The battle at the mouth of the Rat Hole has indeed begun!
Fifteen hours ago, as Qin Lun and the dwarf exploration team left, the seven apostles, led by Mustasha, began to cautiously approach the rat man's cave.
They were tight on the inside and loose on the outside, carrying Tyre night lights, and carrying the large and small packages left by the dwarves, disguising the team as a small business traveler heading to the underground city.
Since the prehistoric era of the valley, the dark elves failed in the Elven Crown War and moved into the Underdark with the elf queen and became the drow elves. They have replaced the Santana dwarves and become the new rulers of the underground world .
However, after all, the Underdark is no better than the surface world. It lacks a lot of resources, except stones, and only stones are left. Although the underground is extremely rich in minerals and there are many biological nests, compared with the surface world, it is basically a sky and an underground.
How could the dark elves, who were accustomed to a luxurious life, and their queens adapt to this change. Perhaps the perverted mental state of the drow elves and the spider queen was slowly distorted because they couldn't stand the barrenness of the Underdark.
The drow elves and the goddess Lolth, who fell into the queen of the spider god, never forgot that one day they will counterattack the surface world.
It doesn't matter whether they miss the life on the surface or prepare for the counterattack against the surface world in the future. In short, after the drow elves have built many dungeons, they generally allow surface merchants to trade in the dungeons.
If it is some long-term cooperative caravan, the dungeon will also send escorts for them depending on the situation.
Because some special products of the Underdark are very rare in the surface world, such as: various gems, dark creature cores, weapons and equipment produced by drow, tamed minotaur slaves, etc., so as long as they do not die in the Underdark, the surface caravan Often there are huge profits.
Therefore, even though the merchant travelers know that the drow are difficult to trust, they still flock to them. Every year, many small merchant travelers venture into the Underdark, seeking to trade with the dungeons.
The biggest problem that surface caravans encounter in the Underdark is often not the sinister and cunning drow elves, but the unknown dangers along the way. Sometimes, a ratman tribe like the one in front of Weiss and others can bring disaster to a small caravan.
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Although the apostles had heard Gilliam introduce the characteristics of the shrieking mushroom, after they touched the howling mushroom for the first time, they were still taken aback by the chain-screaming screams.
The squealing sound of the howling mushroom is a bit like the screeching of the spout of a kettle when it is boiled. The sound of a single howling gray mushroom is nothing, but when the first screaming gray mushroom screamed, the vibration of the air quickly caused a chain reaction.
The entire gray mushroom field boiled up, causing the apostles to turn pale and walk lightly. Their ears were buzzing for a long time, and they couldn't hear any other sounds clearly.
At this time, even Weiss felt a little regretful that he didn't heed Mustasha's advice and put a piece of cotton cloth in his ear.
Even though three ratman sentries ran out of the ratman's cave, the apostles still couldn't get used to the screams of the shrieking gray mushrooms, which made them extremely embarrassed when dealing with the three ratmen.
However, the only good thing is that even if they don't have to act at this time, the Ratman Sentinel believes that their weakness is not just pretending. Soon a rat man sentry ran back to the cave, calling for reinforcements, trying to catch them all.
After the second batch of adult ratmen appeared, the number had reached more than 20, and they also brought a mud monster with them. The size of this mud monster is not very big, about two meters high, but the mud monster is small at the top and big at the bottom, and the radius of the chassis is almost two meters. From a distance, it looks like a small hill in miniature.
The mud monster has no long legs, and the way it moves is that the chassis creeps forward, and there are two huge arms at the side. There are three thick stone toes on the front of the arm. After making a fist, it looks like a hammer head, and it is very powerful.
The dwarf wounded that Qin Lun saw at the beginning was probably hammered on the chest by the mud monster, and finally died without treatment.
Although the second batch of Ratmen was large in number and there were mud monsters to help out, at this time, the caravan pretended by the apostles also stabilized their position. Although they didn't put aside the harassment of the Ratman Sentinel at this time, they had already withdrawn from the influence range of the Howling Gray Mushroom.
Once their minds were unaffected, the apostles performed well even in the face of more than twenty ratmen.
However, the apostles did not release water in the dark. After they stabilized their position, they broke out in a wave, beheaded the five ratmen who rushed to the front, and then fought and retreated, fleeing to the direction of the mushroom forest.
In Gilliam's introduction, they already knew that the rat man was an extremely timid, cautious and cunning intelligent creature.
Since they are intelligent creatures, the Ratmen have their own ability to observe and judge. If a flaw is seen, the apostles will no longer be able to seduce other Ratmen from the Ratmen's cave. a small number of members.
The reason is that they have all wiped out the previous batch of dwarf exploration teams. According to this calculation, the Ratman tribe has at least hundreds of adult warriors.
The judgment of Mustaxia and Weiss was correct. After discovering that the existing forces could not take down the caravan, and no other enemies were found nearby, a large number of adult warriors in the Ratman Cave poured out.
However, at this time the rat people finally showed their cunning.
Qin Lun and the others could see from a high place that the ratmen pouring out of the lair were divided into three teams, one team of more than twenty joined the previous attacking team, while the other two teams began to encircle Masta on both sides. Xia et al.
The overall number of the Ratman team had risen to more than one hundred, as well as the two Ratman priests in the team holding stick-like staffs, and a few Ratman thieves who disappeared immediately after leaving the cave. Qin Lun, who was watching the battle, and others Everyone couldn't help but sweat coldly for the companions in front of them.
Fortunately, under the guise of telepathy, Hill quickly provided the situation observed by Qin Lun to the leader Mustaxia, so that everyone did not have to worry about the development of the situation.
To everyone's surprise, after learning that the Ratmen intended to encircle them, Master Harpist decided to use his tactics and wait for the Ratmen to encircle them successfully before forcibly breaking out.
There are two advantages to doing this. Before the Ratmen successfully encircled them, they would stride back, which would easily arouse the suspicion of the Ratmen. At the same time, they stepped into the ambush circle too early, so they couldn't wipe out all these ratmen.
And wait for the Ratmen to close the siege, and then forcefully break through. The Ratman will no longer suspect that there is an ambush, so he can safely step into the ambush circle of the dwarves.
Of course, the risks of doing this are as obvious as the benefits. There are too many ratmen in this group, and mud monsters, priests, thieves... The iron triangle of attack, defense, and support teams has perfect occupations. Once the breakout fails, the ambush companions have to show up to help in advance.
In that case, not only will the bait plan fail, but the dwarf exploration team will continue to waste a lot of time in this place. Maybe they could still wipe out the Ratmen tribe in the end, but the price they paid would be too high at that time, and it was unknown how much time the apostles would have left to stay.
What surprised Qin Lun again was that Weiss agreed to Mustasia's plan without hesitation. It seems that this high-ranking apostle is still very confident in the strength of his team.
As for Hill and Rand, Qin Lun wasn't worried about them at all. Hill has the blood of the spirit sucker, and the several natural abilities he obtained are the nemesis of low-level underground creatures such as ratmen. And Rand's large-area fire skills are enough to allow him to support reinforcements in any critical situation.
The subsequent development of the situation is completely under the control of Mustaxia and others, but the intensity of the battle opened the eyes of Qin Lun and others who watched the battle.
The shield guard of the Weiss team was the first to show off in this small team. This tall human defender carrying a large tower shield showed the true value of the team MT.
In the battle, his two core abilities played a vital role, one is the range control skill "War Horn", and the other is the range defense skill "Reloaded Shield Bash".
The war horn is an advanced skill of the warrior's battle cry. Every time the shield guards use the war horn, the encirclement circle formed by the ratmen and mud monsters will be trapped, and a gap will appear.
The Ratman Priest in charge had to divide the encirclement into two layers in the end, lest the small caravan break out of the siege.
The Heavy Armor Shield Bash is the most outstanding area defense technique that Qin Lun has ever seen. When this kind of shield strike is activated, more than a dozen afterimages will appear on both sides of the shield guard, and each afterimage seems to have a part of the body's power.
After reloading the shield strike, all the ratmen in front of the shield guard will be knocked into the air, and even the mud monster will be paralyzed for a while before they can rejoin the battle. It can be said that if the shield guards did not possess these two skills, it would be difficult to say how long the defensive formation of this small team could last under the attack of the Ratman warriors.
With the efforts of the shield guards, Mustasia and the other apostles all properly demonstrated their strength.
The female apostle of the Weiss team finally revealed her apostle profession at this time. She is a priest of the Holy Light who is more like a priest than Hill. Each of her healing lights is just right, allowing the most stressed shield guards to relieve fatigue in time and quickly recover their combat effectiveness.
With the existence of the Holy Light Priest, Hill no longer used the half-baked recovery magic, but showed the attack ability of being a Priest of Chaos, continuously emitting purple and black beams of rays in his hand.
Every rat man touched by the purple or black rays either rolled all over the ground in pain and completely lost its fighting power, or fell to the ground without making a sound, ossified and died directly.
Priest of Chaos is the advanced profession of Prayer Priest. When he was the first-level Prayer Priest, most of the divine arts that Hill mastered were some buff magic and low-level laws. When he was promoted to the second-level chaos priest, the terrifying ability of this career line began to show.
The purple ray emitted by Hill is "Shadow Word: Pain", and the black ray is the advanced "Power Word: Obliteration".
"Shadow Word: Pain" is a judgment on the will. Creatures that cannot pass will feel unparalleled pain for a certain period of time.
"Power Word: Annihilation" is even more terrifying. It is a direct judgment on the physique of a living being. If it fails the judgment, it will die directly.
Of course, these two Chaos Prayers consume a lot, and the upper limit of judgment is related to Hill's own will and physique. If it is in front of creatures of the same level, it will not be as effective as that of low-level ratmen.
Except for Hill, the performance of the other two long-distance occupations in the team can only be said to be quite satisfactory. Mustasha's archery skills have not been displayed to the maximum extent. She still needs to observe the battle situation and control the overall situation.
The black-robed mage Romon threw a few fireballs from time to time, and at the same time paid attention to the actions of the rat man priests opposite him. He had to interrupt the recovery spells of the two rat man priests from time to time.
One is to prevent them from concentrating and observing the surrounding environment, and the other is to suppress the results of the Ratman Priest's rescue and treatment of the seriously injured Ratman as much as possible, so as to reduce the pressure for the subsequent battle.
In comparison, Rand and the thieves had special roles, and they basically didn't cooperate with the others. This two-person combination is specifically dealing with several thieves in the Ratman tribe.
Rand blasted the small lava balls purposefully. The fire rain formed by the small lava balls does not do much damage, but the coverage is large and can break the stealth of the rogue. Once the Ratman Rogue shows his figure, the monkey will immediately entangle him, fighting for a wave of explosions, repelling or even injuring the Ratman Rogue.
The two basically ensured that the small team would not be destroyed by the Ratman thieves, so that it could persist for a long time.
The only one who didn't perform his combat duties was Weiss, the strongest in the team. At this time, the high-ranking apostle played the role of a businessman who was furious and furious.
He muttered obscenities that no one could understand, scolded his companions who were pretending to be caravan mercenaries, and waved and waved indiscriminately, but everyone cooperated and ignored him.
Weiss succeeded in reassuring the Ratmen and gathered all their forces to besiege them. At this time, as time went by, Ratmen kept joining the encirclement in the Ratman Cave, and the number rose to more than 130. Qin Lun and the others even saw a few obviously underage Ratmen on the edge of the encirclement.
The Ratmen tribe was finally squeezed out of all their strength by Mustasia and the others. Qin Lun believed that by encircling and suppressing these ratmen, the tribe would not be able to recover for a long time, and naturally it would be powerless to interfere with the subsequent dwarf exploration team.
Despite the fierce battle, Mustasia still noticed that the situation was developing in the direction they expected. She immediately canceled the breakout plan, and just fought and retreated, luring the many rat people who surrounded them to slowly move towards the dwarf ambush circle...