Bang—
Smoke permeated the air, bullets raining like a sudden storm.
Dozens of muskets simultaneously spewed tongues of fire, propelling deadly lead bullets toward the enemy. Trained under Reserit's command, they had made astonishing progress, almost pulling the trigger as soon as they heard the command, creating an impenetrable wall of bullets that slammed into the beastly horde.
The power of thirty-one muskets firing in unison was no joke; nearly a dozen creatures in the horde collapsed instantly upon being hit. Most of the charging Great Beasts took multiple hits, yet still surged forward with determination.
As the most formidable infantry force within the Beastmen warband, Great Beasts boasted fine armor and weapons. Clad in tough and barbaric iron armor, wielding bloodthirsty battle-axes, they were formidable walls of muscle and steel during their charge. Even lead bullets were insufficient to instantly breach this wall.
"Milord, are you all right? Milord!"
Airen shouted with all his might as he fled, calling out Avi's name, but Avi remained unresponsive. His leather armor and clothes were soaked through with blood, and his warhorse was covered in warm, foul-smelling liquid as if emerging from a pool of blood.
"Milord—!"
After spending time together, Airen's respect and loyalty towards Avi no longer stemmed solely from the system's influence or repayment for saving his life, but rather from a deep-seated admiration for this man—from a mercenary who still respected life, something nearly impossible in this world.
He didn't know whose blood covered Avi's body, how many wounds he had sustained, or what Avi had endured. But judging from the two Great Beast heads hanging from the already blood-red warhorse, Airen believed that the captain had just survived a life-and-death battle.
It took quite a long time to reload after the volley of musket fire. Clearly, the Beastmen had also learned this through their prolonged engagement with humans, and their charge after the volley showed no signs of abating. They ran more frantically across the land, even abandoning attempts to shield themselves.
This was evidently the scene Reserit anticipated. He raised his sword again as a signal. As the sword stood high, the sound of bowstrings reverberated through the formation, and a dozen arrows, accompanied by a sharp whistle, fell among the horde.
Though the archers' shooting rate had far surpassed their previous levels after the training, their full-force shooting now exceeded normal, and the swarm of arrows quickly suppressed the horde, slowing its advance considerably.
Suppressive Fire: Drastically increase shooting rate at the cost of accuracy, rapidly exhausting soldiers. This was the most obvious benefit Reserit brought to the mercenary band—a well-trained and powerful ranged force.
Arrows couldn't directly kill well-armored Great Beasts and Great Horns, but they could injure them where they lacked armor protection, reducing the combat effectiveness of these savage species by causing them to bleed from their wounds.
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This was not only due to Reserit's effective training but also owed much to the influence of the system. Of course, the instructor himself was unaware of all this; he just felt that Avi had a keen eye and always sent him exceptionally bright and talented soldiers.
Reserit's ranged tactics temporarily gained the upper hand, but the horde was far more than just a few dozen. The charging Beastmen's roars and war cries sounded like thunderous cannon fire, the sound of their hooves pounding the ground causing the land beneath the mercenaries' feet to tremble slightly.
If it were any other unit, morale would have been affected by now, yet even though Avi was currently incoherent, his characteristics were still effective: Beastmen Bane, preventing the team from suffering morale loss from Beastmen units.
Under Reserit's command and influenced by Avi, the morale of the mercenary band was high. They were fully equipped and prepared for the imminent melee against the Beastmen.
Before the Beastmen could reach the mercenary formation, Reserit's musketeers unleashed a second volley of gunfire. This time, at a distance of less than a hundred meters, they directly felled a frenzy of Great Beasts.
Despite their frenzy, the three remaining Great Beasts recklessly charged into the formation, only to be impaled by the second layer of halberdiers before inflicting any casualties.
In their robust arms, axes dripping with beast blood suddenly fell, and these berserk warriors finally met their end on the battlefield.
Although the horde approached menacingly, consisting mostly of Great Beasts, their long pursuit of Avi had already drained much of their energy. Coupled with the sustained long-range bombardment, most of the Beastmen were now breathless and wounded, no match for the mercenaries in close combat.
Pikemen and swordsmen acted as the first line of defense, blocking the enemy's advance, while halberdiers behind them raised their weapons high, hacking and thrusting. As the melee reached its fiercest moment, Reserit raised his own grenade launcher and fired a shot into the pile of Beastmen.
Before the stunned Beastmen could react, swordsmen wielding giant swords and clad in plate armor swept in like tornadoes, especially the leader, who, with astonishing force, directly cleaved the Great Beasts blocking his path into pieces.
Rafe, seeing Avi unconscious, poured all his rage into his arms and weapons, tirelessly harvesting Beastmen like a moving meat grinder.
Initially, the mercenaries managed to maintain their formation and withstand the Beastmen's onslaught in a circular formation, but as the battle intensified, everyone couldn't contain their battle fervor and rushed forward.
Under Airen's lead, all the cavalry dismounted, swords drawn, charged into the horde from the flanks and rear, wielding their sabers and swords to knock down one Beastman after another.
The organized battle turned into a melee in an instant, humans and Beastmen attacking and killing each other. The energetic mercenaries ultimately defeated the weary Beastmen, exterminating them completely.
"Cut off the heads of the Great Beasts; they'll be useful later," Reserit, sword stained with blood, strode through the battlefield strewn with corpses, cold and meticulous as he searched for still-breathing Beastmen, ready to end their lives at any moment.
"Boss, how's the Boss?!"
Immediately after the battle, Rafe didn't bother to tend to the wounds on his body, which had been opened by Great Beasts' axes. Instead, he ran to Airen, who had just returned with the cavalry.
"Boss!"
Rafe spotted the 'blood man' placed by the mercenaries on a flat ground; he rushed over but carefully controlled his strength, not touching Avi's body.
"I've briefly treated Milord's wounds with medicine; most of them are flesh wounds, except for a deep wound on his back from an axe blow. He may need a long rest."
"Will he—"
"Just from my medical skills, Milord should be fine," Airen removed his helmet, sighing. "But I believe it's necessary to go to Middenheim immediately to find a highly skilled physician to treat Milord."
"Right now, right away!" Rafe's voice trembled with a hint of tears. "The Boss absolutely cannot have any mishaps, absolutely not!"