Chương 19: 19：Military Command Mastery

Bubbles burst in rapid succession within the black muck at the edge of the reed marsh. A crimson flare illuminated the sky, reflecting off the muddy puddles and dyeing the water a bloody scarlet. Ein surged upright from beneath the murky water, spitting out a hollow reed.

"Up!" he barked. Beside him, twelve villagers draped in freezing, soaking-wet burlap broke the surface. Without making a sound, they dragged their legs from the muck, crushed the withered berry vines underfoot, and kept low as they sprinted toward the logging camp six hundred meters away. Having spent years making a living in the swamps, their legs were well-adapted to the exhausting, suction-like grip of the mire.

The twelve men breathed in perfect unison, their grayish-black short spears leveled across their chests. The logging camp's gates stood wide open. Inside, what was once an orderly outpost had been transformed into a frenzied slaughterhouse. Fifty bare-chested Orcs of the Blackstone Warband were crammed into the central clearing, violently shoving each other over nonexistent rations of frozen beef. In the very center of this chaos stood a young human man.

Blood dripped steadily from his steel longsword, and at his feet lay a freshly decapitated corpse.

"Enemy attack!" An Orc Decurion, distinguished by a necklace of beast bones, was the first to react. He kicked a companion out of his way and threw his arms wide, barking rapid orders in guttural Orcish as he desperately tried to rally his disorganized subordinates. Swish! A sharp whistle pierced the air near the gate. A long arrow punched cleanly into the back of the Decurion's skull. The broadhead tore out through his gaping mouth, shattering two front teeth in the process.

The Decurion's roar was abruptly cut short as his massive frame pitched forward, crashing heavily into the mud. Ein held his bow at full draw, his right foot already stepping over the threshold of the camp.

"Form up! Advance!" The twelve fishermen-turned-recruits instantly closed ranks. They didn't even glance at the hulking, muscle-bound monsters before them, their minds were blank, running purely on the instincts relentlessly beaten into their muscle memory over the past seven days. Driving forward in a wedge formation, they smashed ruthlessly into the disorganized mob of Orcs.

"Thrust!" Twelve short spears lashed out in unison. Stripped of their black-iron chainmail, the Orcs' famously tough green skin parted like raw cowhide against the whetstone-sharpened spearheads. The five Orcs in the front rank had their guts punctured in a split second. Withdraw, half-step back, thrust again. Their formation was airtight, their spearheads ruthlessly targeting the groin and lower abdomen.

Caught without their weapons, the Orcs were thrown into total disarray as blood rapidly pooled across the clearing. Meanwhile, inside the holding pen. Through a crack in the heavy wooden door, the piercing red light illuminated Kyle's eyes. From outside came the agonizing shrieks of dying Orcs. This was their chance. Their one chance to survive.

"Brothers!" Kyle hissed, his hands gripping a thick wooden post he had dug out from beneath the straw bedding."If you don't want to end up as smoked meat, we fight!" Thirty emaciated slave auxiliaries were crammed behind the door, their shoulders braced against the wood.

"One! Two! Ram!" BOOM! Rotten from years of neglect and missing its exterior locking pin, the heavy wooden door burst completely open. Splinters flew. The heavy stench of fresh blood instantly flooded their nostrils. Kyle was the first to charge out of the pen. He didn't flee toward the exit, instead, his eyes swept across the camp like a starving wolf. Barely fifteen paces away, piled haphazardly near a weapon rack, lay the gear the Orcs had discarded: black-iron chainmail, heavy battleaxes, and spiked maces.

"Grab your steel! Kill the greenskins!" Kyle roared. He vaulted over an injured Orc thrashing on the ground and threw himself at the weapon pile. His hands seized the thick wooden haft of a double-bladed battleaxe. It was heavy. So heavy he could barely lift it. But, grinding his teeth together, he used the weight of his own body as a fulcrum, forcefully hauling the massive weapon upward. Vice-Captain Torne snatched up a black-iron javelin.

The remaining twenty-eight slaves scrambled for whatever weapons they could grab. Thirty men, their backs a crisscross of gruesome whip scars, crashed into the undefended rear of the Orc formation like a horde of vengeful ghouls crawling out of hell. CHOP! Riding his momentum, Kyle brought the heavy axe down brutally into the back of an Orc who was desperately trying to backpedal away from the spear wall. A sickening crack of shattering vertebrae echoed out as the Orc spewed a mouthful of black blood and collapsed.

However, the despairing gap in raw power became evident mere minutes later. The Orcs were, after all, the most brutal and warlike race on the continent. Their initial panic faded, replaced by the deep-seated combat instincts hardwired into their blood.

"Tear these filthy humans apart!" A particularly massive Orc shattered a slave's sternum with a single punch, sending the man flying backward. Lacking armor, the Orcs used forearms thicker than a human's thigh to deflect blows. Deprived of weapons, they grabbed rocks, firewood, or even hoisted the corpses of their fallen comrades to use as meat shields. Crunch. An Orc clamped its massive hand over the steel tip of a front-row fisherman's spear.

Ignoring the agonizing pain as the blade bit to the bone, the beast violently yanked backward. The recruit lost his footing and stumbled forward. Roaring, the Orc raised a fist like an iron sledgehammer, aiming straight for the back of the human's head. In that hair-raising split second... A silver blur cleaved into the fray. Soren's heavy boots pivoted off an Orc corpse as his body leaned into an impossible angle. His steel longsword swept upward in a blinding half-moon arc. Schlick.

The Orc's raised right arm was cleanly severed at the elbow. Blood erupted three feet into the air. Before the Orc could even scream, Soren flicked his wrist. The blade whipped horizontally, cleanly severing the beast's windpipe. Soren kicked the collapsing corpse aside and hauled the fallen recruit up by his scruff.

"Grip your spear! Get back in formation!" Soren's icy voice cut right through the deafening roar of the battlefield. Meanwhile, the thirty slave auxiliaries were rapidly burning through their meager stamina. Kyle swung wildly and missed, the sheer momentum of the heavy battleaxe dragged him down to his knees. A snarling Orc pounced on the opening. Its maw stretched wide, exposing jagged fangs as it lunged straight for Kyle's throat.

The foul stench of the beast's breath washed over Kyle's face— If you come across this story on Amazon, it's taken without permission from the author. Report it. Then, a steel blade punched through the back of the Orc's skull. It pierced the brain flawlessly, the bloody tip of the longsword halting mere inches from the tip of Kyle's nose. Soren wrenched the blade free, bringing with it a spray of gore and gray matter.

"Switch to a lighter weapon and go for their throats. With your current arm strength, you'll only manage three swings with a heavy axe." Leaving Kyle with that cold tactical advice, Soren blurred back into the chaotic melee. Wherever the human defensive line threatened to buckle, that ruthless flash of silver would appear. Hamstringing tendons, puncturing axillary arteries, slicing through eyeballs... Soren's Grandmaster-level Military Swordsmanship lacked any flashy or wasted movements.

Every flex of his muscles, every swing of his blade, meant one—or sometimes two—Orcs hitting the dirt. Blood mingled with the muck, transforming the logging camp into a horrific, dark-red quagmire. Bolstered by Soren's flawless covering strikes, the humans' morale hit a fever pitch. In the distance, Ein drew his bow again and again. The bowstring had bitten deep into his fingers, sending blood trickling down his hand, but he never stopped firing.

Torne, wielding his iron javelin, rolled across the mud alongside Kyle, specializing in executing the heavily wounded Orcs Soren had crippled. The bloody stalemate ground on for an agonizing hour. The setting sun was swallowed by a thick fog, leaving only the crackling and popping of the camp's braziers to cut through the gloom. Thrust! Gripping a shattered sword, Kyle drove the blade through the back of the final Orc—a beast already on its knees, riddled with spears. The Orc let out a ragged gasp.

Its fingers, previously digging into the dirt, slowly went limp before the colossal body finally collapsed. A dead silence fell over the battlefield. The only sounds remaining were the wind howling through the gaps in the log walls and the ragged, burning breaths of the survivors. Fifty Blackstone Warband regulars. Annihilated. The twelve recruits held each other up. Some leaned heavily on their chipped spears, while others slumped against the gateposts, dry-heaving.

Though every single man was injured, miraculously, they had suffered zero fatalities. The thirty slaves were completely drained, collapsing into pools of blood-stained mud. Kyle gulped down the air, gagging slightly on the coppery stench of blood. He looked down at his trembling hands, now completely stained with green gore, and then at the sea of Orc corpses surrounding him. A surreal sense of rebirth washed over him. He was no longer just Orc fodder waiting to be butchered in a holding pen.

Forcing his aching muscles to comply, Kyle scrambled to his feet. Ignoring his numerous gashes and bruises, he dragged himself step by step toward Soren. Soren stood casually wiping the gore from his longsword with a rag. He was barely stained with muck, and his breathing was as calm and steady as if he had just taken a brisk morning stroll. Kyle dropped to his knees, splashing into the muck.

This wasn't a kneel of desperate pleading from a man backed into a corner, this was absolute, willing submission to overwhelming power and tactical genius. Vice-Captain Torne and the surviving slaves forced themselves upright, staggered over behind Kyle, and dropped to their knees in perfect unison amidst the sea of blood.

"My Lord..." Kyle began, his voice raspy."My life, and the lives of these twenty-nine brothers... belong to you now. Wherever you point your sword, we charge." Click. Soren smoothly slid his pristine longsword back into its scabbard.

"Get up. Gather the axes and armor from the dirt and pile them up. Separate any armor bearing bronze rings into a different pile." Soren's gaze swept over his newly acquired auxiliaries."While you're at it, head to the rear enclosures and toss some raw meat to the fifteen direwolves. Starving mounts are useless for long-distance raids."

"Yes, My Lord!" Without a fraction of hesitation, Kyle turned and began barking orders to Torne and the others to sweep the battlefield. Soren remained where he was, surveying the carnage. Adding these men to the garrison he'd left behind in Ashwater Village, his direct command now numbered sixty-eight troops. Factor in fifty sets of black-iron scale armor, dozens of heavy weapons, fifteen warg mounts, and the vast stockpile of lumber and rations in the camp's warehouses... It was a massive haul.

Right then, a crisp chime echoed in his mind, courtesy of the Warlord System. [Battle Tally Complete] [Achievement: Victory against Superior Numbers. Defeated Stronger Foes with Weaker Forces. Complete Annihilation of a Fully Equipped Heavy Infantry Company.] [Quest Reward: High-Tier Skill -『Military Command Mastery』] In a split second, a torrential deluge of information flooded Soren's mind. The precise geometry of troop formations. The required depth for a heavy infantry phalanx to absorb a cavalry charge.

The optimal engagement angles for light cavalry to flank, harass, and shatter an enemy's wings. The intricate psychology of morale control. He suddenly understood exactly how to manipulate food rations, distribute the spoils of war, and implement brutal decimation tactics to nail a routing army to their defensive line, even when staring down a thirty percent casualty rate. The staggering logistics of war.

He now inherently knew the precise daily salt intake required for a six-thousand-strong infantry regiment marching through mud, and the exact physical degradation rate of draft horses hauling supply wagons up various inclines. Soren closed his eyes. When he opened them two seconds later, his endlessly cold, calculating gaze carried a new weight—the suffocating aura of a supreme commander who held the very battlefield in the palm of his hand.

He turned his head, his eyes drifting over Kyle, who was hauling corpses, and then to Ein, who was methodically stripping black-iron chainmail from the dead. The Soren of the past was a lone god of war. He could twist the outcome of a skirmish through sheer personal martial prowess. Whether slaughtering ten men, butchering a hundred, or assassinating an enemy High Warlord, he had relied entirely on peak, individualized combat power. But that wasn't enough. Flesh and blood had limits.

Stamina inevitably drained, and the sharpest sword would eventually chip against heavy iron. To carve out a foothold in the dark, chaotic era of the Eresia Continent... To forge an immortal empire capable of sweeping across the Misty Swamps, crushing the Silvermoon Kingdom under its heel, and ultimately conquering the entire continent... He would need a sea of steel-clad warriors. He would need a vast, unfeeling military machine that responded to his commands as naturally as his own fingers.

He would no longer settle for being the sharpest blade on the battlefield. It was time for him to become the hand that wielded it.