Perhaps the power inside the castle exploded again, but Zich quickly rejected that idea after seeing the castle’s flames
‘It’s under control.’ The fire didn’t move like it was trying to burn the whole castle like last time. Flames were seeping out of the castle, but there was an obvious pattern in its movements.
‘Is the ritual already over?’ Was the information Romanne received actually part of a trick?
‘If that’s the case, I have to reevaluate my assessment of the Iron Tribe King.’ But that was a task for a later time. It was clear that the sudden flames would not be favorable for the allied forces.
“What do you think about that?” Zich asked Lyla.
“At the very least, I don’t think it benefits us.” It seemed Lyla had the same thought as Zich.
Crack!
“Kuh!”
In the meantime, the war continued. Zich struck one of the Iron Tribe elves coming his way and killed them. And as the war continued on—
Pop! A huge clump of dirt from the center shot up towards the air.
“Sir Zich! It’s Snoc’s signal!” Hans shouted. Lyla also sharply stared at the clump of dirt.
“I suppose something is really coming.” Snoc’s signal meant that the hole he created had to be erased as the situation would no longer allow him to protect it.
“Is it our enemy’s reinforcements?”
“I’m not sure, but we will soon learn about it.”
“Should I check with my magic?”
“It’s fine. We will soon see what it is anyways. What’s more important is that you should stick by my side, Lyla.”
Whether or not they were reinforcement forces or a mysterious power from an ancient empire, the advantage of attacking from the rear disappeared now. Thus, it was safer to have Lyla by his side.
“Hans, continue attacking those elves from the back.”
“Yes!” Hans nodded and began to swing Estellade again. A fancy light laced the battlefield and mercilessly stole many lives from the Iron Tribe. Zich also continued to attack the Iron Tribe with his mana as he maintained his guard at the back. Not long afterward, their enemies showed themselves.
“Hey, Lyla, can you tell what that is?”
“Not really. I don’t know either.”
Neither Zich, who had many experiences from his past life, or Lyla who had diverse magic knowledge could recognize the being in front of them. It was a mass of fire. Its size was a head bigger than an average adult male; and like a human, it had two arms and two legs attached to its body. A structure resembling a head shot out from it, but it didn’t have a face. And there were multiple of them. Like soldiers charging towards their enemies, they ran straight towards the battlefield.
“Lyla!”
“I know!” Lyla raised her staff and began to cast a spell. An immense amount of mana began to swirl around her staff. Then, she pointed her staff towards the fireballs.
Crack! Crack!
The area in front of them began to freeze instantly. The ground hardened, and icicles hung from the wall. Some of the trees froze and their frozen leaves fell and broke.
“Thankfully, their weak point seems to be exactly how they look,” Zich muttered when he saw the masses of fire move much more weakly.
Pop! Pop!
Some of the masses of fire couldn’t withstand the cold and burst apart; in the meantime, Lyla prepared another spell. Behind her, dozens of spears made out of water formed and shot forward according to her commands.
Smash! Smash!
The water spears hit the clumps of fire perfectly and caused a couple of them to burst. Seeing this, Lyla said, “I don’t think they are anything that impressive.”
“Yeah. I thought they were monsters that could regenerate unless you hit them with a nuclear bomb, but they don’t seem to be at that level. Nor do they look too hard to fight against.” As he said this, Zich stared at the back of the masses of fire that Lyla had taken care of. “…If only it wasn’t for their numbers.”
More masses of fire were approaching from behind the area that Lyla attacked. Zich moved this time. In an instant, Zich shortened the distance between the masses of fire and collided against them. The masses of fire swung their arms and attacked Zich—their flaming arms flared up and stretched towards him, but Zich tilted his body and evaded the attacks.
Craaaash!
A small hole formed on the ground as a mass of fire landed on the ground. The dirt was scorched black; if the clump of fire had made contact with Zich’s skin, it would’ve left a gruesome burn scar on his body. Zich swung Windur and sliced the mass of fire’s arm.
Slice!
Pop!
The whole sliced part of the arm disappeared, and it didn’t grow into a new flame out of the severed area or regenerate. However, like it couldn’t feel pain, the mass of fire hugged Zich with its remaining arm. It seemed like it was planning to burn Zich with its intense heat. Yet before that, Windur pierced the clump of fire’s chest.
Whoosh!
Zich evaded the flames rising to his head.
‘It can also shoot fireballs.’ What looked like its head shot out fireballs and passed through where Zich’s face used to be.
‘It’s meaningless to pierce its body.’
Rather than nearing death, it seemed like Zich’s attack didn’t debilitate the mass of fire’s movements at all. Zich swung Windur in a circle, making it turn inside and move towards the head of the mass of fire. Then Zich drew it up from close range.
Slice!
Pop!
The clump of fire burst. Zich shook off the rest of the flames around him and rushed towards the other clumps of fire.
‘They die when you slice their heads off.’ After bursting a couple of more clumps of fire, Zich confirmed the conditions to kill them (although it was hard to say that their disappearance could be described as deaths).
“Aim for the head! That’s how they die!” Zich shouted and sliced the rest of the fireballs. Like Lyla said, they weren’t that difficult to fight. However, the problem was that they were in the middle of a war.
‘We’re getting pushed back.’
As he watched the flames in front of him, Zich cut down an elf that was rushing towards Lyla from the back. He felt that the war was not going the way he wanted. His plan to appear behind the Iron Tribe and fight against them from both sides had been going smoothly—until those fire shapes came in front of him.
The Iron Tribe had attacked the rear of the allied forces, and now they were both getting attacked on both sides from each other. However, they were currently in enemy territory. The battle was disadvantageous for the allied forces because they had to cross a large lake to reach their enemies.
‘Is this it?’ Zich realized that they might not be successful in this battle.
And true to his words—
“Retreat! Retreat!” An order to retreat came from the allied forces.
‘We weren’t able to endure it.’ This was a crucial moment. In a war, being able to retreat well was just as important as fighting well. ‘The problem is that this is a terrible place to retreat.’
Their camp was across the lake, and right now, they were in enemy territory. An island on top of a lake made it difficult for the allied forces to attack and even more difficult to retreat.
Lyla asked, “What should we do?”
Zich held up Windur. “We have to get through the guys in front of us first and meet up with our allies.”
“Hans, take good care of Lyla.”
“Yes, sir!”
“Lyla, send a big one to the front.”
“Got it.” Lyla held up her staff again.
Crackkkkle!
A large flame emerged from the top of Lyla’s staff. The Iron Tribe saw this and began targeting Lyla. Anyone could see that Lyla’s flame looked deathly strong, but Zich and Hans blocked all of their attacks. Thus, the Iron Tribe’s intervention became useless, and Lyla finished casting her spell.
Fireballs came pouring down from the sky.
Crassssh!
Lyla seemed to have taken much more time on this spell since the fireballs landed directly on the Iron Tribe’s side. Of course, there were a lot of elves who were able to avoid the fireballs, but there were also a lot of elves who died to Lyla’s magic. The important thing was not to cause damage upon their opponents, but to destroy the enemy’s base for a bit to create a path to retreat. Zich ran straight into the enemy’s base; he infused mana into Windur and swung his sword in all directions.
“Ugh!”
“Agh!”
Damage upon the Iron Tribe increased. Many elves tried to block Zich, but he never stopped moving. Rather than focusing on causing as much damage to his opponents, Zich chose to focus on moving forward.
“Follow that human!” The general of the allied forces saw Zich’s movement and shouted out an order to all his soldiers.
Zich was causing a rift in the enemy’s base; the enemy’s defense weakened, and it was easier to push past them. More and more of the soldiers in the allied forces gathered behind Zich. Lyla also continued to use her magic to weaken her enemies, and Hans also continuously swung Estellade against the Iron Tribe. The rift became increasingly bigger, and the Iron Tribe’s defense became weaker and weaker; in the end, the Iron Tribe troops were split into two sides. Now, they could see the lake in front of them.
“Woahhhh!”
“A path was formed!”
The allied forces continued to push through the Iron Tribe by using the path that was now in front of them, but the Iron Tribe did not just stand idly by. They continued to pressure the allied forces on both sides to try to block the path and scatter them again. However, the allied forces were not pushed back. As they got closer to the lake, their allies in boats used their arrows and magic to help their comrades move forward; eventually, the allied forces in Mentis were able to reach the allied forces’ boats. When the boats were full, they departed from Mentis and moved back to the other side of the lake.
However, it was impossible for all the soldiers in the allied forces to retreat by using boats since there were too many soldiers for this method to be viable. Zich stepped a bit away from the center of the battle and hit the ground in a rhythmic pattern.
Scatter!
In an instant, a hole appeared next to him. Snoc’s face came out from the hole. Nowem was on top of his head, and he was turning his head around to check for any incoming danger.
“Did you connect them thoroughly?”
“Yes, sir! I’ve also made sure that the hole drilled into the middle of the lake was fixed.” Snoc confidently replied back, and Zich shook his head in satisfaction.
“Send a signal.”
“Yes, sir!”
Dirt flew up in the air once again, and this scene was easy to spot on the battlefield.
“It’s over there! A new tunnel is over there! Those who are nearby, escape through that tunnel!” An officer who recognized the signal loudly shouted to the rest of his soldiers.
The elves near Snoc began to jump into the tunnel. Once they were in the tunnel, they ran as fast as possible; if they moved slowly, the entrance might be blocked and their comrades might have a harder time retreating.
However, even though they successfully caused a rift in the Iron Tribe’s defense and had another escape route through an underground tunnel, it didn’t change the fact that the allied forces were in enemy territory. Moreover, they were currently losing this battle.
“Aghhh!”
An elf that was blocking the attacks from the Iron Tribe to help his comrades retreat was pierced by a flame and collapsed on the ground. Next to him, an elf died from being shot through the head with an arrow. While steadily retreating back, the casualties among the allied forces continued to increase. However, even this had to end. The last survivor of the allied forces moved towards a boat in the lake, but that boat met an unfortunate end.
Crassh!
The fire shapes shot out flames towards the last survivor. The fatigued and injured elves weren’t able to block the attack, and the boat caught on fire and sank into the lake. Like this, the first battle between the allied forces and the Iron Tribe ended.
Now, the Iron Tribe could only see the allied forces retreating in their boats from far away, and there were no more allied forces in Mentis. The tunnel, another escape route for the allied forces, was also closed. The first battle between the allied forces and the Iron Tribe ended with the Iron Tribe’s victory.