Chapter 376 I will take care of your wife and children, so you don’t have to worry (4k)
In the Thessalian camp, after watching Hera and Thetis leave, Loen quickly issued an alarm and ordered the existing forces in Thessaly to enter an emergency state of preparedness.
The entire city was like a clockwork machine, with humans, heroes, and gods all rushing to their respective posts and fulfilling their respective duties. An anxious and gloomy atmosphere permeated the city, and everywhere there was an oppressive feeling of impending storm.
After completing the basic dispatch, Loen walked out of the barracks, checked the preparation progress of various defense lines and posts, helped solve problems encountered on the road, and headed for the Great Temple in Thessaly.
Seeing the arrival of the legendary god of wine, the priests and divinities of Thessaly turned around and saluted Lorne devoutly.
Behind them, in the hall which had been temporarily expanded several times, in addition to the sculpture of Zeus, the king of gods, there were also statues of the other eleven Olympian gods and Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory.
Due to the restrictions of the three goddesses of fate, the status of the temple became extremely important.
This is not only the foundation for the gods to collect the power of faith, but also a weapon for them to anchor their own existence and amplify their own power when they walk in the mortal world.
Therefore, after the Alliance on Mount Areopagus, Thessaly, which had completely sided with Athens, urgently expanded the Great Temple, transforming the original single temple dedicated to Zeus into a large temple that also worshipped the twelve Olympian gods. Several gods who had made outstanding contributions to Thessaly were also moved in to be worshipped, so that they could exert their strongest combat effectiveness when they came to Thessaly.
I just don’t know if it was intentional or unintentional.
After some expansion and renovation, Zeus, who originally had the most conspicuous position and the most respected status in the temple, was squeezed to the innermost part.
Although His Majesty the Divine King still sat on his throne, supreme and powerful, the surroundings were dim and dark.
All the gods who participated in the Alliance at the Ares Mountain gathered around the leader, the god of wine Lorne, without exception, and bathed in the light.
Moreover, I don't know which genius in the architecture department came up with the design, but Loen's sculpture intentionally or unintentionally blocked half of the statue of Zeus, and happened to stand next to the Queen of Heaven Hera.
When Loen saw the inconspicuous olive branch crown on the base of the statue, his face darkened, and he immediately realized that this was probably the masterpiece of the students of the Academy of Athens.
Isn't this putting me on the spot? Without Chiron and the God of Medicine, there will be less homework at school, right?
"Master Dionysus, you are here? What do you want me to do for you?"
The elderly high priest interrupted Loen's inner complaints and stepped forward to ask.
Luo En came back to his senses and pondered solemnly.
"How is the dispatched team doing now?"
“Already on the way!”
The chief priest answered respectfully and ordered his subordinates to open the astrolabe that was placed in the center of the temple.
After a burst of flashes of light, large and small light spots like stars rose from the chaotic starry sky and moved towards Thessaly at different trajectories and speeds.
Loen glanced at the image on the star disk and nodded slightly.
In a quarter of an hour at most, Thessaly would be able to complete a full assembly.
I wish...
“Boom!”
Just as Loen was muttering to himself, a loud roar came from somewhere outside the city.
Wow, it comes so fast!
Loen frowned, pointed at the area marked by the star map, and asked the high priest beside him.
"Where?"
"The mountains of Thessaly!"
The chief priest quickly answered, and took out the record of the dispatch mission, adding in a deep voice.
"That seems to be the area patrolled by Queen Atalanta of Arcadia and the Amazons!"
When Loen heard this, his heart sank. He was about to ask for support, but when he caught a glimpse of two stars, one gold and one silver, on the star disk, rapidly approaching the mountains of Thessaly, his brows relaxed.
Are their siblings here too? Then there shouldn't be any problem.
~~
Meanwhile, the mountains of Thessaly.
“Puff, puff, puff!”
Atalanta ran and shot in the forest. Dozens of completely enraged monsters were pierced through the heart by sharp arrows and nailed to the ground.
However, not everyone in the team has the same skills as Atalanta.
An Arcadian soldier who was accompanying him was not paying attention, and a snake tail emerged from the shadows and wrapped around his ankle, dragging him out of the army. Several hungry monsters swarmed over with low roars, biting his limbs or tearing open his abdomen, surrounding the soldier who was not yet dead and having a brutal feast.
The bloody scene and the dying screams of the soldiers filled the patrollers with fear.
“Puff!”
Two sharp arrows were shot out, accurately piercing the soldier's head and heart, ending his pain of being unable to die.
Then, Atalanta put down the Sky Bow in her hand and gave the order solemnly.
"These are the beasts herded by the giants. Their main force is probably behind us. You go first and follow the signal to move closer to the Thessaly defense line. I will be responsible for covering your retreat!"
The soldiers, who had experienced the baptism of war several times, reacted quickly, immediately set up their guns and shields, constructed defensive magic, and quickly evacuated out of the dense forest.
However, before they had taken a few steps, huge cracks appeared on the mountains on both sides, and several dark-skinned, tall giants jumped out from the ground, holding giant clubs, war hammers, stone axes and other weapons, and waving them at the battle formation formed by the Arcadia army.
After several collisions, the barrier held up by the magicians accompanying the army was shattered. Dozens of soldiers with shields were swept away by the powerful force of the giants, and hit the stone walls and tree trunks heavily, turning into pools of meat paste.
"Get out of here, bastard!"
With an angry roar, a silver chain hammer covered with minced meat and bones flew out from the side of the woods and pierced straight through the chest of a giant.
At the same time, dozens of Amazon female warriors, each over two meters tall and with long and strong limbs, rushed out of the dense forest, threw out their javelins, and nailed several giants to the ground.
After dealing with this wave of surprise attacking enemies, Penthesilea, who was in charge of leading the army, gave a solemn reminder.
"Take your people away! We can't stay here for long!"
Atalanta was slightly startled when she heard this.
In my impression, this Amazon warrior has a hot temper. Her eyes light up when she talks about fighting. She was once described as the one who is most like Ares.
Why did he change his mind this time? He just fought with the giants and now he wants to lead them to retreat?
As if she had noticed Atalanta's strange look, Penthesilea retracted her chain hammer and explained in a deep voice.
"They are different this time and are very difficult to kill. We have encountered these monsters before and lost many sisters because we did not understand the situation. Hippolyta is worried that you will also encounter this group of changed monsters, so she asked me to help!"
As he spoke, the giants on the ground, who were almost strung like hedgehogs by the javelins, actually struggled to get up. Their squirming muscles squeezed the javelins out of their bodies and healed their wounds at a speed visible to the naked eye.
Then, they raised their weapons with a grim smile, uttered fanatical praises, and continued to rush towards the tiny humans in front of them.
"Immortality! Immortality!"
The immortality of the gods?
Seeing this, Atalanta's eyelids jumped, and she quickly ordered her soldiers to speed up their movement, while she stayed behind to intercept with Penthesilea.
Once they started fighting, she found that these giants were just as Penthesilea had said. Not only were their vitality extremely strong, but their reaction and speed were also much better than before.
Moreover, these are just ordinary giants. The elite individuals with scarlet divine emblems engraved on their bodies are more troublesome.
Not only can they mobilize some of the powers of the Titans, but the divine emblems on their bodies are as hard as armor, protecting their bodies firmly within the light patterns.
As more and more giants rushed out from the cracks in the ground on both sides, Atalanta and Penthesilea, who were leading a team of Amazon female warriors, were unable to withstand the attack and were in danger several times.
Suddenly, several giant spirits with long arms crawled out of the ground, light patterns flashing on their bodies, and the divine power in their bodies gushed out rapidly.
As their bodies leaned back, scarlet spears of light gathered in their empty hands and were then thrown out with a whistling sound.
Although Atalanta and Penthesilea reacted quickly, one ran and shot continuously, and the other wielded a chain hammer, trying to block the attack of the giants.
However, faced with the dense and rapid scarlet light spears, Atalanta and Penthesilea could only block about half of them together.
Boom boom boom boom!
The remaining light spears broke through the defenses of the rain of arrows and chain hammers, and hit the magic barrier that was already at the end of its strength, and exploded in dazzling halos.
For a moment, the earth shook and the mountains trembled. The shields that the magicians and priests had urgently supported completely collapsed and shattered, and they themselves vomited blood due to the backlash of magic power.
Immediately afterwards, dozens of giants armed with heavy weapons rushed out of the team, strode forward, and killed the mortal army whose formation had already been scattered.
"Apollo of light, Artemis of hunting, I pray for my divine power to come - this is a petition letter dedicated to the two gods!"
In the dense smoke and dust, Atalanta frowned, leaned back, and at the same time held two arrows between her fingers, gathered all her strength, and shot them into the sky.
As the arrows rose to the top, a huge magic array was formed, and a dense rain of blue and gold light arrows fell like a waterfall, landing on the charging giants.
However, Atalanta's heart sank when she saw those giants with the emblem of god actually took the initiative to hold up a light barrier to help their companions withstand the damage of the rain of arrows and rush over.
The immortality of gods, the power controlled by the Lord God, and the coordination between the different giants...
In just a few months, the Shaguigantes clan, which once only focused on charging forward, has undergone earth-shaking changes.
Now they no longer look like a barbaric and scattered group, but more like a resurgent ancient civilization.
No wonder even the most warlike Amazons suffered at the hands of these monsters.
Before understanding the specific situation or coming up with a targeted strategy, mortals leaving the protection of the city and engaging in a field battle with them would only result in their deaths.
Atalanta quickly assessed the situation, and with several Blood Guards from Arcadia around her, she cooperated with Penthesilea and the Amazon warriors she brought, fighting and retreating all the way to buy time for the mortal army to evacuate.
But the dangers lurking in the dense forest are far more numerous than they expected.
Before the journey was halfway completed, groups of magical beasts in the forest and giants that kept emerging from cracks in the ground launched seven or eight attacks, causing heavy casualties to the Arcadia and Amazon coalition forces, which were already at a disadvantage.
What's worse is that due to the delay of the mortal team, Atalanta and Penthesilea found that they had been surrounded by endless giants and monsters without knowing it.
It’s over!
Looking at the monsters all around surging like a tide, constantly dragging their lagging companions out of the formation and then cruelly eating them, the atmosphere of despair and fear filled the hearts of the soldiers, and the hands holding the weapons could not help but tremble slightly.
Just as the coalition forces' barely-held defense line was about to crumble, solemn and cold mixed voices of men and women echoed in the sky.
"You are the silver of rapid fire!"
"You are the gold that pierces the stars!"
In an instant, the dark sky brightened, and the halos of the sun and the moon broke through the obstruction of the clouds, releasing thousands of rays of light.
“BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM!”
One after another, arrows of light condensed from divine power, accompanied by sharp sounds of breaking through the air, fell towards the stalemate battlefield like densely falling artillery shells, blasting the monsters and giants that rushed forward into minced meat.
"Two kilometers to the east, there is someone to pick us up!"
In the sky, Artemis, who arrived in time riding her golden-horned deer chariot, shouted loudly. At the same time, twenty accompanying combat nymphs flapped their wings and descended to help Atalanta and Penthesilea reorganize their formation.
The priests from Delphi sang the words of God, opened the magic array, summoned hundreds of griffins, and ordered these sacred beasts of Apollo, the god of light, to stop the monsters hovering in the air.
Seeing the originally shaky situation stabilized again, Atalanta breathed a sigh of relief.
Her mission in leading the team out of the city this time was to wipe out the herds of beasts that were beginning to spread across Thessaly and to reunite with the two main gods, Artemis and Apollo.
Therefore, the attack shot into the sky just now, in addition to effectively killing the enemy, was also used to pray with the bow and the arrow as a petition to ask for help from the two main gods nearby.
Fortunately, the two main gods arrived late and successfully pulled their mortal coalition back from the brink of collapse.
The reason for being late...
With her excellent eyesight, Atalanta vaguely saw a trace of golden-red blood on the body of the goddess Artemis, and her eyes froze slightly.
Even the Lord God was injured? The intensity of this war has risen to a level that ordinary people can hardly intervene.
Just as Atalanta was thinking, the stars in the sky fell, and red and black etheric light gushed out from the northern sky, covering the sky at a speed visible to the naked eye, quickly swallowing up the light released by the sun and the moon.
As darkness fell, Atalanta and others on the ground suddenly felt a burst of biting cold, and their hair stood on end.
"Bang!"
At the same time, a golden stream of light fell from the sky and hit the ground heavily.
Everyone looked in the direction of the sound and saw the ragged God of Light Apollo climbing out of the charred crater with a disheveled look on his face.
And in the thick darkness, a pair of male and female Titans wearing dark golden armor and with cold faces were walking side by side. The scarlet emblem of God was released above their heads, becoming the only light in the sky.
Looking at the ancient divine pattern, Atalanta, who had studied the Titan language systematically at the Academy of Athens, couldn't help but shrink her pupils.
——Coeus, the god of the celestial bodies!
——Phoebe, the goddess of light!
They are two of the twelve Titans, and coincidentally, they are also the grandparents of Apollo and Artemis by blood, and the power they hold happens to restrain their grandchildren.
(End of this chapter)
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
