Chapter 121: Round Two (1)
The war started with the appearance of a formidable siege weapon.
“That is...!”
It was a counterweight trebuchet, a type of catapult that used leverage to launch projectiles. The dark elves grew agitated at the appearance of a siege weapon they had never seen before. Even the chieftain who would have normally charged and knocked over the city gate was observing the city walls with his arms crossed.
“Do we have a backup plan?”
“At least cast a shield!”
“That’s a waste of magic!”
“We can’t just take hits!”
There was a conflict of opinions among the dark elves about how to protect the city walls against the trebuchet. Several orc soldiers were getting ready to launch the weapon as they struggled to place a huge rock on top of the trebuchet. Once the hook holding down the arm was removed, the weight on the other end would drop and cause the arm to pivot and propel the rock forward.
Crockta saw dozens of trebuchets spread out across the plains. With their arms drawn down, they were all loaded and ready to shoot at the city walls.
Crockta looked around at the defensive forces. He didn’t see any siege weaponry that could be pitted against it. Moreover, the orcs were too far to reach with arrows. If this continued, the rocks would relentlessly pound the city walls.
“The orcs are quite smart,” muttered Tiyo in a weary voice.
Then, a rock came flying toward them. The dark elves crouched over in fear.
Thud!
Bang!
Thump!
A shockwave reverberated throughout the fortress and shook the city walls. The dark elves were unable to maintain their balance and fell down.
Crockta glared off into the distance as he crouched over to maintain his balance. Calmahart was smirking. He raised his hand again, and the orcs rolled the huge rocks and placed them on the trebuchets.
The orcs were able to lift enormous rocks with relative ease thanks to their natural-born strength. They hurled rocks so large that the sight seemed like an exaggerated version of a battle scene from a medieval movie.
Crockta glared at Calmahart as he endured the shockwave. He then looked past Calmahart and glared at the sorcerer behind him. He was the one plotting all of this.
Suddenly, he met eyes with the sorcerer, but the rocks struck the wall and shook his balance. Crockta grabbed onto the walls around him.
“Ballista!”
The dark elves quickly put their ballista to use. They nocked an arrow as large as a spear on it and set it on fire. The trebuchets were their target.
Dozens of burning arrows and rocks crossed mid-air. The dark elves succeeded in burning down a few trebuchets, but rocks continued to come flying at them.
“Ahh!”
A rock charged at the railing and crushed a section of the wall, killing several orcs who had been standing there.
Dust rose in the air from the continued bombardment of rocks as the dark elves’ morale subsided.
Blurred by clouds of dust, Crockta saw something moving past his field of vision. The orcs’ troops had begun to advance.
“Attack!”
“The enemy is advancing!”
“Prepare to shoot!”
The commanders’ shouts echoed throughout the battlefield. The dark elves raised their arrows in unison, but they were unable to maintain their positions due to the continued bombardment from the trebuchets.
The orcs, who had successfully zeroed in on their target after repeated attempts, continuously aimed at the city wall’s railing.
Swoosh!
“Ah!”
A rock came flying next to Crockta and burst open a dark elf’s head. The rock continued past him and crushed the inside of the fortress. The walls of the building crumbled down.
“Dammit.” Crockta bit his lip. He hadn’t expected a fight like this. The orcs were calmly tackling Spinora instead of just charging at them.
But as soon as he had that thought, the course of the battle shifted.
“What was all that until now?” Crockta burst out into laughter as he watched the orcs charge with a huge ladder.
The genre seemed to have suddenly changed, but there was only one thing he had to do.
He pulled out his Ogre Slayer. He couldn’t even hear the sound of the orcs pinning the ladder against the wall amid all of the shockwaves and explosives. The commanders shouted at the top of their lungs, but their shouts were swallowed by the ringing in his ears.
One by one, the orcs began climbing up the ladder. Crockta peered down below the city wall.
Countless orcs were clinging to the wall like a swarm of ants climbing up an anthill. Their frenzied eyes were filled with the determination to break down the wall. There was not an ounce of fear in their eyes.
The chieftain’s madness was infecting them, but the dark elves didn’t stay still. They poured boiling water and oil down the wall and rolled spiked logs down the ladder to crush the orcs. They had prepared their defenses for situations like this.
The orcs were unable to climb up the wall and fell to their deaths.
“How persistent,” muttered Crockta as he watched the orcs step on the corpses of their comrades and climb up the ladder.
Crockta swung his Ogre Slayer. The orc who had almost reached the railing lost his head and tumbled down. Several orcs below him fell with him as his corpse knocked over them.
Crockta grabbed the ladder. Then, he began pushing it away with all of his strength. His skin grew hot, and veins popped up on his neck.
“Ahhhhh!” the orcs screamed.
The ladder started tilting. The orcs who had been hanging on dropped like flies, and the ladder broke in half as it fell backward.
“Orcs who have forgotten honor!” Crockta’s battle cry crushed all the noise of the battlefield. His roar rang in the orcs’ ears. “I will kill all of you!”
Orcheim’s warriors raised their weapons along with Crockta’s cry.
“Bul’taaaaaaaaaaar!” they cried.
Crockta swung his weapon and chopped the orc who had just climbed onto the railing. The orc flew in the air. His body gushed blood as he fell on the orcs’ heads.
Then, Crockta kicked the orc who had his hand on the railing and sent him tumbling down. He swung his greatsword at a ladder. The ladder and the orcs hanging onto it collapsed to the ground.
A rock hurled from a trebuchet charged at Crockta, but Crockta didn’t budge. Instead, he swung his greatsword at it. The Ogre Slayer struck it like an iron mace, and the huge rock smashed into pieces in the sky and rained down above the orcs’ heads.
Some died on the spot after getting hit on the head. The dark elves’ morale rose as they witnessed Crockta's prowess on top of the city wall.
“Kill the invaders!” shouted Caska, who had been commanding the archer unit in the east. She was firing arrows non-stop. “Kill those assholes who have crushed our homes!”
The arrows rained down on the orc’s heads in unison. The screams of orcs in pain rang throughout the battlefield.
Crockta pierced the orc trying to step into the fortress and then took a look at the scene. The orcs were still advancing like the great sea. “It’s gonna be a long day.”
Crockta could see Tiyo putting on a stellar performance in the distance. He took advantage of the General’s capacity for rapid fire and swept the orcs away from the walls. The orcs dropped like flies each time iridescent lights swept through the ladders.
But Crockta sensed a strange atmosphere stemming from the scene. He began to feel the flow of magic as his Introduction to Magic and his Heart and Soul Penetrating Eye skills activated. He looked above the wall where Tiyo was standing.
“That is...” Crockta urgently looked around the battlefield. He saw a group of orc sorcerers holding hands behind the chiefdom’s army. There were five of them, and mana rose up from their bodies. Mana swirled up to the sky like a whirlpool and soared above the clouds.
Then, it became a huge sphere and burned brightly. It looked like the sun. A blinding light disrupted his vision.
It was a meteor! Although it wasn’t an actual meteor, it looked like a giant meteor pummeling down from the sky. The blazing magic power began to slowly approach the city wall. It was a phenomenal manifestation of magic.
The dark elves paused their attacks in shock. Crockta also turned blank because he didn’t know what to do. If things continued like this, the meteor would cause immense damage and completely crush the city walls.
Right then, a magic barrier began to spread out over the sky. A translucent net rose up in the air and expanded infinitely. The net continuously weaved itself onto another net until it multiplied tenfold and became a huge wall that covered Spinora’s entire sky.
A grand voice cried out, “The net in the sky seems sparse, but not a single thing will pass through it.” It was Jamero, the great sorcerer of Nameragon.
He raised his staff and shouted, “No one shall lay claim on Spinora, the land of the World Tree!”
A blue light gushed out from his staff. At the same time, the magical barrier spread out in the sky began to vibrate. The meteor fell on top of it as it shone brightly.
The forces of magic collided and unleashed an explosive sound.
“...!” Crockta squinted at the immense light.
A terrible rupture, as if the earth was being torn apart, shook the whole area. Flames exploded, and light scattered everywhere. His ears grew numb, and it was hard to see anything. He felt like he was witnessing the end of the world. The two magical forces clashed, repeatedly advancing and retreating.
Luckily, the magic net cast by Jamero was binding over the meteor, and the meteor’s heat gradually subsided.
The sorcerers’ magic that had burned brightly scattered all over the place. Then, the meteor turned to ashes and dissipated in the air. It disappeared completely.
Jamero had won, but he dropped to his knees from expending too much energy. The dark elves cheered. With renewed vigor, the dark elves’ arrows filled the sky again. Orcs collapsed on the battlefield.
The orcs’ march had begun to falter. Although some orcs had succeeded in climbing to the top of the wall, they were unable to advance further due to the dark elves’ desperate resistance. They pushed the orcs back over the edge of the wall, and sent them falling to their deaths.
The dark elves heaped boiling oil on the orcs and set the ladder on fire. A pungent smoke billowed up, but it was too early for the dark elves to let their guards down.
Crockta sensed a huge presence and raised his head to look. He was coming.
Crockta clasped his greatsword. A huge shadow loomed over him. At first glance, it appeared to be a rock catapulted by the trebuchet, but Crockta knew... it was an orc.
With a loud crash, a huge orc landed on top of the city wall. He looked like a huge mountain standing up there. Crockta took a step back. The dark elves around him all vanished from the area.
Only Crockta and Calmahart remained standing on the city wall of this unit.
“I waited for the moment we would meet again, Crockta,” Calmahart looked at Crockta with his vivid crimson eyes.
Crockta grinned. “Same here. You have become more good-looking, Calmahart.”
The wound Crockta had inflicted on Calmahart’s face had become a scar. Calmahart narrowed his eyes as he laughed. He looked even more hideous than before. “You’re all talk. Hahaha.”
Both raised their weapons at each other. Suddenly, Crockta looked around him. “Where is your nanny?”
“What are you talking about?” asked Calmahart.
“The sorcerer who follows you around everywhere and tells you what to do. He’s just like a nanny looking after a kid.”
Calmahart’s face turned stiff. Crockta’s smile grew wider. Then, he provoked Calmahart again. “Last time you chickened out, but at least you acted like a well-behaved child and listened to your nanny. Did you come here with his permission?”
Sparks flew from Calmahart’s eyes. “Shut up!!!!!!!”
He swung his double-headed axe. Crockta dodged it. The floor collapsed.
Crockta gripped his Ogre Slayer tighter. The situation wasn’t progressing in their favor. The orcs were climbing on top of the walls, and the walls had become useless with Calmahart’s appearance.
No one could block the ladders with Calmahart here, and the orcs began to climb on top of the walls one after the other.
The orcs ran to the opposite side and attacked the dark elves on the walls. The dark elves resisted with their rapiers, but they didn’t stand a chance against orcs in close combat. The dark elves fell in heaps, and their corpses landed below the walls. The orcs cheered.
“...!” Crockta twitched. He wanted to immediately go and help them, but the one who was blocking his path was none other than the chieftain.
“Keep going.” Calmahart approached Crockta without any trace of a smile on his face. Crockta backed away.
“I said, keep jabbering bullshit,” Calmahart spat out.
Red waves rose from his body. It was different from the infiltration and the battle at Juolaideh. Instead of its usual sinister energy, his eyes were calm. He was stronger and colder. With things like this, there was no point in provoking him further.
“I apologize,” said Crockta politely.
Calmahart laughed at him. “Hahaha, already scared...”
Crockta cut him off. “That guy must have been your mom, not your nanny. How is your mom’s health? Is she still creeping around?”
Calmahart’s expression changed. “You trash!!!!!!!!!”
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