Xiao Han was surprised when Paul arrived with over two dozen soldiers behind him.
After the explanation, he praised the soldiers for their courage and thanked them for their efforts before sending them back to their units.
Once they left, the two of them discussed the different patterns of behavior of the Devouring ants, and Paul regretted that Fei Fei was not around, as she might have some insight into this mystery.
An hour later, the decision was made that the whole army would move out immediately.
It was better to be on the move than a sitting duck, especially since the enemy now knew their location.
This time their marching speed was way slower, and the reason for that was the high number of wounded from the battle.
Unfortunately, the healers they had with them could not fully heal all of them, and decided to focus their efforts on saving as many people as possible for now.
It took the army five hours to reach the capital city.
To their complete surprise, the gate was opened for them, allowing their army to get behind the walls and into safety.
Xiao Han and Luo Feng were immediately summoned to the palace as the healers from the capital started treatment of the wounded, trying their best to heal as many people as possible.
Even if most of them would need some time to fully recover, the priority was for them to be in good enough condition to stand at the walls and be capable of using their bows.
-Do you think these bugs will attack us here?
Natalie asked as they were sitting under the wall, getting some rest.
-It's possible.
Paul said in a tired voice.
-But here we are behind the walls, and the protection barrier of the capital is the most powerful one in the empire.
So they will have a hard time getting to us, while we can shoot them from the wall.
He explained, and Anna nodded, remembering her experience in White Cloud town.
With the imperial army and all the reinforcements that were arriving from other provinces, she was sure that the ants would need to pay a terrifying price for getting past the barrier and over the wall.
-That's good to hear.
Irine said, sounding as tired as she looked.
All the ladies were tired after the battle and the march to the capital.
Paul was no different, and he hoped that they would get at least a few hours to rest.
-Ladies, try to get some sleep.
He said.
-I'll stay up in case anything happens.
As tired as he was, he could still manage it, so he wanted them to rest as much as possible.
All the ladies nodded and closed their eyes, falling asleep almost instantly, and they were not the only ones.
When Paul looked around, he saw many cultivators sitting under the wall or lying on the ground, sleeping while their friends watched over them.
Paul took out some blankets from his spatial device and covered his companions before returning to his spot and beginning to cultivate his mana again, since he used a lot of it during and after the battle.
Thankfully, the rest of the night went by peacefully, giving everyone time to rest.
Unfortunately, it all ended the moment the sun rose above the horizon, revealing a massive swarm of devouring ants approaching the capital.
The alarm bell sounded the moment the beasts were spotted at the edge of the clearing, a kilometer or so away from the walls.
As soon as everyone heard the bell, they woke up and rushed to get ready.
Officers from the imperial army arrived a moment later, ordering everyone to get on the walls and prepare for battle
Paul and the ladies rushed up the stairs, near which they were resting, and arrived just in time to see the ants rushing in a gigantic wave, covering everything from the forest edge to halfway through the clearing.
-You have to be kidding.
Natalie said, not believing her eyes as the torrent of spirit beasts rushed at the city.
-At least this time, we have a wall and a barrier.
Anna said, with a nervous tone, as even her previous experience didn't prepare her for this sight.
Along the wall, the cultivators as well as the imperial army were preparing for battle.
Whole barrels of arrows were placed on the wall, and boxes of bombs were placed right next to them.
-What are these stone piles?
Irine asked Paul, pointing at the small piles of stones outside the walls.
-These are range markers.
Paul explained.
-The furthest away marks the range of arrows, the next one is for spells, and the last one is for bombs.
An officer who had just arrived at the wall answered, after hearing her question.
His voice was loud enough for all of them to hear.
It was normal that some rookies didn't know about that, so it was better to enlighten them as soon as possible.
-Nook arrows.
The officer shouted next as the ants were closing in on the markers.
Everyone did as ordered.
-Pull.
The order came, and everyone pulled their strings.
-Release.
The officer shouted as soon as the first ants got passed the stone pile.
A massive wave of arrows shot almost simultaneously and a moment later fell on the attacking bugs like rain, killing and wounding hundreds of ants.
-Fire at will.
The officer shouted, taking out his own bow and joining everyone else in sending arrow after arrow into the enemy ranks.
For the next half an hour, everyone on the wall was shooting arrows as fast as they could, not even bothering to aim, as the ants were packed so tight next to each other that it would be almost impossible to miss.
After that, the ones shooting were replaced by the people behind them and sent to catch their breath.
The wall was wide enough to place ten people one after the other, and still have space to move freely.
Right now, there were five rows of defenders on the top, and the people who were replaced went down the wall to make room for the next batch.
Since Paul and his ladies were in the first row, they went down to rest after they were replaced.
-Do you think we will be able to stop them from getting to the wall?
Anna asked, as soon as they sat at the same place they had rested before.
-It's hard to say, but for now, they didn't even reach the spell markers, so there is a good chance for that, especially if they focus all their forces on attacking only this wall.
Paul said while massaging his muscles.
He really hoped that this was the case, since it would be hard for them to defend the whole capital at once.
The city was simply too big, and the defensive walls were too long to be defended all at once.
-We sure killed a lot of them by now.
Irine said, with a bit of optimism in her voice.
After the battle from the previous night, she was more than happy to shoot arrows at the bugs from the safety of the walls.
-That might be true, but we barely made a dent in their number.
Lan said, remembering what Paul told them about the enemy numbers.
-She's right.
Yin added.
-From what we know, there are at least twenty-five million ants, and we killed at most about a hundred thousand of them.
Hearing this, Irine's optimism evaporated immediately.
She saw the piles of dead ants on the battlefield just now, but she never considered that this was less than one percent of the enemy forces.
-Then what will we do?
The seamstress asked.
Much less optimistic than a moment ago.
-For now, we will rest, and once it's our turn again, we will go and kill as many of them as possible.
Paul answered, before closing his eyes, and a moment later, he was asleep.