Chapter 871 - One-Sided
'If a massacre is necessary, I'll do it. But if there's no real reason to?'
If there's no reason to make a river of blood and build a tower of flesh, I won't.
This was Krang's thought.
From that perspective, what that madman named Fel was doing was quite a good sight.
Reducing the number of enemy soldiers, even by one, might be better for the future.
The enemy soldier who survived now might kill his soldiers, his people, in the future.
'It feels like walking on a rope strung across a cliff, Enki.'
Krang repeated inwardly.
Choosing the second-worst option, not the worst, was easy, but one who walked the best path, better than the second-worst, must always perform a feat, as if walking a tightrope.
Just as Krang was doing now.
'Hoo.'
He only sighed inwardly.
Outwardly, he showed only smiles and confidence.
That was what a king must do.
The king knew he was not a great strategist.
Instead, he was a person who knew well what his duty was in his position.
If army fought army, both Naurillia and Lihin-Stetten would end up with fatal wounds.
'If we two fight so fiercely, who is the one who laughs last, Great Emperor?'
Krang asked the ruler of the South, who was far away.
Naturally, there was no answer.
He had asked inwardly, and the emperor would not have heard.
He didn't need his answer.
Because he knew, even without hearing.
It would be hard for both himself and the southern Great Emperor to laugh.
Would the ruler of the Empire, hidden in the north, be happy?
Therefore, a massacre was not needed.
That was why the current situation was quite satisfactory.
It felt like he had taken the first step on the tightrope very well.
Fel had done that for him.
'But it's not time to be relieved.'
The battle wasn't even over.
Krang thought again and again about what would happen next.
The things he had to do from his position, what he had aimed for by coming this far, preparations for things that might go completely against his expectations, those who had been sacrificed for this.
The king's mind was complicated.
He was not in a position to be simply happy.
***
"Your comrade, then, is he a bit lacking?"
Galuto asked.
He was speaking as he watched Fel repeatedly swat away and dodge arrows.
Ropord nodded his head greatly, agreeing.
He agreed with his opponent's words to an excessive degree.
Was his opponent not saying what he himself wanted to say?
He was a man with a good eye.
To the point where it was a waste to kill him here.
But that didn't mean he could let him live and send him off.
Enkrid had said what he needed to before entering the battle.
"Subdue all knights. Capturing them is fine, but it's not very meaningful. Do as you see fit."
As always, his words respected everyone.
It meant they could do as they pleased, for the most part.
"Capture? What capture. I'll just chop their heads off with my axe."
Rem had received those words.
Knights fight based on oaths and vows.
Just because things went wrong, southern knights did not change the king they served or the place they lived.
Even if they did, it was rare.
At least, it was right to say there was no room for such leisure on this battlefield.
Therefore, capture was meaningless.
This was the second reason Ropord had stepped up instead of Fel.
Because that bastard Fel would surely rampage, saying he'd capture him alive to show off his skill.
'We are at a disadvantage.'
Ropord went beyond observing the small-scale battlefield and considered the flow of the entire war.
It was a conclusion reached with the help of Krais' added words.
This was the reason he couldn't afford to get sentimental about sparing the opponent, just because his skill would go to waste.
Naturally, the first reason he had ditched Fel was to tease that bastard at least once.
When this fight is over, I'll tease him, calling him a slowpoke, lazy like Sir Ragna.
"That's right."
Ropord opened his mouth and added his words.
Galuto narrowed his eyes.
A few thoughts brushed past, and he reached a single conclusion.
Ordinary taunts won't work.
"Knights speak with their swords," Galuto said.
It was a moment to decide the match with skill rather than taunts.
Just because he used calmness as his weapon, did that mean his skill was lacking?
It was the opposite.
Elma fought the best within the Amethyst Knights, but if you only counted their dueling records, Galuto had won more.
He knew how to fight a winning battle.
He gauged the situation and occupied the high ground.
He forced a battle of wits on his opponent and cornered him onto a calculated battlefield.
His personal tactics were the same as when he led his troops.
'Open the door to all possibilities and prepare for them all.'
The Blocking Sword, the Grasping Sword, the Swamp-like Sword—these were Galuto's nicknames.
Within the Amethyst Knights, the knights who could beat Galuto could be counted on one hand.
He repeatedly calculated and exerted his insight to the extreme.
That was Galuto's specialty.
His gaze sank, just as one cannot tell if it is dirt or a swamp before stepping.
They were dark brown eyes.
Rotten leaves, dirt, corroded animal bones, sediment piled up—his eyes were like a swamp.
The things that had not completely decomposed clumped together, looking like black masses.
The brown light faded from Galuto's eyes, and only a dull soot remained.
He repeatedly calculated, looking at his opponent's stance, his center of gravity, and so on.
He glimpsed the action the continental knight standing before him would take.
He saw the future.
'A single point thrust.'
The action his opponent would take.
'Dodge and strike.'
The match wouldn't be decided in one blow.
The situation that would follow was also clear in his mind.
Ropord just stood with both feet on the ground, steadying his breath.
He made no preparations, no calculations.
He gauged his opponent's skill and watched intently what he was doing.
He was a man who fought in a style similar to his own.
After grasping that, he folded his thoughts.
Ropord concluded what he had to do in one action.
To dash out and thrust his sword.
He bent his knees and put strength into the foot that was on the ground.
His right foot dug halfway into the ground.
Udeudeudeuk.
When the clod of earth, compacted by pressure, became as hard as a rock, it was enough to use as a foothold.
Ropord placed his right foot on the foothold, and the moment he leaned his body forward, he bent his knees further and then straightened them.
All his movements were as fast as lightning.
Bbeong!
The ground exploded.
Peok!
Flesh also burst.
Galuto was in his spot, and Ropord brushed past him as if in passing.
Their positions were swapped.
They were in a stance showing only their backs to each other.
The victory or defeat of the fight was decided in one blow. Jureureuk.
Both shed blood.
However, the one with a hole in his neck died, and the one whose pauldron was sent flying, receiving only a wound on his shoulder, lived.
Tung-.
The piece of the pauldron, which had been split in half from receiving the power of the blade, fell to the ground.
It was made of high-quality iron and monster hide, but it was not enough to withstand a knight's sword.
'Still, it was excellent.'
If not for the pauldron, the wound would have been deeper.
Ropord felt a part of the flesh on his left shoulder, where the blade had hit and passed, had been torn off.
It was hard to call it light, but on the premise that he had won against a knight, it was an injury that could be called light.
"In our unit, there's a monster who makes it so you can't even begin to attack, no matter what you do."
Ropord said.
A faint light still remained in the eyes of Galuto, who had a hole in his neck.
He was on the verge of death, but his ears must still be open.
The reason the match was decided in an instant?
It was simple.
Galuto had focused on protecting his body, picturing a long fight.
Had he caught a glimpse of what happened to Elma?
That must have had an influence.
Conversely, Ropord fought like Fel.
He faced the battle with Enkrid's mindset.
He acted as if it didn't matter if he died today.
The dying Galuto waved his hand in the air.
Was there something he wanted to say?
It was hard to hear now.
Even a knight wouldn't have the skill to speak with a hole in his neck.
He waved his hand and then fell forward.
Koong.
Galuto, who had fallen to the ground with his face turned to the side, gasped.
It wasn't hard to guess what he wanted to say.
It was presumed to be "a gamble," or something like that.
That's what it looked like, reading his lips.
Blood gurgled and poured from his neck.
The red blood was proof that he was human.
Leaving aside winning or losing, dying or living, was he bitter?
For dying in an instant to a gamble?
To his opponent, it might have looked like a gamble.
"It wasn't a gamble."
Ropord muttered.
It really wasn't.
It was the tactic with the highest probability, found through the sense he had gained from countless duels and fights.
In other words, he had just chosen the best move to win.
'If the fight had dragged on, all factors, including stamina, would have had an effect.'
His opponent was endlessly skilled in that kind of fight. It was a tactic of cornering the opponent with calculations, a form that Ropord also enjoyed.
The difference between Galuto and Ropord was that Ropord could fight like Fel at any time, to win.
He would unhesitatingly do bold things to win, even if it meant abandoning what he usually enjoyed using.
Naturally, the foundation of all this was mixed with what he had learned.
In particular, the words the captain had said were impressive.
'A round circle.'
Enkrid's teaching.
After putting forward an outstanding specialty, he had said to train until that specialty looked ordinary again.
Ropord confirmed with the corpse of the knight, fallen before his eyes, that his hard work had not been in vain.
The blood pouring from his neck turned the dirt a dark red.
Almost at the same time as Ropord's fight ended, Dunbakel also struck her opponent's neck.
The scimitar in her hand drew a refreshing line.
She had stepped back, then dashed forward, and the blade she swung tore the air.
A jijijijik- sound was left in the air, and in its midst, the enemy's neck was also cut.
"Secret technique: Fast Cut. You bastard."
It wasn't a secret technique or anything.
It was just that she had seen her opponent's tactics and specialty, stepped back, and then ran at him and cut him.
But there was no one to answer her.
The knight with the severed neck had kneeled and collapsed to the ground.
With the slash, Dunbakel had held her breath, hopped forward a couple of times, and only then has she spoken.
By doing that, she avoided the poison left in the air.
Her sense of smell was on a different level from an ordinary beastkin's.
She saw the traces of the smell with her eyes through her sense of smell.
It was a nose so sensitive that no one would believe it.
The fight was one-sided.
It was something both the Madmen and Krang had expected, but for the enemy army, it was a truly dumbfounding moment.
***
Enkrid balanced on Weird Eyes and surveyed the battlefield.
While he was rampaging in the sky, he had seen a part of The Madmen Knights—to be precise, Rem, Dunbakel, Ropord, and Fel—charge out and slaughter the enemy knights.
And at the same time, Fel's acrobatics.
"Why do you think he's doing that?"
He asked Weird Eyes, and it just shook its head with a Heeigh-.
Right, you wouldn't know either.
You can't know what's in a person's heart unless you become that person.
Even a Dragonkin like Themares only read a part of the heart.
'If you put up a false front, even a Dragonkin can be fooled.'
It was a simple but firm logic.
For a knight, deceiving one's own intentions was commonplace.
They might pretend to settle the match in one blow, but then demand a battle of stamina, or conversely, act like they would fight for a long time, and then settle it in one blow.
If you deceive the opponent, you have an advantage.
There was no one who didn't know that simple logic.
'Deceiving the opponent by deceiving yourself first.'
That was the basic of the Valen-style mercenary sword.
Now he knew that that swordsmanship contained the essence of the deceiving sword.
It was worthy of being called the parent of the Enkrid-style orthodox swordsmanship.
'Anyone can be good at deceiving.'
But the best at it was an elf.
Shinar threw jokes even using the Dragonkin.
The elf, whose specialty was distorting the truth, had the skill to not just be unread by the Dragonkin, but to use him.
It was a thought that came to him as he watched.
Applying a part of these passing thoughts to his swordsmanship was a habit.
Anyway, the fight was one-sided.
The tide of battle had turned.
It was only natural that the troops, who just a few days ago had been battered by the Demon Realm's rain and the griffons, would cheer.
"Uooooooh!"
"We are!"
"The Protectors!"
"We are!"
"The Guardians!"
Each unit had its own traditional slogan.
For example, the Border Guard shouted, 'The flower of the battlefield is the infantry.'
The enemy army had shouted that they just fight, even in hell.
The Border Guard's slogan had solidified that way because the majority of their main force was infantry, not a small number of cavalry.
The enemy's slogan must have solidified in that form because it was connected to the spirit of the South.
'The place that created tactics where soldiers would drag down a knight even in death.'
To put it more simply, the "knight's thousand-man cut" had first happened in the South.
The knight who had cut down a thousand soldiers, who had charged him, high on drugs and prepared for death, was still gripping his weapon and breathing in that very South.
Finally, the slogan of this place, which called itself the guardian wall of the South, was simple and clear.
We are the Protectors, We are the Guardians.
It was a slogan filled with the pride of those who had endured the South's invasions and the Demon Realm's incursions for long years.
Enkrid was just an assistant; he had no intention of disparaging the work they had done, just because of his own final slash.
Even if it hadn't been him, even if The Madmen Knights hadn't been there, the Crimson Cloaks would have won.
What's more.
'It's not enough at this level.'
The number of knights was only four.
The number of soldiers was a bit high, but considering the fame of Cypress, who had protected them until now, it was too few, and too young.
'Why?'
The question was short.
He was about to continue his thoughts, but he saw a few dots approaching the rear of the allied forces.
It was the enemy's detached force.
To be precise, they weren't human, so they couldn't be called an army.
Galuto had not just died.
He had poured out every card he had, including his trump card.
In truth, he must have predicted victory, but the arrow he had shot had reached the allied camp.
That was what Enkrid saw.
***
If you enjoy the series and want to get more chapters early, head over to https://payhip.com/Samowek
Next 100 chapters - 25e [Be sure to message me on discord for any information]
[SHOP BEST BUY] - 50e - Every chapter translated - Latest WN-1011 + daily chapters from monday to friday for a month.
-KNIGHT - Cost 20e - Chapters 942-1011 + daily chapters from Monday to Friday for a month
I welcome you to join our discord https://discord.gg/RY7BbJpeAZ
**ANY INFO ONLY APPLIES TO THE LATEST CHAPTER HERE ON WEBNOVEL**