The first siege tower came to a sudden stop less than five meters from the city wall.
In the middle section of the tower, a huge bone plate slowly extends forward.
The bone plate suddenly pressed down, creating a temporary passage about two meters wide between the city wall and the siege tower.
"The siege tower has been used as a bridge!" the lookout shouted hoarsely.
Before the words were even finished, the undead warriors who had been waiting inside the tower surged out like a tide, stepping on the bone plates and charging straight to the top of the city.
These undead warriors were a head taller than ordinary skeletons, with thicker skeletons. Their bone swords were coated with intense shadow energy, leaving trails of dark afterimages with each slash.
The halberdiers and garrison infantry on the city wall quickly turned to meet the attack. Halberds thrust out, shields parried, and the crisp sound of bone knives clashing with iron echoed across the city wall.
However, the undead warriors' impact was far greater than expected, and the garrison infantry's shield formation was instantly breached.
Two undead warriors seized the opportunity to rush inside, their bone blades sweeping across and severing the shaft of a halberd soldier's halberd. Then, a second blow struck heavily into his breastplate.
The halberdier crashed to the ground, and his replacement was knocked down by a third undead warrior, widening the gap in an instant.
"The Dawn Crusade!"
On the inner passage of the city wall, fifty members of the Dawn Crusaders were already fully prepared for battle.
The leader was a man wearing dark gray chainmail, who dragged a broadsword in one hand, the blade of which shimmered with a pale white holy light.
"Press it down! Seal the opening!"
He raised his sword and pointed it toward the bone plate, his voice as steady as a mountain.
Fifty Dawn Crusaders advanced towards the breach from both flanks, forming an arc-shaped formation to firmly surround the undead warriors around the bone plate.
The greatsword's length and weight imbued each swing with devastating power, and the holy light emanating from its blade inflicted exponential damage on undead units.
More and more undead warriors poured out of the siege tower, and the bone plate was soon crowded with gray and white figures.
The Crusader soldiers held their ground at the junction of the bone plates and the city wall, wielding their greatswords, each strike accompanied by flying bone fragments and the sizzling sound of holy light burning.
When the soldiers in the front row ran out of energy, they would take a step back, and the soldiers in the back row would immediately take their place. They had already developed this tacit rhythm of rotation during the bloody battle three days ago.
But there was more than one siege tower. As more and more bone siege towers arrived outside the city wall, dozens of bone plates simultaneously clad the crenellations, and the undead warriors' impact points instantly spread throughout the entire western section of the city wall.
The Dawn Crusade's defenses were being stretched thinner and thinner, and every gap required troops to be scrambled to fill, putting immense pressure on them.
"Awakened Ones! At the top!" came the stern shout of the second-tier commander from the city wall.
The awakened beings who were waiting in various places along the city wall responded to the call and moved into action.
The awakened warrior roared and charged toward the gap in the bone plate, the flashing blades clashing violently with the stark white bones.
The awakened mage cast spells from behind, with fireballs, ice spikes, and wind blades sweeping overhead and precisely striking the interior of the siege tower.
The archers stood behind the crenellations, providing close-range, direct fire suppression to the undead archers atop the tower.
The awakened assassin class uses stealth to circle around to the side of the bone plate, delivering a fatal blow from behind as the undead warrior passes by, before disappearing back into the shadows.
The battle unfolded across the entire western section of the city wall.
The skeletons continued climbing the Bone Serpent Slope, the Bone Siege Towers continuously supplied undead warriors, and the bone mortars relentlessly bombarded the city's supply lines and reserve assembly points.
The sounds of shouts of battle, cracking bones, clashing metal, and magical explosions mingled together on the city wall, creating a deafening roar.
Just then, a blue whirlwind suddenly swooped down from a height of a thousand meters.
During the intense aerial battle, Isabella spotted enemy aircraft on the ground.
The azure light of the Wind God's Staff in her hand tore through the air, and a huge whirlwind pierced down from the sky, swept over the city wall, and accurately smashed into the skeletal mortar position behind the sea of bones.
The whirlwind exploded in the mortar array, and blue wind blades splashed in all directions, instantly destroying more than a dozen skeleton mortars.
The necromancer controlling the mortar was caught in the center of the whirlwind, his skeleton was shredded to pieces by the high-speed spinning wind blades, and more than a dozen soul flames were extinguished at the same time.
The defenders on the city wall erupted in a brief cheer.
But before Isabella could confirm the outcome, a deadly barrage of shadow arrows rained down from the sky.
Taking advantage of the moment when she was casting a spell to attack the ground, the Lich King Sazar fired six Shadow Bolts in a fan shape, blocking her escape route.
Isabella's "Echo of the Wind" passive effect was triggered by her Wind Girdle, causing her to dodge in a blur, but two Shadow Bolts still grazed past her mana shield.
The shield value dropped slightly, and fine cracks instantly appeared on the pale golden light membrane.
She immediately looked away, refusing to glance at the ground again.
The Lich King would never give her a second chance to be distracted.
...
On the city wall, female warriors charged upwards, stepping on the bone plates of the siege tower.
Her team originally consisted of twenty Dawn Crusaders, but by the time they reached the middle of the tower, only thirteen remained.
Undead warriors kept pushing in from both sides, but the Crusader soldiers used their greatswords to guard the left and right, clearing a path in front of her.
She ascended the spiraling bone ladder, her longsword flashing rapidly in the narrow space, each strike precisely piercing the eye sockets of the skeletons blocking her path.
With the tower platform in sight, she flipped and leaped onto it, sweeping her longsword across and slicing two undead archers guarding the platform entrance in half at the waist.
The Crusader soldiers behind him rushed onto the platform, wielding their greatswords and slaying the remaining undead archers one by one.
In the center of the platform, a fist-sized purple core floated on the bone base, emitting a dark purple light, surrounded by fine shadow energy.
This is the power source for the Bone Siege Tower, which she had already confirmed when she destroyed another tower.
Once this core is destroyed, the entire siege tower will lose control, and the tower's structural plates will collapse on their own.
"Guard the entrance!" she shouted.
The Crusader soldiers formed a circular formation at the platform entrance, with their greatswords facing outwards.
The female warrior raised her sword, preparing to strike the purple core.
A shadowy impact shot from the side and struck her left shoulder.
Caught off guard, her light armor was torn apart by the shadow energy, fragments of armor flew from her left shoulder, and her flesh was instantly charred.
The impact threw her off the edge of the platform. She tumbled in mid-air and plunged her longsword into a crevice in the outer {N•o•v•e•l•i•g•h•t} wall of the tower, managing to stop her fall.
Bones shattered and fell beside her. At a height of sixty meters, with an army of undead below, a fall would surely mean certain death.
"Captain!" the Crusader soldiers on the platform shouted in unison.
"Leave me alone!" she roared through gritted teeth. "Destroy the core! Now!"
