"General Argent, look up there!" One of the Wyvern Riders was wiping his sweat as he pointed to the where they saw a floating platform being dropped by a large metallic bird. Everyone stopped their digging for a moment and watched it drop down towards them. The goblin riders were elite warriors, yet not one of them thought that this dirty manual work of digging sh.e.l.l sc.r.a.pes was beneath them, since they all understood how important it was for the upcoming battle. It was not intended for them but for the incoming goblin army which might have some use to it.
One might ask what a small company of 50 goblins could do to contribute to the upcoming battle? Why were they wasting their strength for sh.e.l.l sc.r.a.pes which were equivalent to graves? The answer was to present some sort of goblin military force presence when there was none to begin with against the incoming Orc army. To show that the goblins were at least prepared in their defences and not to be underestimated by the Orcs. Yet at the same time, showing weakness while holding on to the surprise element of the flying units. This should give Orcs the perception the goblins could be crushed easily causing them to be more reckless and careless when the goblins actually had a trick under their sleeves.
The Das.h.i.+ng Wyverns and the incoming cultivators were at least 400-500 metres away from the bordering town of Gob Gob Bu and the militia in that area had already started evacuating the innocents away from the fight. The militia was also commanded by General Argent to sh.o.r.ed up defences by creating the makes.h.i.+ft barricades in the town in case the Das.h.i.+ng Wyverns could not delay the Orcs.
The wyverns, those flying lizards were on standby at least 50 metres away based on the mind to mind connection that they had with their riders. It was part of General Argent"s plan to use the wyverns as a surprise element against the orcs but whenever the riders needed the Wyverns to swoop in, it would be possible to connect to them from such a distance.
General Argent also dropped his shovel and looked up as the floating platform slowed down. Similar to Jin, these humanoids were wearing the masks of animals. Most jumped off the floating metallic platform except for one who was standing at the side holding a bar. Her clothes closely resembled the style of the eastern goblins and she was wearing a full pure white mask compared to the others. Argent was aware that they were humans according to Jin but he kept the promise of hiding the fact that such reinforcements a.s.sisted the goblins.
Piercestriker placed his shovel down in the earth and greeted the cultivators and proceeded to chat with them. His father watched the son, who did not seem to care that those were humans and Argent realised that his son most likely had seen more than what this world had to offer. (He did not know Piercestriker travelled to more than one world.)
"Master Jin brought you guys to the front line?" Piercestriker asked while Zhi Nu requested him for his spear as he conversed with the cultivators.
"Yeah, Mission briefing said that the orcs might be coming soon. We a.s.sume it"s the scouting group that is ahead of the main Orc Army." Xiong Da replied while surveying the surrounding valleys. It was definitely a good spot for the orcs to flank them if they caught on fast else it was definitely a viable spot for the goblin army to hide and ambush orcs. This particular valley seemed to be a double edged sword.
"There seem to be two scouts per team approaching on each side of the cliffs. The rest of the scouting party are approaching from the centre." s.h.i.+ Zuo took out his phone to check the map of the current region via the Pandamonium app.
"The usual I guess? Bin Bin and Jia Jia as a team to the left, me and lazy monkey s.h.i.+ Zuo will be moving to the right." Luo Bo suggested and they agreed to leave Xiong Da, a heavy hitter, at the centre with Ruo Ying.
"It"d best to not let them see the wyverns this early. We want to appear weak in our defences, so that we can surprise them later on." Argent shared his opinion with Team Hippo and they nodded their heads in acknowledgment.
"We will try our best to deter and if possible kill them." Bin Yong said as he started to sprint forth to the left.
"Do you need me to follow any of them, Father?" Piercestriker asked and he shook his head.
"You can defend the frontline with us for now. We will be ready to intercept at a moment"s notice." Argent patted his son"s back while Zhi Nu had been making some adjustments to Piercestriker"s spear returned it to him.
"Master Jin noticed that your spear was in poor condition after the fight against the Black Disaster. He requested me to come here to repair it. Master Jin wanted me to give this to you, too. " Zhi Nu said as she pa.s.sed a shorter one handed spear to the son of the Spear General. She had temporarily repaired the spear by weaving her strings on the damaged areas of the spear. (Especially the area which was nearly broken by the halberd strike by Nubwort, the Black Disaster.)
Her strings were as tough, if not stronger than modern metal compositions, sewn at the damaged area of the spear. She was able to do it skilfully due to much acc.u.mulated experience in that regard. Zhi Nu had been utilising this skill to repair the metal armour plates of Mechataur and hence its armour plating was able to withstand the repeated attacks of the mechanical spider it fought in the Dungeon World. However, even Jin was surprised that she could weave metal as easy as weaving cloth, her potential was deemed limitless by doing that and he wondered if her metal weaving could be infused into clothes, strengthening them while still remaining flexible enough.
The spear that Piercestriker received seemed to have a mechanical component to it and upon closer inspection, it looked like a duplicate form of the Gearbox enhanced spear that Piercestriker haphazardly put together during the fight against the Black Disaster. The System had copied the data of the fight and already placed it into production. However to facilitate prolong use, it made it slightly lighter and shorter as compared to the current one that Piercestriker was holding. "As a spare." Zhi Nu said but in actual fact, the System was rewarding Piercestriker for a job well done.
The gearbox spear could be shortened to the length of a baton and Piercestriker placed it at his waist as a backup weapon while he heard rumbling noises from afar. "Get into position!" General Argent told his goblins as he too hid himself except for the two masked humanoids.
"Ahhh these humans!" Argent thought to himself as he a.s.sisted the goblins with sheets of camouflage that they obtained from the bordering town of Gob Gob Bu.
"It"s okay, we will be the decoy. Besides, I need to exercise some steam off from work." Xiong Da told the concerned general. Argent nodded his head reluctantly since they did not follow the plans and hid under the sheet of camouflage while pointing his gun towards the front. The rest of the company had their crossbows lock and loaded, ready to fire at a moment notice.
The Orc scouting party was travelling at a fast speed on their war boars to see two large humanoid figures at the centre of the road. The party immediately a.s.sumed those two were travellers. "A bulky male and a slender female with chains on her hands ahead. Probably a slave. What should we do Leader?" One of the scout orcs asked their leader for their next actions while slowing their war boars a little.
"Heh, what else? Kill the man, grab the girl and enjoy a little break before announcing our arrival to the town of Gob Gob Bu. We have been travelling without entertainment for a long time." The leader answered as he licked his lips looking at the slender but well toned legs and b.u.t.t from afar.
"Urgh, somehow I can feel an extremely lecherous vibe from the orcs." Ruo Ying s.h.i.+vered a little and Xiong Da sn.i.g.g.e.red. She knew how others had looked at her with Xiong Da and talked behind their back. She could even sense those prying eyes looking at her body without any reserve which made her feel very uncomfortable. Previously when she was with Ji Ao rarely anyone dared to look at her that way. After all it was known that her criminal then boyfriend crippled those who did. Xiong Da was not the type to resort to such means.
However, Xiong Da gave her personal coaching with regards to confidence by a.s.sisting her with her cultivation style on a daily basis after their honeymoon. Due to the busy work schedule both of them shared, they did not necessarily take part in Jin"s dungeons but the both of them made an effort to train and exercise at least an hour each day together.
This made Ruo Ying able to face others with more confidence. Not to mention she was rea.s.sured through these training that she had a rather fierce bodyguard with her all the time. He might not look the part, but she had witnessed the capabilities of her enraged Hippo.
"Hmph! How dare they try to ogle and feast on my girl"s image." Xiong Da turned his sn.i.g.g.e.r to a smirk as he fetched his warclub from his storage ring and swung it over his shoulder. "War Club Art, Hippo Ground Pounding Smas.h.!.+" Xiong Da roared as his chi was released from his body and was felt by almost every goblin hiding. They never felt such strong magical aura from what seemed to be a warrior. (Mainly because Jin had yet to reveal his own chi aura to them in the previous fight.)
"Darling I cannot let you do all the work. Chain Art, Void Strike of The Egret!" Ruo Ying said with a smile on her face. The chains on her hands unrolled and unlike Xiong Da who was waiting for the Orcs to come closer, Ruo Ying"s Void Strike enabled the chains to extend magically at fast speeds, striking the legs of the unlucky war boars. This caused the front few orcs to fall forward while most of the remaining scouting party managed to manoeuvre their war boars in time to prevent a direct crash. The Orcs flew forward from the crash. They entered the range of Xiong Da"s war club and with a simple descend, their bodies were utterly crushed under the weight of the weapon. b.l.o.o.d.y and bone fragments scatter around the surroundings and Xiong Da shook his war club to remove the excess remains that stuck to his weapon.
The Orcs on the war boars immediately surrounded them after what had happened and they gave out a war cry as if to avenge their fallen comrades. But it was actually a signal to the nearby scouts at the cliffs to provide support. Unfortunately, there was no response and Xiong Da could only laugh loudly when his phone started to ring. There was apparently a voice chat in the Pandamonium App which he did not know until now when he picked up to answer the phone.
"Left All Clear." Bing Yong whispered into the phone as he kept his presence hidden to the scouting party in the centre of the valley.
"Right Clear too. Bash away Hippo." Luo Bo was still used to calling them by their code names for anonymity sake when she joined in the group voice chat. The Orc Scout Leader realised that someone or something had silenced their men on the cliffs. However it did not matter at the moment. Right now, he felt insulted that he was bested by some fat adventurer with his slave chained girl.
"Let me pla- erm no let me punish them. Hippo." Ruo Ying slammed her chains down and her Hippo stepped aside to enjoy the upcoming showcase of her skills (Technically he couldn"t really move anywhere else since they surrounded them.)
"If that slave girl wants to fight us then so be it. Show her what us mighty Orcs can really do!" The leader of the Orc scouting party shouted and ordered the front two orcs to charge towards her.
"Maybe, you should not tell me which Orc is moving towards me. Makes the thing a little less of a challenge that way." Ruo Ying rolled her chains up to her arms while making sure it was tightened and waited for the two orcs on war boars to charge with their spears pointing at her.
"It is all about the timing!" Ruo Ying immediately used her two open palms to intercept the incoming spears. Her Esthetical Egret Style allowed her to elegantly move between the two spears while her command of chi enabled the chains to wrap the spear poles like a snake. By intercepting the spears, she made use of the incoming kinetic force and Ruo Ying leaped into the air to prevent herself from colliding with the war boars. The chains that wrapped around the spears held on tight, causing the spears following the direction of Ruo Ying"s leap.
The orcs who were holding on their spears tightly found their hands being pushed upwards because of the sudden entrapment by the chains of Ruo Ying. After which, the change in momentum made the orcs fall backwards but the war boars were still charging on towards Xiong Da who used the war clubs to slam them to one side.
The scout leader did not stay idle not wanting to see his comrades die in front of him. He stood on his war boar and leapt towards Ruo Ying but she pulled on the chains that were still being wrapped with the spear while using her leg to push the arm of the orc away from the spear.
Like a whip, she unleashed the chains with the spear wrapped around towards the leaping Orc scout leader and used her chi to untangle the spear, granting the spear freedom to approach the enemy with no mercy.
"You underestimate me!" The Orc Scout Leader deflected the incoming spear and the subsequent one which Ruo Ying threw later. However, this broke his leaping charge and he was on equal ground with Ruo Ying.
"Let"s see how you deal with melee attacks!" The Orc Scout Leader purposely threw his sword to her as a distraction while rus.h.i.+ng in to attack at close range, disabling the chain"s potential.
"Have you not learnt yet?" Ruo Ying now focused her chi again and this time she activated the temporary inscription she chose during the mission debriefing in the C130 plane. The temporary inscription enabled her to have more control with her chains, making it straight and work like batons with which she clobbered the unarmed orc.
Yet, the orc did not flinch and pushed forward attempting to throw a jab to her abdomen area. If not for her Egret Style, she would have been unable to evade it properly. That made her realise that he might have some physical resistance with his tough skin. The Orc Scout Leader grinned quietly as he increased the pressure by throwing even more punches towards Ruo Ying.
"Stepping in." Xiong Da sent a voice transmission to Ruo Ying as he felt this was not the time to suffer any wounds for Ruo Ying if they were to stay here for half a day. Ruo Ying acknowledged the intention and hurled her chains towards Xiong Da"s war club. He then pulled her in time before a punch could connect yet at that moment, the lethal force of the blow left a deep scratch at her shoulder.
"This Humanoids only look tough, they still blee-" A sudden impact was felt at his side as the Orc Scout Leader was trying to boast. Nonetheless, he managed to block in barely in time and understood that the bird masked girl used the change of momentum to throw the war club at him. The throw was not that painful and it was still tolerable by his high physical resistance until the Fat guy disappeared.
In actual fact, he sped himself up fast with chi and grabbed onto his war club to finish the job. "This is what you deserve for injuring my girl!" The bloodl.u.s.t eminating out from Xiong Da was intense as he grappled the Orc Scout Leader with his bare hands to the ground and slugged the war club into his face. The Orc Scout leader managed to cover with his hands. Hoping that his metal gloves would protect him, but the impact made him quickly regret it. His arms were broken beyond repair and his metal plated gloves were bent along with his bones.
The other remaining Scout Orcs rushed towards Xiong Da as they attempted to save their Orc Leader but three of the Scout Orcs were killed almost in an instant before Xiong Da or Ruo Ying could touch them. A Kunai, an arrow and a magical shot which dissipated the entire head away had done them in. After which a volley of arrows suddenly shot out from the "ground", making sure the rest of scouting party were killed except for one. The remaining Orc was not killed but strung up by Zhi Nu before the attack began.
"Looks like our goblin allies and friends backed us up." Xiong Da smiled while he returned his full attention to the Orc Scout Leader and slammed his war club into its face.
Seeing that the situation calmed down, the goblins had come out of the camouflage sheets and looked at the captured Orc scout that they spared. General Argent then commanded his goblins to put the Orc Remains on stakes and placed them at the front as a sign of provocation and warning. (Apparently, the System noted the situation from the monitoring rings the cultivators were wearing and had not processed the bodies for capture yet. In the worst case scenario, the System would just ignore those corpse as there were many more to choose from.)
The Orc who was tied like he was spider food began to squirm when Xiong Da approached him along with the still freshly bloodied war club. "Tell us more about you guys. The size of your force? Who is leading you? And how much time until the main force arrives! Any unfavourable answer will lead this club to a particular extremity of your body." Xiong Da threatened him while pointing to his legs and arms.
"I will say! I will say!" The Orc was surprisingly easy to break but considering what he had seen, he"d rather live than be subjected to such cruelty. "The Thunder Army is being led by the Exalted Avatar of Syldra, the Purple Thunder. All our superiors have been equipped with thunder related equipment." He figured that confessing to these goblins and humanoids who were rumoured to be kind was his best choice to keep his life. Despite their threats they would surely let their prisoners live after getting the information. Besides, what could they possibly do in the short time until the main force arrives.. Their destiny would be to die in the hands of the Thunder Army.
"Anything else?" Xiong Da asked and the Orc swore that he was just a cog in the Orc machinery and knew nothing more. General Argent wanted his men to perform some quick interrogation techniques but Ruo Ying stopped them.
"It is fine. Let him go." Xiong Da said as he looked at General Argent and they unwilling let him off. The Orc thanked them openly but secretly cursed them at the bottom of his heart as he took his war boar and started to run away.
"Luo Bo, finish him." The Pandamonium App Voice Chat was still on and Xiong Da used his phone like a walkie talkie.
"Was waiting for you to say that." Luo Bo took a special arrow she had bought previously and aimed at the back of the running Orc. Despite the speed the War Boar was going, Luo Bo"s Illusive Rabbit style gave her the intuition to predict how much pull was needed to shoot a precise shot.
"The main army is about 1km away and the speed the war boar is travelling…I"d say set it at 175 seconds." s.h.i.+ Zuo was at her side doing some rough calculations via the Pandamonium Map App.
"Okay, Timer set. Shooting." Luo Bo adjusted certain parts of the arrow and later increased the position of her current bow angle higher so that she could achieve a longer range and nock her bow with the special arrow before loosing it. The arrow was slung over the cliffs and it pierced the war boar, causing it to grunt and huff. The escaping Orc laughed at his fortune while steadying his war boar and continued to run towards the main orc army.
"Luo Bo, did you just miss?" Xiong Da who entrusted Luo Bo for doing her job, was shocked that she was not able to kill the Orc Scout before it got away. Heck this was the first time he had ever seen her miss her target so far.
"Ahh, young Pandawan, you have no sense of war tactics." Luo Bo teased him over the voice chat and that was when Jia Le got worked up.
"Rabbit! Did you use that arrow?!" Jia Le asked over her phone with amazement and Luo Bo could only laugh.
"Indeed! It was exactly one of the scenarios we talked about during lunch break!" Luo Bo guffawed and s.h.i.+ Zuo shook his head in dismay.
"Why do I continue to fall for this girl." He thought to himself as he explained the entire thing to the rest of the confused group until they finally understood what Luo Bo had done.
"Oh my, you are one terrifying archer." Ruo Ying meant that as a compliment and Luo Bo took it as such although the others understood the underlying meaning.
"In any case, your group has successfully allowed us not to sustain any causalities and showed some of your abilities. I am thoroughly impressed and no doubt the comrades of the Panda Master, if I get the animal correctly. My son told me otherwise." General Argent praised with some relief in his tone.
"However if it really is the Thunder Army we will have to fight then these sh.e.l.l sc.r.a.pes are for naught. Unfortunately my Das.h.i.+ng Wyverns have the worst compatibility fighting against magical thunder units. I was a.s.suming we would be against the Wind Army since the Avatar of Garuda would surely wish for revenge." Argent was talking but only the goblins understood what he meant and not the cultivators.
"What is this avatar thing?" Xiong Da asked and General Argent remembered that these comrades might not know about it too, so he explained them as High ranking generals like him with mighty magical powers. Meanwhile, the rest of the cultivators regrouped to the centre of the valley too.
"If you are unable to fight against the incoming army, do we need to retreat to the border town since they have fortifications?" Bin Yong suggested and General Argent agreed that would be a good choice.
"Technically, the plan was to delay them as much as possible. If the Thunder Army reaches the border town, well the result is still…" Argent began discussing certain plans with his captain and the cultivators while he sent out a Wyvern messenger to check how far their own reinforcement army was. The Das.h.i.+ng Wyverns had pledged to fight to the death but Argent felt uneasy. If possible, he did not wish to waste this particularly elite company of his. They had been with him for years and the potential for them in the upcoming campaign was vast.
"I have already notified Master Jin about the current developments, he said that he would send more reinforcements on our way as well and he has prepared some surprises …oh wow that was fast." Zhi Nu was informing the cultivators when they heard a C130 plane flying low to drop something off. It was a fairly large supply crate and most of them had to make way for the crate to land properly on the ground.
Once it landed, they removed the parachute as quickly as possible and noticed that there was a note stuck at the side of the crate. "Have fun with this! This is the first one ever field in this raid dungeon and you guys have the opportunity to be the pioneers of using it. Very user friendly to use, the controls are rather automated once you get the hang of it. I made sure that even a goblin can pilot it with sufficient training! DO NOT LET THE ORCS HAVE IT or I will personally deduct all your points! Or maybe panda medals - Jin."
"What is it inside that made him so agitat- WOOOOW!" Bin Yong went mad when the crate automatically opened from all sides once they removed the note.
Inside it was a M4 Sherman Tank from the World War 2 Era.
Team Hippo never thought they would ever be driving something like this at all. At best they a.s.sumed if there was one in the field, it most likely be an NPC. "Holy s.h.i.+t! We are going to drive and fight in that?! This might really change the course of the battle…wait a minute this is made of metal right?! Aren"t we gonna be fried like roasted meat when the Thunder Army uses their -" Bin Yong hyped the thing and subsequently got dejected because of the Thunder Army. Yet, he got interrupted by Zhi Nu, saying that Master Jin had already taken that into account.
"Look here." Zhi Nu pressed on the metal plating and an inscription glowed all over the tank in blue. That feeling the aura emitted and the design of the inscription was no doubt the exact same resemblance of a thunder resistance inscription. Just a lot larger in size.
However, what amused the group more was the side of the metal plating. It had stickers of cartoonish animals of their style. The egret, monkey and rabbit were standing on the hippo while at the side of the hippo, there was a bellflower and a beetle holding on it. A very innocent looking sticker on a fearsome war machine.
"What is this metal thing? Some lost technology similar to those flying metal birds?" The goblin captain of the Das.h.i.+ng Wyvern asked with curiosity and some fear of the unknown.
"This." Xiong Da slammed his hand on the metal plating and it made an echoing sound. "This baby right here will delay the incoming Thunder Army that you are so scared of." Xiong Da smiled as he began formulating a quick battle plan with the Das.h.i.+ng Wyvern Captain and General Argent. The rest explored the functions of the M4 Sherman Tank, which they dubbed the "Mastodon."
Separately, the Orc Scout that was rus.h.i.+ng back to the main army was delighted that the Goblin and humanoids were stupid enough to let him leave. He purposely left the arrow on the war boar to show that he did not desert his unit and that he was injured. Fleeing while healthy was a war crime, but falling back after receiving an injury was still honorable.
The closer he got to the main army, the more he tried to look injured and scared. "LET ME THROUGH! I HAVE IMPORTANT INTEL!" The Orc scout shouted to announce as he was the sole survivor. The frontlines marching broke their formation slightly to allow the scout to run past them and to their commander.
"What exactly happened?! Where is your entire group?" A higher ranking officer was shouting his questions even before the Orc Scout could stop his war boar and get off it.
"Sir, I am afraid I have bad things to rep-." The Scout Orc pretend to pant a bit even though he was on the war boar all along.
"Obviously! Your entire group is missing! Stop wasting my time!" The officer shouted back at the Orc Scout and it was visible the rest of the orcs were busybody as they tried to inch closer to listen to the conversation while still being in formation. The other Orc officers noticed it ordered them to stay in formation while approached the Orc Scout to listen to what he got to say.
"There was little goblin presence but -" The Orc Scout got down from his war boar and accidentally broke the arrow that was on the War Boar. All of a sudden, there was a loud booming explosion that took out the officers and the Orc Scout along with the Orcs around them. The rest stood there were horrified. Was there a long range fire magician around the corner?! The Orc magicians immediately started their sensor magic while the frontline orcs immediately went into a fighting stance.
Most of the normal orcs involved in the explosion became pieces and one or two heavily armour orcs survived the blast. All of the high ranking officers wore armour with magical defence which was able to withstand the blast but a number of them still lost arms or legs from the sudden bombing. The Orc Healers hurried but the initial confusion caused delay resulting a few officers to die from the loss of blood especially from the legs. This explosion had indeed crippled the chain of command of the advancing Thunder Army.
Luo Bo initially just wanted the orc scout to explode near the main army to create chaos. If she were to find out that her explosion killed multiple high ranking officers all at once which would cause the main Thunder Army to delay their advance, she would be boasting to the group for months to come.