Ch.165Overwhelming Victory

With Phyllis’s sniper shot taking down the shaman, we charged forward to pursue the orc horde. We needed to get within bow range while the orcs were still confused from losing their leader.

“Kwek! Kweeeek!”

“Kuk-kuk-kuk!!”

An orc spotted Seti running down the hill slightly behind us and let out a pig-like squeal, causing all nearby orcs to turn their heads.

The orcs’ reactions upon detecting our approach were completely disorganized.

Some gripped their spears and shields tightly and charged back at us, others set down their weapons to draw short bows and nock arrows, some abandoned the fight and fled, while others fell into panic seeing their comrades desert.

*Swoosh swoosh*

“This is a piece of cake.”

The first attack exchanged between both sides was arrows from the orcs, supposedly with a range of 150 meters.

However, of the nine orcs, only two had switched to short bows to fire suppressing shots.

Even those were merely blind shots, fired without proper aim due to the confusion from their leader’s sudden death.

*Swaaash!*

As the orcs’ arrows cut harmlessly through empty air, Seti’s spear tip swung fiercely, sending out a sharp blade of wind.

An orc charging with a spear hastily raised his shield to block the attack, but the wind blade was more powerful than expected, momentarily disrupting his stance.

“One.”

*Slash!*

Seti’s spear blade sliced through the opening, cutting off the orc’s head.

If it had been an ordinary living being, Seti would have been drenched in a fountain of blood, but monsters sustained by dark magic typically don’t bleed when wounded.

Though orcs seemed to be an exception to this rule, as a dark liquid seeped from the severed neck.

The amount was too minimal to call bleeding, and whether that substance—which evaporated like dark vapor upon contact with air—could even be called blood was questionable.

*Bang! Click, Bang!*

As the headless orc’s body rolled lifelessly down the hill, Phyllis, who had already brought the enemies within rifle range, fired her lever-action rifle in rapid succession at an orc holding a short bow.

Holding a bow meant the orc’s left hand wasn’t holding a shield.

In other words, it had no means to block the powerful white magic bullets from Phyllis’s rifle.

The two orcs who had failed in their preemptive bow attack and hadn’t switched back to their other weapons before we approached had to pay for their misjudgment with their lives.

“Flame Lance!”

*Ta-ta-tang!*

The orcs with shields tried desperately to block the incoming attacks, but Flame Lance, with its fire attribute and high penetration power, was the perfect counter to their wooden shields.

You might say their shields were somewhat effective against my revolver since it couldn’t pierce or burn through them?

Well, there were plenty of other places to shoot on those fat bodies besides the vital spots covered by shields.

I could target exposed knees or spear-wielding right arms to cripple their combat ability, then leave the finishing blow to my companions.

“Kweeeeeeek~~~”

“Hmph.”

*Thunk!*

An orc that managed to approach Seti with desperate determination thrust its spear forcefully, but Seti easily avoided it with a jump, landing on the orc’s spear shaft and driving her own spear into its heart.

Upon landing, she skillfully kicked up the fallen orc’s spear with her foot, caught it, and pierced through the heart of another orc whose knee I had shot earlier, from behind.

“Nice one, Seti!”

“Yeah.”

*Bang!*

As I gave her a thumbs up, Seti responded with a V-sign while pulling her spear from the orc’s chest.

Meanwhile, Phyllis took aim and eliminated another orc with a headshot.

Excluding the one that fled immediately after the shaman was sniped, only one orc remained alive.

“Kweeeeek~!!”

Realizing it couldn’t possibly win against enemies who had annihilated its unit in the blink of an eye, the lone surviving orc threw down its weapons and turned to flee.

Phyllis’s rifle took aim at the orc’s back as it ran in a straight line.

*Bang-!!*

A single gunshot echoed across the hillside.

The orc’s desperate struggle to survive had only prolonged its life by a mere 10 seconds.

“That ended more easily than I expected.”

“The successful sniper shot made a big difference. Having their commander, the shaman, fall first was completely outside the orcs’ expectations.”

“It’s unfortunate we let the first one that fled get away. Orcs are a species with their own language, so the survivor will likely return to its village and report information about us.”

“It doesn’t matter. It won’t have any information besides our numbers anyway. More importantly, about the direction the last one was running…”

“Yeah. Instead of running directly away from us, it headed toward the steep hill on the left.”

Normally, someone fleeing in panic would run in the opposite direction from the threat.

There was only one reason it would choose a diagonal direction, especially one with a steep uphill ahead.

“Looks like the orcs’ base is in that direction.”

“OK, then let’s quickly clean up here before the escaped orc returns with reinforcements.”

“Got it. We’ll collect the orcs’ magic stones while Will goes back to Mina and brings the carriage.”

Enemy casualties: 9 dead, 1 escaped. Allied casualties: none.

Our first engagement with the orc group ended in flawless victory.

~ ~ ~ Western Hills of the Detour, Orc Village ~ ~ ~

“Grrrr…KWAAAK!!”

*Thud!*

The orc soldier who had fled immediately after the shaman fell to Phyllis’s sniper shot was brutally executed right after reporting the defeat to the tribe’s leader, the Orc Lord.

The first reason: he had fled without fighting the enemy. The second reason: he had returned with no information except the number of enemies.

“Kroara! Kwar! Kwak kuwaaak!”

“Grrrr…kuk-kuk-kuk, kweek…”

“Krook! Kweek, kworororo!”

An orc shaman with a painted face bowed his head, trying to appease the Orc Lord, but the Lord roughly shoved the shaman’s shoulder aside before slumping down on his throne made of scrap metal and animal hides.

Orcs.

Humanoid monsters with pig heads.

Although classified as weak monsters on par with goblins by the pioneers of Grantis, they had their own pride and dignity.

They were different from goblins, who possessed intelligence but lacked the ability to think deeply.

They were different from beast-type monsters that acted only on instinct.

Wild animals that couldn’t even receive dark magic weren’t worth mentioning.

How dare someone speak of fleeing without even pointing a spear at white-skinned monkeys—just four of them—who could be killed even by those wild animals?

Calling it a tribal disgrace wasn’t enough. Not even a speck of bone or piece of flesh deserved to remain in this world.

“KWAAK! Kworo! Kweek!!”

“Kweek, kweek-kweek…”

The Orc Lord, who had been growling while suppressing his anger, ordered the shaman still bowing beside the throne to organize a new unit.

What did it matter that a scouting party of ten had been annihilated?

The village still had nearly 50 troops remaining, and he had one more shaman under his command.

Though the shaman needed to stay by his side and couldn’t be dispatched, sending twice the force would be more than enough to thoroughly crush the mere four attackers.

“Kwororororo…”

The Orc Lord, a special mutant born to be a low-level commanding entity, didn’t consider for even a moment that the tribe he led might be defeated by a handful of adventurers.

In reality, the orc horde led by the Orc Lord possessed collective combat power and equipment far superior to ordinary groups.

The Orc Lord had the intelligence and leadership to command troops, as well as the technical skill to forge weapons from bronze or iron.

It had taken considerable hardship and time to teach these skills to his dim-witted subordinates and equip them all adequately.

What were mere four humans—orcs couldn’t distinguish between humans, elves, and dwarves—anyway?

Their magic sticks couldn’t shoot as far as orc short bows powered by orc strength.

In one-on-one combat, human strength and endurance were far inferior to those of orcs.

Add numerical superiority to that, and there was no reason anywhere to be found for orcs to lose to humans.

Before the sun reached its zenith, his twenty subordinates would return triumphantly carrying the tattered corpses of humans.

The Orc Lord believed this without a shadow of doubt.

However, the twenty orc warriors who marched out with such vigor would never return to their village again.