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Chapter 86: Alive (4)

“...!” Karmat instinctively retreated.

He could feel the energy of death from Anor. It was an energy that would make any living being recoil in fear.

“This is...” muttered Karmat while sifting through his memories.

He was in utter disbelief. He heard that this kind of energy had been eradicated from the northern region, but it now flowed out from Anor and emanated its unique stench.

“Dammit...” muttered Karmat.

Then someone suddenly grabbed his foot, and Karmat looked below. The dead Nakai had come back from the dead and was thrusting a dagger into Karmat’s calves. Karmat slumped down in shock.

“Ahhhhh!” he screamed.

When Karmat came to his senses, he grabbed Nakai by the hair, but Nakai continued to stab Karmat’s calves like a machine. As an undead who couldn’t feel pain, Nakai persistently stabbed Karmat over and over again until Karmat hurled him across the room in a feat of desperation.

Nakai twitched as he struggled to get up from the ground. His bones had dislocated from the impact and moved in strange ways, but he was able to stand up. Nakai walked slowly, swaying back and forth as he made his way toward Karmat.

“He’s a necromancer!” shouted Karmat at his subordinates.

Then he looked around. He was shocked to find one of his subordinates hanging upside down, completely limp. The drake that the orcs had killed had awakened as an undead and was loudly chewing on an orc’s head.

“Dammit...”

As a warrior and a sorcerer, Karmat could sense that Anor’s magic was extremely dense and powerful. It was a pitch-black energy of death.

‘How did this sort of guy just come out of nowhere?’ Karmat wondered.

His sorcery was no match for Anor’s.

“But I have to take him on...”

Karmat gripped his axe tightly and began walking toward Anor, but it was difficult for him to walk because Nakai had wreaked havoc on his calves. Nevertheless, he staggered to his feet. He just had to kill that necromancer.

Meanwhile, Anor just looked at him blankly.

Karmat gritted his teeth. Then, his fellow warriors approached him.

‘Good, it might be possible with several of us...’ thought Karmat.

“Come, we can attack from both sides...” he began to say but quickly noticed something was off.

Karmat looked at his peers. Their eyes looked like little voids.

“Dammit...” cursed Karmat.

His subordinates who had been killed by the drake were wobbling toward him with their axes raised high up in the air.

Karmat shouted, “Everyone else, retreat! Retreat! Let’s join the search team outside!”

The orc warriors who were still safe stopped fighting and proceeded to leave. One of them propped Karmat up on his shoulders, and they swiftly exited the town hall. The undead under Anor’s command chased after them, but the undead were too slow and could not catch up with the orcs. The remaining orc warriors took this chance to quickly exit the town hall too.

A deadly silence came over the room. Anor looked around at the trembling dark elves. They all averted their gazes.

A few dark elves whispered among themselves.

“As expected, he is just like his mother...”

“Cursed blood...”

Anor heard everything. He turned toward the exit; he didn’t want to stay there any longer. However, just as he was about to leave the town hall, someone grabbed his sleeve.

“W-Wait.”

“...?” Anor turned around.

It was the dark elf lady who had always ignored him. She hung out with Nakai’s gang and had always looked at Anor with eyes of disgust.

‘Is she planning to apologize after all this time?’ wondered Anor.

“If you leave...” the dark elf lady began.

“...?”

She continued, “What will happen to us if those orcs return? You need to stay here with us.”

The other dark elves inside the town hall nodded in agreement. Although they feared Anor and were wary of him, they also wanted him to stay with them as their protector.

Anor looked up at the sky for a second. He didn’t think for long about what to do. He immediately kicked the dark elf lady in the stomach. She fell over, landing face-first on the ground.

Anor spat at her and said, “Fuck off, you crazy bitch.”

***

The Ogre Slayer slit the neck of an orc warrior who was trying to climb over the village’s defensive walls. Blood gushed out from the wound, spilling onto Crockta. Then Crockta, who was soaked in blood, swung his greatsword again. He was embroiled in a desperate battle to protect the walls on the outskirts of Nuridot.

The dark elves resisted fiercely against the orcs. Their arrows flew and pierced the orcs beyond the walls, but the orcs didn’t stop after taking just a few hits. Instead, they shouted bloodthirsty battle cries fueled by hatred stemming from the pain that they felt. The orcs, filled with hatred, swung their weapons and jumped over Nuridot’s walls by stacking corpses together and creating makeshift ladders. The invading orcs swarmed inside Nuridot, startling the dark elves.

At that moment, a huge roar shook the earth. “Bul’taaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrr!”

The orcs charging toward the dark elves stopped in their tracks, but the dark elves’ fighting spirit surged. The dark elves were ready to charge; it was as though a huge wind was pushing them forward. The orcs, on the other hand, took a step back as if they were afraid of being pulled into the gust of wind. Crockta’s roar was a great weapon for raising the morale of his allies.

In the meantime, the battlefield was static. The orcs and the dark elves faced each other with the crumbling wall between them. Neither side could take the initiative.

“What a monster,” an orc warrior said.

The wall collapsed, and that orc warrior walked inside Nuridot’s defense line. It was the great warrior Urok, who was leading the invasion of Nuridot.

He looked at Crockta and grinned. “What a great warrior. Is your name Crockta?”

“Yeah,” replied Crockta.

“You dark elves should be grateful to that warrior. If it wasn’t for him, you’d already be dead meat,” Urok said, overflowing with confidence.

Crockta couldn’t understand Urok’s confidence, considering the current tide of war. The orcs’ invasion of Nuridot wasn’t progressing as they had intended.

Crockta looked around him. Did Urok have a hidden trick up his sleeve? The orc warriors still outnumbered the dark elves, but the dark elves were doing their utmost to put up a defend their village. With the addition of Crockta’s powers, this battle would ultimately end in Nuridot’s victory. Urok had to know that, yet he was oozing confidence. Crockta suppressed the anxiety rising within him.

“Crockta, won’t you join the chiefdom?” asked Urok.

“There was someone else who made the same offer,” replied Crockta with a laugh.

The leader of the wandering orcs had made the same offer to Crockta after seeing Crockta hold off the orc troops on his own. However, Crockta had replied with a decisive move that split the leader in half from his head to his crotch. Urok had witnessed it as well.

“True, but I’m not like him. I have received the title of Great Warrior from Chieftain Calmahart. We will accept the gnome as a member of the chiefdom too, if you join us,” said Urok.

“How funny. The meaning of ‘great’ in the north seems to be different from our continent, Crockta,” muttered Tiyo, who was beside Crockta.

Crockta burst out into laughter and then squinted his eyes at the mention of a great warrior.

“There were several who said the same thing to me as well,” said Crockta.

“Are you talking about Hammerchwi?” asked Urok.

“Not just him. There were a couple more here and there. They all died,” replied Crockta while grinning from ear to ear. “They were so pathetic that it wasn’t worth remembering their names.”

Crockta thought that even the strongest and most skilled fighters whom he’d met here weren’t worth remembering. Crockta valued Kaburak’s name more than the names of the strongest northern orc warriors that he’d fought. Kaburak wasn’t an orc warrior but a sorcerer orc from Orcheim who had lost all of his powers and became just a regular guy. Crockta found the chiefdom’s custom of judging everything based on strength barbarous. Being strong wasn’t what it meant to be a real orc.

“It’s the same for you too,” stated Crockta.

“As expected, you are a dangerous guy, Crockta. Hahahaha,” said Urok.

After having a fit of laughter, Urok whispered to his subordinate who was beside him. His subordinate nodded in response and then brought out a crossbow and an arrow. Orcs rarely used crossbows, so Crockta kept a vigilant eye on the subordinate’s movements. Urok’s subordinate lit the arrow on fire and aimed it at the sky.

Crockta immediately grabbed an axe from a collapsed orc and threw it. The axe spun in the air and charged toward its target, but the arrow had already departed from its bowstring. The moment the fiery arrow flew into the sky, the axe chopped off the subordinate’s arm, and blood gushed out. Urok’s subordinate screamed in pain.

“As expected, you have good intuition,” said Urok.

“What did you do?” asked Crockta.

“Don’t assume that the chieftain is like every other orc, Crockta. He can see through everything on the battlefield. He is a true warlord of the orcs,” replied Urok. He raised his axe high up in the air. “The sorcery unit that the chieftain formed should have infiltrated Nuridot under a concealment spell and should be slaughtering the useless dark elves in Nuridot by now.”

“...!” Crockta and the dark elves were horrified at the news.

“If you surrender, there will be no more meaningless slaughter,” declared Urok.

The dark elves murmured restlessly among themselves. Some looked like they were ready to run into the village any minute. All of their families were gathered in the center of the village. The militiamen’s morale suddenly dropped. Skepticism about being able to win the war and a sense of helplessness spread like wildfire among the dark elves. They felt like they had already lost.

“Stop them immediately!” shouted Nadya. “Let’s stop and talk first, Urok! Please listen to your conscience. There’s no need to kill innocent villagers!”

Urok laughed at Nadya. “Conscience? Mine’s different from yours.”

With Urok’s gesture, the orcs raised their weapons again. The brief ceasefire came to an end.

“For us, having a conscience means we consider whether we kill someone painfully or give them quick deaths.”

“...!”

“And Great Warrior Karmat, who infiltrated Nuridot, is a crazy dude without even an ounce of conscience. Hahaha!” Urok laughed and walked forward.

The dark elves nocked their arrows, but the tips of their arrows trembled. They were worried sick about their families back in the village. The faces of their family members flashed in front of their eyes.

“Wait!” shouted Nadya.

Crockta looked at her. The two exchanged looks. Nadya made an apologetic expression toward them.

After biting her lips and deliberating for a bit, Nadya yielded to the orcs. “I surrender, so please stop the attacks on the villagers.”

“Oh,” muttered Urok.

“I surrender,” declared Nadya.

“Then drop your weapons,” ordered Urok.

“After we secure the safety of the villagers—”

“In that case, we will continue fighting. Everyone, raise your weapons,” said Urok.

Smiles emerged on the orcs’ faces. They had a chance of winning now. The chiefdom’s warriors were crueler than anyone else once they had the upper hand. Nuridot was about to face a massacre instead of war.

“Everyone...” Urok was about to command his warriors to attack.

However, Nadya threw her weapon onto the ground.

“...!”

Nadya turned around and looked at the dark elves. No one said anything, but everyone understood. The militiamen began to toss their weapons onto the ground in succession. Only Crockta and Tiyo held onto their weapons.

“This is unfair,” said Tiyo.

Crockta shrugged.

“What should we do, Crockta?” asked Tiyo.

“Hmm...”

Crockta wondered whether he should cause trouble or abandon Nuridot and flee. He wasn’t na?ve like the dark elves.

“Ohh, Karmat came here just in time,” remarked Urok.

Everyone’s eyes turned toward the village. A group of orc warriors were walking over from there, and all of their weapons were covered in blood. The dark elves were stunned by the sight.

“Don’t worry, dark elves. Our plan wasn’t to kill everyone, so some of your family members may still be alive,” said Urok.

The dark elves experienced hope and despair at the mention that only some of their family members might be alive. They grew even more restless and turned to look at Crockta and Tiyo with eyes of resentment. It was clear the dark elves were telling them to discard their weapons.

Crockta frowned. He was annoyed now. It wasn’t that he couldn’t understand them, but as someone who was helping them, he couldn’t embrace the dark elves’ sudden change in attitude. Then Crockta noticed Tiyo gripping his General even tighter. They were partners who had been on the brink of death together many times, so they didn’t even need to talk to understand each other’s intentions.

Crockta nodded and was about to raise his greatsword.

That was when someone casually said, “Wow, the situation really looks like dog shit.”

Everyone turned around to look behind them.

The same voice spoke again, “What the fuck are you looking at, you bastards?”

An orc warrior walking over to them struck a dark elf who was in his way, causing the dark elf to slump to the ground. The voice wasn’t that of an orc’s though. Crockta then noticed that all of the orcs’ eyes looked dead.

“These fucking bastards can’t fix their old habits even if their lives depended on it. Can’t believe they are treating the guests whom they requested help from like this. These fucking crazy elves.”

There was a dark elf standing amid the newly arrived orcs. He had a pitiful appearance. Both of his ears had been severed, and clumps of dried blood were stuck to them. The dark elf tirelessly spewed harsh words, but he had a soft voice that didn’t really suit the profanity that he used. He awkwardly stressed his expletives in a non-threatening manner.

“They are acting like fucking dogs,” said the dark elf.

It was Anor. However, his eyes were different; they had a fanatical look to them. Anor raised his hand, and the orc warriors who had come with him raised their weapons.

Right then, Crockta realized these orcs resembled the undead that he had seen at Orcrox’s dungeon. He burst into laughter. He didn’t know what had happened, but...

“I tried to be kind my whole life, but why do I have to suffer when they are the ones who harass me and do bad things? Why do I have to change when they are in the wrong?” The Anor who had tearfully whispered those words to Crockta in the dark was gone.

“You are finally alive,” said Crockta.