Chapter 87 Soldier-Wall

Darting to either my left or right, I avoided the tents that came my way. To the rear. That was my destination. More precisely, I was headed to some place they called the Guild Bureau. It wasn't the headquarters of the human guild of adventurers, but it was some other office they had, situated at the outpost of the battle against an orc country.

Said branch office of the Guild Bureau was established not on the battlefield, but further behind it in the human settlement. That was the broad place I first saw from up my hill before I mingled with the action. I had observed tents, mostly, and many other quick-built facilities that could serve any purpose at the rear. And so, on the Quest's instructions, that's where I was headed.

Running, avoiding many orcs, and jumping, I wasn't so out of breath, but running so fast was demanding, especially with Quick Pace. The skill cost me lots of MPs, but well, I didn't think about that for now. The device the System called "guiding fragrance" proved useful at times like this. Using it, all I had to do was try and "smell" my way up to the goal the System ascribed to me. Thanks to it, I knew for sure the direction I took was the right one.

One of the orcs' tents went down in a surprise attack. An old man and some monster had taken it down. Word had been out: So and so Warchief of the So and so clan of the Red-skinned Orcs was out recruiting a powerful asset the orc could need. To the orc army, whatever the Chief's plan was, they didn't need to heed it. They weren't concerned about it.

For now, all they had to do was fight and keep at it. The orc army really lacked organization. That's how when the tent went down with the old man's attack, and dozens of orcs were found lifeless in it, along with, eerily enough, a good handful of humans, too, the orcs didn't know much about the situation happening.

When some red-skinned orc and an unidentified old human male were found in the midst of that shattered tent, at first, the orcs were at loss regarding what to do and how to act. But when some strange, and also unidentified, monster leaked out of the red-skinned orc's body, who also happened to, incidentally, and for unknown reasons, be engulfed in a sea of bright, white flames, the unorganized bits of the scattered orc army instantly knew what to do.

Some trumpet was blown. It had been blown before, with the loudest reverberations, to inform all orc soldiers that the time was to strategically retreat (the humans had done the same, that's how I got this deep into the frontlines in the first place), and now it was blown too. The loud blowing sound didn't indicate to the unorganized army to retreat. This one blow cried "Enemy sighted in the camp!" or something along those lines.

All at once, from the chaos they gave, the orcs sprung into order and began the manhunt.

That was beautiful and all, but, even when I was farther behind in the orc camp, with only five or so minutes, I jumped up the last wall of orcs blocking my way out. And that was it—the Outside World again. After another minute of dashing forward using Quick Pace, again and again, the orcs were a thing of the past.

And the scenery I was seeing, at present, conveyed just that message. The orc army was of the past. The war they upheld against the humans was mostly a defensive one. They waged war, sure, but that was simply the last desperate cry at wishing to live they had to take and go forward with.

On the battlefield, it was clear. The humans may have been way more numerous than the orcs in coming to the battlefield, but they weren't bigger in numbers of casualties at all. The human army was far from that. Sure, they suffered casualties, just like the orcs, but the number was probably ridiculous in comparison. The orcs definitely lost.

Death was what equalized people, but running through the field at a very high speed, I wasn't so motionless like the fallen warriors of the battle of Greenfield—I was alive. It was "game over" for all of them, but I was still a winner. Scattered down the grand, grassy field, as far as my eye could see from left to right, people had fallen, and raptors kinds of birds flew up and down the earth.

The second battle for Ladafar was settled, for now. Before the orc army could thoroughly be chased away from this grassy field, and retreat further back to their houses, both teams of humans and orcs would rest up a little. As for why the humans strategically rested, it was to win a greater victory against the vile demi-humans' threat. And about the demi-humans' reason for momentarily pulling the troops back, as the orc team simply was here to fight a defensive war, they would likely go keep it at that—defense.

That's how, for the present moment, war wasn't raging through the land. I still ran across the now timid and meek battlefield, not even waving bye-bye at the orcs still desperately running after me behind my back. I hurried myself, pierced through the air, and worked my way up to the human team in the distance.

From a very faraway distance (which diminished by the minute), I could observe the men. As I got nearer and nearer to the human team, with all their soldiers and men assembling in the horizon, forming an ever-stretching long line, I wondered about what could be the strategy behind their retreat and whatnot, having no clue about warfare and how to wage war, I mostly had my eyes on the formation all the metallic men were adopting.

And… oh! What was that in the sky? A long, reddish-smoking flame flew up in the air. It had been shot from down the ground. Shot or blasted off from behind the soldiers' line. Going up with a crackling, smoky cry, it jumped higher and higher in the blue sky, before it lost itself and vanished in a trail of red smoke. That was intriguing. I certainly wished for another of these fireballs to fly up the sky, performing the same wondrous dance in front of me, but it didn't. Incidentally, that flying fireball, though I ignored it, was a signal from the fighting human force.

A green fireball shot in the sky authorized the adventurers and mercenaries to partake in the fight, while a reddish one prohibited them to. The people had their own little language I was oblivious of, so seeing the red of the flames didn't worry me in the least, thinking I might get into some legal troubles soon enough. Well, even if I did get into any legal problem, at some point—it's all good, man.

Kicking off the earth with "Quick Pace," I thought I'd hurry along to discover where the smoke signal came from. Those reddish smokes, the ever-stretching lining up of the soldiers, obviously getting ready for yet another organized assault against the losing team, and the delivering, to whatever institution, of the warlord orc head dangling by my side were my three goals.

The last time I overdid it, with the Quick Pace active skill, I ended up so worn-out and exhausted, leaving me breathless and more or less inefficient for a little while. My feet dancing their way to the human team still, I didn't overuse the skill this time.

Well, and the horizon of a minute ago wasn't the horizon of the present moment. I had gotten to the horizon when another horizon sprang up behind it. Basically, I proceeded onward, sometimes jumping over whatever dead body I found under my feet. The very long rows of soldiers were at last close enough. And then, another flying red fireball was blasted off from behind the clustering soldiers.

Now that I had gotten closer, my running steps slowed down, and I trotted down the field. Soon, my trotting would become walking. All the same, proceeding onward, I analyzed the humans' formation, thinking about all the scenarios in which I had to somehow fight against an army of thousands and dryly chuckling about the obvious result of such fights.

In their formation, to my discontentment, there were no adventurers whatsoever. Where had my beloved people gone to? Only soldiers were found here. They were professionals working full-time for the State and Kingdom. Equipped all the same way, they formed a thick metallic wall. This was no simple "row" or "line," now that I was closer; it was a wall.

The soldiers were as motionless as statues. The wide and thick wall of metallic statues wasn't simply standing there, forming the perfect human-wall on their own, no. Of the human team, there were other kinds of "bigger" soldiers who weren't quite nourishing the wall and its thickness, no. Big men. They were taking care of the wall from the outside of it. There were others like him, a demi-dozen of them, big and strong as him in presence. Check that one up: He's a titan. A titan among little ones. That's impressive.

Standing out, a good ten meters ahead of the soldier-wall, throwing about waving hands and jerky gestures to the pack of soldiers. I gathered that, tossing about these motions, at times ordering the soldiers forward and stuff, they indeed took good care of the wall.

This was about the bigger picture of the human team. My pair of feet had dragged me near enough to them. Peering behind my shoulder, I scoffed and shrugged at how far I had gotten from the orc team. Slowly pacing toward the soldier-wall, my legs now simply walked.

Only a short distance, which was still long enough for the soldier in charge not to notice the boy's presence, separated me from the wall. It was then that one of the thick soldiers picked up an unknown presence on the battlefield, behind his back. A question mark popped above his head, and he turned to me like he had smelled my presence.

His broad armored shoulders turned toward mine, which let the huge breastplate face my rags—my tunic, shirt, and breeches—artistically painted with blood. Upon seeing the red canvas of the boy lost in war, the soldier's two nostrils flared up with his eyes. I wondered why the man looked my way. His two fierce eyes had only bothered peeking at me, their most esteemed guest, after so long. I had long since noticed their presence, but they hadn't minded me. That was rude.

I had grown bored of the both metallic and organic soldier-wall in front of me, by now. My curious eyes wanted to see past it. What was behind it? I picked so many different noises that illustrated liveliness coming from behind it.

The noisy atmosphere, to me, heralded the presence of adventurers. I looked forward to seeing the Outside World of the humans, with my wide, sparkly eyes, but I refused to either jump up to peek behind the wall right away or use Mana Perception and see what roamed free behind the metallic structure.