Chapter 585: The Battlefield Butcher

"Did we escape?"

"For now. But Death is still one who could appear beside me at any moment."

Even so, Loren didn't panic. His Intuition would give him a warning.

Even if Loren were fast asleep, the moment he sensed danger, he would jolt awake.

All in all, Loren wasn't too worried about Death. When she made a move against him, she was clearly hesitant. Though she didn't say it out loud, deep down she still acknowledged Loren as her master.

Loren had seen her kill others before. That was a clean chop without hesitation, nothing like just now, when she had the leisure to show Loren her legs.

...

Until Loren reached the border, Death never appeared again. Perhaps it was simply because Loren had been flying in the sky the whole time.

"Let's rest here for a while. We may need to walk from here. We need to find that Battlefield Butcher and take his blade."

The border was very close to the battlefield, close enough that it had essentially reached the point of defending the city walls.

The Bountiful Church had received Loren's Hymn, and their strength had grown tremendously. Even fighting one against two, they could hold the upper hand.

There was another reason the Bountiful followers' combat effectiveness had risen: Loren had killed Simone (the leader of the childless cat-loving women) ahead of schedule, which had greatly boosted the morale of the Bountiful followers.

According to the original course of events, the Plague Believers should have breached the Bountiful followers' city gates, and the Bountiful followers should have been forced to cede territory and pay reparations.

But now, not only had the Bountiful followers held off the Plague Believers' assault, they had even turned around and pushed all the way to the Church of Pain's doorstep...

Normally, before soldiers went to war, they would receive a flurry of breakup letters, watching the people they wanted to protect throw themselves into the enemy's arms. That crushed their morale, made them forget what they were fighting to protect, and led to a total collapse, even surrender without a fight.

However, Loren wasn't worried about the situation changing too dramatically.

Knowing the Bountiful Church's nature, there was definitely more than one Simone there.

Loren killed Simone, but more Simones would step up. It was only a matter of time.

This wasn't a Simone problem. It was a Bountiful Church problem.

In a sense, this was even more terrifying than the Plague Church's virus.

Unfortunately, before leaving, Loren had told them how to solve the Zombie Virus problem, but he hadn't told them how to solve this kind of problem.

Actually, the solution was simple. Just let those women actually go to the battlefield. It was just that the Bountiful Church might not think of it.

...

Even though the Bountiful Church's army was already at the city gates, the civilians on the Church of Pain's side still hadn't evacuated. They were still working hard, using people to replace horses, replace oxen, replace donkeys.

Many of the carriages forcibly conscripted for the army were pulled by people.

The ground was already covered in bloodstains, left behind by those pulling the carriages.

Just moments ago, the Church of Pain had won a great victory. Under the Battlefield Butcher's leadership, they had used five hundred men to repel an enemy force of two thousand.

The Followers of Pain had lost three hundred. The Bountiful followers had lost eight hundred.

It was a resounding victory, but no one was happy about it, because half of their own casualties had been killed by the Battlefield Butcher.

He showed no distinction between friend and foe when he killed. And yet, he only charged with the army.

The area around the military camp was filled with wounded soldiers. The Followers of Pain's method of treating wounds was simple: find a nail, nail the severed limb back together, then wait for it to heal on its own.

If that method didn't work, then they could just die. No use hoping for better treatment.

On the battlefield, the gap between mages and ordinary soldiers wasn't that huge either. If they got surrounded, they'd die just the same. The mages of this world were glass cannons.

"When we head onto the battlefield later, be careful. Protect yourself. Even if you're invisible, you can easily get bumped and bruised..."

By this time, Loren was already standing on the city wall with Veronica. Before setting out, Loren first gave Veronica a few words of reassurance.

"Mhm mhm..."

Facing Loren's nagging, Veronica showed not a trace of impatience. She only felt warmth.

Her Arcane Ability had no combat power, she hadn't turned dark, and she had only just started learning magic. At most, her stats were much higher than an ordinary person's. It was only natural for Loren to worry about her.

"Alright, ready to head out..."

Just as Loren was about to depart, the sound of a war horn echoed through the camp:

"Heretics approach! Prepare to defend!"

At the herald's shout, the soldiers who could still stand began to muster. They didn't want to fight, but behind them, mages had their magic aimed at their backs.

On the battlefield, mages served more as an execution squad.

Their method of supervising was simple: they used magic to lift the suppression of pain from the soldiers. The sensation was so agonizing that calling it worse than death wouldn't be an exaggeration.

"How many on the other side this time?"

Just as the army was mustering, a towering man stepped forward.

His body was covered in scars. He was bald, standing a full two meters tall, with the rugged look of a hard man straight out of an American movie.

At his waist hung a longsword. Ordinary longswords were about a meter in length, but his was a full one point three meters, matching his height perfectly.

At the same time, the blade radiated a thick, murderous aura.

From the terror in the soldiers' eyes, it was clear this man was the Battlefield Butcher Loren was looking for.

"There are about three thousand on the other side..."

That was a horrifying number. The Bountiful followers' numbers could always overwhelm every other following.

"How many of us can still move?"

Facing such a terrifying number, the Battlefield Butcher felt no fear. Instead, he began to tremble with excitement.

"Fewer than six hundred..."

"Good. Then we all charge together. Let's slaughter them all in one go."

"Yes..."

Though the soldiers were terrified, they didn't dare resist. If anyone said no at this moment, there was no need for the supervising mages behind them to act. The Battlefield Butcher would cut them down with a single swing.

"Move out!"

The soldiers quickly finished mustering and filed out of the city gates, surrounding the Battlefield Butcher.

The Battlefield Butcher didn't care about formations. As long as the soldiers gathered around him, enough to keep him from being focus-fired, that was fine.

Most of these soldiers didn't have a single intact piece of armor. Their role was to be cannon fodder. Every tactic here revolved around the Battlefield Butcher.

And Loren had been following right beside the Battlefield Butcher the whole time, completely undetected.

"Master, we've found him. Should we stab him in the back, take the blade, and leave?"

"Forget it. I'm going to defeat him fair and square on the battlefield."

Killing him outright might cause the Church of Pain's army to collapse, letting the Bountiful Church win a crushing victory and upsetting the balance among the gods.

Loren wanted to stop this war where the combat power was completely mismatched, let the contradictions within the Bountiful Church erupt, and only then officially start the war.

Moreover, this was closely tied to another evolution path of the Blood War. Otherwise, Loren could have just stabbed the Battlefield Butcher to death, then used an AoE to cripple the Bountiful Church's army. That would have stopped the war just the same.

Loren looked ahead. As long as he crossed the battlefield, he would reach the God of Bountiful Harvest's territory, and then he would see Anna.

He wondered if she had grown thin from hunger...