Chapter 204: Dragon Attack on the City

Fortunately, although the location of the previous attack was close to the border between the Bolerum Territory and the Nozdack Territory, it was still considered close to Poitou City. If they rode fast, it was only a journey of half a day. Even with the burden of the wounded and those captives, at their current speed, they could still return to the Territory before nightfall.

Suddenly, everyone felt a vibration from the earth, followed by a rumbling roar. Then, the sea breeze coming from the southwest brought large clouds of flying dust.

Under the influence of this inexplicable sudden situation, the caravan quickly stopped moving forward. At the same time, because of the sudden attack they had just encountered, many Guards seemed to be like startled birds.

Before the Wagon behind had even come to a steady stop, the shooters who were originally correcting their bowstrings or oiling their bows for maintenance immediately picked up their weapons and jumped off the carriage one after another without saying a word.

Although their arms hung low and their bowstrings were not drawn, they scanned the surroundings of the caravan with their sharp and spirited eyes. They began to search for any location that might potentially conceal a threat. That thin layer of dust did not seem to have any effect on these elite soldiers.

Spears were raised, and Tower Shields were equipped. Although the dozens of Guards could not form a shield wall enclosing the entire caravan, they still prioritized protecting the carriage George was in and the open carriage behind it.

As for those captives, except for the key personnel under guard, it seemed they were temporarily left unattended. However, there did not seem to be any highly skilled people among them, and the captives, unable to undo the shackles on their hands and feet, seemed to have lost the desire to escape. Basically, they all sat down on the wet ground with a plop.

“What happened again!” George quickly put on his helmet and stuck his head out of the carriage. It seemed that he, too, had become somewhat paranoid.

Looking in the direction from which the dust came, something seemed to have happened behind a small hill not far from the road. That small hill was about four or five kilometers long. Because it was an important economic source for the Bolerum Territory in the early years—a copper mine. Therefore, many winding mine tunnels had been dug into this seemingly inconspicuous hill.

If one were to enter inside, they would discover that one end could not be seen from the other at all. Because of this, after the copper mine was exhausted, it became an important black market in the Bolerum Territory and a main gathering area for Rogues in the past. However, the mine tunnels should have been completely sealed shut during George’s grandfather’s generation!

‘Could the guys who plotted this attack have dug open that abandoned mine pit? Could they be holding some special Magic ceremony inside?’ With such doubts, George commanded the team to quickly rush to the scene of the incident. As for those captives, they were first handed over to the auxiliary soldiers for guarding. Since they did not take the opportunity to escape earlier, the possibility of them successfully resisting now was not very high.

“Hisss—hisss—” The neighing sound became clearer and louder as George and the others continued to approach. The huge shadow revealed through the dust gave everyone an extremely strong sense of oppression. Most of the ordinary soldiers had to use their weapons as support to barely remain standing.

Suddenly feeling a weight on their bodies, George and Hiren immediately recalled the experiences they had before. The two looked at each other in tacit understanding and immediately drew their respective weapons. At the same time, George gathered his breath in his dantian and, coordinating with special Soul fluctuations, began to issue orders: “All Archers listen to the order, prepare strong bows of over 200 pounds to aim at the wing roots. Other Archers, after making visual contact, attack the opponent’s wing membranes as much as possible. Melee fighters, discard your shields and set up a spear formation. Be careful of the opponent’s pouncing crush and swinging tail. Against a Dragon, flexible dodging is much more useful than the defense added by a shield.”

White Raven’s Lament, your loud voice inspires the willpower of your companions. As long as you are on the battlefield, your companions are stronger when facing effects that attempt to make their wills yield.

George used a stance that he could not even be considered to have fully learned this time. It was precisely in the hope of enabling the soldiers under his command to recover from the fear caused by supernatural power. These warriors, most of whom were so scared that their hands and feet were weak, could not form any effective combat power at all.

It was unknown whether George’s ability was really not mastered well enough, or if the opponent’s Dragon’s Dread effect was too powerful; in short, the team behind the two still could not form up for a while.

On the contrary, the response of those Adventurers was quite calm. Although they experienced the same panic at first, they quickly regained their composure after hearing George’s orders. Now, they had already assumed the proper formation their adventure team used when facing powerful enemies.

However, to everyone’s surprise, the one standing at the very front was not the Paladin Alamil, who used a sword and shield combination so smoothly that he could almost support a defensive line by himself. Nor was it Stone Marx, who possessed stunning dual blades and was like a white-skinned third brother. Instead, it was the little bean sprout, Green Beren.

This made George mutter in his heart: ‘Even if Green Beren is small and agile, and has strong survivability when facing attacks. But he doesn’t seem to be able to hold back the enemy and create a relatively safe combat space for his teammates behind him, right? Is there some trick to this?’

But at this moment, the huge wings flapping in the dust fanned up an airflow that was almost visible to the naked eye. In the blink of an eye, it blew away the obstruction, making its image clearly visible. However, the flying sand and stones that came with it made the team behind George feel even worse.

Accompanied by a pungent smell almost like chlorine, a huge monster with an olive-green body appeared in front of everyone. Its jaws full of teeth and its raised horn crest fully revealed their combative nature. The cone-shaped protrusions densely covering its forehead and chin made its appearance look even uglier.

George could see that it was precisely because of the impact of this one in front of him. The originally intended mine tunnels could not support their own weight and collapsed. The collapsed section was over a dozen meters long.

At the same time, anyone with relevant knowledge could see it. The condition of this Green Dragon could be said to be quite bad. To say nothing else, the nose horn on its head was already broken. The acidic blood constantly overflowing from it dripped onto the ground, constantly emitting green smoke.

For Green Dragons that liked to live in dense jungles, the nose horn was a very important tool. Usually, when shuttling through the forest, it would use the nose horn to push aside the branches and leaves blocking the way. The horn crest protruding from the Green Dragon’s head could prevent the obstacles pushed aside by its nose horn from bouncing back onto its face and obstructing its vision.

At the same time, the wing membranes on the Dragon’s wings were also tattered, and the movement of its front claws did not seem to be very nimble. This made George, who had thought about how to retreat immediately after seeing the opponent’s size, feel slightly relieved: ‘This battle seems to be still worth fighting?’

Just when George thought a big battle was about to break out, the performance of that Dragon was quite timid.

Seeing this, George immediately turned his head and scanned the surroundings. Not finding anything, he could only shout loudly: “Mr. Val, stop hiding on the side and watching the show!”

“I really wasn’t hiding. If you don’t believe me, you can look up and see for yourselves!” came the confident voice of Knight Val from the sky.

George looked up at the Son of the Sun, who was still looking extraordinary in the air. He could not help but slander in his heart: ‘I dare say Knight Val was definitely hiding in the clouds watching a joke earlier!’

“Mighty Knight, I surrender! I demand Noble treatment. I can pay my own ransom!” The Dragon in front of him began to use the Common Tongue to beg for surrender from Knight Val, who was hovering in the air. It seemed that the legend that Green Dragons are very smart and cunning was quite accurate.

Knight Val did not give a direct answer. After landing and discussing with George for a while, he left the negotiation entirely to George. He was responsible for playing the bad cop, and George was responsible for playing the good cop. When George was bargaining with that Green Dragon named Robert, Knight Val naturally applied pressure on Robert from the side.

A carefully platinum-wound circlet, worth about 7,500 Gold Coins; a gold necklace with a black opal surrounded by fire opals, worth about 2,500 Gold Coins; a swan-shaped gold harp worth about 2,500 Gold Coins; a platinum pitcher engraved with dancing dragons worth 2,500 Gold Coins. Plus gems that were hard to appraise because they were uncut—two purple star sapphires, six fire opals, one cloudy lilac Diamond, and three garnets.

A ransom price with a total value of roughly between 18,000 and 19,000 Gold Coins was finally negotiated. This was already far higher than the purchase price of a Dragon’s corpse, but for the Green Dragon Robert, as long as it could save its own little life, such expenses were worth it.

After using an item teleportation spell to send enough ransom, Robert spread his tattered wings and wobbled away toward the northwest.

As for why, although a Dragon’s corpse is extremely precious, its selling price was somewhat disproportionate to its value. That was because the number of organizations and individuals who knew how to process and use Dragon’s corpses was scarce. This turned the buyer’s market into a seller’s market. Although due to its intrinsic value it wouldn’t be sold too cheaply, it still couldn’t be sold for a high price. Of course, this also had something to do with the scarcity of Spellcasters in the Duchy of Nohan.

After completing the arduous negotiation work, George finally couldn’t hold back his doubts and worries: “Knight Val, this attack wasn’t launched by the Dragon Queen, was it?”

“George, you had better be mentally prepared! The loss to the Territory this time is not small.” Knight Val said as he patted George’s shoulder. He began to narrate the course of events.

Originally, the Bolerum Territory today, on the whole, could be said to be sunny. Phenomena like sun in the east and rain in the west were relatively common here.

This was the second day after the Carnival. Without the noise of the celebration obstructing traffic, the coming and going Caravans gradually resumed their usual operations. At the same time, after a day of rest, the residents who had reveled for three days also recovered part of their energy, and the whole city seemed to come alive.

But just when everything was turning in a good direction, there were always people who, for various reasons, came to destroy such a harmonious scene. First, the spies who had mixed into the Territory began to use methods such as instigation and deliberately creating contradictions to trigger chaos. The suddenly increasing number of security incidents made the Security Squad in Poitou somewhat overwhelmed.

Among them, the fight that occurred near the city gate caused considerable chaos. Even under the suppression of the Security Squad, it had a tendency to intensify. The conflict between about a dozen guards from two Caravans and the surrounding onlookers completely blocked the main road.

In such a chaotic scene, how many people could think through the causes and consequences thoroughly? Seeing that the chaos there could not subside for a long time and had already begun to affect the normal entry and exit of the city gate, the Guards at the city gate, although still sticking to their posts, more or less had their attention attracted by the chaos over there.

But at this moment, an ordinary-looking man entering the city suddenly darted behind a Guard. Then, with a flick of his long sleeve, a dagger struck out like lightning, and the cold light it brought up was like cold electricity, lingering for a long time!

And that Guard, who had only been slightly distracted, had his throat cut by this attack. Covering his neck with both hands, unable to make a sound, he collapsed just like that.

Another Guard was also attacked at the same time, but his luck was slightly better and he did not die on the spot. But immediately, under the cooperation of several professional Assassins, he only let out one shout before his resistance was declared a failure.

However, what those attackers absolutely did not expect was that inside the peepholes on both sides of the city gate, several other Guards on rotation witnessed all of this.

“Clang! Clang! Clang!” The alarm sound immediately rang out from the city gate tower. Immediately afterwards, the Guards in the winch room who heard the alarm moved the bolts, and the 6,000-pound gate quickly fell, dividing the inside and outside of the city into two worlds.

At the same time, the attackers, seeing their first plan fail, began to constantly attack the surrounding Commoners, as if to vent their dissatisfaction. Soon, meteors shot out from the city gate tower, rising slowly into the sky. Accompanied by huge sounds and dazzling firelight, these three Magic fireworks signaled an alert to all the residents and soldiers in the Territory.

The Bolerum Territory under military politics could be said to be all-people soldiers. Long-term training made it so that in the Territory, as long as one was an adult male, one was a qualified warrior.

Within less than 10 minutes after the alarm sounded, all the elderly, women, and children were stuffed into the basements by the pillars of their families. Then, they picked up the weapons they had not put down for long and freely combined according to different blocks. Using various furniture or stones to build barricades, the whole city was prepared for street fighting.

At the same time, the soldiers in the city filed out of the barracks with neat equipment and began to rush to various battlefields within the city.

The original clouds in the sky seemed to have been cut through by a sharp sword; accompanying the fragmented clouds, two huge shadows swooped down towards Poitou City. Accompanied by sharp roars, they flapped their wings and swept past the buildings above. But what followed was an unmatched prestige expanding outward from their whole bodies.

The city walls and towers at a farther distance were not affected by the Dragon’s Dread. The Guards worked in pairs of two, hurriedly turning the two cranks beside their hands. With the turning of the cranks, the two screw rods underneath turned together, and the Ballista next to them began to turn direction, aiming at the nearest Dragon.

Other companions beside the Guards also began to carry out their work step by step, everything looking so orderly. It was like a clockwork pendulum that had been wound up tight.

The Soldier in charge of aiming beside the Ballista waved his hand, and the soldiers beside him immediately stopped adjusting the angle. Immediately afterwards, the Soldier grabbed the rope, waiting for the signal to appear. These Ballistas had their bowstrings drawn tight, the Crossbow Bolts were buckled on, and even the fire basins at the front of the Ballistas were lit.

“Release!” With this command, the Soldiers pulled hard. The mechanism fixing the bowstring popped open, and the Crossbow Bolt, which was more than a person long and as thick as a cup mouth, was immediately shot out. When the Crossbow Bolt brushed past the fire basin in front of the Ballista frame, the incendiary agent on it was ignited, and this shot Crossbow Bolt turned into a fire meteor.

All the Ballistas had adjusted their directions, and a row of angry shots flew neatly towards the two Dragons in the sky. But those two Dragons flapped their wings elegantly and agilely, dodging the rocket attacks from afar like fish in water.

Only then did the Guards discover a loophole in the Territory’s defense that could not really be called a loophole. Unlike the harbor’s cannon batteries, the Ballistas in the city were not equipped with Magic Crossbow Bolts—Red Dragon’s Breath. Therefore, amidst the firepower net interwoven by these dozens of arrows, the Dragons still managed to dodge this counterattack quite calmly. At most, the long tail of that Black Dragon gained a graze.

Even more deadly was that the Crossbow Bolts flew over from above, leaving large holes in the houses in the city. If the organized residents had not rescued effectively, a large-scale fire would have broken out long ago. However, there were still many areas where Commoners, hindered by the Dragon’s Dread, failed to extinguish the fire in time, and quite a few houses were still burned down.

Not long after, the closest Knight Ahuatan and Knight Baptiste made contact with that Black Dragon. Sharp claws and blade edges interlaced. Pulling out a string of conspicuous sparks.

The Black Dragon in the sky never expected that the other side would have someone capable of threatening its existence so quickly. In just a few jumps, the two men wearing medium armor had crossed such a long distance in the blink of an eye and entangled it.

However, that Black Dragon dared to come and carry out this task, so it must have something to rely on. It thought that even if it could not defeat the other side, at least it had more than enough ability to protect itself.

A Dragon is a Dragon, especially the Black Dragon and Red Dragon among the Chromatic Dragons who are best at fighting. The Black Dragon might be the most vicious of the Chromatic Dragons. The Red Dragon might be more frenzied, and the Green Dragon might have greater ambition for deception and control, but few other Dragons possess the same cruelty as the Black Dragon.

This creature hunts not only for survival and to protect their territory, but also for the pure joy derived from inflicting pain. They do not care whether their victims are innocent or harmful, weak or powerful. Violence brings satisfaction.

However, the huge force transmitted from the Longsword was not what Knight Ahuatan had estimated before. He looked up in horror, just in time to see that Black Dragon spread its wings and fly into the air, then lowered its head and opened its mouth.

Breath! The alarm bells in this Knight’s heart rang loudly. Although he had not fought a Dragon, at least he had not eaten pork but had seen a pig run. With his scalp tingling, he unhesitatingly took advantage of the momentum to roll forward. The next moment, a dense cloud of corrosive mist sprayed past, barely missing the shield in his hand. Immediately, a cone-shaped deep mark appeared on the ground.

At this moment, Knight Baptiste, who was right next to him, could not care about style and demeanor anymore. He rolled on the ground in an extremely wretched manner. Then he climbed up like a dog eating shit. Even so, the cloak behind him was left with only a little bit of scraps.

Throwing away the shield in his hand, Knight Ahuatan had no time to miss his old partner he had used for many years. Because just as he rolled forward and got up, he heard a sound of wind and thunder in front of him.

From spreading its wings to charge to turning its body to claw, the Black Dragon’s hind legs were like two giant harrows. Sweeping past the place where the two had originally stayed in a beautiful arc.

Climbing to breathe, diving to rake, the Black Dragon’s attack was almost done in one breath. Leaving no room at all. In its view, if that mortal continued to dodge downward, it would take the opportunity to crush him; if the former forcefully turned, it would sweep its tail sideways.

The whole body of a Dragon is a weapon; they are true combat creatures, and Black Dragons and Red Dragons are experts in using these natural weapons. Unlike the massive Red Dragons, the naturally smaller Black Dragons had to use their bodies more precisely. Of course, Black Dragons appeared abnormally slim, which was thin and muscular, not emaciated. The one in front of them could be said to be battle-hardened, able to seize the vast majority of opportunities to exert its advantages.

But what made this Black Dragon a bit scratchy was that its sure-hit attack actually missed. The swinging of its two claws just now only hit the air.

And Knight Ahuatan and Knight Baptiste dodged this disaster by trespassing into a private house. They were in a hidden house nearby adjusting their breathing. The situation just now was really too dangerous. If they were really hit, even with their strength, they would inevitably lose half their lives. The strength of an Ancient Black Dragon had a semi-crushing effect on these two Knights who had not yet stepped into the Bronze Rank.