bully his army, but he couldn’t ignore his curiosity about the bald man. He spoke to this man while descending slowly.

”I don’t know who you are, so I assume you are with the Echos Army that is helping those rebels. You have earned the right to let me know your name before I give you proper punishment. Go ahead and enlighten me.”

”My name is Amon,” Amon replied.

”Amon? Ah... You are General Amon, the commander of the Echos Army. I have heard your name in a report, but I didn’t pay attention. I don’t make it a habit to trouble myself with the small stuff.”

Amon grinned. He wasn’t offended by Shou Zou calling him small stuff. In Shou Zou’s perspective, he was indeed one, but he would soon force the Kazhan King to change his perspective.

A large talisman appeared in Amon’s hand, which was hidden behind his back. The talisman started glowing as Amon began its activation process.

Shou Zou didn’t see what Amon did behind his back, but he could sense it. He frowned. He didn’t believe anything Amon did would trouble him, but the aura he sensed from Amon’s back was weird. He thought Amon must be hiding a tool or a talisman. Yet, it was unlike anything he had sensed before.

He decided to be prudent. He threw his axe forward. The axe spun at high speed, creating a tempest of sharp winds as it headed toward Amon.

When the axe approached, the battle puppets around Amon acted. They flew above Amon and crowded in the axe’s path. The axe sliced through them. The battle puppets were like going into a meat grinder. They were disassembled into small parts with terrible crunching sounds as they refused to move away.

Shou Zou sneered. No matter how many of these battle puppets were standing in the way, they wouldn’t be able to block his axe.

Just as that thought crossed his mind, he heard a loud sound of his axe hitting something hard. He then watched in astonishment as his axe flew out of the mound of puppets. His axe didn’t fly back because he willed it to. It did because of a recoil.

A stream of water picked up the axe and delivered it back into Shou Zou’s hand.

When the axe was back in his hand, he saw what had caused his axe to recoil. The mound of puppets parted. In its place were two large battle puppets. One had shells dominated by red color, and the other by blue. They were unlike the other puppets. He couldn’t sense these two puppets’ power, but the fact that they could repel his axe meant that they should be at least high-tier runic grade.

These were the two battle puppets Amon had Zhong Yuan complete before he departed from Khode.

The red puppet was recycled from the damaged Alpha Puppet. Amon gave this red puppet the same name as its predecessor. Unlike when Zhong Yuan first built the Alpha Puppet, he had access to better resources and better facilities since they had occupied Dabao City. The new Alpha Puppet was better. It also had additional weapons. It still had a Morningstar for its right fist, but its left one was replaced with a chainsaw sword.

The blue puppet was the one that had repelled the axe. It had energy shields in both hands. A thin layer of barrier constantly covered its body. Amon named this blue puppet the Beta Puppet. While the Alpha Puppet had offensive weapons, this Beta Puppet prioritized defense. He figured that with each focused on one field, they could generate enough power to wound or block the attacks of an Intermediate Lord Stage.

Shou Zou snickered. ”You think you have a chance against me with these two junks?”

”No, they serve as supports,” Amon said. He revealed the large talisman hidden behind him. The activation was completed. ”This will be your opponent.”

The talisman flashed with blinding light. As it did, a gargantuan mountain emerged from the ground.