Under the guidance of Lin En’s spiritual power, the earth began to writhe and deform in a way that defied the laws of nature.
The ground did not violently rise or collapse, but across a vast area, it created countless winding, deep ravines and towering earth mounds in an insurmountable manner.
These ravines and mounds crisscrossed, like the palm lines of a giant, forcibly dividing the once open charge zone into dozens of narrow, crowded, and visually limited corridors.
“He’s… commanding the earth?”
A young guard shouted in disbelief.
“No!”
Master Elaine refuted excitedly.
“This is Legion-level Earth Magic. How is this possible? He’s casting it alone.”
Fiona ignored their argument. In her eyes, only pure tactical shock remained.
“A trap… no, it’s a massive fortification! He turned the entire battlefield into a fortress tailored for us!”
He restricted the enemy’s numerical advantage, forcing them into a slaughterhouse we created!
The torrent of the Beast Tide crashed headlong into this giant Maze.
The massive forces were forcibly split by the terrain, unable to form an effective assault formation.
Countless beasts crowded and trampled each other in the narrow passages, resulting in countless deaths and injuries. The momentum of their charge was continuously depleted, and their formation was pulled apart and scattered.
The Beast Tide was consumed from within and successfully divided.
Fiona stared, eyes wide in amazement, murmuring to herself.
“This use of terrain has already surpassed tactics. This is strategic-level engineering! It’s changing the very rules of the battlefield!”
Then, Lin En’s gaze fell to the end of one of the corridors. This was his pre-selected first Trap Zone, a patch of soft ground rich in underground water.
When the largest, most terrifying Fungus-armored Bears, wild boars, and Long-tusked Elephants squeezed past their companions, roaring as they burst from the narrow passage, Lin En gently stomped his foot.
[Earth Magic – Earthquake Wave Liquefaction]!
In an instant, the solid ground turned into a muddy swamp.
These heavy, tank-like beasts plunged headlong into the mire the moment they charged out, their massive bodies perfectly blocking the corridor’s exit and becoming indestructible living barricades.
“Success!”
A young guard shouted excitedly.
Hundreds of enormous Fungus-armored Bears and Long-tusked Elephants—behemoths like moving fortresses—charged into this hopeless marsh driven by inertia.
At this moment, their tons of weight became the heaviest shackles.
Giant paws sank deep into the mud, and the more they struggled, the faster they sank.
They roared in anger and helplessness, their colossal bodies clogging the main assault corridor like a dam of flesh and wailing.
But the true nightmare came from behind them.
The second and third waves of the Beast Tide’s main force had already burst out of the Maze, slamming into the backs and haunches of the trapped giants.
The sharp sounds of bones breaking, muscles tearing, and anguished howls mingled, making one’s scalp tingle.
Some of the smaller beasts were crushed into pulp on the spot, their blood and viscera instantly staining the swamp’s edge.
Yet, this was not the end—but the beginning of chaos.
The trapped giants howled in pain, the beasts behind screamed, and further back, the Beast Tide continued to surge forward.
Unable to advance, unable to retreat, the sharpest tip of the assault formation was plunged into paralysis and mutual slaughter.
“My god…”
Fiona’s voice carried a trace of disbelief.
She swallowed with difficulty, her gaze shifting to the chaotic, bloody, and wailing Slaughter Dam, and then to the distant black-robed figure still standing calmly.
He made this unstoppable Beast Tide fall into self-slaughter and self-consumption!
Soon, their overwhelming joy was quickly replaced by new fear.
“Master Lynn!”
Barret shouted anxiously.
“Those heavy beasts are trapped! But those wolves and feline monsters are too agile! They’re… they’re using the big ones as stepping stones!”
Just as he said, in the muddy main battlefield, countless smaller, more agile figures appeared.
They were the assassins and light cavalry of the Beast Tide.
They moved without hindrance—either darting at high speed through unaffected narrow passages or leaping nimbly from the broad backs of Fungus-armored Bears and the exposed heads of Long-tusked Elephants, using the sunken giants as springboards to rush madly toward the Ridge Line Defense!
“Look, Fiona,”
Master Elaine’s voice was filled with a sense of enlightenment and excitement.
“This is battlefield segmentation—the beast horde has been split.”
At this point, the battlefield was thoroughly divided into four parts:
The main army blocked outside the Maze.
Beast Tide forces trapped in the Maze corridors, caught between advancing and retreating.
Heavy Units trapped by liquefied ground.
And a few agile Vanguards who broke through other passages, charging toward Lin En.
Fiona froze, staring blankly at Lin En.
In the face of Barret’s warning, the man’s face showed no surprise—not even a ripple.
He merely watched coldly, as if waiting for all the actors to stand on their prearranged stage positions.
Tens of thousands of Dewolves and Mycoclaws Cheetahs formed a gray lightning bolt, surging out from a wide basin exit, charging straight ahead!
[Thermobaric Art]!
Boom—
After a dull explosion, fire clouds swelled, sucking out the oxygen.
High heat and overpressure cleared the field in an instant.
Those speed-based predators didn’t even have time to scream; they were carbonized in the extreme heat.
Within the shockwave’s ring, oxygen was instantly evacuated, forming a massive, fleeting vacuum.
All magical beasts that rushed into the area had the air ripped from their lungs, the fluids in their bodies boiling under low pressure. They didn’t even have time to cry out before their bodies exploded and disintegrated from the inside out.
This was a wide-area, absolute Death Domain.
“Cough… cough!”
Everyone retreated, driven back by the suffocating pressure and heat, their faces filled with horror.
“What kind of Fire Magic is this?!”
Master Elaine grabbed his beard, nearly pulling it out.
“No incantation! No sign of fire elements gathering! He—he ignited the air itself?!”
Ella, coughing, frantically scribbled in her notebook with trembling hands.
“A new, area-killing spell based on air itself… Naming suggestion: Lynn’s Sigh. Features: efficient, deadly, incomprehensible.”
“So… so powerful…”
Awe was written all over Barret’s face.
He was about to say “again,” but Master Elaine held him back.
“No!”
The scholar’s eyes were filled with urgency and dread.
“Look at that area! He can’t cast there consecutively!”
Everyone stared.
Within the emptied circular zone, the air was like stagnant dead water, even the light twisted bizarrely.
“The fatal flaw of this air-ignition magic!”
Elaine explained rapidly.
“It consumes all the air in the target area as fuel! That place is now a Suffocation Zone; a second spell can’t detonate! If the Beast Tide just charges through—”
Before he finished, Lin En gave his answer with actions.
He knew the weaknesses of Thermobaric Art when facing massive enemy forces.
For a physicist with modern hot-war thinking, weapon cooldown and ammunition limits are core parameters to consider.
He snapped his fingers at the center of the Death vacuum zone.
“Do you think vacuum is a weakness?”
His voice echoed overhead.
“No. Vacuum is the best stage.”
“[Storm Meat Grinder]!”
The moment his words fell, at the center of the Suffocation Zone, a cyclone was born out of thin air!
The vortex did not expand outward—it sucked madly inward!
The pressure difference between the Suffocation Zone and the outside air created terrifying force, fueling the wildest storm!
In an instant, a massive tornado shot up, like a giant drill connecting heaven and earth.
It crazily devoured and sucked in fresh, oxygen-rich air from the surrounding areas, instantly resolving the Suffocation Zone’s negative effects and perfectly preparing the battlefield for the next round of [Thermobaric Art]!
But that was only its first function.
The true terror of this magic, named “Meat Grinder,” lay in its second effect—destruction.
As the tornado spun at high speed, it swept up everything from the ground!
The debris left by the Thermobaric explosion, shattered magical beast bones, sharp splintered wood—all of it was sucked into the storm, turning into billions of rapidly spinning blades!
It was no longer a tornado—it was a true [Meat Grinder] connecting heaven and earth!
It moved rapidly across the battlefield, and wherever it passed, sand flew, and flesh and blood splattered.
Magical beasts that tried to charge forward were swept up, and in seconds, shredded into a bloody mist by countless fragments.
Tough carapaces were shattered inch by inch by flying rocks, and sharp bone shards cut through flesh like scalpels.
For the first time on the battlefield, cries of terror and retreat rang out.
Facing this ever-moving, shrieking tornado of death, even the wildest magical beasts felt primal fear.
Fiona stared blankly at it all, feeling her understanding of war being utterly crushed and reshaped.
“Master Elaine… is he using a storm… to ventilate for the next explosion?”
Her voice was dry.
“At the same time, this ventilation process continues to slaughter the enemy…”
Master Elaine closed his eyes and let out a long sigh, as if all his strength had left him.
“This isn’t tactics… it’s… a system.”
“Using that terrifying Fire Magic as a furnace, burning all things. Using the [Storm Meat Grinder] as bellows, reigniting the flames and slaughtering the enemy in the process.”
“And those magical beasts…”
He opened his eyes, now filled with boundless awe.
“They are like red-hot iron, repeatedly hammered on an anvil, refined until nothing remains.”
He paused, then added the final words.
“Until they are reduced to nothing.”
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