Chương 67: 67：Not a Single One Escapes

But the moment his voice faded... High above, on a protruding rock serving as a vantage point, the sharpshooter Ein gently released his fingers. His [Calm] talent kept his breathing as steady and precise as a ticking clock, perfectly unaffected by the chaotic battlefield below. Swish! The feathered arrow struck silently from above, entering perfectly through a Centurion's slightly parted lips. The arrowhead burst out through the back of his skull, pinning him completely dead to a nearby dead stump.

"Fourth Squad! Shield wall—!" Another Orc squad leader had barely turned around to shout. Squelch! A sharp arrow violently pierced his carotid artery, sending a geyser of blood spraying into the air. Bolstered by the terrifying 35% accuracy bonus of [Natural Hunter], every draw of Ein's bow heralded the death of a low-ranking Orc officer attempting to rally a counterattack. The entire Black Iron Orc force was utterly decapitated of its command.

Armed with nothing but brute strength, they milled around the valley floor like headless flies!

"Get the hell out of my way!" Just as the Orcs descended into fear and chaos, a half-naked figure—his blocky muscles mapped with hideous scars—leaped directly from the twelve-meter-high cliff face! The Monk, Renn, carried no weapons. He crashed heavily into the dead center of the Orc pack! The immense impact of the fall was absorbed by a deep, highly resilient bend of his knees. The moment he touched down, two Black Iron Orcs reacted.

With bloodshot eyes, they swung their warhammers from the left and right, aiming straight for his chest. Murderous intent exploded in Renn's eyes. Instead of retreating, he surged forward! His body snapped forward like a taut bowstring. With terrifying, preemptive speed, his iron-hard elbow slammed laterally into the dead center of the left Orc's chestplate. CRACK! The Orc's rigid black iron breastplate caved in, violently cratered by Renn's elbow alone.

The concussive force shattered the entire sternum, driving bone fragments backward into its heart. The Orc vomited a massive mouthful of blood and collapsed flat on its back. In the very next breath, Renn executed a low sweeping kick, precisely shattering the inner knee cartilage of the right Orc. As the beast lost its balance and pitched forward, Renn snapped his fingers together into a blade.

The veins on his arm bulged viciously as his fingertips whipped up a nasty gust of wind, driving a ruthless spear-hand strike upward! Squelch! Renn's fingers pierced straight up through the soft tissue under the Orc's jaw, mashing through the root of its tongue and instantly pulverizing its fragile cervical spine. He yanked his hand back, dragging out a crimson string of blood. Renn was a starving wolf unleashed in a flock of sheep. He weaved and flickered through the absolute center of the dense Orc formation.

With every punch and every elbow, skulls fractured and torsos caved in. Deep within enemy lines, armed with nothing but flesh and bone, he sparked a wave of sheer terror that rivaled the devastation of a wide-area magic scroll!

"Get out of the ditch! Scatter! Don't just stand there and get shot!" Bringing up the rear, Karl finally snapped to his senses. Screaming hoarsely from the back of his warg, he struck out at his retreating subordinates, desperately trying to drive the battered remnants out of this fatal kill zone. On the periphery, some Orcs threw down their heavy shields, scrambling to flee toward the mouth of the valley. However, the narrow path leading to the valley exit had—unbeknownst to them—already been sealed shut.

Buck, the cavalry commander recently brought under Soren's banner, stood like an immovable iron tower in the dead center of the path, gripping a chipped standard-issue iron sword. Behind him stood over thirty battered human soldiers. Though their stamina had long since been depleted, their eyes were currently as red as dripping blood!

"Trying to run?! Not unless my sword says so!" Watching seven or eight fleeing Orcs charge toward him, Buck swung his blade. He cleaved a gaping gash horizontally through the waist of the leading Orc, spilling its intestines all over the muddy ground. These thirty remnants barely had a single decent piece of armor between them. Yet, acting like rabid dogs desperate to prove their worth to their new lord, they fiercely barricaded the exit, trapping the retreating Orcs within the encirclement.

One human soldier took an Orcish battleaxe to the shoulder. Instead of falling back, he offered a savage grin and clamped his arms fiercely around the Orc's arm. His comrades instantly swarmed the beast, frantically caving in the Orc's skull with their weapons. A sharpshooter picking them off from above, a Monk throwing their formation into chaos from within, and a suicide squad sealing the exit from the outside. Terror and dismay gripped Karl. He couldn't fathom it.

When did such an elite, ruthless, and highly coordinated human army—one that completely threw away the conventional rulebook—appear in the misty swamps?! Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

"All forces, heed my command." High on the cliffside, Soren no longer bothered to look down at the chaotic slaughterhouse. His cold, clinical voice cut through the wailing.

"Armor-piercing Heavy Halberd Phalanx. March down. Close the net." CLANG! A perfectly synchronized clash of metal rang out. Sixty-four elite infantrymen clad in black armor advanced, each gripping a massive, 2. 5-meter-long heavy halberd. Tramping through the yellow mud of a gentler slope, they descended into the sun-baked gully. Front rank: thrust. Middle rank: parry. Rear rank: cover.

"Advance." THUD! Sixty-four pairs of iron boots stepped forward in unison.

"Thrust." SHING! Relying on their absolute reach advantage, the 2. 5-meter halberds mercilessly impaled the Orcs through the chest long before the beasts' meter-long handaxes could even come close to landing a hit. Even the famously resilient black iron half-plate was punctured like paper beneath the full-force thrust of an elite armor-piercing halberd. Shk! Shk! Shk! The halberd tips were yanked free, sending a spray of blood raining into the air.

"Retract! Step!" Another perfectly synchronized march forward. Trampling over Orc corpses and spilling entrails, the heavy phalanx advanced methodically, coldly slicing and steamrolling everything in its path. This mechanical, emotionless military slaughter was the final straw that crushed the psychological defenses of the Black Iron Orcs. At the rear. The once-arrogant Orc officer Karl watched as his two hundred proudest elites were butchered down to less than thirty men in the span of just ten minutes.

Whether it was a mindless charge or a brute-force counterattack, everything was utterly snuffed out by the enemy's oppressive tactics.

"It's over... It's all over..." Karl's hand trembled violently around the hilt of his blade. In his single remaining eye, there was only bottomless dread. Yanking the reins of his warg, he threw his bullshit Orcish pride to the wind. Desperate, he turned his mount around in the chaos and tried to flee for his life. A forest of halberds. A waterfall of blood. In a matter of seconds, the mud at the bottom of the gully was completely stained a sickening, dark green. Clatter.

Standing amidst the hopeless carnage, Victor's palms were slick with cold sweat as his rusty iron sword slipped from his grasp. He raised his head, looking at the dozen brothers beside him who had been certain they were about to die. In their eyes, he saw a violent eruption of disbelief and pure ecstasy. They survived. Trapped in this valley of death, they had actually survived! A few dozen meters away, Buck, who had witnessed the entire spectacle, sharply inhaled a breath of cold air.

As a former cavalry captain of the Silvermoon Kingdom's regular army, Buck understood infantry warfare all too well. In the Silvermoon Kingdom's military doctrine, infantry phalanxes were merely expendable fodder meant for passive defense. The moment those spearmen had their first line broken, they would shatter into loose sand, ripe for slaughter. But this sixty-four-man unit completely shattered everything Buck thought he knew.

Every single step taken by these sixty-four heavy-armored elites was so perfectly measured it was as if dictated by a ruler. They operated in three-man combat cells. One used the halberd's barbed lug to hook and trap the Orc's battleaxe; the second stepped in to deliver the killing thrust; and the third covered the flank's blind spots. None of them broke formation for personal glory. Step. Thrust. Retract. Cold sweat beaded on Buck's forehead as he muttered to himself, "Unbelievable...

what kind of commander could forge such a relentless war machine?" Profound awe and shock were permanently branded into the cavalry commander's heart. High on the cliff face, Soren's ruthless voice carried down into the gully on the wind.

"Tighten the net! Do not let a single one escape! Annihilate them all!" Under the crushing pressure of the advancing halberd phalanx, the usually boastful and arrogant Black Iron Orcs finally broke. The twenty-odd surviving Orcs abandoned their heavy shields, scrambling and clawing their way up the steep dirt slope at the rear in a desperate bid for their lives.

"Dammit! Damned humans! Out of my way!" Karl, the Vanguard Commander of the Blackstone Warband, had eyes bloodshot to the point of weeping. He viciously whipped the giant warg beneath him. The beast unleashed a pained howl, its four paws clawing frantically at the slick, muddy slope, desperately trying to carry its master out of this hellscape. If he could just crest this muddy slope and plunge into the poison mist forest ahead, he still had a chance to survive! However, the Reaper's arrow is never late.

Perched high upon the rocks, Soren's expression remained as calm as a placid lake. Slowly, he raised the cyan rune-covered [Windwhisper Bow].