Apocalypse Gachapon Chapter 2278: Country Alliance (1)

Earth.

Li Daqian sat atop a high hill, gazing out at the calm sea in the distance and at the various ferocious and terrifying sea creatures that occasionally appeared in his field of vision between the sea and the hill.

He had previously made a decision: he gave up the bottle of nine-star evolution potion offered by Cloud Peak and exchanged it for ten bottles of eight-star evolution potions and ten pieces of Red Condensation-grade equipment to strengthen the overall power of the Ten Thousand Beasts Manor.

Compared to a single top-tier evolution potion, the conditions he asked for seemed not particularly high. But Li Daqian knew that these... were just right.

In terms of military merit, his Ten Thousand Beasts Manor did not count for much within the Cloud Peak system. Even though it had performed outstandingly in several recent major battles, it still lagged far behind those who had fought for Cloud Peak for many years.

The reason he had been able to receive a nine-star evolution potion was mainly that... Chisel Tooth had died in battle.

That powerful war beast, which had been cultivated in the Ten Thousand Beasts Manor's large beast pool and jointly controlled by many, and had long held the top rank in the national region, had died in battle.

It had fallen in the great battle between Cloud Peak Villa and the sea beasts.

This was the first time Cloud Peak had lost a top-tier lifeform.

The surging waves, the attacks filling the sky, the swarming monsters, and the crisscrossing light and shadows—and that figure, overwhelmingly powerful, seemingly eternal between heaven and earth.

That was the first time Li Daqian had seen the full form of the Demon Whale, and it left the deepest terror imprinted on his soul.

Chisel Tooth, which he and the entire Ten Thousand Beasts Manor had once taken such pride in—a war beast that could hold its own even among Cloud Peak's top-tier lifeforms, of which there were too many to count on both hands, and whose strength was firmly in the top ten—had been hunted down and killed by that Demon Whale simply because of a moment of pride, straying about a hundred meters from the main formation.

The entire hunt took less than five minutes.

Because of that hundred meters, Cloud Peak's other top-tier lifeforms had been tied down by their opponents and could not arrive in time. Chisel Tooth’s entire body had been smashed to pieces alive by the Demon Whale.

Since then, Cloud Peak and the entire national region had uniformly referred to the Demon Whale as super-level-nine.

Cloud Peak had had exactly twenty top-tier lifeforms; after Chisel Tooth’s death, there were nineteen left. Even the strongest among them—such as the Talking Lady and Black Cat duo, the Red-Haired and Undead Dragon Fish duo, the Death King Tree, Mo Ye, and the Xia Bai and Female Guard combination—when facing the Demon Whale one-on-one, had less than a thirty percent chance of victory.

Do not forget that the Demon Whale, an existence almost equivalent to a sea king, also commanded a considerable number of top-tier lifeforms under it, and most importantly, even more lifeforms of other ranks.

Along this coastline, which already stretched over several thousand square kilometers, the number of sea beasts was preliminarily estimated to exceed forty million—five times the eight million Cloud Peak soldiers stationed here.

Eight million Cloud Peak-affiliated soldiers—that was already the absolute maximum Cloud Peak could field.

Along with the roughly fifteen top-tier lifeforms that were constantly maintained, even so, they could only barely hold the defensive line.

Cloud Peak Villa, which had now occupied almost the entire national region except for some territories of the Glory Army and Resistance Zone C, was at its most powerful era. Yet it was struggling immensely against these sea beasts.

Under these circumstances, Li Daqian knew that the bottle of top-tier evolution potion could go to Tong Hu, Young Master Yun, Sister Rong, Tang Tian, or even Liu Zhenghong or Le Dayuan—but he could not take it.

This was Li Daqian's way of conducting himself.

And his choice quickly brought extra returns.

In addition to the potions and equipment he had requested, Xia Lei had already promised to give his granddaughter a bottle of top-tier potion at an appropriate time. She had also allocated a batch of excellent mutated lifeform cubs to the Ten Thousand Beasts Manor for them to cultivate on their own.

It should be noted that Cloud Peak now had a War Beast Department, and the Ten Thousand Beasts Manor was part of it. These cubs were, in plain terms, for the Li Daqian family.

However, as a member of Cloud Peak, Li Daqian was still somewhat concerned about the war situation. He could sense that both sides were building up their strength, and perhaps before long, a decisive battle that would determine victory or defeat would erupt.

What would Cloud Peak become at that time?

Li Daqian could not help but recall a statistic that Xia Lei had mentioned during a meeting.

Forty percent!

No matter what, Cloud Peak's losses could not exceed forty percent, or the nation would spiral out of control. If it exceeded sixty percent, Cloud Peak would regress to a superpower rather than a sovereign power. If losses reached eighty percent, Cloud Peak would slowly be destroyed.

Just then, some commotion caught Li Daqian's attention. He patted the giant mottled bear lying beside him, then mounted his war beast. The giant mottled bear rose to its full height, its top-tier lifeform aura radiating outward.

From his elevated vantage point, Li Daqian saw a large force approaching Cloud Peak's camp from the west—a force that did not belong to the villa, and it was extremely numerous.

Li Daqian quickly rode the giant mottled bear back to Cloud Peak's vast military formation and arrived at the central camp.

This was where Cloud Peak's command headquarters was located.

When he arrived, Xia Lei happened to be there.

Perhaps knowing why Li Daqian had come, Xia Lei said while studying the map, "It should be reinforcements from the Glory Army and the Resistance Zone."

Li Daqian dismounted from his war beast and walked over to Xia Lei's side. The giant mottled bear used its bear eyes to look at Yellow Ball, who was lazily sunbathing, its meaning clear.

Brother, let's go, want to go have some fun? Big Yellow immediately jumped up, and dog and bear quickly disappeared.

Everyone knew that their so-called "fun" meant teasing a certain dragon.

"Why would they come to aid us? Once the fighting starts here, people are bound to die. Aren't they afraid we'll use them as cannon fodder?"

Li Daqian glanced at the two top-tier war beasts heading out together, while voicing his question.

Now that Cloud Peak was the undisputed dominant power, much evidence showed that the Glory Army and the Resistance Zone had, to some extent, formed an alliance, fearing that Cloud Peak might swallow them up in one gulp.

"Normally, they wouldn't come to help—they'd be hoping we'd fight the sea beasts to a bloody stalemate and suffer great losses, so they'd feel safer and wouldn't have to worry about us swallowing them one day." Xia Lei smiled and said, "But who knows—maybe up in the sky, Ji Ruiguang and Mu Hanyi got a beating from our little Ye."

"Two million people in total—that's two-thirds of their combined forces, so it's quite an all-out effort."

Li Daqian chuckled and looked around the central camp once more. Little Tiger was curled up sleeping over there, while Red Hair was bathing the Undead Dragon Fish.

"Did Guangyao go to receive them?"

Not long after the Battle of Mei City, Guangyao had followed Xia Lei, Xia Bai, and the others in becoming a nine-star evolved.

"Yes, he knows them all well. We'll let them handle the coordination directly." Xia Lei waved her hand and said, "Since Zhongming should have joined forces with Ji Ruiguang and Mu Hanyi up there, we'll treat them as our own. That makes a total of ten million soldiers."

With that, Xia Lei fell silent for a moment, then said, "The potion you returned hasn't been used yet. After you use it... Uncle Daqian, do you think we can launch an attack?"