General Offensive

Not long after the morning sun rose into the sky, its few rays of light were obscured by dark clouds, as if it might rain at any moment.

The few remaining mages in the army climbed onto the high platform one after another, raising their staffs and focusing their mana on a single point.

A massive fireball condensed above the mages before crashing into the mountainside. Flames shot into the sky, and thick smoke billowed upward from the slope like a black mushroom cloud.

After several rounds of alternating bombardments, raging fires broke out in multiple places on the mountainside.

The horns signaling the advance sounded, and the first few hundred-man phalanxes moved in response. They began their march toward the mountainous region, their figures quickly vanishing into the mountain paths and dense forest.

Roger watched the direction where the conscripts had disappeared from afar, finding this tactic all too familiar.

Use cannon fodder to trigger traps and expose gaps in the defensive line first, then have the actual combat-capable troops charge up the path paved with corpses. It was no different from before.

“What on earth did they even discuss in those military meetings over the past few days...?” he muttered to himself.

Before long, the conscripts began fleeing back from the forest in scattered, disorganized groups.

Before they could even reach the foot of the mountain, a squad of light cavalry that had been waiting behind the formation rode out, their longswords swinging down. The deserters were cut down where they stood, their screams abruptly cut short at the base of the mountain.

Once the first wave of routing soldiers was thoroughly dealt with on the spot, the light cavalry turned their horses around and returned to the rear of the formation, their hooves leaving a trail of dark red prints on the wasteland.

The horns sounded once more, and another squad of conscripts stepped out of the formation under the urging of the knights, heading up the mountain.

Once again, it did not take long before this group of conscripts also routed back down. The light cavalry struck again, their swords rising and falling, leaving another row of corpses on the ground.

The third horn sounded. The interval between this one and the previous two was much shorter, and its tone was significantly sharper.

Knight Stine drew his sword, turned to face his squad, and took a deep breath.

“Forward!”

The Raymond family's troops marched forward, reaching the foot of the mountain and stepping onto the winding mountain path.

The ground was littered with the corpses left by the first two waves of conscripts. The troops threaded their way through the bodies in silence, save for the rustling of boots on the grass and the occasional brief command from the front of the column.

Roger channeled his mana and silently cast Scout's Eye.

A subtle ripple of mana spread from his body. In the next second, the area within a fifteen-meter radius was projected into his mind as a bird's-eye view.

This all-around vision ran parallel to what his eyes actually saw, like opening a second projection screen in his mind.

Finding no trace of goblins, he kept Scout's Eye active and continued following in the middle of the column.

The troops advanced about two to three hundred meters up the mountain, passing through a small patch of scorched earth left bare by the fireballs, before several diverging paths appeared ahead.

Stine raised his hand to signal the column to slow down. He quickly compared their position with a crude map, then waved his sword toward the path on the far left.

Just as the column turned into this path, several grayish-green dots appeared in Roger's bird's-eye view.

They were lurking behind the dense forest about a dozen meters ahead, waiting for the human army to approach.

Roger stepped forward, tapped Stine on the shoulder a few times, and pointed toward the dense forest ahead.

Stine nodded and quickly gestured to the veterans in the squad, who immediately adjusted the orientation of their shields.

Roger nocked an arrow, stopped beside a tree, and pressed his body flat against it. The Windwood Bow's mana pathways activated as he drew back the string. Leaning his upper body out from behind the trunk, he aimed his arrowhead at a goblin crossbowman perched in a tree.

The bowstring twanged softly, and the arrow tore through the air in a straight trajectory, piercing through the dense layers of leaves and branches.

A scream echoed from above, followed by the goblin crossbowman falling from the branches.

“Points +50, Total: 250.”

At the same instant, Irene's figure shot out from the column. The other two goblin crossbowmen hiding in the trees pulled their triggers simultaneously, their bolts grazing past her shoulder guards and helmet.

Without even turning her head, she used the momentum of her charge to step onto a tree trunk and leap into the air. With a sweep of her sword, another crossbowman fell screaming from the tree.

The remaining crossbowman hurriedly dropped its crossbow, attempting to draw the short dagger at its waist, but Roger's second arrow pierced the side of its neck. It swayed unsteadily before falling from the tree as well.

A whole row of goblin infantry then emerged from behind the dense forest.

They had been hiding in shallow pits covered with thick, dry leaves. Shaking off their camouflage, they stood up in unison, raising their short swords and round wooden shields as they rushed the column with coarse, raspy roars.

Stine charged ahead of everyone. His longsword glowed with the white light of Life Energy, and with a single strike, he cleaved the leading goblin—shield and all—clean in half.

The armed retainers followed closely behind, bracing against the goblin charge with a shield wall. Spears thrust repeatedly through the gaps in the shields, each strike accompanied by a scream or a dull thud.

Roger slung the Windwood Bow over his back. Mana condensed and compressed in his palm before a bolt of blue-white lightning shot from his fingertips, striking the leading goblin infantryman and blasting a charred hole in its chest.

The electrical arc did not dissipate there; it chained from this goblin to its nearest companion.

The Chain Lightning bounced repeatedly across the clearing, each leap accompanied by screams and the stench of burnt flesh.

By the time the final arc faded into the air, a dozen goblins lay dead on the ground.

“Points +600, Total: 900.”

The battle was over as quickly as it had begun. The main force of the charging goblins had been wiped out by the Chain Lightning, and the remaining ones were swiftly cleared out by Irene, Stine, and the armed retainers.

Roger lowered his hand, took the Windwood Bow off his back again, and checked his mana consumption.

Although Chain Lightning was impressively powerful, its mana cost was also quite high. That single cast just now had consumed nearly a fifth of his total mana.

Scout's Eye was still active as well, continuously draining a small amount of mana.

However, the Azure Ring was replenishing his reserves, and the passive recovery of Croft's Meditation Method was also quietly working its magic.

Roger estimated that at his current rate of consumption and recovery, his mana should restore to over eighty percent before the next battle broke out.

“Keep moving,” Knight Stine said, pulling his sword from the corpse of a goblin. He flicked the blood off the blade and gestured up the mountain.

The column continued to advance up the mountain path, encountering two more similar goblin ambushes along the way.

Roger harvested another wave with Chain Lightning during the second ambush, bringing his points to just over fifteen hundred.

By the third wave, he refrained from using Chain Lightning, choosing instead to save his mana by using arrows in coordination with Irene's melee suppression.

After three waves of ambushes, his points had risen to 2,500.

Only a few armed retainers in the squad had been wounded. Roger casually cast Heal on each of them to stop their bleeding, farming a bit of experience in the process.

When they reached a relatively open terrace halfway up the mountain, the column temporarily halted to rest and reorganize.

The soldiers leaned against the rocks, panting heavily as they gulped down water.

Roger also leaned against a tree, reviewing the recent battles as he drank.

The effectiveness of Chain Lightning in the narrow mountain terrain was even better than he had anticipated. The only downside was that its mana consumption remained rather high. He would need to carefully consider how to budget this skill in different combat situations in the future.

Just as he was about to tuck his waterskin back into his waist, a low horn sounded from up the mountain.

Everyone looked up.

Ahead, more grayish-green figures were slowly emerging from the shadows of the trees. They lined the slopes and thickets on both sides of the mountain path in dense numbers, easily far exceeding the total of the previous three ambushes combined.

At the very front of this green-skinned horde, several elite warriors—conspicuously larger than ordinary goblins—stepped out of the forest, their bare upper bodies covered in twisted tattoos.

Knight Stine stood up, tossed his half-empty waterskin to a nearby retainer, and gripped his longsword tightly once more.

The light on his blade flared to life again, brighter than it had ever been before.

“Prepare to engage.”

Roger tucked his waterskin back into his waist and drew an arrow from his quiver.

His gaze swept over the dense, grayish-green tide on the hillside, finally stopping on the elite units at the very front.

“More of those guys with the giant cleavers,” he muttered to himself, beginning to charge his Empowered Shot.