Chương 222: 222：The Ultimate Defense

Soren strode to the very front of the formation, his voice ringing out:"The standard Black Iron armor currently on our backs cannot withstand a direct, frontal cleave from an Orcish heavy battleaxe! If we take even a single solid hit, our bones will shatter and our organs will rupture!"

"Yes, we have suppressed them tactically, but in terms of sheer, physical defensive hardware, we have always been at a catastrophic disadvantage!" The vanguard elites clenched their jaws in grim agreement. Facing an insurmountable gap in physical mass and armor quality, human infantry engaging in close-quarters meat-grinders was practically suicide. This had been the absolute, bloody reality of the continent for centuries.

Soren suddenly spun around, pointing at the row of matte-black armor behind him, his face radiating an intense battle-lust:"But today, we rewrite the rules!"

"This is the human-standard [Black Steel Full-Plate Armor] freshly forged by Luger! Its composition is unimaginably dense! Put this on, and you will be able to completely withstand a direct, frontal strike from an Orcish heavy weapon!" Hearing this, the seventy elites simultaneously sucked in a sharp breath of cold air. The massive cognitive dissonance left them not only shocked but genuinely skeptical.

"Ignore most conventional physical attacks?"

"How... how is that even possible? Even the most elite heavy cavalry of the Silvermoon Kingdom—the Royal Paladins guarding the palace—wouldn't dare claim their Mythril-alloyed plate could completely shrug off an Orcish heavy axe!"

"The Lord Commander says it can block it... could it actually be true?" The veterans calculated in their hearts. Having spent their lives gingerly dodging lethal blows in standard Black Iron gear, it was almost impossible to fathom a set of human-sized armor reaching such a terrifying threshold of durability. Soren keenly detected their skepticism. It was entirely expected; without witnessing it firsthand, any verbal hype was utterly hollow.

"I know exactly what you're thinking," Soren chuckled confidently. He waved his hand, issuing a decisive command:"Bring a set out! Mount it on a rack! On the battlefield, the only truth is forged in blood and iron. Since you don't believe it, we will conduct a live-fire test right here, right now!" Several goblin apprentices grunted and heaved, firmly planting a heavy wooden target rack into the mud thirty paces away, securing a complete set of the Black Steel armor onto it.

Thin grey mist drifted across the testing grounds. Standing behind the firing line, Soren called up Ein, the Captain of the Second-Line Longbow Battalion.

"Ein, draw your Imperial military longbow! Load a specialized anti-armor round—give me the triangular armor-piercing heavy arrow!" Soren ordered. Ein, the master marksman, nodded, his gaze instantly sharpening. He drew a wicked, razor-sharp heavy armor-piercing arrow and nocked it against the subtly glowing magical runes of his heavy longbow. Simultaneously, Soren singled out two exceptionally burly vanguard elites:"You two! Grab the heavy geared repeating crossbows! Load solid steel heavy bolts!

Aim directly for the breastplate and the helmet, and pull the trigger!" The two named soldiers felt their palms slick with sweat. The heavy geared repeating crossbows required a mechanical winch to draw the string. Their sheer kinetic lethality was horrifying. At this thirty-pace distance, they could effortlessly punch through two superimposed layers of standard Black Iron armor, or pin a fully grown dire-boar directly to a tree!

"Ready!" Soren raised his right hand. Under the breathless, unblinking gazes of everyone present, he violently chopped his hand downward:"Fire!" THWACK! CHUNK-CHUNK!! The terrifying, explosive crack of the heavy bowstring and the brutal, mechanical snapping of the crossbow gears ripped through the air. This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

In a fraction of a second, completely imperceptible to the naked eye, the triangular armor-piercing arrow and the thick, solid steel bolts tore through the grey mist, striking the Black Steel armor thirty paces away with absolute, pinpoint precision! CLANG!!! SCREEECH! CRACK! Deafening metallic collisions echoed across the dormant volcanic crater, violently sparking bright showers of sparks into the dim light. However, in the very next second, everyone's eyes bulged, their jaws dropping in absolute disbelief.

That heavy armor-piercing arrow—capable of shredding any chainmail—upon violently impacting the Black Steel breastplate, did not penetrate a single millimeter! Instead, completely overwhelmed by the terrifying counter-force and the meticulously sloped, hardened curvature of the armor, it snapped on the spot! The thick wooden shaft violently splintered into a shower of thousands of fragments! As for the two heavy steel crossbow bolts, possessing the absolute highest kinetic lethality...

they were violently deflected! They ricocheted off the armor, spinning wildly through the air before violently embedding themselves deep into the mud banks off to the side. The sheer, terrifying kinetic transfer of the impacts had physically shoved the heavy wooden mounting rack several inches backward, the thick timber groaning under the strain. Yet the targeted armor itself? It maintained a flawlessly intact structure.

"Go take a look," Soren jerked his chin toward the target. Dozens of vanguard elites instantly stampeded forward, tightly swarming the armor. A veteran extended a trembling hand, gently brushing his fingers over the exact epicenter of the breastplate where the heavy crossbow bolts had struck.

"No penetration... It didn't break its defense at all!" the veteran let out a deeply incredulous gasp. Upon that surface, which had just absorbed a terrifying barrage of kinetic energy, there were only a few shallow, pale scratches. There wasn't a single microscopic fracture! Silence. Following a brief, suffocating silence, the entire clearing violently erupted into deafening cheers!

This defensive display, which entirely transcended the absolute limits of conventional armor, thoroughly shattered the paradigms of every vanguard elite present! Their breathing grew ragged, their eyes turning bloodshot with feverish, manic excitement.

At this very moment, a single, unshakable conviction crystallized in their minds: As long as they wore this tier of Black Steel Full-Plate Armor, they would exist in a state of absolute, impenetrable safety against enemy archery volleys and conventional melee slashes! They would never again have to pathetically scramble and dodge incoming arrows. They could puff out their chests and engage the Orcs in a completely reckless, unapologetic close-quarters meat-grinder!

"From this day forward, you are no longer standard infantry," Soren paced slowly toward the visibly trembling, over-adrenalized soldiers. In his mind, he was already laying out the framework for modern special forces heavy-breach tactics. He clapped his hands sharply, violently yanking their attention back to him:"However! If you think that donning this heavy plate means your only job is to stand in place, absorb hits, and play passive defense... then you are dead wrong!

Defense is forever just the stepping stone for a vastly more brutal offense!" Following the armor test, morale was practically boiling over. Striking while the iron was hot, Soren immediately launched into an in-depth, highly specialized tactical training seminar for these seventy vanguard elites—a curriculum that would entirely upend the martial common sense of this era.

Soren casually picked up a hardened Black Steel bracer, tossing it to one of the soldiers as he began lecturing on his entirely new tactical paradigm.

"Point One: Kinetic Inertia and Impact!" Soren walked to the center of the clearing, dragging his boot through the mud to draw two parallel lines representing battle formations:"In traditional military doctrine, the sheer weight of heavy armor severely handicaps mobility. Heavy infantry moves like turtles, restricted to forming static shield walls. But you are different! Every single one of you has been administered the [Basic Troll Blood Serum]!

You possess the absolute peak of physical conditioning in this world!" Soren clenched his fists, adopting a posture of a full-speed, violent charge, his expression deadly serious:"Picture it! Your augmented muscular strength, combined with the sheer mass of this entire set of Black Steel armor, weighing well over a hundred pounds! The moment you initiate a full-throttle sprint within a thirty-pace engagement window, that terrifying physical inertia will instantaneously obliterate any obstacle in your path!"

"Do not stand in place waiting for the enemy to come to you! Weaponize your mass to physically crush them! Shatter their formations! Launch them violently into the air!" The elites listened, their blood boiling. Their minds instantly conjured the apocalyptic image of seventy heavily armored juggernauts executing a synchronized, explosive charge. It was a terrifying offensive that absolutely no flesh and blood could withstand.

This revolutionary concept—converting defensive deadweight into a weaponized kinetic payload—violently pried open an entirely new horizon of combat awareness for them.

"Point Two: Exploitable Armor Gaps and Footwork Defense!" Soren's tone abruptly shifted, turning immensely stern:"There is no such thing as an absolutely flawless defense in this world. Even with Black Steel Full-Plate, to ensure your joints retain combat mobility, the armpits, the backs of your knees, and the vision slits of your visors are inevitably spliced with flexible chainmail. These are your fatal weak points!" Soren turned his head, glancing at his bodyguard, Lyra.

She was standing a short distance away with her arms crossed, her silver hair drifting in the cold wind.

"You have all seen Lyra butcher our enemies." Soren pointed to Lyra, using her as a real-world tactical case study:"She is a master of throwing knives and close-quarters assassination. In our previous engagements, how exactly did she utilize her physical agility to surgically target the Achilles tendons of those heavily armored Orcs?" The soldiers nodded in immediate recognition.

They had personally witnessed Lyra seamlessly slip into the absolute blind spots of the Orcs, cleanly severing their tendons and bringing the towering monsters crashing down into the mud.

"The enemy will inevitably use the exact same tactics against you!" Soren stepped directly in front of one of the soldiers, personally demonstrating CQC (Close Quarters Combat) footwork:"Your weapons are not merely tools for hacking and slashing; they are tools for dictating spatial control and positioning! In a chaotic melee, do not ever stand rigid and expose your vital joints to an enemy wielding a short blade."