Volume 3 Containment Operation Chapter 31: One General's Success Depends on the Death of Thousands of Soldiers
Wu Ma "bravely" wanted to rush forward and die. I naturally couldn't let it do whatever it wanted and force it to escape immediately. Although it was somewhat reluctant, the power of the "Soul Contract" overwhelmed its nature. It could only helplessly roar at the Dark Knight and quickly turn around to retreat.
This action made the Dark Knight, who was preparing to fight a battle to kill the one who lost his honor, extremely angry. He "awwed" and uttered a strange syllable. Judging from his expression and tone, it should be the "national curse" of the Undead. Generally speaking, the Dark Knight would flee when he was defeated by his opponent, but retreating without fighting like Wu Ma was considered a great shame and was disdainful. However, Wu Ma, who surrendered to me, was no longer a real Dark Knight. Everything must be dominated by my will, and his tactics were naturally more flexible and changeable.
After venting his anger, the Dark Knight urged his mount to chase Wu Ma. With its speed, it would not take long for it to catch up with Wu Ma who was retreating on foot. However, with me holding it back, it would not be able to do so. The "Touch of Death" constantly attacked the Skeleton Horse, forcing it to stop repeatedly to distract itself from the "Sperm Suck|Essence Devouring Marrow" in its eagerness to sprint. It could not get rid of my entanglement, but it was a pain for me. The continuous use of "Touch of Death" was cracked, and it was backfired by the artifact, and I was also seriously injured. Fortunately, the Dark Knight was focused on chasing Wu Ma and had no time to take care of me, so there was no danger for a while. Even so, because Wu Ma was too slow, it gradually closed the distance between us.
During the pursuit, we had left the area of high-level undead creatures and approached the location of my undead army of more than 10,000. The horseless one ran to the front, and the zombies opened a path for it to pass, and then gathered together again, ready to block the Dark Knight's advance.
Facing such a huge coalition of low-level Undead, the Dark Knight remained unafraid and his charge speed did not decrease at all, but he strengthened his "intimidation" ability, trying to force the zombies to surrender without a fight and make way for them. However, I also immediately launched "pressure" and tried my best to offset those negative effects. Therefore, just like the last time I fought against Wu Ma, although the zombies were all timid and dared not attack, they stood firm and did not move away.
Such a result was obviously beyond the Dark Knight's expectations. He couldn't help but look back at me. He obviously realized the problem, but he didn't stop at all. He waved his saber and charged into the group of zombies.
The Dark Knight with a mount was extremely powerful. The gap in strength was too great. He charged and chopped like a tiger entering a flock of sheep, extremely ferocious. The seemingly strong zombies were like paper, falling down in groups. Those who were knocked over could still struggle to get up again, but those who were stabbed were all cut in half. Such a large group of zombies seemed unable to hinder the Dark Knight's advance.
I had imagined the Dark Knight to be strong enough, but I didn't expect that its actual strength would be even greater than I expected. I had planned to take this opportunity to recover from my injuries, but unfortunately the zombies' performance was not satisfactory. At this rate, Wu Ma would have no way of escaping its pursuit. I could only rush forward and continue to use "Touch of Death" to restrain it.
Thanks to my harassment, the defeated zombies finally got a chance to catch their breath. They could move back and forth according to my instructions, and quickly plug the loopholes left by the horseless passage, leaving no opportunity for the Dark Knight to take advantage.
The Dark Knight's purpose was quite clear, and he was very persistent. He had been staring at the direction where Wu Ma fled and chasing him. Of course, he would not show mercy to the zombies who dared to stop him, and would kill them all without mercy. Wherever he passed, there were corpses everywhere, and the number of casualties was increasing rapidly.
Where there is war, there will be sacrifices. As the saying goes, one general's success is built on the sacrifice of thousands of soldiers. For a better future, I can only pray silently for these brothers who have passed away. I still have to carry out the second step - the "human shield" consumption plan. I will use all my strength to gamble with the Dark Knight . If I lose, I will have to start all over again. If I win, I can be reborn and gradually realize the strategic transformation from low-level arms to high-level arms and win by quality.
The decision to start with the Dark Knight was actually the result of an unexpected development. Originally, I was going to start my conquest plan with the lower-level Black Warriors, and try to lure the more murderous ones away from the high-level Undead creatures area, and then concentrate troops to subdue them. Of course, there will be some sacrifices in the process, after all, the Black Warriors with a murderous aura are not much worse than the Dark Knights in terms of strength. However, due to an accident caused by Tao Tao, I had to fight Wu Ma first, and at a great cost, I finally subdued this Dark Knight who lost his mount. Although Wu Ma's strength may not be inferior to that of the Black Warrior due to the lack of horses and shields, it can no longer move freely in the high-level Undead creatures area before it has a mount again. It may be hunted down by other Undead Knights at any time, and cannot provide strong support for my transformation and expansion plan.
After all the hard work, I got a guy who is not very useful. I will definitely not be satisfied with such a result. I must maximize the surplus value of Wu Ma to strive for the greatest benefit. So I came up with a plan of "throwing a brick to attract jade", bypassing the Black Warrior and directly conquering the higher-level Dark Knight. The risks and sacrifices may be a little greater, but from the perspective of long-term development, it is definitely worth it.
The Dark Knight had been chasing Wu Ma in and out of the zombies several times. Because they were too close, I didn't dare to let the zombies disperse, so the Skeleton Archer behind me didn't get a chance to attack. For the time being, I was helpless. Wu Ma was able to escape the Dark Knight's pursuit repeatedly thanks to the dense defense of the zombies and my full harassment. Once the distance was opened to allow the Skeleton Archer to attack like the last time when Wu Ma lost his mount, the Dark Knight could take advantage of his speed and would probably catch up with Wu Ma soon. Alas, the zombies were too weak after all. They were really vulnerable to the real Dark Knight. I couldn't implement the interception plan well and couldn't buy more time for Wu Ma.
The massacre lasted for several hours, and thousands of zombies had been sacrificed. The Dark Knight was still persistently and tirelessly chasing Wu Ma. My resurrection time was approaching, so I gave up on using "Absorbing Essence and Devouring Marrow" and concentrated my mind to control the zombies gathered around the Dark Knight to desperately move towards the center, trying to block its movements. At the same time, I ordered the skeleton archers in the back to gather in the surrounding areas of this area and surround it.
Seeing that the Dark Knight had slaughtered all the zombies blocking the road, he urged his mount to chase Wu Ma. Suddenly, black fog filled the surroundings. I activated the "Chaos Ball" and used the "Blinding Fog" to trap it. I didn't dare to use this tactic against Wu Ma last time because I was afraid that it would take the opportunity to hide inside to recover. However, the Dark Knight has strong mobility. If I am not there to command the zombies to intercept, it will definitely catch up with Wu Ma quickly. Once a tangled battle begins, even if I reappear, I am afraid I will not be able to separate them. With the current state of the Dark Knight, Wu Ma will definitely lose, which will surely destroy my plan of luring the enemy to encircle and suppress. In desperation, I had to take a gamble, hoping that the Dark Knight was eager to chase Wu Ma and would not stay in peace. He would definitely run around looking for a way out. With his speed, he should not be trapped for too long. The skeleton archers gathered around took the opportunity to try their best to shoot arrows into the black fog. The dense rain of arrows could at least cause some harassment to the Dark Knight, preventing him from getting too lucky and rushing out of the fog before I could get back.
I stepped onto the battlefield again. Fortunately, the Dark Knight failed to break out of the "blinding fog", but I began to worry that it would stay inside and not come out. If it waited until the fog cleared before it appeared, its condition would definitely have recovered, and my previous efforts would have been in vain. However, at this point, I couldn't figure out the situation inside, so I could only order the skeleton archer to speed up the attack rhythm and shoot more arrows to prevent it from staying inside so comfortably.
Waiting outside was getting really anxious, so I couldn't hold back any longer and moved forward to release "Death Cloud" into the black fog, shooting aimlessly, not caring if it worked or not, just to give myself some peace of mind.
Suddenly, a black shadow rushed out from the fog area not far ahead, and was exactly on my attack line. It was hit by several "Death Clouds" I sent out. It was the Dark Knight. The fog area was so big, but it happened to rush out from in front of me, and after a few jumps, it had rushed in front of me.
When we met for the first time, I was caught off guard. It seemed very surprised as well. It didn't react for a while and was stunned. But it might be out of instinct. Although I was stunned, the saber in my hand was not idle. It chopped down at my head. If I hadn't woken up quickly and turned the horse's head to dodge in time, and had not been very cautious to release the "Undead Shield" to protect my body, I would have resisted for a moment at the critical moment. I was very lucky to be only touched by the saber, otherwise I would have suffered a great loss.
By the time the Dark Knight reacted and started chasing me, I had already escaped from its attack range and retreated far to the side. It roared at me in protest, waved the saber in its hand, then turned around and found Wu Ma hiding in the group of zombies, and immediately urged its mount to charge forward.
After a melee, another three thousand zombies were killed. In order to protect their horses, even more than a thousand skeleton archers were reluctantly drawn into the battle and became victims of the butcher's knife. In total, nearly half of my manpower had been lost. Although the price was huge, my human wave tactics finally paid off. The Dark Knight was already showing signs of fatigue, and the skeleton horse under him had lost its initial prestige. Not only did it stagger, but it also had little power when it charged. It stopped helplessly after running a few steps, blocked by the zombies, and the wielding sabers seemed to be a little exhausted. The most it could do was to separate the zombies' heads and bodies. It was already powerless to cut them off in half. It was stuck by the zombies' waists several times and had to exert force again to pull them out.
Most of the Dark Knight's strength has been consumed, and he is no longer as brave as he was at the beginning. It is time for him to act without a horse. Although he may not be the opponent of the Dark Knight yet, at least he has the strength to fight and will not be killed in three or two rounds. I just want him to attract the Dark Knight's attention and make him unable to resist my "Touch of Death" attack, creating a chance to subdue him.
As soon as he saw Wu Ma appear, the Dark Knight's originally exhausted spirit suddenly perked up, and he immediately urged his mount to meet him, charging and ramming him, forcing Wu Ma to stagger back a few steps, then swung his saber at him on the head. Wu Ma had no shield, so he could only hold up the saber to block left and right. For a while, he could only parry and had no power to fight back. The Dark Knight, with the help of his mount's charging and shield blocking, repeatedly attacked and succeeded, causing Wu Ma several serious injuries.
Seeing the Dark Knight suddenly showing such power, I was shocked. Could it be that it was so smart that it saw through my plot and deliberately showed weakness to the enemy to trick me? Is it still an NPC monster? How can it use more insidious and cunning methods than me?
Seeing that Wu Ma was unable to withstand the attack and was retreating step by step, unable to escape defeat, he was urgently thinking about countermeasures. Should he continue to attack with all his strength and fight to the death or withdraw early and conserve his strength for a comeback? Suddenly, the Dark Knight's violent attack slowed down. The Skeleton Horse was trembling and staggering, and the saber he chopped out was powerless and lost its previous power. Wu Ma easily blocked it, and seized the opportunity to counterattack and forced it back a few steps. In an instant, the situation on the field reversed and became favorable to me.
Such a dramatic change really surprised and delighted me. After careful observation for a while, I confirmed that the Dark Knight was indeed exhausted, and then I felt relieved. It seemed that just now it was just a last-ditch effort of courage, and he was unable to sustain it. I said it, there is no information showing that NPC monsters like the Dark Knight would show off such fancy weapons in battle. They are not top-level bosses, and it is impossible for them to be set up so outrageously.
Facing Wu Ma's attack, the Dark Knight still showed his powerful strength. A round shield blocked most of the attacks. Moreover, Wu Ma stood on the ground and raised his saber to attack the knight on horseback. He seemed quite uncomfortable and his movements were rather strenuous. Although he pressed forward step by step and attacked fiercely, he did not cause any substantial damage to the Dark Knight. I couldn't help but curse Wu Ma for being stupid. Why did you work so hard to hack at the knight? Why not attack its mount directly? Are you afraid that it will not fight to the death? This way is both labor-saving and convenient. Isn't it more effective?
Wu Ma immediately changed his fighting style after receiving my instruction, and swung his broadsword at the skeleton horse. This violation of the rules of the Undead Knight certainly caused strong dissatisfaction from the Dark Knight, and he received a bunch of "national curses" through his mental fluctuations, which he couldn't understand. Of course, under my control, Wu Ma would not pay any attention to it, and swung his saber at the skeleton horse. Since ancient times, might is truth. As long as I subdue you, you still have to follow my rules.
