Chapter 87. Takeoff
***
Timur Khan's blue eyes flashed. Mamorota was dead. Even if he had already discarded him, it was still the death of a sworn brother.
Timur Khan had watched the battle between the enemies and the Gray Wolf Squadron from beginning to end. The shock sent ripples through his heart. It was a bizarre fight he could not have believed if he had not seen it himself. It was too far away to see clearly, but it was definitely strange. And the victory of that battle clearly belonged to the man who killed Mamorota, Dong Bong-su.
However, the strategic victory belonged to Timur Khan, to him.
With the "sacrifice" of the Gray Wolf Squadron, the Whirlwind Gunner unit had fallen into a state of annihilation, and even the few mercenaries that remained were almost completely scattered. With achievements like that, wasn't it worth sacrificing the Gray Wolf Squadron?
Timur Khan made his eyes shine even more and continued to observe Dong Bong-su's actions, his surroundings, and the entire battlefield.
Dong Bong-su was crouching down and examining Kaiji as if to see whether he was alive or not, and one Gray Wolf Squadron member whose identity was unknown remained behind, watching that scene.
Even in the meantime, the remaining Gray Wolf Squadron members were diligently returning to Guisui Fortress, and Lee Ja-song's main force was advancing toward Guisui Fortress to cut off their retreat.
Timur Khan soon stopped paying attention to Dong Bong-su and the trebuchet-type cannon. What was the point of paying more attention to a place that had already turned into pandemonium? He could see one broken trebuchet-type cannon, but well… with just that much, it was impossible to play a role in deciding the course of this war.
Having judged so, he completely shifted his gaze to Lee Ja-song's main force.
"Fire the crossbows."
A new order from Timur Khan fell upon the entire defensive force on the walls.
"They say to fire the crossbows!"
The crossbowmen simultaneously fired their crossbows toward Lee Ja-song's main force. At the same time, the archers who had long been drawing their bowstrings also let go in sync with the crossbow battery's attack.
Pipiping! Pyupyupuk!
With the sound of the wind being torn apart, dozens of those who had been charging at the front of Lee Ja-song's main force fell. Naturally, the advance speed of Lee Ja-song's main force slowed down.
Lee Ja-song, who knew well that once the encirclement had been narrowed to this distance Timur Khan could not open the gates, did not force his way forward any further. No matter how excellent the defensive power of Guisui Fortress's gate was, he also knew well that when it came to opening and closing it, its flexibility was not as good as its defensive power.
The confrontation continued between Lee Ja-song, who was waiting for the gate to open, and Timur Khan, who had no intention of opening it at all. But Lee Ja-song also knew well that Timur Khan had no intention of opening the gate. If he opened it at this distance, it was as clear as day that it would allow the main force to enter the fortress.
From the beginning, Timur Khan had no intention of letting the Gray Wolf Squadron back in when he sent them out. Their role had ended the moment all the trebuchet-type cannons were destroyed. The moment he sent them out onto the steppe where black monsters ran rampant, their usefulness disappeared, and only their sacrifice remained.
Shushushushuk!
As expected, Lee Ja-song's main force fired a volley at the Gray Wolf Squadron that was trapped in front of the Guisui Fortress gate with nowhere to go. Timur Khan seized that moment and focused on inflicting as much damage as possible on Lee Ja-song's main force. It was to reduce the enemy's numbers as much as possible when they had come this close.
Timur Khan concentrated the crossbow battery's attack on Lee Ja-song's vanguard, Lee Ja-song fired indiscriminately at the Gray Wolf Squadron, and the Gray Wolf Squadron, having lost all paths of retreat, perished.
Pipipiping!
"Aaagh! U, uaagh!"
It was a romance-less battle. In war, swords and spears should clash and blood should splatter for it to have any flavor....
But this was real war. If you could kill without being seen, you did so, and if you could not, you annihilated the enemy while avoiding direct contact as much as possible. In a fight, winning was what mattered, not looking good.
Both Timur Khan and Lee Ja-song were waging war based on that simple truth.
Peobeobeok!
"Kkeuheeeaak!"
They kept killing and being killed, but while Lee Ja-song's expression was not very good, Timur Khan was smiling.
Although he had lost the entire Gray Wolf Squadron, the enemy's artillery positions had been completely destroyed, and it would be difficult to obtain the materials to make them again. Moreover, Lee Ja-song's gunners had also been slaughtered beyond recovery. In other words, even if there were materials, there were no technicians who could make them.
If he just locked the gates well, the enemies would collapse on their own. Because of the current battle, Timur Khan became even more certain of victory.
The flames attached to the Yinshan Mountain Range were growing more and more intense.
On the other hand, the number of the Gray Wolf Squadron was rapidly decreasing. Now, their complete annihilation was not far away.
'Now that Kaiji is gone too, it will be difficult to create a new Gray Wolf Squadron.'
That was all the impression Timur Khan got from this battle. He had already completely forgotten the sacrifices he had forced upon them, and was only lamenting the fact that he could no longer reorganize the Gray Wolf Squadron.
More precisely, it was Kaiji's death. That alone was regrettable. Because Kaiji, the great Gray Wolf man, had existed, he had been able to easily command the Gray Wolves, who were wild beasts that could not be tamed.
Kaiji was dead, and his corpse must be lying there together with Mamorota...!?
While thinking about the final moments of Kaiji and Mamorota, Timur Khan glanced once more far to the southeast, toward where Dong Bong-su was.
But for a brief moment, his head that had turned to take a look did not return to its original position. It could not.
Because something gray was flying this way!
'Kaiji?'
It made no sense. How could a dead fellow come here? And flying, at that?
However, something that truly made no sense was happening.
Kaiji was taking off and flying toward Guisui Fortress.
And on top of him!
Dong Bong-su was riding.
"Ho… how…?"
Even as he said that, they were getting closer and closer.
"Shoot!"
The crossbow batteries were aimed at Lee Ja-song's main force, so it was difficult to fire at Kaiji, and only the archer unit quickly turned their direction and fired at Kaiji and Dong Bong-su. He did not know by what method they were flying, nor how Dong Bong-su had managed to tame Kaiji, but it would be difficult to avoid this rain of arrows.
But expectations do not always come true. Especially when, like now, a situation has already gone wrong once, things often only get more and more tangled.
Dong Bong-su, who had been pressed flat against Kaiji's back, straightened his waist and thrust his hand forward.
Then something pitch-black appeared in his hand.
A corpse!
And one contaminated by the black monster, another monster!
Dong Bong-su threw it toward where the arrows were flying. And threw another. He kept throwing.
"...!"
No one knew where they were coming from, but corpses kept popping out. The corpses blocked the arrows in place of Dong Bong-su and Kaiji and flew toward the fortress wall.
Timur Khan drew his sword and threw it at the corpses. But the corpses Dong Bong-su threw were not just one or two.
Growing desperate, he grabbed nearby archers or crossbowmen who were shooting and threw them toward the incoming corpses.
Puk. Peobeok.
"Aaagh!"
A dull sound rang out as living bodies and corpses collided.
After that, the living bodies also fell under the wall and became corpses.
Right now, for Timur Khan, the death of one or two soldiers was not important. No matter what, he had to prevent even a single one of those black corpses from crossing the wall. He had even thrown away Mamorota and the Gray Wolf Squadron to stop those things, so what was an archer or two?
In the end, all the corpses were blocked. But Dong Bong-su and Kaiji still remained and were flying this way. He absolutely had to knock them down in midair.
Pat.
Timur Khan leapt toward Dong Bong-su, who was flying into the fortress at tremendous speed. Now, if he just killed that man and kicked him out of the fortress, everything would be over.
He did not think for a moment that he would fail. Even if the opponent had defeated Mamorota, he was certain that he would not be able to block his sword. On this battlefield, the only thing that threatened him was the black monsters.
Sswaeaek.
Would an arrow leaving the bowstring be faster than this?
Timur Khan flew toward Dong Bong-su and Kaiji at a terrifying speed.
He stretched both arms straight downward as much as possible to minimize air resistance.
Then, when he rose to a position where Kaiji's belly was close enough to see, he lifted the arms he had lowered with all his strength. Soon, the tip of his sword would pierce through Kaiji's belly, gouge out the entrails, then protrude out the back and penetrate Dong Bong-su's lower gate. That would finish this matter.
But at the very moment his sword was about to touch Kaiji's belly.
Suddenly!
Kaiji! And Dong Bong-su disappeared.
"...!"
His sword cut through empty air in vain, and his body, together with it, continued to fly powerfully across the sky and even higher upward. In response, Timur Khan hurriedly tried to brake by doing a somersault in midair, but because the force with which he had been rising and the force with which he had swung his sword were so strong, he had no choice but to fly several more zhang even in that state.
"Kkeuaaaak!"
In the meantime, Dong Bong-su, who had safely landed on top of the wall, slaughtered the archers and crossbowmen indiscriminately. The peculiar thing was that Kaiji followed Dong Bong-su as if he were his original master.
Dong Bong-su's Human-Wolf Killing Method looked far more skillful than Mamorota's, which had been trained for over ten years, and in reality, it was.
Kaiji bit to death all the nomad soldiers who blocked Dong Bong-su's path.
In the meantime, Dong Bong-su took out black corpses and threw them wildly into the fortress.
Only then did Timur Khan, who had used the Sky-Piercing Pillar to stop himself and was falling, see that scene with his own eyes. He had tried so hard.
At last, the black monsters came flooding into Guisui Fortress like a tide.
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