Chapter 38 -- Earth wall

"What the---?" Where the only words out of Jennifer's mouth. Her and the five hunters had just witnessed the rank one army completely ignore Lex and Adam. She did not have time to be surprised for too long however as the horde was now heading straight for her. She had the hope that the captain and Adam would get rid of a couple 40 lions for them but it turned out it was not happening.

She had to at least halve this army of more than 150 in order to give the Michael and Mia a fighting chance. The team was fighting with the mindset that Laura and Linda where not even there, so in their minds, Mike and Mia where the last line of defense.

"Get ready....AIM......FIRE!!." Jenny shouted when the lions where 10 meters away from the trap, which was covered by a paper thin layer of earth so the beasts would not see the trench.

As soon as she yelled 'Fire' the five hunters picked up tennis ball sized rocks from the pile behind them and started to hurl them at the horde. It may have seemed funny to see grown men throwing stones, however these rocks where not ordinary stones. They where made from the manes on the rank two lions which Lex had killed.

The hunters used the little earth manipulation they had to to make the rocks travel as fast as they could. With their physical strength and the toughness of the rocks coupled with the earth manipulation, those stones became a deadly weapon. Two shots to the head could kill a beast as the rank one lions didn't have the rock hard manes of their rank two counterparts.

Jennifer watched in glee as the lions fell like flies under her relentless fire. A dozen rocks revolved above her head before shooting towards the lions at a speed way faster then the hunters could achieve.

More than 30 lions had already fallen before even arriving at the pit trap and this made Jennifer really happy. However the stones eventually ran out and the horde advanced only to fall into the trap. Roars and whimpers of pain filled the air as tens of beasts fell and got impaled by Jenny's earth spikes.

"Get out of here! go back to the village you can't help anymore. I applaud you for your bravery"Jennifer said to the group of hunters.

"Thank you ma'am" one of them said as they ran towards the village. It was not strange for the adult hunters to take orders from someone more than 40 years younger than them. In a world where power is everything, age was just a number.

Jennifer watched as the lions filled her pit with their dead bodies. Lifting both her hands, a large slab of earth began to accumulate on top of the trench only to drop down on the hole, closing it like a lid. Effectively trapping all the lions which had fallen inside while still alive. Jennifer knew that her action would be making a bridge for the other beasts to pass, but at the moment she had no other choice.

The trap had killed about 60 lions, leaving 60 more alive who didn't hesitate to use the bridge which had killed their comrades. All of a sudden high powered bullets of water elemental 'Force' started to rain down on the advancing squad. Tina had started to assist the fight from her position on the roof of the highest building in the village.

Jennifer had used almost all her 'Force' by then and she quickly started to retreat back into the village to recover. Using her earth powers to move the ground under her, she zoomed past Mia and Michael before arriving at the gate, only to realize that Linda was alone.

"Where's Laura?" she asked.

"A group of rank two lions was seen on the other side of the village. She went there to take care of them." Linda replied.

"Ohh is she gonna be fine all alone" Jenny seemed concerned

"Yeh she's fine, it was a small group of about 10 anyway and for her, rank two is nothing" Linda said while looking in the direction of the battlefield. Michael and Mia had engaged the lions and they seemed to be handling them easily, well at least Michael was.

"You are worried about him aren't you?" Jenny said.

"..........."

"Captain is strong Linda. Don't forget he was able to kill rank two's before his breakthrough. Now he's stronger and he has help. He will be fine don't worry" Jenny reassured Linda with her hand on her shoulder.

"Now wake me up if anything important happens, i will be using [Absorption] I'm out of 'Force'. She said, already closing her eyes after sitting on an armchair she had made from the ground.

Meanwhile, Mike and Mia where in the middle of their fight. For Michael the battle was too easy and for some reason, the lions where actively ignoring him as they all went for Mia. However he did not let that happen and was punching and kicking most of the beasts headed for Mia. He could have attacked all of them, but he wanted his student to also gain battle experience. No one would believe that this was the first time team Cursed ever fought beasts.

Mike, being a rank two Cultivator, it took him only one hit to kill a lion. He didn't even need to take out his sword as he massacred the beasts left and right with his bare fist. Mia however was having a harder time, it was not as easy for her to pierce the though skin of an earth lion. However it was not the same as before the team came. The last time she could not do anything against the enemy, she just hid under a bed with her mother until the lions took everyone to the hall.

This time though, she was actively fighting. A lion had just gotten past Mike and did not hesitate to leap through the air towards the weaker human. Mia saw it coming and quickly threw one of her blades, which hit the mark straight on the beasts forehead as the lion whimpered in pain and stopped it's attack. However the blade didn't manage to reach the brain so the lion was still very much alive, which caused Mia to follow up with a kick to the back of the dagger, pushing it into the lion's rock hard skull.

Back on the rank two battlefield, Lex had just witnessed the black flame come out of his open mouth. He was not sure whether his mouth was still open because of his attack or the surprise. The system had told him it was a new Dragon skill and Lex could not help but remember Adam asking him about whether he could breathe fire or not.

Lex finally closed his mouth as he was starting to feel pain on his throat. Adam also stopped his [Inferno] at the same time Lex stopped his [Dragon's breath]. When the black and orange flames cleared. Lex and Adam saw the corpses of more than 20 lions, which was a good thing if it wasn't for the fact that a large earth wall was obstructing their view to see the rest of their damage.