In hearing the first bàozhà, Qiuda's squad followed instructions, emerging one by one from their hiding places.

But before they had run even a few steps, another earth-shattering roar came from the north! The sound was so loud that it stirred up dust from the ruins, and the violent shaking of the ground almost knocked everyone off their feet.

Qiuda steadied himself and looked in astonishment towards Fangtooth City—because of his low position, he could only see a ball of orange-yellow fire mixed with billowing smoke rising continuously, like a fist swung at the sky. Around the flames, the red mist was illuminated brightly, as if the horizon were burning.

The Sand People showed expressions of fear.

This momentum... could only be described as the wrath of the Three Gods!

"Don't be afraid!" Qiuda gritted his teeth and shouted, raising his arms, "That's a means used by the Grand Chieftain, used to deal with the enemy! It's the devils who should be afraid!"

His words brought everyone back to their senses.

"That's right, this is the heavenly fire brought down by the Grand Chieftain!"

"Don't stop, keep moving forward!"

The stagnant squad started running again. From the cracks in the walls, the windows, the corners of collapsed houses... people constantly emerged, joining the attacking force. Soon, this inconspicuous renliu quickly turned into an unstoppable wave, rushing straight towards Fangtooth City.

Qiuda ran in the lead.

Although he had long admired the Grand Chieftain, he always believed that the Sand People of the Northern Lands were more suited to combat, especially warriors like him who came from barren oases and had struggled with death since childhood. Not just with bows and scimitars, but also with firearms. After receiving Brian's training, he even developed a unique skill, not only excelling in fixed target shooting, but also having a good hit rate in running shooting.

And now was undoubtedly the time to prove himself.

He would not only be the first to rush into the city, but also achieve the first victory for the army.

He would make the name Qiuda Mojin resound throughout the entire army!

However, as the troops advanced along the gentle slope, just as they could see the walls of Fangtooth City, a terrifying heatwave swept over them—for a moment, Qiuda almost thought he was back in the far south, and at the peak of the sand dunes at noon in midsummer.

The scorching air burned his skin, making it difficult for him to even open his eyes.

Those behind him were no better off.

The entire team seemed to have crashed into an invisible wall, and the speed of advance slowed down immediately. Some of the Northerners who rushed to the front even retreated in a mess, squatting down below the slope, as if doing so could avoid this sudden heat.

Qiuda struggled to walk dozens of steps, feeling more and more that something was wrong.

The fireball that had risen into the sky had extinguished, leaving only a circle of smoke still spreading. The originally overwhelming red mist was missing a piece here, as if a giant beast had taken a bite out of it. The surrounding mist did not fill in immediately, but formed a large arc-shaped blank space.

Through the open city gate, he saw that the ground inside the city seemed to be rippling with heat, and the outlines of the buildings became distorted and blurred, especially the wooden houses that had been destroyed by the bàozhà. The scattered charred pillars resembled devil claws stretching out from the ground. And the enemy neither rushed out to stop them, nor fled in panic—in fact, he couldn't find any trace of the devils at all.

At the same time, Qiuda felt breathless, and the surging heat around him made him afraid to open his mouth to breathe. His body also seemed to resist continuing to move forward, each step as heavy as a mountain.

Damn... when did I become so fragile?

The city wall was clearly not far away, but he felt that he had lost all his strength, and his vision became blurred.

Qiuda staggered twice and fell to the ground.

The last sight he saw was Farah's disgusted face as she dragged him away.

...

The direction of this blocking battle completely exceeded Iron Axe's and the staff's expectations.

In the original plan, the burning barrels arranged around the north of Wolfheart King City would turn most of the outer city into a sea of fire. The raging flames

would not only devour the flammable houses, but also burn away the red mist inside and outside the city. This would make Fangtooth City temporarily become an "island", and those devils who did not carry breathing devices would inevitably fall into chaos and panic.

The final decisive blow was the ambush force that launched the attack in the chaos—although he was not clear about the specific number of the enemy, judging from past intelligence, the devils would allocate manpower according to the population they occupied. The evacuation of Fangtooth City would inevitably fall into the eyes of the enemy's scouts, so in the first few days of the red mist's coverage, the number of enemies entering the city should not exceed five hundred. In other words, the First Army would have an absolute advantage in terms of both numbers and momentum.

As for how many enemies could be annihilated in the end, that was not the focus of this battle. After all, in order to avoid the detection of the Terrorbeasts, the soldiers could only hide in the dark passages and ruins in advance, and all heavy weapons were useless. It was not difficult to suppress the enemy with buqiang and anti-devil grenades, but it would be difficult to chase and kill the opponents all the way.

The main purpose of this battle was to strike at the devils' offensive spirit. As long as they realized that the retreating humans still had the ability to fight back, it could further reduce the pressure on the evacuation team.

But the battle stopped abruptly at the "explosion" stage.

The envisioned wall of fire did not appear, but instead turned into an earth-shattering bàozhà. The King City, swept by the flames, became a restricted area. The ambush force could not even cross the city gate and was pushed back by the heatlàngbi. Several people even experienced burns and fainting. At this point, the subsequent attack was obviously impossible to carry out.

Of course, this did not mean that the blocking battle had failed. Even outside the city walls, one could feel the scorching air. He could imagine what the situation was like inside the city even with his eyes closed.

There has never been any evidence to show that devils or humans can withstand burning.

The only regret Iron Axe felt was that he could not personally walk around the battlefield to see the specific results of this blocking battle—he didn't know when the temperature inside the city would drop, and this was obviously not a place to stay for long.

"Lord, all the troops have withdrawn from Broken Tooth Fortress, leaving only us." Brian entered the temporary command post, his eyes full of excitement. For him, who had not experienced the new weapon test but directly witnessed this scene in actual combat, this battle was indeed a scene worth remembering for a lifetime.

"Very good, let's withdraw too." Iron Axe nodded. "I estimate it won't be long before the enemy notices this place. Once their pursuit force arrives, it won't be so easy to leave."

...

In fact, as he predicted, in less than a day, a squad of devils rode Terrorbeasts to Fangtooth City. The leader was none other than the Lord of the Sky, Hexode.