I, the prince in distress, send money

Chapter 559 The Final Moment, the Critical Moment
The Abyss Dragon felt the excruciating pain tearing at the base of its left wing and the burning, suffocating sensation in its neck. Looking down at the Bagnians below, who were like a swarm of boiling ants, showing no sign of retreating because of its injury but instead becoming even more frenzied, a strong, instinctive will to survive screamed wildly within it.

escape!
Get out of this damn place! These humans aren't prey, they're lunatics!

Its massive body twisted and turned with difficulty in the air, attempting to use a feint of a dive attack to turn around and escape the beach that had brought it shame and devastation.

With such a vast sky, what can these insects on the ground do to it as long as it keeps its distance?

However, the instant this thought arose, an even colder and more terrifying will, like an invisible shackle, suddenly gripped the core of its soul.

That was the command that the demon lord Grossag had imprinted deep into its consciousness before it even launched its attack.

"Suppress the beachhead, draw all fire, and create an opportunity for Safira and his men to act!"

Saphira, that insidious and powerful six-armed serpent demon, and its elite squad, should be taking advantage of the huge commotion created by the dragon and the main force, lurking in the shadows, infiltrating the blasphemous church that keeps spewing "mutated monsters".

If it were to escape now, causing Safira's operation to be exposed or fail... the mere thought of Lord Grossag's methods sent shivers down its spine.

That would be an eternal torment more painful than death.

Is it better to face the onslaught of these crazed ants before you, or to endure the lord's endless wrath afterward?

Faced with two evils, despair and violence intertwined in the burning pupils of the abyss dragon, ultimately culminating in a hysterical roar filled with endless grief and indignation.

It cannot leave.

With this desperate, do-or-die mentality, the Abyss Dragon abandoned the idea of ​​escape and, like a trapped beast in a desperate situation, launched an even more frantic, but also more chaotic, counterattack.

No longer caring about its injuries, it flapped its still-intact right wing violently, swept wildly with its claws and tail, and even tried to gather dragon breath again, even if it would worsen the wound on its neck.

This desperate, frantic struggle did indeed cause greater casualties among players, but it also hastened its own demise.

Players keenly sensed its weakness and agitation, and their attacks became even more unrestrained.

Finally, under a barrage of near-face-to-face shotgun fire from several armed merchant ships, and a suicide ramming attack launched simultaneously by more than a dozen flying players carrying explosive charges, the already severely damaged left wing of the Abyss Dragon was completely blown off.

Losing the balance of half a wing, this massive war beast let out a final, unwilling cry. Like a collapsing mountain, it crashed onto the edge of the beachhead, scattering blood and shattered scales everywhere, crushing the last section of the intact defensive wall and stirring up towering dust and tremors.

The abyssal dragon has fallen.

"We won! We slayed the dragon!!"

"Materials! Quick, grab the materials!!"

"I want the Dragon Heart, and nobody can take it from me!"

A deafening cheer erupted from the player camp. Almost all the players still fighting were swept up in ecstasy, their eyes fixed intently on the massive corpse of the fallen dragon, as if they had discovered a priceless treasure.

It is indeed a treasure beyond compare. Players don't know if the materials on the dragon corpse can be used to make any magical equipment, but the experiments on the demons have convinced them that resurrection using dragon materials can definitely turn a character into a dragonborn.

However, just as the clamor of victory reached its climax...

Changes occur suddenly.

Behind the Church of the Mechanicus, in a shadow that was violently churning from the fall of the dragon, several figures emanating powerful fel energy suddenly appeared like ghosts.

The leader was none other than Saphira, a six-armed serpent demon nearly three meters tall with six arms, each wielding a different enchanted weapon.

Its feminine upper body was alluring yet ferocious, while its lower body's snake tail moved with lightning speed, and its six eyes gleamed with a cold and cunning light.

Behind it followed several high-ranking demons of various shapes, all exuding a terrifying aura, as well as a group of elite mid-ranking demon guards.

They had clearly been lurking here all along, concealing their form and presence with some kind of powerful shadow magic, just waiting for the moment when the dragon would create chaos and attract all attention.

"For Lord Grossag, destroy that blasphemous church that creates monsters!"

Safira let out a hoarse shriek, and all six of her weapons rose up at the same time.

This elite demon squad, like a drawn blade, seized the fatal gap when the players were relaxed due to their successful dragon slaying and their attention was drawn to the dragon's corpse, and rushed straight to the nearby Church of the Mechanicus.

"Enemy attack! The church! Their target is the respawn point..."

"Stop them!!!"

"Fire coverage, quick!"

Upon witnessing this scene, the players near the church roared in terror and anger, hastily turning their guns around. Flintlock bullets, stray rockets, and even hand axes thrown by the players rained down on the assault team.

However, it was too late, and the distance was too close.

Saphira and her high-ranking demon guards completely ignored the attacks from the flanks. They withstood the players' firepower, their bodies flashing with various magical shields and fel energy. Occasionally, a demon would be knocked down by the fierce firepower, but the core members, especially Saphira, had already rushed to the front of the church like an arrow released from a bow.

Safira's serpentine tail, covered in fine scales, suddenly sprang forward, and its body moved like a ghost towards the church door. Its two muscular arms had already swung the two-handed warhammer burning with green evil flames, aiming at the seemingly heavy steel structure door, ready to smash it down hard.

However, at this critical moment...

"crunch..."

The church door, scarred and charred from the ravages of war, was suddenly pushed open from the inside.

A warm smell, a mixture of sulfur, engine oil, and steam, wafted towards me.

Behind the door stood a team of players who had just completed their physical reconstruction and were eager to rush out to participate in the "Dragon-Slaying Feast" and seize materials. Their eyes were filled with a thirst for battle and their new bodies.

The two sides bumped into each other right there in the narrow doorway.

The players inside the gate stared at the ferocious six-armed serpent demon outside and the high-level demon behind it emanating a terrifying aura. The excitement on their faces instantly froze, turning into utter astonishment.

Safira outside the door was clearly not expected to be intercepted so at such a good time, but a cold surprise flashed in its six eyes, which was then replaced by an even stronger killing intent.

"Stop them, don't let them in!"

Inside the door, the fastest-reacting player roared, instinctively raising his flintlock shotgun and firing, igniting the battle.

Without any words or confrontation, the bloody battle erupted the moment they met.

"For the new materials!"

A player, who had just been resurrected with the flesh and blood of a berserker demon and was of a robust build, with red eyes, charged at the six-armed snake demon at the front like a raging bull, trying to push it out of the door.

Saphira's arm shot out with lightning speed, not to block, but to precisely grab the player's shoulder as he charged in, her sharp nails instantly digging into his flesh. Her other arm held an enchanted longsword that, like a viper's tongue, pierced directly through the player's chest.

The player didn't even have time to scream before falling backward.

"Get out of my way, monster!"

Another player, wielding a flintlock pistol with a fixed bayonet, stabbed it viciously at a bewitching demon beside Saphira.

The bewitching demon emitted a shrill scream that confuses the mind, causing the player to freeze in place before being cleaved in two by the battle axe of a giant bull demon nearby.

The porch instantly transformed into a high-speed, deadly meat grinder.

The newly resurrected players, fueled by sheer courage and unfamiliarity with their new abilities, desperately tried to halt the advance of the demon elites.

They blocked the doorway with their bodies, attacked wildly with weapons, and some seriously injured people even tried to grab the demon's legs to create an opportunity for their companions.

The flintlock muskets roared at close range, swords clashed with the demon's claws and bone blades, the players' roars intertwined with the demon's howls, and blood and severed limbs stained the church threshold.

However, the gap in strength is enormous.

These players, who had just been resurrected, were poorly equipped, and had not even fully adapted to their new bodies, were facing elite demons carefully selected by Grossag to carry out decapitation missions.

Safira is the best of the best. Its six arms seem to have independent wills, wielding different weapons to form a death zone. Any player who gets close is instantly torn to pieces.

Although the players' resistance was valiant, and they even managed to inflict damage on several mid-level demons with their reckless fighting style, their defenses melted away as quickly as ice and snow under the sun in the face of Saphira and the high-level demons' absolute power.

"Get out of my way, you ants!"

Saphira let out an impatient hiss, swinging her warhammer with one arm to smash a player away, while her other arm unleashed a shadow bolt that pierced another player who was trying to sneak up from the side, leaving a bowl-sized hole in his chest.

Then, with a sudden flick of its massive snake tail, it swept the last two players blocking the entrance away like rag dolls, sending them crashing heavily into the inner stone wall, their bones broken, clearly beyond saving.

The road leading into the church was forcibly opened.

But those few seconds that players gained at the cost of their lives were not meaningless.

The bullets fired hastily and the swords swung desperately did not all miss their mark. Several deep, bone-revealing wounds appeared on Safira's alluring upper body, from which dark purple blood gushed.

Behind it, a giant bull demon with its eyes gouged out roared in anger, while another tall succubus had half its shoulder shattered by a shotgun blast, making its movements noticeably slower.

This elite commando team had already paid a price and suffered injuries before storming the church.

Saphira paid no heed to its injuries. Its six eyes, burning with fel flames, stared greedily and cruelly into the depths of the church... at the steam engines that were roaring and constantly spewing steam, beating like hearts.

Just then, Safira saw one of the steam engines turn on and spit out a naked player, and it knew that this was what it was looking for.

The six-armed serpent demon let out a shriek of impending victory, and swam its tail first, crossing the threshold littered with player corpses, and rushed into the inner sanctum of the Mechanicus Church. The high-ranking demons behind it roared and followed closely behind.

Outside the church, there was revelry and chaos following the fall of the dragon.

Inside the church, the last barrier protecting the resurrection point has been breached, and the blade of blasphemy is aimed directly at the core.

The moment Saphira burst into the heart of the church, its blasphemous ecstasy and destructive desires reached their peak. The weapons on its six arms simultaneously glowed with terrifying fel energy, their targets aimed directly at the roaring "Holy Steam Resurrection Machines"!
"For the glory of Lord Grossag, turn to scrap metal!" it roared, warhammer, longsword, staff... all attacks were about to pour down.

"Damn it, how could demons appear here?!" "Fight them..."

Inside the church, the remaining mechanical priest players and a few players who had just resurrected and hadn't yet rushed out roared in anger.

They lunged at the demon with their bodies, using wrenches, steam pipes, and anything at hand to attack, trying to stop this final destruction.

The Scarecrow Bishop even activated some kind of emergency protocol, causing the church's large steam pipes to overload and spew out scorching white steam, temporarily obscuring the view and burning several demons that were rushing too fast.

But this final resistance was like a mantis trying to stop a chariot when faced with a well-prepared and powerful elite demon.

Ignoring the onrushing players and the scorching steam, Safira pinpointed the location of the core machine and wildly swung its six arms.

Boom, crack, hiss...

The entire church was filled with the ear-piercing sounds of metal tearing apart, explosions, and the shrill screams of leaking steam.

One resurrection machine was smashed and twisted by a warhammer, its engraved runes extinguished; another was cleaved in two by an enchanted longsword, its internal gears and pipes scattering everywhere; and yet another was struck by a fel ray, causing a small explosion that ignited green fel flames...

The core resurrection matrix suffered a devastating blow. The deep, powerful rumble that sustained the players' endless resurrections here, like the panting of a dying beast, quickly became intermittent and finally stopped abruptly after a violent tremor and a series of small explosions.

Only sporadic electrical sparks and leaking steam continued to hiss.

The church, the foundation of the players' beachhead, has fallen; the respawn point has been destroyed!
Almost at the same moment the lights went out and the roaring stopped inside the church, a glaring red warning popped up on the system interfaces of all players on the external battlefield.

+Warning: The small Mechanicus Church at the regional resurrection point is no longer functional. If you die in this area, your soul will return to your initial bound temple.
This news was like a bucket of ice water poured over their heads, instantly sobering all the players who were immersed in the euphoria of slaying the dragon.

"The respawn point... is gone!?"

"Holy crap! My house got burgled!!!"

"It's those demons who rushed in!"

Panic and extreme anger replaced the previous excitement. The players looked at the church, which no longer emitted steam and light, and then at the dragon's corpse, which was close at hand and gleaming with an alluring glow. A desperate madness was ignited within them.

"Damn it, the respawn point is gone, and I can't afford to lose these dragon materials!"

"Hold the line! Hold the position! Even if we die, we'll take them down with us!"

"Fight them to the death, grab whatever you can!"

The absence of a respawn point actually ignited the players' most extreme ferocity.

Instead of trying to reclaim the church, which was now a foregone conclusion, they poured all their madness and resentment into the last fortress they could still control... those armed merchant ships stranded on the beach like wounded beasts!
"Everyone, retreat to the ship! Use the ship as a fortress!"

"Keep the artillery firing! Bombard us!"

"Hold the line! Kill as many demons as you can. Killing one is enough, killing two is a huge bonus!"

The surviving players roared like beasts, abandoning some of the less fortified beachheads like the receding tide, and desperately retreated towards the stranded merchant ships that had not yet been completely taken over by the demons.

They rushed onto the deck along the makeshift wooden planks, ropes, and even waded through the water.

Each armed merchant ship that could still support a person quickly became a separate, desperate stronghold of resistance.

Players utilize the ship's height and relatively sturdy structure to defend from a superior position.

The gun deck became the last hope. The gunners, covered in blood, mechanically repeated the actions of loading, aiming, and firing.

The shells whistled as they crashed down on the demons surging in from all directions, creating brief gaps in the black tide.

The shotgun blast swept across at close range, tearing the demons that tried to climb the ship's hull to shreds.

The upper decks and ship's sides became bloody melee battlefields, where players used flintlock pistols, scimitars, axes, and even salvaged rudders and ropes to fight to the death against the demons who had managed to break through the barrage of fire and climb aboard.

Players were constantly being dragged off the ship by demons, or perishing in the sea with them, but others would immediately fill the gaps.

However, the number of players is visibly decreasing rapidly.

Every demonic charge means the permanent exit of several or even a dozen players.

The bodies of the fallen lay limply on the deck, in the sea, or torn apart by demons.

The defensive perimeter continued to shrink, and one armed merchant ship after another fell into silence as all the defenders were killed or the cannons were destroyed, completely overwhelmed by the demons.

"Ammunition! The artillery on the east flank is out of ammunition!"

"The western flank has been breached; reinforcements are needed!"

"Damn it, there are only three people left on my boat!"

Players fought from dawn until afternoon, their desperate cries echoing between the ships.

The roar of artillery became sparse, and the gunfire gradually weakened.

The demons, like an endless black tide, crashed against and eroded these last few isolated "reefs".

They climbed onto the hull, smashed through the hatches, and poured in through every possible gap.

The Shanghai Pirate King stood on the stern deck of the Steel Justice, his body covered in wounds, his finely crafted officer's sword nicked and chipped. He looked at his dwindling number of companions, at the distant, utterly silent church, and then at the horizon, a look of near despair appearing in his eyes for the first time.

"Could it be... that we're really going to all die here?"

Elven advisor Elunor stood beside the Pirate King, his body stained with the blood of demons and humans, holding a scarred longsword, looking utterly disheveled.

In this final battle, Eluneor did not flee, but joined the fight, using her swordsmanship and magic honed over many years to kill many demons.

"I'm sorry, friend, I've dragged you into this."

The Shanghai Pirate King looked at Elune with deep apology, but the latter shook his head without speaking. He then turned to look at the sea, a thoughtful expression on his face.

And just as these last few armed merchant ships were teetering on the brink of collapse, and the players' resistance was about to be utterly crushed...

boom! boom! boom! boom!
A deep, penetrating roar, unlike any other sound on the battlefield, came from the sea!
Immediately afterwards, countless black dots, accompanied by sharp whistles, like the scythe of death, ripped through the sky after dawn, crossed the beachhead, and somewhat inaccurately struck the rear of the densest wave of demons besieging the players' last line of defense.

The first shell landed with no spectacular explosion, only a dull, deafening thud.

It smashed the heavy shoulder armor of an abyss golem, burying half of its body in the sand, with shattered bone armor and rock-like flesh flying everywhere.

The cannonballs, still unabated in their momentum, bounced off the ground again, carving a bloody trench through the dense demon formation like bowling balls. Wherever they passed, berserker demons and lesser demons were crushed by an invisible force, instantly shattering into pieces.

Another shell struck the side of a stranded merchant ship that had already been partially taken over by demons. The thick planks were pierced through instantly as if they were made of paper, and a spray of blood mixed with wood chips, demon shells, and player limbs rose up inside the cabin. The shell exited from the other side and continued its destructive journey.

boom!
Another one crashed onto the beach, stirring up a cloud of dust. Although it did not directly hit the large group of demons, the terrifying shockwave and the flying stone fragments caused all the low-level demons within a dozen meters to stagger and have their internal organs ruptured.

The bombardment from the sea precisely struck the relatively dense rear and flanks of the demon attack echelon, greatly relieving the pressure on the last few armed merchant ships.

The demons' offensive became noticeably chaotic, and many demons looked back in terror at the massive fleet at sea.

"Reinforcements are coming! It's our fleet!"

"Hahaha, you damned demon, taste what we've got!"

"Good, keep going, blow them to bits!"

The ecstasy of escaping death instantly overwhelmed the remaining players. Ignoring their injuries, they cheered and jumped for joy on the deck, their morale soaring.

However, war is never merciful.

The trajectory of solid shot is not entirely controllable, especially when firing over such a long distance, and friendly fire is inevitable.

A shell that veered off course did not land among the demons, but instead slammed into the stern of the Sea Lion, another merchant ship that was still putting up resistance, not far in front of the Steel Justice.

The stern pavilion of the "Sea Lion" was smashed to pieces, with wood chips flying everywhere. Several players who were operating a small cannon and firing a musket there didn't even have time to scream before they were reduced to a cloud of blood mist and fragments along with their weapons.

The ship shook violently and began to slowly tilt.

The other shell flew over a sand dune and landed near a section of the defensive wall ruins that the players had previously abandoned, where dozens of players and demons were engaged in a final, brutal melee.

The shells fell indiscriminately, blasting both sides in the battle, along with the shattered fortifications, into the sky.

"Damn it, are you blind? Where are you shooting from?!"

"They're on our side! They've hit one of our own!"

"Damn it... this..."

The surviving players, seeing the carnage of their friendly ships and the sight of their comrades being accidentally wounded, began to curse.

The fleet on the sea was clearly aware of the problem of friendly fire, and the shelling began to become more layered and targeted, focusing on the demon remnants and gathering areas far from the player's last line of defense, attempting to isolate the battlefield with firepower.

The shells continued to fall, creating death and chaos among the demons, and also supporting the last crumbling line of defense for the remaining players.

Hope and death, amidst the roar of gunfire, intertwined to create an incomparably cruel symphony of war.

Elunor stared at the massive and unfamiliar fleet flag on the sea, a look of shock on his face. He turned to look at the Pirate King.

"Your fleet?"

"Yes... a regular army fleet."

(End of this chapter)