Chapter 185: Final Battle (VII) (Seeking Guarantee for Next Month)
Information quickly flowed back from various channels.
At the rear of the Balogan Grand Temple, there lay the core festival hall and a series of prayer sanctuaries. This hall had once been claimed by Yuhjiker, connecting to the platform altar behind, and outside were rows of monk quarters, along with two outer walls on the rear side of the elven ruins.
The festival hall was not only the highest building in the entire ruins but also the core of the central axis of this complex.
It was also the first place that Antinna set her sights on.
The mercenaries moved like ants scurrying through the ruins, taking Antinna’s orders and crossing the yard within the grand temple—this yard had once been the place where Silver Elf monks prayed in meditation, but now the once beautiful and tranquil sanctum was left in ruins. The exquisitely beautiful Saintly White corridor now only had remnants of its pillars; amidst the silent stone forest, whispers of the past seemed to linger, recounting the history of the place.
In this silence, the first three Lubis mercenaries to leave arrived at their destination. They set up defenses on the second outer wall at the northwest corner of the festival hall and observed the lizardmen in the forest from there.
The Silver Elves had built two outer walls as the defense for this sacred forbidden zone. However, after several centuries, the weathered fortifications had nearly collapsed; today, apart from the height difference between the second outer wall and the first, the rear side of the festival hall had almost no defense left—and the lizardmen didn’t seem to plan on repairing these structures.
This was mainly due to two reasons: one was that they lacked the capability; the defenses planned by the elves were crafted by skilled artisans, and with Yuhjiker’s intelligence, they simply did not understand how to rebuild these fortifications into rubble. The second reason was that they didn’t need to; in this forest, the only nemesis that these lizardman raiders had was drunkenness and infighting, which caused double-digit casualties almost every year.
Of course, now their nemesis had one more addition: Brendel.
The second squad reached another breach.
“The lizardmen have crossed the forest—”
“They’re starting to approach the ruins.”
“The number is no less than a hundred.”
“Command detected.”
The mercenaries transmitted messages through sign language, falling exactly into Antinna’s sight.
The young lady quickly crossed the festival hall, hurrying to the platform outside that hosted important sacrificial activities. This was the highest point of the entire ruins, and she stood at the edge of the platform, overlooking the rear half of the grand temple.
The intricate defense system of the Silver Elves suddenly became clear in her eyes.
She lowered her head and compared it with the sketch in her hand—a rushed drawing made due to limited time, but at this moment looked fairly accurate. Her professional architectural knowledge played a role at this moment; this was the fortress system of the Silver Elves from five centuries ago, just the type she was most familiar with.
She turned back and with all her strength lifted the flag—a banner made from two bundled long spears and a piece of gray cloth; there was no pattern, no insignia, not even any identifiable marks.
That cloth was made from Brendel’s cloak.
She raised the flag and pointed in a certain direction—
This signified two things.
The first meaning was to tell Naminez and Husher at the front that the rear defense had not yet fallen. As long as this flag was still up, they didn’t need to split their forces.
The second meaning was: Grey Wolf mercenaries, go defend the fourth breach.
But the Grey Wolf mercenaries below exchanged glances at this command.
The position of the platform had once been an extremely safe location, but that was in the past; it had now collapsed halfway. If the lizardmen broke through the front, they could easily rush to Antinna’s position. Brendel had once told them that their duty was to protect this noble lady’s safety, but now she was sending them to the other side.
“Antinna, Miss?” one mercenary shouted.
“Follow my orders.”
“But—”
Antinna waved her hand and said loudly, “I am in command now; everything is based on following my orders. As for the problems that may arise afterward, that’s later.”
The mercenaries were left speechless.
But the girl on the platform frowned as she looked up to see the lizardmen gradually emerging from the forest. Their formation was quite scattered, indicating that the enemy might have sensed their numerical disadvantage. However, that was not the worst; the worst was that the only forces she had at her command consisted of fifteen people, and the individual combat effectiveness was not even favorable.
In close combat, the exchange ratio was at most one to four or one to five.
Only delaying time was possible.
Antinna unknowingly gritted her teeth and gripped the flagpole tightly.
…
Brendel was sweating profusely.
He couldn’t remember how many times he and Xi had changed directions now—because they were too close—he could almost see the tension in Xi’s heart as she felt the same anxiety; her heartbeat raced in her slight frame, and her breaths began to quicken. This was a sign that her stamina was starting to wane.
“That charge you mentioned… how long until it can be used?” Xi gasped.
“Give me twenty more seconds…” Brendel was mentally estimating the time.
“No, if we don’t… gain altitude… we can’t delay for that long!” The girl immediately shook her head.
Brendel glanced back.
He wished this answer wasn’t true, but he knew it was an unattainable assumption. Because the earth god Eckmen had indeed caught up as expected, just as he had anticipated. Although its turns were clumsy, the monster’s straight-line speed was astonishing, often recovering any distance lost in a mere few steps during a turn.
But Brendel understood he couldn’t keep making Xi change direction; if this continued, they wouldn’t even have the chance to lure the creature to the designated location by nightfall.
Gaining altitude could solve the immediate worry, but they gradually realized that this creature was getting smarter. It used stone spires to attack the airborne platinum warhorse, and without trees to obstruct it, it was like hitting a target.
“We can’t gain altitude.” Brendel replied.
Xi gritted her teeth.
The young man looked back once more at the distance shrinking between Eckmen and him. He couldn’t hesitate and immediately tossed a disintegration crystal backward. Amid a series of explosions, the monster covered its head with its hands, seemingly showing no signs of stopping, already leaping out from the smoke with the force of the explosion.
The red-haired girl also felt the threat from behind, and reluctantly, she could only order her warhorse to take flight. But Eckmen thrust out his hands, instantly causing stone columns to shoot up from the ground behind, aimed directly at the two of them.
Although Xi immediately commanded the warhorse to change direction, the prolonged tension had inevitably made her fatigued; a momentary slow reaction resulted in the stone column accurately striking the side of the warhorse’s hind thigh; the platinum steed stumbled, crashing directly into a tree.
The tremendous impact threw Brendel and the red-haired girl, who were unprepared on the horse’s back, onto the ground. By the time the young man reacted, he was heavily sprawled on the ground. At that moment, Brendel almost believed he had returned to that night at Buche’s old mansion—when he had been thrown out by that skeleton, it felt just like this clouded, dizzying sensation, as if a bomb had been dropped in his mind.
But the first thing Brendel worried about was not whether he had been concussed or if something else was wrong, because he knew there was still a deadly creature that could rush in at any moment to finish him off.
This was bad!
He had already pressed down on the last disintegration crystal. He shook his head instinctively, wanting to stand up, but before he could react, a hand pressed down on his chest and held him down.
“Listen carefully.”
This was Xi’s voice. Brendel tried to open his eyes, but his vision was blurry. He could only vaguely see the person’s face; the red-haired girl was looking at him.
“I’ll drag that thing out and buy you some time.”
“What are you going to do?”
Brendel shook his head, dizzily asking. He felt a sharp pain in his back, making him suspect whether his spine was about to snap.
“You don’t need to worry about me; I’m also a god’s envoy. That mindless thing can at most just severely injure me—”
“The characteristics of a god’s envoy are something I seem to have told you… cough cough.” Brendel half-squinted his eyes, his vision still not clear. He coughed as he struggled to sit up and felt himself being propped up by her.
“Hmph.”
The girl snorted coldly beside his ear and then let go of him, “The horse is back there; don’t waste time.” She dropped this line and turned around, gripping her axe-spear—within her line of sight, the massive creature had already smashed through three trees and was charging this way.
Xi leveled her long spear and bared her small sharp teeth.
Brendel watched Xi’s back, momentarily stunned. But he quickly stood up with effort to grasp the platinum warhorse’s reins. He didn’t dare waste time; now was not the moment for disputes; Xi made her choice, and he had to cooperate fully.
In team activities, this was the most basic rule.
Otherwise, the opportunity would be wasted in hesitation.
Brendel mounted the horse and immediately issued the command to gallop. He looked back from the saddle and saw Xi being swept away by the earth god’s hand, the girl shot straight into the forest like a stone, producing a series of cracking sounds.
Then, silence fell.
The low-tier Gold Element had no means to defend against the evolved elemental force.
The earth god Eckmen confirmed that the enemy had lost combat capability before once again setting its sights on the fleeing bug. No one gave it commands; the envoy was dominated by the violent nature brought about by divine blood, and its first action’s goal was naturally to kill everything that could still move.
Especially since Brendel feared it would continue to seek trouble with that red-haired girl, he casually tossed it a disintegration crystal; undoubtedly, the monster’s hatred immediately returned to the young man.
But the time Xi bought did have an effect.
Because at this moment, Brendel finally activated his recharging charge skill. After completing three consecutive turns, he drew out a stretched silver line that swept through the forest, and in fact, under the acceleration of the platinum warhorse, Brendel’s speed exceeded ten times a thousand energy levels for the first time since coming to this world.
This number was now infinitely close to his former peak agility attribute data from his last life.
And if anyone was fortunate enough to witness such a scene above the forest, they would surely see a magnificent silver line cutting across the entire forest, effectively dividing it in two and extending into the endless distance.
(PS. Continuous outbursts are too exhausting; taking a break. I played TERA on the Korean server today and sighed that South Korea is indeed ahead of us. Seeking guarantee for next month’s vote.)(To be continued, if you want to know what happens next, please log on; there are more chapters to support the author and support the official reading!)
