Chapter 586 Ambush 2 (Black Ebony Grass)

Chapter 586: Chapter 586 Ambush 2 (Black Ebony Grass)

"Ambush!!!"

One of the Tigrens positioned along the outer edge of the formation, near the thick bushes and trees, suddenly shouted the warning.

But it was already too late.

A volley of arrows came screaming out of the surrounding vegetation, raining down upon the unsuspecting Tigrens. There was no time to scatter, no time to find cover, and certainly no time to determine where their attackers were hiding.

The male Tigrens immediately threw themselves in front of the females, using their bodies as shields. They raised their arms to protect their heads and other vital areas, while those behind them crouched low and used their backs as living barriers against the incoming storm of arrows.

For a brief moment, the entire formation dissolved into chaos as the arrows continued to rain down from around the trees.

"Ugh!" The males grunted as they immediately formed a solid wall around the females, using their massive bodies as shields.

A deafening chorus of arrows continued to tear through the air before piercing into their flesh, making them look like a pincushion; the sharp impacts were followed by groans of pain as the metallic scent of blood quickly filled the air around the group.

Luckily, the Tigrens possessed massive builds, their bodies covered in dense layers of thick muscle that absorbed and deflected most of the arrows. Their sheer size had prevented the volley from becoming a massacre.

No one had been killed, but many of the warriors had been seriously injured, arrows embedded deep within their flesh as blood streamed down their bodies.

"Quick! Into a defensive formation!" the Deputy Chieftain, Leon’s second-in-command, immediately roared.

He barely finished speaking before he reached down and ripped the arrow lodged through his arm free without so much as a flinch. He had been the one carrying the Priestess earlier, which made protecting her easier and she had remained close to him throughout the entire ambush.

Fortunately, he had also been positioned near the core of the formation, where the barrage of arrows had been less concentrated, leaving him with only a few relatively minor wounds.

The moment the arrow was removed, the wound began closing before their very eyes. Flesh knitted itself back together, blood flow stopped, and within seconds, there was barely a trace that he had been injured at all.

But the same could not be said for those stationed along the outer layer.

Several of the Tigrens looked like pincushions, their massive bodies riddled with arrows. Fortunately, they had instinctively shielded their heads and the backs of their necks, preventing any of the arrows from striking a fatal spot. Yet even with their extraordinary resilience, the sheer number of wounds had left them bleeding heavily.

The Deputy Chieftain’s expression darkened as he noticed something else.

The bleeding wasn’t stopping.

That alone was strange.

Then he felt it after pulling another arrow from his thigh: a sluggishness spreading through his own body, subtle but unmistakable. His regeneration ability was being suppressed too.

His eyes narrowed.

And he realized that there was something on the arrows.

Paralysis poison.

And judging by how slowly their wounds were closing, the enemy had mixed something else into it as well, herbs or some kind of compound designed specifically to interfere with their natural regeneration.

As Leon’s second-in-command, the Deputy Chieftain possessed strength surpassed only by Leon himself. His regenerative ability was correspondingly powerful. Under normal circumstances, a wound as small as the one on his thigh would have healed within two seconds, three at the absolute most.

Yet this time, it had taken nearly five seconds.

Five seconds for something that should have taken no more than three.

If he hadn’t been paying such close attention, he might have dismissed the difference entirely. But now, seeing his warriors still bleeding, especially those who had taken the brunt of the barrage, it became impossible to ignore.

His gaze swept across the wounded Tigrens, his expression growing colder by the second.

This also proved that the enemy had known exactly how to hurt them.

They had prepared arrows capable of piercing their defenses, poison capable of paralyzing them, and herbs capable of slowing the very regeneration ability that made the Tigrens so difficult to kill.

It became very clear that someone had planned this ambush carefully.

And that realization was far more disturbing than the arrows themselves.

So, it was no longer merely a suspicion that the werewolves had been leading them astray. They had indeed been deliberately guiding them farther and farther away from the Royal Capital, luring them into an isolated area where they could be assassinated without anyone noticing.

And because the Tigrens had suddenly stopped moving, the hidden enemies had been forced to act before the Tigrens noticed something was off and became guarded.

However, since this was not the location they had originally planned for the assassination, they could not simply wipe out the Tigrens with overwhelming force. But they had no other choice but to take action either way.

And since the attack wasn’t a sure kill, they instead resorted to more insidious methods, using paralysis poison to weaken and immobilize their targets, while the herbs coated on the arrows prevented their wounds from closing properly.

This forced the Tigrens to continue bleeding while simultaneously suppressing their rapid regeneration. They were clearly trying to wear the Tigrens down first, gradually robbing them of their strength and ability to fight back before moving in for the kill.

Now, the situation had become much clearer.

The Deputy Chieftain and the Priestess exchanged a look, the same grim realization reflected in both their eyes.

"Enemies..." they simultaneously relayed through the mindlink.

Those who could still move immediately grabbed the Tigrens closest to them by the back of their necks and dragged them toward the center of the formation, tossing them into the hands of those who were still capable of protecting and treating them.

They needed to give the injured a chance to recover while the able-bodied warriors moved outward and formed a defensive perimeter around them.

The warriors then immediately shifted into their Tigren forms, intending to use their larger bodies and greater physical strength to shield the others.

But the moment they transformed, something felt horribly wrong.

Their legs trembled beneath them, their knees suddenly weak as though their strength had been drained away. They barely managed to remain standing before, after only five seconds, their bodies forcibly reverted to their human forms.

"What... what’s going on?"

The Tigren warriors furrowed their brows as they stared down at their trembling palms, confusion and unease spreading across their faces. They had never experienced anything like this before.

"They used Black Ebony Grass!"

The Priestess immediately recognized what was happening the moment she saw the effects. Although she was known as a Priestess within her Clan, her true identity was that of a witch, and she knew exactly what Black Ebony Grass was.

It was a rare herb whose properties were known only to witches, making its presence here more than enough to confirm her worst suspicion.

There was a witch behind the people who attacked them.

Her expression immediately became more guarded as she relayed her discovery through the mindlink.