Chapter 125
Chapter 125
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 125
Chapter Title: Counteroffensive and Immortal Horde
-----------------------------------------------------------------
-Hiiiing!!
The warhorses charged ferociously, rearing up high on their hooves with all their momentum.
Armored head to tail in finely forged barding, the accelerating cavalrymen were living siege engines in their own right.
Kwajijik!
The head of a dark elf charging at the forefront was crushed flat beneath the warhorse's stomping hoof, bursting apart.
Even bolstered by the blessings of the Earth Dragon Karaktus... the elite striking squads of the Lichtenauer Martial Clan cut down the dark elves mercilessly, as if such things meant nothing to them.
It was true that the overwhelming firepower of the Earth Dragon's black flames had briefly suppressed their momentum.
But their patriarch was an absolute being who had long transcended human limits, wasn't he?
So they trusted in their lord, the patriarch, and gave their all to annihilate the clan's enemies.
That was the very reason for the squads' existence—their pride and self-respect.
Seokeok!
One member of the Azure Dragon Squad sliced off another dark elf's head from behind the broken front line where a warhorse had trampled through.
"Hahaha! They're not all that impressive after all?!"
Watching the dark elves die so easily made the squad member feel foolish for having been so tense over the Earth Dragon's blessing.
Of course, the Azure Dragon Squad was the clan's proudest elite force.
They weren't the sort to grow careless on the battlefield, even against feeble foes.
Yet when the slaughter was this one-sided... it was only natural for some tension to ease compared to usual.
Especially if they'd been wound up tighter than a spring.
And so, for a fleeting moment, the squad member overlooked it.
Dark elves excelled at ambushes, too.
But their true strength lay not in the regenerative power or brute force of ogres or trolls... but in their spirit arts.
Woooong!
"Huh...?"
Sensing something eerie from below, the squad member instinctively glanced down at his mount.
He paid the price for overlooking the dark elves' nature.
Puhwaaak!
And that price was far too steep.
He would never live to see another sight.
-Hiiiing!
A massive spear of earth pierced the warhorse's thick barding and gutted its soft belly.
Along with the torso of the rider atop it.
Unlike the warhorse thrashing in agony on the spot with mournful cries, the squad member died instantly, without even feeling pain.
Puhwak! Puhwaak! Pupupupuk!
And scenes like this were unfolding across the front lines.
They sacrificed the lives of dark elves at the vanguard like arrows, luring the clan's forces deep in.
Then they annihilated the invading elites in one fell swoop using summoned spirits.
With this simple tactic, the dark elves blunted the clan's spearhead and launched their counterattack.
"You brutish humans, strutting about without knowing the heights of heaven. Look how ridiculous you seem now."
Drakelas murmured coldly as he watched the clan's front lines crumble.
The Lichtenauer Martial Clan's warriors had grown furious during their push through the great barrier to the dragon's tomb, thanks to the dark elves' ceaseless sabotage.
So it was no wonder they fell so easily for such a basic ploy.
...No, that's not all there is to it.
Humans fundamentally despised 'monsters.'
They thought monsters incapable of strategy—primitive brutes who relied on mindless force.
Even after falling for his strategies time and again on the way here.
How arrogant, how insolent a race.
He would make them pay dearly for that damned nature, right here and now.
"Just like you!!"
Puuung!
As if losing his mind, Drakelas summoned a wind spirit into a barrier and shouted at empty air.
Kiiiing!!
But as if to prove he hadn't gone mad...
The blade clashing against the wind barrier sparked wildly.
"Tch, found out, huh?"
The man who swung the blade grinned white-toothed and casual.
He was the captain of the Azure Dragon Squad, Bihar Hawk.
"Too bad. I was gonna slice off that last arm nice and clean. Now... it'll be off-balance, right?"
He was also the one who'd severed Drakelas's left arm during the advance on the dragon's tomb.
"You think I'd fall for the same trick twice?!"
Tuwoong!
Drakelas lightly swung Oath of the Night, drawing up spirit power. Spears of fire, ice, and earth formed from all directions, threatening to end Bihar Hawk.
"There are two I've sworn to kill no matter what. One's that traitor I'll rip apart—Aelion."
Cheoeok!
The elemental spears locked onto Bihar Hawk with ominous momentum.
"And the other... is you!!"
Woooong!
Bihar Hawk whistled at the monstrous energy gathering on the spear tips.
"Whiiist... Guess it wasn't just bluffing after all?"
Of course, unlike his relaxed facade, his eyes weren't smiling at all.
With one arm gone, he'd figured a sneak attack would finish him easily.
That assumption had gone spectacularly wrong.
Even blessed by the Earth Dragon, Drakelas hadn't let his guard down... and he'd grown incomparably stronger than before.
No matter that he was a squad captain of the Lichtenauer Martial Clan—he couldn't handle this alone.
"Die!!"
Pipipipipipit!
Spears infused with multiple elements flew at Bihar Hawk.
Their speed was hard to track with the eyes, but not beyond a master's ability to handle.
Destructive as each one was, none held power a master like Bihar Hawk couldn't block.
But.
That insane number... there was no way he could fend them off solo.
Yet the solution was simple.
"I don't have to block 'em alone!!"
Kakakakakakak!
Two men and women appeared from left and right behind him, batting away Drakelas's spears alongside Bihar Hawk.
Chaechaeng!
"Sadly, I'm more cowardly than I look. I don't charge in solo trying to hog the glory."
With the spears reduced to a third in an instant, Bihar Hawk casually deflected them as he spoke.
"Hmph... Truly, you're a human without a single redeeming quality."
He'd used his subordinates' lives as kindling to create an opening.
Yet he cherished his own life so dearly.
The epitome of humans' hypocritical duality.
It only fueled Drakelas's disgust.
"What a coincidence."
No, he knew it already.
"I've felt the same since the moment I first saw you old hag."
This feeling bordered on self-loathing.
Drakelas had done the same—using his tribesmen's lives as bait.
"Fine, all the better."
Drakelas growled, conjuring more elemental spears.
"I'll slaughter you all right here!!"
"Come on, let's dance!!"
Buwaaak!
The hefty halberd smashed through skeletons.
Its momentum seemed unstoppable by any undead.
Kaaang!
Yet surprisingly, it failed to crush a single head.
A dullahan—an undead that carried its head like a shield—had blocked it.
The dullahan let out a grotesque cry, biting down on the halberd's blade.
-Woooarrr!
"Uwak! Save me!"
As the monster raised its other hand's longsword to strike, Ralph—whose halberd was stuck—shouted in panic.
And in that gap.
Chiriririt!
Ian's twin swords slipped in, shattering the dullahan's already-severed head.
"Phew, saved. Thanks, captain!"
Ian had no time to reply to Ralph's thanks, turning to the next prey.
In this endless wave of undead, he couldn't spare breath for words.
It was bizarre.
The right flank assigned to the Lichtenauer Martial Clan was meant for the dark elves.
So why was Ian's Latent Dragon Squad locked in a deathmatch amid an undead horde?
It wasn't some noble reason like sparing Aelion the trauma of fighting her kin in her presence, then diverting to face the undead.
Aelion had abandoned all ties to her tribe the moment she chose to betray Drakelas.
The real reason so many Lichtenauer warriors, including Ian's group, had detoured to assault the undead was simpler.
Their forces were overwhelmingly stronger compared to other fronts.
Even bolstered by the Earth Dragon, facing the entire great disaster was one thing—but pitting mere dark elves against the clan was laughable.
Besides, the clan's warriors weren't fools.
They knew who the great barrier's biggest threat was, aside from the Earth Dragon.
The pinnacle of fingers that was both one and legion.
The undead Arch Lich, Arckandor.
Unless he was dealt with, they'd keep burning forces against the ever-growing undead over time.
So they'd swung their excess power from the dark elf front toward the undead.
That was the path to ending this fight swiftly.
Among the clan's boasted Twelve Captains...
Confirming three could hold Drakelas, the captains had redeployed two more to the field and gathered the rest's power for a decisive strike on the rear undead.
Three could hold; surely six could take down Arckandor.
However.
Their expectations missed spectacularly.
Peoseok!
The hammer crushed a skeleton's skull.
Kwajijik!
The halberd pulverized a ghoul's torso.
Their might was overwhelming.
Low-tier undead not even worth orc fodder couldn't scratch the squads, let alone regular striking teams.
However.
Ujijik!
However.
Ppakak!
However.
Kwaduk!
They couldn't advance.
Destroy one, two rise.
Break two, four emerge.
Crush four, eight spawn.
Endlessly, endlessly, endlessly.
The infinite death legion demonstrated the primal, overwhelming violence of sheer numbers.
"Damn it! This is insane... no end, there's no end."
Walther, captain of the Martial Peak Squad, was appalled by the hopelessness of the ocean-like undead surge.
He finally understood why the great barrier—lacking an absolute powerhouse without the Earth Dragon—was ranked with Golden Heaven or Mudflow.
That skeleton mage's anti-army capabilities were... utterly beyond norms.
No other great disaster monster, nor any Lichtenauer mage, could match such prowess.
"Should've begged the patriarch to bring the full forces of the three vassal houses... Damn, at this rate, it'll never end."
Walther sent an aura message to the other captains.
Gregory, captain of the Mysterious Light Squad, snapped back irritably.
"You blind?! See that?!"
Where Gregory pointed.
Arckandor loomed, exuding terrifying menace without a hint of hiding his presence.
And around him.
Even amid the advancing undead hordes, black knights stood sentinel, holding their ground aloofly.
Death Knights.
The pinnacle undead monsters, reachable only by sword experts of the highest caliber in life.
Twenty such abominations guarded Arckandor.
Of course, the captains' power could dispatch twenty Death Knights without much trouble.
But.
With Arckandor's aid endlessly regenerating them, surrounded by swarming lesser undead...
The story changed entirely.
Walther had no retort to Gregory's words.
Fighting undead didn't require exceptional powerhouses.
Numbers of average warriors were far more efficient at holding them.
Pull out the elite squads... and the undead tide would shatter the gap.
They couldn't afford to.
There was only one way.
A small elite team.
While the captains handled Arckandor, they needed powerhouses to hold those Death Knights.
But in this dire moment, where could they find such perfectly suited...
"“““““Lord Walther!!””””””
...They were right there.
As if scripted, voices calling Walther echoed simultaneously across the battlefield.
Those invoking the Martial Peak captain all bore the qualifications.
Alex Lichtenauer, the clan's eldest young lord.
The thunderbolt genius of the branch family.
Andy Pallkion, second son of the Pallkion Sword House.
Manus Kalia, heir to the Kalia Warfare House.
Sophia Clonen, flower of the Clonen Shadow House.
The clan's little stars.
The prized prodigies to lead the Lichtenauer future.
They'd read the captains' intent and called out.
Chwaaak!
"We'll take the Death Knights!"
Alex, aura-slicing a banshee's wail, charged at the fore.
"Lord Walther and the captains, take out that lich!"
Led by Alex's steady advance, the little stars surged toward the Death Knights.
The warriors, wearying against undead, felt morale rise at their valiant charge.
But one moved before the little stars.
Chiririririt!
A shadow's white-and-black blades whipped through the air diagonally, swiftly erasing undead.
"That’s...?!"
The Lichtenauer Martial Clan's second young lord.
Ian Lichtenauer.