Chapter 123 - What You Can

Although most of them were exhausted, the infantry, cavalry, and the archers crossed the Eastern gate of Rustburg to meet the mercenaries on the open field. At that point in time, most would think they were accepting unnecessary risks. However, if they wanted to keep defending the town, certain risks had to be accepted in order to reach other goals. 

"Remember, stay slow for the time being," Verkan said to Zaos. "Keeping myself out of the enemies' sight is impossible since I am a captain, but if you hold back on your magic for a while, we might surprise them."

"Yes, sir," Zaos said.

The mercenaries had to spend a little more time to assume their positions, but in the end, they did so in order to make sure that all their soldiers could be used during the day. After a couple of minutes, the mercenaries finally began to march. Five hundred infantrymen, five hundred riders, five hundred archers… 

While the enemy army got closer, the defenders didn't move a single inch. While the defenders tried to decrease the distance between the frontline and the archers in order to grant them a chance to attack and not give the same chance to the enemy archers. However, the enemy army was also marching pretty close to each other.

"With me!" Verkan shouted.

Verkan shouted when the archers on his side finally fired their first volley. The arrows fell on the back of the infantrymen, but most of them managed to escape unscathed because of their shields. They sure came prepared to a tough fight, but while that protected them from the archers, the same thing couldn't be said about the other forces on the battlefield.

Zaos met two enemies who pointed their spears at him, but he easily dodged them. The real problem came afterward when he saw two shields protecting the spearmen. Zaos swung his sword with all his might and then made their shields fly, and he heard their armies cracking.

Verkan opened another hole in the enemies' formation, and then the company began to advance amidst the enemy formation. Without using magic, the enemies didn't take much notice of Zaos. From their perspective, he was just a short soldier who had a lot of brute strength. 

The piercing power of the company couldn't even be compared to the previous battles. Still, thanks to the fact that Zaos wasn't much farther away from the squad's center, the number of losses had been minimal. However, when they reached the other side of the first line of enemies, they found the cavalry dashing toward them.

Zaos and Verkan had been the first ones to be attacked by the riders. Zaos first reaction had been to fire magic at them, but he refrained from doing so. He couldn't even use wing magic that was barely noticeable on his sword or as a projectile because he couldn't stand much more. So, he only parried the enemy's spear to the left side and then dashed and swung his sword at the horses' leg. Once the rider fell, Zaos finished him up before he could even fall on the ground with a single thrust on his neck.

Before Zaos could even recover or take a quick breath, another rider appeared and pointed his weapon toward him. Zaos held his sword with his left hand and then blocked the attack. Meanwhile, Zaos kicked the spear of the first enemy and then made the tip hit the second horse. Thanks to the attack, the horse fell on the ground, and once again, Zaos finished the second rider.

"This is taking too much time…" Zaos said and then sighed as he looked in the distance.

"Be patient, Zaos," Verkan said while he looked in the sky and saw another volley of arrows falling, this time on the back of the enemies' cavalry.

The riders and the horses didn't react in time to notice the volley of arrows, so many of them got killed or deeply wounded. However, on his side, Zaos could see many more people getting hurt and killed.

"If you want to command someday, Zaos, you must understand that you can't save or protect all of your soldiers," Verkan said. "The battlefield isn't that simple or easy… one last thing. Our job here isn't to survive, do you understand that?"

Zaos nodded. Their goal there was to take the heads of as many enemies as possible before going down and, if they last for long enough, attack the enemies' siege weapons. All in order to make the two armies of mercenaries don't attack the other towns and villages and the northern base.

Zaos clenched his teeth as he noticed another rider dashing toward him, and then he had a certain idea. Amidst the battlefield, no one would notice that. So, he assumed an ox guard, and when the enemy got close enough, he fired a strengthened Earth Bullet. His projectile hit the horse's leg and made it snap. Once again, Zaos finished the rider while he was falling.

"What I said about magic?" Verkan asked.

"No one noticed, sir," Zaos said. "Besides, I can fire fifty of those without running out of mana. Blocking and parrying takes too much of my stamina, and also takes too much time to face a rider after that."

"… You are a troublesome kid," Verkan said after a long sigh. "Whatever, just focus on knocking down the enemies that attack you."

Zaos managed to knock down and kill several archers in just a couple of minutes using that strategy. However, he only managed to do that for so long. When Zaos and Verkan were about to reach the last line of riders, they heard a very ominous sound. The sound of arrows being fired. 

"Shields!" Verkan shouted. "Raise your shields!"

Even without Verkan's orders, most of the men fighting had heard the sound of hundreds of strings firing arrows, but when the arrows fell, not all of them were ready for the arrows. Zaos managed to repel the arrows that almost hit him by swinging his sword, but that had been only the first volley.