Alz's writhed in pain on the ground, holding onto his left knee with both his hands as he endured the strong, pulsating pain that was spreading from his left leg.

The elf closest to him naturally didn't let this chance go to waste, launching his body directly towards Alz attempting to pin him down with his weight.

He didn't dare let his guard down even in Alz's current state, hoping only to pin him down so his allies could reach. After all, the cold remains of his two companions attested to the consequences of doing so.

Before this, even though they didn't voice it out, many of them had thought that the chieftain was being overly cautious by sending over the entire squad to capture a single elf, much less a youth, but now they realised the meaning behind this.

Although, the chieftain himself would probably have been shocked by this outcome, as he had sent them over primarily to deal with other potential complications and also to show the importance of this matter to him, but it ended up paying off in an entirely different way than he would have expected.

Nonetheless, what mattered the most in the end was the outcome, and while they had suffered from two unexpected casualties, the mission was evidently still successful as Alz currently laid helplessly on the ground awaiting their capture.

The five elves unconsciously slowed their pace as they saw their comrade flying towards Alz, feeling a relief wash over them as the conclusion approached.

"I'm taking one more with me!!"

Yet, Alz suddenly let go of his leg while the elf was in mid-air, looking at him with a cold, fiery gaze that made his blood run cold, showing no signs of being distracted by the pain from the arrow.

Alz gripped onto his dagger in reverse and swung his left hand towards the elf's neck, but the elf was already alarmed before this and instantly reacted, crushing his hand downwards with the overwhelming weight advantage on his side.

Alz revealed a look of desperation and immediately flung the dagger towards the elf's neck right as his hand was being pushed down, but this again blocked by the elf, grabbing onto the dagger with his other free hand.

However, before he had any chance to celebrate his successful defence, his eyes suddenly widened with shock and fear as he looked as Alz's expressionless face, before slowly looking downwards towards his body.

A dagger with green shards along its blade buried itself deeply into his chest, held in the hand of the young elf below.

"You..." the elf tried to speak, but he never got to finish his sentence, coughing out large amounts of blood before he fell lifelessly onto Alz.

The breathing of the other five elves got heavier, hastily racing over to the two elves on the ground. Even though he died, the last elf had successfully accomplished what he set out to do, his body weighing Alz down heavily and preventing him from taking any other actions.

After reaching, one of the elves carefully brought the body of their comrade away from Alz while two of them lifted Alz by his hands, suspending his legs in the air without support.

Despite finally neutralising Alz, none of them paid any attention to him, directing concerned gazes at the injury of their comrade. The elf who pulled him away placed his ear to the elf's chest, but a look of grief soon appeared on his face as he shook his head sideways while looking at the other four.

The four of them briefly revealed pained expressions before glaring dangerously at the suspended Alz, the culprit who had led to the loss of three of their comrades.

"WELL DONE, WELL DONE INDEEED!" the leader roared with intense anger in his voice as he walked up to the group while Cruz followed by his side.

*Drip* *Drop*. The leader's steps were accompanied by a rhythmical dripping sound, as blood steadily flowed from his tightly clenched fist onto the field, staining the flowers along his path in a bright crimson shade.

The four elves rapidly directly their eyes away from Alz and began to gather before the leader with the two elves suspending Alz leading at the front.

*Thud*. A punch landed squarely on Alz's face the moment he was brought into range, thrown without any warning. This punch was only the first of many, as the leader continued to lash out multiple punches at him, finally stopping after over a minute passed.

While he understood that this would jeopardise the mission objective, he didn't much of a choice in the matter as the one who led the squad. He didn't do this because he was overcome with rage or anger, but out of duty to his men and the three lives that were lost to Alz.

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"Treat him." the leader frowned slightly as he looked at Alz's leg, giving out an order to his men.

Thankfully, the earlier display by the leader had eased some of the restlessness they felt, so the five elves reluctantly abided by the leader's orders despite their unwillingness.

However, while they were treating him, this didn't mean that they were going to be gentle about it. One of the three elves who had his hands free forcefully plucked the arrow out from Alz's left thigh, causing Alz to shout out due to the sharp pain.

The two other elves followed up by grabbing some herbs and pressed them to his leg before bandaging it up, stopping the bleeding from the open wound.

None of them even spared a second glance at the bruises littered around his body, only treating the one wound that was potentially life-threatening.

The leader gave a nod to his men when they were done bandaging the wound before starting to observe Alz's condition carefully. By this time, Alz's was breathing weakly with wounds and bruises all over his body, barely remaining conscious from the intense pain he felt.

Yet, when the leader's face went in to look closer at Alz, a spit landed on his face as Alz looked at him with a bloody grin, his expression filled with insanity.

"You have guts." the leader forced the words out of his mouth, desperately trying to rein in his anger as he moved his head away from Alz.

"Bring him back." the leader commanded, turning around preparing to leave.

"Wait, we haven't persuaded him yet." Cruz suddenly spoke out against the leader's words.

"When will he become more like his father."

The leader subconsciously looked over at him as though he were an idiot, but his words of got stuck in his throat when his eyes landed on Cruz, letting out a heavy sign inwardly as worry and unease flashed across his face.

Their mission had two objectives, to persuade Alz to join them, or to extract the method of building the crossbows from him.

Whichever the case, the main result the tribe wanted was control over the deadly new weapons that recently surfaced, the crossbows.

Initially, there were plans to convince Alz to join their side immediately after his capture, but the unexpected developments that followed naturally meant that the chance of this happening was essentially nil right now.

Yet, Cruz still chose to bring it up at this moment whilst knowing full well it wouldn't succeed, clearly having other intentions in mind.

While the leader wanted to retreat immediately, he wisely chose to remain silent as he watched by the side, knowing that he was powerless to change anything even if he spoke out now.

After all, even though he was the leader of the squad, the chieftain had officially sent him here to assist Cruz with the mission, so Cruz was his superior at this moment and he couldn't go against his words.

"The North is sincerely inviting you to join us in the upcoming war." Cruz spoke haughtily, completely at odds from the contents of his words.

"...War?" Alz murmured weakly under his breath.

"Be honoured, it is your chance contribute to the side of the future rulers! Will you join us?" Cruz ignored Alz as he went on to ask.

"I will join." Alz replied.

"No? Then surrender the cross... what?" Cruz looked to Alz with surprise, but he immediately caught sight of the insulting smile on his face.

Cruz looked at Alz like wanted to swallow him whole, his body shaking uncontrollably with anger. Just then, the corner of his eyes caught sight of the weapon holstered on Alz's waist.

"So, this is the famed crossbow. I will test it personally to see if it is worthy of being used in our tribe. " Cruz took one of the crossbows from the defenceless Alz and started observing it with interest.

This was the first crossbow he had ever seen close up, as they had been laying low the past few months to avoid alarming the guardhouse. As he held in in his hands, he immediately felt the urge to test it, directing a cruel smile at Alz.

"Bring him to those trees." Cruz commanded coldly, pointing towards a group of trees about 200m in front of the group.

The two elves who were holding Alz up panicked slightly and looked to the leader for help.

The leader also frowned at this, deciding to try and persuade Cruz, "Young chieftain, remember, the chieftain's orders were to capture him alive."

"As long we have one of these, we can figure out how to make them anyways."

"I know, I know, I won't kill him, don't worry." Cruz answered with annoyance in his voice as he tested the firing mechanism of the crossbow.

"Hurry up!" Cruz raised his head and shouted impatiently towards the two elves when he saw that they were not moving.

The leader shook his head lightly and sighed, looking away from them. The two elves quickly exchanged glances they gritted their teeth and carried Alz over to the area Cruz pointed to.

As they were walking over, Cruz loaded an arrow onto the crossbow and fired it towards another direction, his eyes lighting up as he saw the power behind the arrow.

"This is for trying to act like a hero."

After testing the weapon with several shots, Cruz's smiled maliciously at Alz who was suspending in front of the tree.

Alz looked at Cruz with a look of resignation, feeling his heart sink into the pits of despair. While the two elves were bringing him over, he had tried countless times, but couldn't seem to muster enough strength to break free of their binds no matter how hard he tried.

Suddenly, Alz heard a series of harried footsteps approaching from the side, jolting him back to his senses.

"Don't come! Get away!" Alz repeatedly shouted in a panicked voice, the identity of the visitor immediately appearing in his head, but the footsteps only got louder.

The two elves suspending him also reacted immediately, giving a signal to the group in the distance.

"Catch the intruder." the leader commanded in a stern voice as he moved up closer to Cruz. The three elves didn't dare delay, moving towards Alz without any hesitation.

Cruz wrinkled his eyebrow slightly, but still continued to aim his crossbow at Alz with hesitation on his face, knowing he probably wouldn't get another chance like this if he stopped now.

"WHY IS SHE HERE!?"

Just as he was hesitating on retracting his weapon, his mind blanked out as he saw a figure emerge from the trees, accidentally pulling on the trigger.

"Is this the end?"

*Whoosh*. The wind-piercing sound captured all of Alz's attention immediately, letting out a bitter smile as he looked at the approaching arrow. He emptied his mind at this moment, bracing himself for the sharp pain that would soon arrive.

Yet, several seconds later, he tilted his head with puzzlement, as the impact from the arrow never came. As he opened his eyes, a soft golden radiance spread out before him, filling up his world.