The Mighty Dragons Are Dead

Chapter 372: Chapter 0369: Raising the White Flag (Third Update, 10,000 Coins Reward Celebration 3/5)
 

First kill!

No rewards.

The Li Dragon Horse leapt high, jumping over the enemy horse that had fallen to the ground and charged towards another warhorse. Carried by his Dou Qi, Liszt struck and killed instantly. His spear, not breaking, continued to thrust towards another Earth Knight.

This Earth Knight seemed to have quick reflexes, forcibly twisting his body to dodge the spear and avoiding being impaled. He was merely grazed by the shaft of the spear and fell from his horse. But dead or fallen, the result was the same, and there was no need for Liszt to switch to the Crimson Blood Sword for the coup de grace.

Douson had already charged over and crushed the Earth Knight’s head with his paw.

Douson, being an Intermediate Magical Beast, now weighed over two tons. The force of his dog paw was comparable to a millstone, crushing everything including the helmet into pieces.

Liszt did not concern himself with the knight whose head had been crushed by Douson; he continued his charge while simultaneously scanning his surroundings with his peripheral vision.

The Black Knight Order had caught the Mane City Knight Legion completely off guard, and the chaos wrought by Douson’s magic only plunged them further into disarray, allowing the Black Knight Order to complete their encirclement. Countless Knight’s Spears thrust into the panicked enemy ranks.

The flustered Mane City Knight Legion not only trampled their own men but failed to demonstrate their charge’s strength as well. Their collective Dou Qi had already dispersed in the mayhem, each fighting for their own.

So their Knight’s Spears failed to impale even a single knight from the Black Knight Order.

The situation was one-sided.

Filled with pride, Liszt searched for a third Earth Knight to assassinate. With the support of Douson and the Rock Spikes constantly disrupting the enemy formation, he faced no real resistance. Moreover, he was an Elite Earth Knight enhanced by potions, his body surging with Dou Qi, frequently unleashing “Flaming Wave”.

In just a brief encounter, a third of their hundred-strong knight legion had fallen.

At this time, the Divine Archers besieging Nameless Castle also joined in, shooting arrows from the periphery of the charging knights. Their accurate arrows continually reaped lives.

Douson.

Archers.

Charging knights.

Under this triple assault, the Mane City Knight Legion was instantly on the brink of annihilation, unable to even flee. They were relentlessly charged by the Black Knight Order, who after impaling their foes, immediately wheeled their horses around for a second charge, followed by a third. They reaped heads as though cutting down wheat.

Liszt was the wildest of the group, as he remembered he still had a Smoke Mission to complete—to personally slay an enemy of the same rank, an Elite Earth Knight.

He wasn’t certain if the first one he killed was an Elite Earth Knight, so he had to act fast to kill more Earth Knights.

He was bound to encounter an Elite Earth Knight eventually.

Reaping wildly, after his Knight’s Spear broke from consecutive kills, he immediately switched to the Crimson Blood Sword and killed another. After three charges, he found no more enemies around him. Unsatisfied, he drew his bow from behind and began to reap the fallen, not yet dead Earth Knights on the ground, and indeed he collected a few more heads.

At this moment.

There were no standing knights left from Mane City on the battlefield, and the Black Knight Order continued their charges, completing a spectacular massacre—Douson’s contribution was indispensable. His formidable Intermediate Magical Beast combat strength was fully displayed, especially in his effective disruption of the enemy’s charging formation.

Compared to human magicians who need time to prepare their spells, magical beasts release magic instantly with a mere breath.

After all, a significant portion of a magical beast’s source of magic power comes from within itself, whereas magicians must gather it from the air. The speed of their spellcasting is not on the same level. Even a Grand Magician well-versed in Earth System magic would struggle to disrupt a charging formation so smoothly.

“I surrender!”

A Earth Knight lying in a pool of his own blood on the ground began to wail in pain.

Because he realized that Liszt had already aimed his bow at him—under normal circumstances, knights can choose to surrender and then let their family or landlord pay for their ransom. If no one redeems them, they become serfs, working for the person who captured them to repay the debt.

Nobles adhere to this rule; they rarely kill captives, as ransoming captives requires a large sum of money, which is more profitable than killing.

However.

Liszt’s arrows still pierced through the throat beneath the knight’s helmet, because the Grand Duke’s fury was fierce, and he directly commanded that there be no captives, that the traitors be unforgiven—the most crucial point was that these knights were not Expedition Knights; once captured, their lands and wealth would be taken by the Grand Duke.

There simply was no money for their redemption.

“Huff.”

Confirming that there were no living knights left, Liszt finally put down the bow and arrows in his hands, his gaze coldly sweeping over the blood-soaked battlefield.

A full hundred or more Earth Knights lay in pools of blood.

The wails of horses and the stench of blood in the air intertwined, painting the brutality of war.

It was Liszt’s first charge, his first kill, his first victory; he didn’t know what he was feeling inside. Raised under the red flag, he had never killed a man, let alone a chicken. But after crossing into this world, since his first hunt of a Magical Beast, he finally began to hunt his own kind.

As the adrenaline slowly faded, he felt the urge to vomit.

But he knew he could not vomit, as his image of bravely killing the enemy would instantly collapse; as a noble, as a knight, his display of being fearless in combat could not falter.

“Commander, all enemy knights have been slain!” Captain Layden rode over on horseback, his body smeared with plenty of blood, but none of it was his own.

“What are our casualties?”

“No one is dead, only two knights are severely injured and have lost their ability to fight.”

“Leave the severely injured knights in the care of the retainers, send out two squads of knights to guard the tunnels exit in Mane City!” Liszt, resisting the urge to vomit, commanded coldly, “Everyone else, follow me to lay siege to the castle!”

The Li Dragon Horse began to gallop once more, the sun blazing down, the warm wind blowing on his face, allowing him a slight escape from the effects of killing.

He needed a release!

Perhaps because his attention had been redirected back to the war, he no longer thought about the human limbs on the ground, or the blood of his own kind on his hands; he just wanted to take down Nameless Castle—in fact, ever since he had killed a rat, he had completely immersed himself in the moral dilemmas of this world.

War, it was the destiny of a knight!

Blood, it was the noble’s wine!

…

Seeing the Knight Legion of Mane City wiped out in their failed sneak attack, the defenders of Nameless Castle were completely panicked, with only a few dozen Earth Knights daring to show their heads.

However, just when Liszt, with Douson in tow, was about to dismantle Nameless Castle, a window of the castle opened, and a white flag was extended outwards.

White stood for purity, purity meant having nothing, having nothing signified a total loss, a total loss… and thus, surrender.

This was the flag of surrender.

Soon, the castle gate opened, and the knights, having taken off their armor, walked out dejectedly, one of them shouting, “Howard Woodstick, representing all the nobles of Mane City, surrenders to the noble conqueror!” Then, the group of knights knelt on one knee, indicating their submission.

This left Liszt, who was ready to vent his frustration by demolishing the building, momentarily stunned.

According to the Grand Duke’s orders, no captives were to be accepted, so he killed every enemy knight with a coup de grâce after the charge. But those knights who came out to surrender, unarmed and unarmored, put him in a difficult position.

To kill?

Or not to kill?