Chapter Seven: A Moment of Peril

The chieftain of the Wild Wolf Tribe, Battle Wolf, was leading more than six hundred jackal-men and over nine hundred goblin fodder at a steady pace toward Sun Li’s encampment. Due to the differences in stamina among the beastmen, the entire column was drawn out and ragged, with only Battle Wolf’s own clan maintaining something resembling order, at least managing to march together without stragglers. As for the goblins, they were scattered here and there, hardly resembling an army marching to war; it looked more like a group heading out for a picnic. If not for Battle Wolf’s formidable intimidation—deserters faced skinning, tendon extraction, and other cruel punishments (even getting lost counted as desertion)—keeping two-thirds of their numbers intact upon arrival was considered a sign of well-trained troops.

While the goblins struggled to keep up, a group of disheveled dwarfs came rushing from the front. When Battle Wolf heard that his vanguard had been utterly annihilated, with barely one-tenth managing to escape, rage erupted within him, and he unleashed his fury upon the routed survivors, beating them mercilessly. After all, they were his private assets, too precious to kill outright.

As the furious beastmen quick-marched toward the camp, even Sun Li was surprised. “Since when did these beastmen move so efficiently? They’re almost as fast as regular troops!” He was only slightly startled, though; his heart remained calm, just as before. With archers in front, spearmen behind, and swordsmen on both flanks, he planned to open with several volleys, then order the spearmen to charge. Sun Li felt the battle would be over quickly, heralding the joyful moment of harvesting heads.

Under the beast chieftain’s enraged howls, the beastmen abandoned any attempt at probing defenses, ordering the goblins into a reckless charge. This tactic, reminiscent of the Japanese “boar rush,” was so straightforward that even the simple-minded beastmen executed it with surprising proficiency.

But no matter how practiced the goblins were at charging, without the Bloodlust spell, they easily broke under two rounds of arrow volleys. Sun Li, distracted, hadn’t noticed that the main force of over six hundred jackal-men stemmed the goblin rout with a wall of bodies, driving them forward into continued attack. Trapped between death ahead and death behind, some goblins even turned around, suicidally returning to the battlefield.

Thus, when Sun Li ordered an all-out assault, the spearmen collided head-on with the returning goblin hordes, sparking fierce combat. Fortunately, the disciplined spearmen held their formation, advancing steadily at a stunning exchange rate of one to five. This reassured Sun Li, who moved forward behind the archers for a better view. With melee troops locked in combat, the archers could no longer fire for fear of friendly casualties, so they stood at the rear like a ceremonial guard, watching the battle unfold.

As the goblin numbers dwindled rapidly, Battle Wolf finally showed a rare moment of cleverness, leading his six hundred jackal-men warriors in a flanking assault from the left wing. Towering over two meters tall, Battle Wolf and his muscular, knife-wielding warriors swept through the forty swordsmen on the left like chopping vegetables, slaughtering them despite fierce resistance. The overwhelming numbers kept the jackal-men’s charge relentless, and when the spearmen on the left barely had time to turn their spears, the jackal-men’s blades descended upon them.

With their superior strength, the jackal-men followed their chieftain—whose prowess rivaled that of a low-level knight—quickly punching a hole in the spearmen’s ranks. Especially around Battle Wolf, no spearman could withstand him for even a moment. The only thing preventing total collapse was the system soldiers’ innate fearlessness.

Seeing the tide turn, Sun Li made a snap decision: all archers were ordered to move quickly, rushing forward for point-blank shots at the jackal-men. Three hundred archers loosed a volley at close range, felling nearly two hundred jackal-men in a single round. Battle Wolf, eyes blood-red, let out a furious howl, rallying his fifty elite guards—the tribe’s strongest warriors—and charged directly at the archers.

Unfortunately, the rigid archers, focused solely on firing at the main jackal-men force, were unprepared for the sudden assault from Battle Wolf’s squad. After a second volley downed over a hundred more jackal-men, Battle Wolf crashed into their ranks like a tiger among sheep. Equipped only with daggers, the archers were helpless against Battle Wolf’s knight-level combat prowess, sacrificing their lives to delay this formidable enemy.

On the left wing, Battle Wolf’s departure eased the pressure on the spearmen. Though the formation was broken, they managed to hold against the remaining jackal-men, whose ranks included women and youths, lacking the strength of their male counterparts.

The elite spearmen seized the opportunity, abandoning the left wing to lead over a hundred into a full-scale massacre of the goblins. By now, the goblins had suffered nearly half casualties, and, weakened, were finally routed by the charge of the elite spearmen.

It must be said that for goblins, who typically collapsed after losing a tenth of their numbers, holding out this long was nothing short of miraculous. But when the last shred of morale snapped, their rout was complete—they had lost all will to fight.

At this moment, the intelligence boost of the elite spearmen proved invaluable. Newly promoted spearman commander Ryan, leading the hundred plus elite troops who had leveled up through combat, abandoned pursuit of the fleeing goblins and pivoted to attack the jackal-men from the side and rear.

By now, the spearmen had suffered nearly half casualties, with less than three hundred remaining, and only a hundred engaged in desperate combat with the jackal-men. Every moment saw more spearmen killed. If the archers hadn’t decimated half the jackal-men with their volleys, the spearmen would have been wiped out already. At this critical juncture, the sudden assault from the elite spearmen on the jackal-men’s flank precipitated a rapid collapse. Some jackal-men even knelt in surrender, though the spearmen, bound by their training, had no concept of taking prisoners.

Battle Wolf, intoxicated by slaughter, saw his main force destroyed and realized that victory was impossible with just his fifty-man squad. A desperate idea flashed through his mind: capture the king to win the war. His gaze locked onto Sun Li, who stood nearby, stunned by the battlefield’s carnage.

Since Battle Wolf had begun his killing spree among the archers, Sun Li—the reclusive lord—had been utterly dazed, clinging to hope for a miracle rather than fleeing. The chaos made it impossible for him to issue effective commands; instinctively, he summoned the forty swordsmen on the right who hadn’t yet entered the fray to protect him. With sixty soldiers wielding kite shields and longswords at his side, he felt a slight sense of security and continued to watch the real battlefield before him, the likes of which he’d never seen in his previous life. Flesh and blood flew, severed limbs littered the ground, leaving him deeply shaken and oblivious to the danger he was still in.

Just then, Battle Wolf, leading his fifty elite warriors, charged toward Sun Li with murderous intent!