Chapter 76 - 72: Knight vs. Beetle (Part 2)
Chapter 76: Chapter 72: Knight vs. Beetle (Part 2)
Fifty meters.
For a Level 4 Knight like Ola Stonebeard, that was a distance he could cross in three frantic heartbeats.
His lungs worked like a red-hot bellows, each exhalation a plume of scalding white mist.
The power of his [Unyielding Aura] surged through his veins, flooding every muscle, driving out all exhaustion and leaving only pure, seething battle lust.
"In the name of Stonebeard!"
Ola let out a heaven-shaking roar. His speed surged again, his body becoming a living sledgehammer.
The beetles in his path didn’t even have time to execute their rigid tactics before his furious ax blade tore them into a spray of blood and gore.
[Reckless Charge]!
Ola held his battle-ax out before him, his body nearly scraping the ground as he bulldozed through every obstacle in his path with brute, unreasonable force.
He paid no mind to the monsters he sent scattering in his wake.
His eyes were fixed on a single figure.
The young man who, from the moment the battle began, had sat leisurely upon his horse like a mere spectator.
Velin Klein.
Forty meters.
Ola saw him finally still that damned pen, calmly close his notebook, and tuck it into the leather pouch on his saddle.
Thirty meters.
He saw Velin look up, his wine-red eyes calmly meeting his own.
There was no fear, no panic.
That gaze felt unnervingly familiar to Ola—it held affirmation, gratitude, and regret.
It was a look Ola had often seen on the battlefield. He had even given it to many others himself.
It was the look one gave when bidding farewell to an officer being discharged for disability.
A humiliation more piercing than any defeat stabbed viciously into Ola’s heart.
’He... he actually thinks I’m... useless?!’
"You bastard... DIE!" He channeled all his fury and power into the battle-ax in his hands.
Twenty meters.
In one more breath, he would cleave that arrogant head—and that damned composure along with it—in two!
He saw Velin raise a hand.
It was a clean, slender hand, one more suited for holding a pen than a sword.
Then, the hand turned toward him and, gently, made an upward-lifting gesture.
It was as if he were lifting an invisible feather.
Ola’s charge faltered.
Not because he wanted to stop.
The very ground beneath his feet had come alive.
Several green vines, thick as a baby’s arm, burst from the soft earth without warning.
They grew at a visible, frantic pace, instantly wrapping around his feet.
"What the hell is this!"
The moment they ensnared him, Ola’s Spiritual Power erupted. With a furious roar, he shattered the vines to pieces.
He didn’t break stride. "Is that paltry little trick all you’ve got?!"
But with every step, more vines erupted from the ground, lashing at his ankles.
"Get off!" he roared, swinging his battle-ax in a wide arc.
[Tornado Slash]!
The sharp blade sheared through the vines, sending a spray of green and dark-green leaves flying.
It was meaningless, however.
For every vine he severed, three, then five more would burst from the ground at an even greater speed.
The new vines were tougher, their bark covered in a layer of obsidian-like chitin.
Ola’s battle-ax could no longer sever them in a single strike.
The vines multiplied, and in the blink of an eye, they had swarmed past his knees and were coiling around his waist.
A massive force pulled him from below.
Ola’s body began to rise into the air, completely beyond his control.
"No!" he roared in defiance, hacking wildly with his ax, but the vines grew far faster than he could destroy them.
They coiled around his arms, tearing the battle-ax he cherished as his own life from his grasp.
They bound his legs, rendering his formidable, hard-won skills utterly useless.
Countless vines wrapped him in a massive cocoon.
One meter.
Five meters.
Ten meters.
As everyone on the battlefield watched, the defiant shouts of Shiyan Town’s peerlessly valiant Rock Breaker grew fainter and fainter.
All that remained was the CREAKING groan of his armor as the vines crushed it.
His Knights watched in horror, their formation falling into disarray.
As for the black beetles, they abandoned their previous tactics at that very moment.
Their squads reformed into columns, becoming a black tide that swarmed from all sides, cutting off and surrounding the thirty Knights who had lost their leader.
A few scattered screams, and then, silence.
...
A deathly silence fell over the camp. The two hundred-odd conscripts were frozen in place as if struck by a collective Petrification Skill, their faces masks of terror and bewilderment.
Kane and Mo’er, the two unlucky Pioneer Knights, stood with their mouths agape, a strangled gasping sound escaping their throats. They couldn’t utter a single word.
What had they just witnessed?
A war? No, that wasn’t a war.
That was... what it was no longer mattered.
The lord of Newly Town, in a manner they couldn’t possibly comprehend, had casually and utterly crushed the power another lord had prided himself on.
Then he’d hung him in the sky as if displaying a war trophy.
CLANG.
Someone’s shield slipped from their grasp and fell to the ground with a sharp ring.
The sound was a signal.
The stunned crowd instantly erupted into a massive commotion.
But this time, it wasn’t a rout.
THUD.
First, a conscript near the edge of the battlefield went weak in the knees and dropped to the ground, kowtowing repeatedly in the direction of Newly Town.
He was followed by a second, then a third.
Vast swathes of soldiers dropped their weapons and fell to their knees in submission.
"Is... is he really a Pioneer Knight?" Mo’er’s voice trembled like a leaf in the autumn wind.
Kane said nothing. He just stared blankly at the figure dangling high in the distance, then back at the young man who remained perfectly calm on his horse.
’Suddenly,’ he thought, ’being extorted for those ten Golden Suns doesn’t feel so humiliating anymore.’
...
"Holy fuck..." The harpoon in Sea Wolf’s hand fell to the ground with a CLATTER. He rubbed his eyes hard, then slapped himself across the face.
"HSSS... That hurts! Dammit, so I’m not dreaming!"
The sailors around him looked as if they’d seen a ghost, their jaws practically on the ground.
"C-Cap’n..." a young sailor stammered. "Th-that big bearded fellow... how’d he get up in the sky?"
Sea Wolf smacked him on the back of the head, spittle flying as he spoke.
"You’re asking me? Who the hell am I supposed to ask! Is this how you fight a war? That pretty boy—no, I mean, His Lordship—did he draw a sword? Fire an arrow? No! He just waved his hand, and the ground sprouted like hair on a troll’s arse, and WHOOSH, up the man went!"
Another sailor, shouldering an anchor, muttered, "Bloody hell, that’s more wicked than a sea witch’s curse! We who live on the waves, our biggest fear is some unholy thing getting tangled on the hull. But this? This is something else, growing right on a man..."
"Enough of the damn chatter!" Sea Wolf’s expression shifted rapidly.
The ordinary crew might not know any better, but as the captain of a flagship of the Golden Sail Commerce Association, he’d been around and seen a thing or two.
To instantly neutralize a Level 4 Knight... anyone who understands Magic knows just how profound that is!
Fear, shock, and dawning terror twisted inside him. "You all hear me? The nature of this job has changed."
"We’re not here to rescue some besieged Knight! We’re here... We’re here to pay our respects to a big shot we can’t afford to piss off."
He snatched his harpoon from the ground, shouldered it, and plastered a pained smile on his face—one that looked worse than if he were crying.
’Caroline, oh Caroline... you disastrous woman...’ Sea Wolf wailed internally. ’Do you have any idea what kind of person you’ve provoked? In the future, I’m afraid it won’t just be you—he’s going to devour the entire Golden Sail Commerce Association!’