Volume 6: Job Change Chapter 13 Temporary Field Commander
Melee professions picked up long-range weapons, and everyone tried their best to stop the enemy from approaching. This was a welcome change. Everyone made their own efforts to buy time for our city defense war this time.
But to be frank, although each of our air force volunteers has a combat capability far superior to that of the enemy, on this battlefield they behaved more like a group of reckless men fighting on their own rather than a well-trained army.
These guys had no plan in their choice of targets. Every time an enemy was knocked down, there were always seven or eight offensive spells, crossbow arrows, or musket ammunition that missed. Many people had not even hit a single enemy from the beginning until now. All the targets had been taken by others first. This repeated target locking and extremely inefficient attack method was a stupid waste of ammunition and magic as well as our defense time.
The same is true for the rescue professions. Whether it is the devout priest whose job is to rescue with holy light, or the druid who is proficient in natural recovery magic, or the shaman who uses the power of souls to give birth to life, they are not selective when rescuing the wounded. Often, a person who has just suffered a minor injury will be cast with several rescue spells in a row, and his vitality is so strong that he is about to explode and die, while the seriously injured person next to him who is dying has no one to care for him and can only rely on drinking life potions to survive.
In general, our battle was chaotic, lacking in coordination, with huge losses and ineffective results. Fortunately, the majority of the defenders were well-trained. If we were the only ones to defend the city, I'm afraid we would have been breached by the army of the Doomsday Empire.
This may be because they are used to fighting in small teams of three or five people in their daily adventures. When faced with the huge battlefield of tens of thousands of people, these space travelers are at a loss. Too much blood is flowing, too many lives are disappearing. This is a very spectacular mutual killing, making it difficult to find a sense of victory or defeat.
Fortunately, in any group, there are always one or two people who are rational, clear-headed, and able to wake up first in the chaos and find the right way to solve the problem:
"Don't attack the archers, attack the siege vehicles first! Everyone, concentrate your firepower and attack the vehicle closest to the city wall!" During the battle, a deep voice penetrated the chaotic noise of the battlefield and came from behind. This voice made my mind, which was overwhelmed by the desire to fight, pause for a moment. I looked back and saw a human swordsman with a scar on his face, a sword and a knife on his body, and the name "Foxiao" on his head. He was standing aside with his arms folded, shouting at everyone calmly.
Like the Shadow Thief, the Swordsman is also a combat class transformed from the Rogue. To be precise, the Swordsman should be the reverse variant of the Rogue. They completely violate the Rogue's combat philosophy of hunting in the shadows, and instead choose to display their power in an upright head-on confrontation.
Due to the restrictions of professional skills, the range of professions that a swordsman can choose is very limited, and he can only choose some one-handed weapons such as sabers, long swords or daggers.
Most swordsmen are arrogant extremists, bloodthirsty maniacs who love to attack and kill. What they pursue is huge explosive power, lightning-like attack speed, and smooth and gorgeous powerful fighting skills. Compared with their own physical training, they put more energy into studying the habits of weapons and developed many skills to increase the power of weapons to the extreme.
Any one-handed sword in their hands can exert more than 20% of the usual attack power, and the probability of critical hit is twice as high as others. What's more amazing is that even an ordinary short sword with no characteristics can produce various special effects such as tearing, piercing, and heavy hitting at will under their skillful manipulation, which allows them to adopt corresponding tactics according to the different means of defense of the opponent: for spellcasters wearing cloth armor and weak vitality, the tearing effect of continuous loss of life is a fatal threat; and for those melee professionals wearing chain mail, piercing attacks will greatly reduce the protective ability of their armor.
As the price of studying the sword, swordsmen gave up some special skills that originally belonged to rogues. The most obvious difference is that they can no longer hide and sneak. At the same time, they still have many weaknesses of rogues, such as: they can only wear leather armor at most - for a fighter who can only fight in close combat, this greatly reduces the swordsman's protective ability - and their physique is still not strong, and their health is very limited.
If you encounter a swordsman in battle, you don't have to think about how to take the initiative, because it's impossible - their speed is always faster than you think. The only question you need to think about is: how to survive the first ten seconds. Once you fight with a swordsman, they will completely engulf you with an unstoppable wave of attacks in a split second. The sharp blades in their hands are like the teeth of a vampire demon, sucking your blood without a drop left in a very short time.
However, if your vitality is stronger than he imagined and you survive his first round of attacks with extraordinary tenacity, he will be the one with a headache: for the swordsman's fragile defense, any form of counterattack may pose a fatal threat.
Due to the limitation of his profession, this swordsman named "Buddha Smile" does not have the ability to attack from a distance, which means that he cannot intervene in the battle for the time being and can only be a "spectator" on the battlefield. However, I think that this is perhaps what allows him to observe the current situation more calmly and discover our problems.
"Just dismantle the siege vehicles..." Buddha shouted with a smile, hoping that people would do as he reminded them, "... ignore the archers on the vehicles first!"
Only a small number of people followed Fuxiao's advice, while more people remained the same and targeted the "Imperial Rangers" on the siege vehicles, enjoying the pleasure of killing in their deaths, without considering whether Fuxiao's suggestion would help the battle. What's more, some people rolled their eyes at him in disdain, or muttered in a sneer, expressing their dissatisfaction with this guy who was taking over the command of the battle.
I guess the main reason for their behavior is that they don't like to accept orders from a stranger of the same status as themselves. If they obey the instructions of Foxiao, they will feel embarrassed. In fact, many people in this world are like this: they never want to think about whether what others say is correct, but only look at the identity and status of the person who speaks. They are often willing to unconditionally obey older people or people with higher social status, even if it means doing something obviously stupid; and if it is advice from peers or juniors, they will ignore it even if it is the right reason.
Even if only a few people concentrated their firepower, the speed at which the siege vehicles were damaged was significantly increased. Because the durability of the siege vehicles was so high, no matter how many attacks it took at the same time, it was directly reflected in its degree of damage. No bullets or spells missed, and no attack power was wasted, which greatly improved our attack efficiency. Not long after, the first siege vehicle collapsed with a muffled sound.
If the siege vehicle is still there, no matter how many Imperial Rangers are killed, they will be replenished in time, which can be said to be endless. But if a siege vehicle is completely destroyed, the enemy troops on the vehicle will lose the advantage of attacking us and can only retreat to the main camp. This will not only delay the time for the enemy to approach the city wall, but also reduce a lot of our defensive pressure. It can be said that we kill two birds with one stone.
Not only that, most of the siege vehicles that were able to rush to the front had been hit by a huge stone bullet from the catapult, and their durability had already been reduced by half. The dedicated native defenders also spent a lot of effort trying to destroy them, which made most of the siege vehicles close to the city wall dilapidated and shaky, and some had less than a quarter of their durability left . Those who joined hands to attack them only needed to spend a little effort to destroy these behemoths, and at the same time gained rich experience points. This was simply a ready-made big bargain, and it was not troublesome to pick it up.
As siege vehicles were destroyed one after another, more and more people changed their targets and joined the ranks of destroying siege vehicles. Even many guys who were very dissatisfied with Foxiao at the beginning took advantage of others' inattention and secretly set their targets on siege vehicles. As our manpower continued to increase, the speed at which siege vehicles were destroyed became faster.
Although we have achieved far more fruitful results than expected in this short period of time - six siege vehicles were smashed into a pile of wood chips before approaching the city wall, this is far from enough to completely curb the pace of the Doomsday Empire Army's attack. Not long after, three siege vehicles rushed towards the city wall almost in unison. For the defenders on the top of the city, these behemoths are too strong. Although most of them are trying their best to aim at the siege vehicle in the middle and fire fiercely, trying to destroy one first. Judging from their advancing speed, I am afraid that we will not be able to further expand our results before they reach the city wall.
"Don't attack the siege vehicles anymore. Magicians, save your mana. Archers, focus on the archers on the roofs of the vehicles!" The human swordsman named "Buddha's Smile" also discovered this problem and shouted again, reminding us to change our tactics. "All shadow thieves, place traps on the city walls! Healers, add blood, and prepare for melee!"
This time, no one was resistant to Foxiao's instructions. The successful battle just now had established considerable prestige for this ordinary human swordsman. Almost everyone who heard his voice did as he said. Those professionals with healing skills spontaneously restored the lives of their comrades around them, and prepared for a battle to climb the city. Although the number too large and it was difficult for us to heal them one by one, fortunately we had enough shamans. The effect of the life totem could cover a considerable distance. One totem pole could provide treatment for more than a dozen people around. Soon, a row of ancient totem poles were erected on the top of the city wall, with one pole at a certain distance. The light blue light produced by the healing effect of soul magic almost covered the entire city wall.
At the same time, a large number of shadow thieves also began to get busy. Various ingeniously designed and insidious traps were cleverly placed on the city walls. Some of them could release cold magic, freezing the person who triggered it into an ice cube; some would violently spray flames after being triggered, drowning an area in a sea of fire; and some were simply fragile bottles. Once kicked, the toxins in the bottles would spread rapidly, causing great suffering to the unfortunate people trapped in them. Before this, I had never seen such a variety of traps presented in such a large density. For a moment, I even felt that this place was not like a battlefield, but more like a trade fair for mechanical products.
The half-orc fat man Chang Sanjiao, who had been promoted to a shadow thief, also appeared in the ranks of the mechanism. At this time, he was carefully placing a round steel clamp with sharp sawteeth on the top of the city. This was a powerful single-target damage mechanism. Once someone stepped on it, the sawteeth on the steel clamp would quickly rebound and close, biting the guy's calf tightly, which would not only cause considerable damage to the triggerer, but also temporarily cripple his legs and greatly reduce his movement speed.
I have to admit that this insidious and vicious mechanism really fits the Orc Shadow Thief's dirty and despicable fighting nature. He shrewdly chose a suitable location for his mechanism : facing the direction of a siege vehicle rushing towards him, about one step away from the city wall. Whether it is the grasp of terrain or the grasp of distance, the Orc Shadow Thief has an extraordinary talent. I can even imagine that once this siege vehicle successfully builds a suspension bridge on the city wall, the first step of the soldier rushing in front on the city wall will fall into this insidious trap.
After setting up the trap, Chang Sanjiao also maliciously smeared a layer of purple-green "exhaustion potion" on the sharp saw teeth - poison is also the specialty of the shadow thief. Anyone who is hit by this exhaustion potion will have his attack and defense reduced to 60% of the original, and his maximum health will also be reduced by 20%. The raw materials for making this fierce potion are now worth at least 15 silver coins each - using such an expensive thing to deal with ordinary enemy soldiers who are about to climb the city is really a huge waste.
"Be careful, don't step on it, or you will suffer the consequences!" After doing all this, Chang Sanjiao put a warning sign on the mechanism to remind others to pay attention. He seemed very satisfied with his work that exuded a sinister murderous intent. He proudly puffed out his big belly and looked around to show off.
At this time, a feather arrow flew in from outside the city and hit Chang Sanjiao's buttocks squarely. The arrow was not very fast, and its flight path was crooked. Rather than saying it was an attack after aiming, I think it was more like a jumping arrow that missed the target.
"Ouch!" The sudden arrow caught Chang Sanjiao off guard. He cried out miserably in pain, holding his big butt and jumping in pain. He subconsciously took two steps forward.
"Click...Snap!" A crisp mechanical sound came from the ground. Chang Sanjiao's expression suddenly froze, frozen at the moment he opened his mouth and cried out in pain. His eyes moved and the corners of his eyes suddenly became moist.
It was not until a moment later that he slowly lowered his head and uttered a few words in a tearful voice, biting his teeth in pain:
"Oh, that fucking hurts..."
His voice was like a cat whose tail had just been stepped on.
As we can see, the precision steel clamp is biting on Chang Sanjiao's calf tightly, and the sharp serrated tip has deeply penetrated his leg flesh. A line of "-250" flutters above his head, like a bright red flag of mockery.
At this time, the siege vehicle had just advanced to the right distance, and with a "clang" it lowered the wooden suspension bridge. One end of the suspension bridge was placed on the city wall, just in front of the Yangtze River Delta.
A troll warrior wielding a large axe rushed up from the siege vehicle fiercely, and chopped the half-orc shadow thief standing in front of him with an axe. Chang Sanjiao wanted to dodge, but his leg was injured and he moved very slowly. He was hit on the forehead by an axe, and blood flashed on his head again. The poison worth 15 silver coins was indeed genuine and full of weight. The poisoned Chang Sanjiao became weak at this time, and the life bar on his head lost 300 points. His situation suddenly became precarious.
Then another axe hit Chang Sanjiao's shoulder, and then the troll warrior kicked Chang Sanjiao's body hard and kicked it off the city wall - just like that, he gloriously became our first Skywalker Guard to sacrifice in this battle.
I have to admire him once again. His level of skill in setting up mechanisms is indeed superb. No matter the location, the effectiveness of the trap or the effect of the poison, they are all so exquisite and coordinated perfectly, and will definitely force the unlucky person who triggered the mechanism to death.
Except for a minor mistake made by the person who fell into the trap in the end, every aspect of the setting up of this mechanism can be said to be perfect.
Although I felt very sad and regretful about his sacrifice, I was really sorry. It was hard for me to feel angry and sympathetic to the enemy. On the contrary, Chang Sanjiao's death even relieved my psychological pressure to a great extent in the face of the powerful enemy, and I could throw myself into this life-and-death battle with a relaxed and happy mood. And I believe that among the comrades who witnessed his tragic death, there were more than just one or two who felt the same relaxed mood as me.
This may be the only valuable thing brought by the death in the Yangtze River Delta...
As the enemy soldiers climbed up the city wall, a hand-to-hand fight that was doomed to end badly began.
