Chương 40: 40：Target: Bone-Shatter Pass

Galahad slumped back into his wooden chair. He had completely abandoned any thought of recruiting him. A monster of war like Soren was bound to turn the entire Misty Swamp upside down sooner or later. After conversing for a while longer, Leona prepared to leave. There was no need to linger at Ironwood Fortress. She had already obtained the strategic information she came for: intel on the Shadow Priest's soul escape, and the flaws in the Titan monster's shields.

At this moment, only one intense thought occupied Leona's mind. She strode out the door. She had to gather her forces and lead a team deep into the heart of the territory to find Soren. She needed to see with her own eyes just what kind of terrifying army her subordinate had forged in the center of this fog-filled swamp! … Meanwhile, in Graywater Village. White smoke billowing from the sulfur pools intertwined with the dark, overcast sky.

The cold rain had finally stopped, leaving behind an expanse of blackened mud. At the village entrance, two longbows peeked out from the twin wooden watchtowers. A flurry of hurried footsteps approached. The log chevaux-de-frise opened just enough to leave a gap, and Gary squeezed into the camp, looking like a mud monkey. His simple leather armor was snagged with dead vines, and a two-inch bloody gash from a bramble marked his left cheek.

But he didn't bother wiping it, sprinting straight toward the stilted wooden cabin in the central clearing. Soren was sitting on a wooden block in front of the cabin.

"My Lord!" Gary rushed up to Soren, buckling his knees to drop into a half-kneel.

"The intel you interrogated out of Kash earlier has been verified! Forty-five kilometers to the west, there really is a place called [Bone-Shatter Pass]. It has an outer wooden palisade about chest-high, and inside is an inner keep built right against the cliff face."

"Inside the inner keep is a battalion of Black Iron Orc heavy infantry."

"I hid in the tree canopy and counted their cooking pots. Sixty large cauldrons. Based on the ration sizes for each pot, there are exactly five hundred of them." The surrounding soldiers, who had been resting, froze. The firewood Kyle was carrying slipped from his grasp and hit the ground. Five hundred fully-staffed Black Iron Orc heavy infantrymen. These weren't stragglers wandering the wilds, this was a regular army backed by a fortress.

According to the military texts of the Silvermoon Kingdom, uprooting a stronghold defended by five hundred heavy infantry required at least a thousand fully armored spearmen, supported by heavy trebuchets or siege ballistas, taking three to five days to grind down their defenses. And they—including Soren—only had sixty-five men. It was an ironclad fact that their crude leather armor wouldn't stop a heavy warhammer.

"That's not all, " Gary continued."The outer palisade camp is full of barracks tents. They have fifty direwolves tied up there, along with fifty wolf scout riders."

"They have Kobolds on lookout duty, working in two shifts. The moment there's any disturbance and the Kobolds blow their bone whistles, those fifty riders will counter-encircle us like mad dogs." The instant Gary reported the terrain and troop numbers of Bone-Shatter Pass, a line of text flashed at the bottom of Soren's vision. [Ding!] [Situation Assessment Complete. Warlord System Issuing Siege Quest.] [Quest Objective: Capture the Orc Stronghold at Bone-Shatter Pass and sever the enemy's central transit hub.] Quest Reward 1: [Blacksmith Forge] Quest Reward 2: [Bog Potato Seeds] Soren lowered his eyelids slightly. Dozzens of captured Orc Black Iron armors were currently piled up by the sulfur pools. Due to the lack of a blacksmith, they couldn't be forged into armor suitable for humans. They could only be crudely melted down into arrowheads, and of terrible quality at that. Furthermore, the territory's two hundred-plus villagers were burning through the cartloads of wheat flour looted from the orcs every single day.

If he wanted to expand his population in the future, the food issue had to be resolved. A blacksmith forge and high-yield potatoes. These two rewards would directly solve Graywater Village's current logistical bottleneck. But the risks were equivalent. Sixty-five men attacking a fortress of five hundred and fifty. If they got bogged down in a battle of attrition and close-quarters combat, his small squad would be wiped out within ten minutes.

Soren's gaze drifted past the kneeling Gary, looking toward the clearing behind the village. A beast pen had been erected there using thick wooden posts. Forty-three direwolves, each over two meters long, were lying in the muddy water, gnawing on the mangled corpses of a few demonic crocodiles. These were the direwolves—also known as giant wolves—that Soren had captured alive in previous battles. Soren stood up.

"Have you calculated the Kobolds' shift changes?" he asked.

"I have. One shift takes the first half of the night. At 3: 00 AM, when they're at their most exhausted, the second shift takes over, " Gary replied. This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon. Soren looked toward the distant wolf pen.

"We strike!" he spat out. Kyle quickly stepped forward, lowering his voice."My Lord, the enemy has over five hundred men. If they block the main gate and hack outward with poleaxes, our halberd formation won't be able to push through. In a head-on clash, most of the brothers will die."

"Who said anything about a head-on clash?" Soren turned and walked toward the cabin."Gary, Meyer, Ein, Kyle. Inside." The heavy wooden door shut. A tanned beast skin was spread out on the table. Soren drew his dagger and stabbed it right into the center of the hide.

"Ambushing fifty wolf riders is a massive risk, but in my eyes, they're just fifty beasts of burden waiting to pull our plows."

"Our village lacks oxen. The swamp mud is too sticky, human strength can't pull a curved-shaft plow. But direwolves can. They have large paws that don't sink into the muck. Most importantly, they aren't picky eaters. They'll eat meat, chew bones, and even eat coarse grains or grass. They're extremely easy to keep."

"If we wipe out those fifty wolf riders on the perimeter and capture their war-wolves alive, Graywater Village's lack of draft animals for reclaiming the swamp wasteland will be solved in one fell swoop." The breathing of the four men kneeling on one knee before the table grew heavy. As long as they didn't have to go hungry, slaughtering greenskins was as natural to them as drinking water.

"Listen closely to my orders." Soren's dagger carved three deep, decisive lines into the beast skin.

"Step One!"

"At 3: 00 AM, we sneak over. I will personally lead the stealth approach. Within half an hour, using the cover-mouth-and-slit-throat method, we pin down and kill all fifty wolf riders inside their barracks tents."

"No survivors among the riders. We only want the wolves. Under no circumstances can a single warning whistle be blown!"

"Step Two." Soren pulled his dagger out and held it in a reverse grip.

"Once the perimeter is cleared, you will hold your ground and form up your battle lines. I will personally lead a squad to scale the stone walls of the inner keep and slip inside."

"The primary objective won't be to kill, but to target the winch of their iron portcullis. After that, we locate the command tents. I want to chop off that Commander of a Thousand's head while he's fast asleep!"

"Step Three!" Soren's gaze swept over the four men.

"When the winch drops and the inner gate swings wide open, that is your signal."

"You will form a phalanx outside with the 2. 5-meter armor-piercing heavy halberds. The sixty-five of you will split into three rows and completely block the inner keep's corridor—a corridor that can only fit a dozen men side-by-side!"

"Five hundred leaderless orcs, jammed into a tight corridor. These greenskins won't know our actual numbers, which will only add to their chaos. That is our golden opportunity!"

"As long as they can't break your formation, push the halberds forward. I want you to spill their guts until there's nothing left."

"Everything must be resolved before dawn."

"Once the sun comes up and they realize we only have sixty-five men, they will counterattack like madmen at any cost. If that happens, the battle will turn into a quagmire." A cold-blooded, absolutely insane plan.

"Do you understand?" Soren barked in a low voice. The four men slammed their fists against their chests." Understood!" … The next day, before dawn. The mist was so thick it refused to disperse, anyone standing more than three paces away was a mere blur. In the center of Graywater Village. There were no torches. The only thing present was the faint, bloody stench emanating from the black mud smeared over their weapons. All sixty-five men were assembled.

Three grey-black short spears were strapped to their backs, and each man held a 2. 5-meter-long armor-piercing heavy halberd horizontally in his hands. Soren stood at the very front of the formation.

"Move out." Soren turned his head and was the first to step forward. The sixty-five men vanished into the thick fog as silently as ghosts melting into dark water. The forced march had begun. Gary and Meyer walked ten paces ahead of the main group. The two brothers looked like wildcats on the hunt, their waists bent like drawn bows. Snap. Meyer's palm stopped softly in mid-air. He leaned down, probing the thick mud with two fingers, and pulled out a poisoned vine as thin as a strand of hair.

It was a tripwire for a perimeter trap set up by the orcs. With a flick of his dagger, the vine was severed soundlessly. The entire squad did not pause. For the soldiers in the rear, every single step they took landed flawlessly and perfectly inside the footprint of the man ahead of them. A squad of sixty-five men forcefully marched in a way that left the trail of only a single person.

The rotting mud and dead branches were pressed down by incredibly light footsteps, not even having the time to emit a noticeable snap.