Screams Entwined with Salvation
The northern gate of The Outpost groaned with a heavy, mournful wail as it split open to the sides.
Beyond the gate, the training ground already burned with the heat of a battlefield.
Following Jinhyuk's order, Beom Dal relayed the command to the Black Wolf Army. Within The Outpost, the Black Wolf soldiers moved swiftly to prepare for departure.
Especially when one thousand spare fish-scale leather armors were distributed from the warehouse, Jinhyuk stepped forward.
Jinhyuk looked down at the dirt beneath his feet.
He dragged the tip of the Black Bear Bow he held roughly across the ground.
The bold characters carved into the earth, stirring up dust.
Jinhyuk leaned on those letters like a staff and coldly addressed the Black Wolf soldiers gathered on the training ground.
"Those who wear this armor must stand at the very front, the vanguard, and receive the enemy's assault with their own bodies."
Beom Dal caught the meaning behind Jinhyuk's writing and speech and immediately stepped forward.
He pointed at the characters Jinhyuk had carved into the ground and unleashed a roar from deep in his chest across the entire training ground.
"This is the brigade commander's order! Can you see these letters? Only those willing to stand in the vanguard and hold their ground to the death are worthy of wearing this fish-scale armor! Today, those who will become your brothers' shields and leap first into the place of death, step forward!"
To the rough men who had lived as slave soldiers in the northern reaches of the Central Plains, surviving countless battles against beasts and nomadic tribes, the imposing sight of the fish-scale armor radiating a jet-black luster stirred a primal desire far stronger than the fear of death.
It was not resentment toward the dangerous position of the vanguard.
It was a primal craving for equipment directly tied to survival, an urge that far surpassed the desire a modern man might feel upon seeing a limited-edition supercar, a luxury watch, or the latest gaming console.
The men's eyes gleamed.
"I'll wear it! Even if I die, I'll die wearing that armor!"
"Out of the way! The vanguard is my place!"
Volunteers surged forward like a wave, shoving one another aside in a scene reminiscent of a frenzied bargain sale.
Watching the chaos, a hollow laugh escaped Jinhyuk's lips.
'Hah... Is it really that good?'
The pressure of having to kill people, the weight of commanding ten thousand men, the suffocating burden that had made breathing difficult, paradoxically lightened.
Their simple, almost ignorant willingness to risk their lives for a single piece of equipment while marching toward death loosened the tension in Jinhyuk's nerves.
With the hollow laugh came a light sigh, and the faint tremor in his fingertips subsided.
At that moment, a bizarre and ominous aura spread from one corner of the training ground.
"Kuhahaha! Brigade Commander Kang, isn't it a bit much to leave us out of the feast with the grassland bastards?"
With a hearty laugh, Dokmun, the leader of the Ten Thousand Demon Cult, appeared.
Behind him, five hundred fanatics of the Ten Thousand Demon Cult, adorned with beast skulls and clutching ritual tools, emerged cackling.
Dokmun wore a sly smile as he stared straight into Jinhyuk's eyes.
"Why, don't you need our sorcery anymore now that the beasts are gone? Kuhaha! Brigade Commander, at least I acknowledge that arrogant confidence of yours! But we're joining too! Let's go! It's been so long since we've used grassland heads as ritual mediums that my hands are itching!"
"A mountain of corpses and a sea of blood... A festival of blood! Let us offer blood to Asura. Hihihihi!"
"Kekeke, once it's over, let's throw a grand feast with their blood!"
At the arrival of these madmen, unexpected cheers erupted from among the Black Wolf soldiers who had been tense with anticipation.
"Oh! The Ten Thousand Demon Cult brothers!"
"Having those lunatics on our side is better than ten thousand troops!"
The soldiers who had been secretly anxious about facing ten thousand enemies finally relaxed with the addition of the Ten Thousand Demon Cult, who treated even death as entertainment.
Jinhyuk found Dokmun's brazen attitude absurd, yet felt a corner of his heart lighten.
A faint smile spread across his lips, which had been stiff with tension.
But the smile did not last.
Because Jo Pil, sitting right in front of the gate, caught his eye.
Jo Pil no longer looked human.
Having run dozens of li across the wasteland on foot without any mount, his leather shoes were shredded, his soles were rags, and bloody phlegm kept spilling from his lungs.
Jinhyuk looked down at the wretched sight from where he stood.
That desperation would soon be Wiji Gang's state, and that appearance could become the future of his subordinates.
"Hey, Jo Pil."
Jo Pil's shoulders flinched. At the pressure in Jinhyuk's voice, Jo Pil, who had been kneeling blankly, instinctively raised his head toward him.
"Are you coming too?"
Jinhyuk's question came with a hardened expression and intense gaze.
It was as if he were asking, "Will you keep sitting here in a daze, or will you go save your lord?"
Without even wiping the blood from his forehead, Jo Pil clawed at the ground with his fingernails and forced himself upright.
"Kuh... Uuugh! Kack, ptoo! Take me with you as well."
Jo Pil spat out the blood in his mouth and stared straight into Jinhyuk's eyes.
Instead of answering, Jinhyuk lightly plucked the string of the Black Bear Bow.
Twang~!
"Beom Dal! Bring out the fifty horses set aside for cavalry use immediately. Form a cavalry unit centered on those with riding experience. Give one horse to Jo Pil as well."
Beom Dal relayed the order at once. Moments later, the fifty horses reserved for cavalry appeared. Jinhyuk leaped onto the saddle in a single bound.
"All forces, advance! The cavalry moves first!! Beom Dal, tell them we're leaving behind anyone who falls behind."
Beom Dal immediately roared.
"This is the brigade commander's order! Cavalry, sortie first with Adjutant Jo Pil at the head! All forces, follow and move to the earthen fortress! Anyone who breaks formation will be executed on the spot!"
Uoooooh~!
A total of 2,550 rescue troops began moving in unison.
'Uh... But I don't even know how to ride a horse properly?'
.
.
.
At the fortress atop the earthen hill, barely one shichen had passed since the battle began.
The walls were a slaughterhouse filled with human screams and the clash of metal.
Hoorororororoooo~
Shushushushushuk~
Outside the walls, nomadic warriors circled on horseback, letting out eerie war cries while arrows rained down.
Even the tallest walls were only about five jang high. To the nomadic warriors, remnants driven out from the grassland unification, that height was no real obstacle.
Of the ten thousand refugees, two thousand warriors in the ragged guise of defeated soldiers charged the fortress.
Every time rope hooks spun from horseback and arrows from powerful bows struck the battlements, the entire wall shuddered with screams.
Swish-
Aaaaargh~
Several rope hooks caught, and warriors who had used the momentum of their galloping horses to leap toward the walls fell screaming when the ropes snapped.
"Cut the ropes! Do not retreat!!"
Crack~
Above the northern gate of the fortress, Wiji Gang's hoarse roar burst forth along with blood.
At his side were only ten Iron Blood soldiers... Across the walls, 185 Iron Blood soldiers huddled in groups of five, holding on with eyes filled with desperate resolve.
"Die! Die, you barbarian scum!"
"Jo Pil... As long as Adjutant Jo Pil reaches The Outpost, that's enough! Just hold on a little longer!"
"If those slave soldier bastards come, we'll survive too!"
The Iron Blood soldiers now gripped broken wooden spears, smashing them down onto the faces of nomads climbing the walls.
They believed the only reinforcements coming were fellow slave soldiers armed with wooden shields and spears draped in rags, yet even the slim hope that their arrival might draw attention from the outside and create an escape route was all they had.
Crack! Kuaaaargh!
"Aaaah! Let's go together, you dog bastard!"
Those whose wooden spears broke or who had no weapons left, and those mortally wounded who could no longer fight, threw themselves off the walls alongside the climbing warriors in mutual destruction. Desperate cries and furious roars echoed throughout the fortress.
Clang~ Clang~
"Do not die! Hold together no matter what!! Do not throw your lives away recklessly!!!"
"Kuhk, the general is done for... Become my companion on the road to the underworld!"
"N-no!"
Kuaaaargh~
Thud, thwack, crack
Wiji Gang swung his sword atop the gate wall, commanding against the warriors climbing up.
Before he knew it, a soldier whose abdomen had been slashed by a curved blade dragged two warriors with him and leapt from the wall.
Huff, huff huff...
"Kuhk, not even a moment to breathe..."
With the soldier's death, three, then four more warriors climbed onto the wall as the space left by two men vanished.
Just as Wiji Gang's sword reached its limit and his body screamed, it happened.
Piiiiiiing~!
Crack.
A grotesque tearing sound ripped across the battlefield.
The head of a nomadic warrior about to leap over the battlements burst like a watermelon.
"Huh...?"
Wiji Gang's gaze turned to the southern horizon.
There, instead of ragged slave soldiers, he saw a small group of black cavalry charging through a cloud of dust.
At their head was Jo Pil, covered in blood and slumped over his saddle.
Kuaaaaaaaaah~
And beside him, a man galloped while swinging the Black Bear Bow—reinforced with the bones of the Great Snow Bear—like a club, firing arrows and letting out wild cries.
"Th-that crazy barbarian?"
Fifty cavalry led by Jo Pil.
They had thrown themselves into the battlefield first with only one thought: to save Wiji Gang and the Iron Blood Unit.
Pew~! Kwaaaang!
Jinhyuk's second arrow struck the center of the cavalry trying to pull the ropes up the wall, instantly igniting a massive flame.
As horses fell and screams erupted, the fifty cavalry pierced the encirclement formed by two thousand warriors like an awl.
Beom Dal's lion-like roar from within the cavalry shook the battlefield.
"Charge! Save the Iron Blood Unit who offered themselves as shields for us! Trample anyone who stands in the way!"
Though only fifty riders, their momentum was that of five thousand.
Especially Jinhyuk's archery, swinging the Black Bear Bow and firing arrows from the center of the cavalry, was awe-inspiring to Wiji Gang.
Every time the bowstring twanged, nomadic commanders vanished from their horses as if erased.
"Ha... Haha... Insane. They really came. With only fifty riders, they charged into this battlefield?"
Wiji Gang spat blood-mixed saliva and burst into a mad laugh.
Below the wall, his eyes seemed to meet Jinhyuk's as the latter forced his way through the nomadic encirclement.
For some reason, those eyes appeared filled with only whites, but it lasted only a moment, so he dismissed it as an illusion.