Chapter 99
Chapter 99: A worshipped little skeleton
“Elder Calvin, has the village been discovered by forest trolls?” Han Shuo’s face turned grave as he turned towards Calvin, asking him in a solemn tone.
“Han, why are you suddenly asking such questions? There have been quite a few encounters with the forest trolls recently in the past couple of days, but even we don’t know if they’ve discovered something.” Calvin first started and then explained.
According to the field of vision coverage from the original demons, Han Shuo discovered that the current amount of forest trolls present numbered around five or six hundred this time. There were forest trolls, warriors, hunters, and priests. They all advanced in an orderly fashion, and coordinated with each other in exceedingly reasonable ways. This indicated that this batch of forest trolls must surely come from a strong faction. Five to six hundred forest trolls grouped with the right amount of troll hunters and priests would make for a sizeable force.
There were only 50 or 60 dwarves who were strong enough to participate in this battle within the village. Add to that Han Shuo and a few elves, their strength was completely subpar to that of the forest trolls’. This made Han Shuo understand that it would truly be tough to tide over this time’s danger.
“Five to six hundred forest trolls are headed in this direction. It looks like your village has truly been exposed.” Han Shuo sighed lowly and slowly revealed the truth.
Benedict had listened to Han Shuo’s words with some disbelief, but the group of dwarves that Calvin was leading immediately panicked upon hearing that five to six hundred forest trolls were headed their way. They were at a loss of what to do and proposed wild plans.
“What to do, what should we do?” An iron mallet waved in Bennett’s hands as he gave a glance at the female and children behind him, appearing very worried and resigned.
The dwarves weren’t a race that was cowardly and afraid of danger, but they couldn’t be irresponsible towards their females and children. When danger arrived, their first thought would be how to protect the women and children.
“Chief Calvin, I know that your village is hidden within a mountain valley. Are there any other ways of leaving the valley? No matter how suitable the valley is as a place to reside, I think we need to evacuate as quickly as possible. We’ll be hard pressed to fight against five to six hundred forest trolls.” Han Shuo tried persuading.
Han Shuo was truly surprised, he hadn’t expected the arrow to have such power and involuntarily looked askance at Benedict.
“Benedict, you shouldn’t waste such precious magical arrows on these cursed forest trolls. You know that these magical arrows are all very precious!” A female elf was a bit angry at seeing Benedict show off and lectured him.
Benedict stuck out his tongue and made a face when the female elf lectured him and then spoke self righteously to Han Shuo, “Did you see that just now? The magical arrows that have been imbued with magic from our elders have such strong power after being shot out with a magical bow. If those dwarf-forged weapons are modified by us, they will immediately turn into powerful magical weapons and bring lots of trouble to the forest trolls. You should give those weapons to us.”
It looked like the elf still hadn’t forgotten his duty, even now, and was still attempting to use his naive and laughable words to persuade Han Shuo. It was a pity that apart from flicking him a glance in the beginning, Han Shuo paid no more attention to him and only calmly gave a few orders to the dwarves around him.
After the first batch of forest trolls paid a heavy price in casualties, they were much more cautious the second time around. They first had the troll warriors approach, and then the priests added blessings on them, making their bodies more nimble and strong. The enhanced forest trolls immediately shoveled away the weeds at the entrance with great enthusiasm.
At this moment, the crossbows in Han Shuo’s and the dwarves’ hands continuously shot out across the tall grass, but whenever their crossbolts appeared, the long spears of the troll hunters would rake through the air, also falling on Han Shuo and the dwarves’ hiding place.
But because the crossbows had a longer firing range, this caused the forest trolls’ judgement of distance to be off the mark. The long spears fell in rows in front of the group, without causing any damage to them.
After paying the price of the lives of a few more troll warriors, the forest trolls finally cleared away the obstacles to the village entrance. With another loud yell, the forest trolls raised their weapons and charged in with large steps.
The traps set at the entrance to the village started displaying their lethality. The forest trolls out in front all fell into deep holes with sharp sticks in the bottom, and they lay there moaning in pain. The entrance to the village was finally overcome, but not without the mounting forest troll death toll and casualties.
“There are simply too many forest trolls, I think we should retreat.” Han Shuo looked at the village entrance thronging with forest trolls and understood that the difference between the two was simply too great. He shook his head and sighed.
Benedict also displayed his fright at this time and nodded in agreement with Han Shuo’s words. “Yes, I think we should retreat first and wait for me to go back to the tribe to alert our people. When our people arrive, these cursed villains will pay a painful price.”
When Han Shuo and Benedict said so, the ten or so dwarves around them seemed to be a bit dejected as they all laid down their weapons. One of them said, “The chief said that we should listen to Han. If Han wants us to retreat then we’ll retreat.”
Han Shuo smiled faintly upon hearing his words, “Since this is the case, then all of you should come back, otherwise we’ll be in big trouble.”
The dwarves, who had been bent on fighting to their deaths, all retreated to the back of the village in accordance with Han Shuo’s orders. The crossbows within their hands continued to fire. In the face of a densely packed forest troll advance, the crossbow bolts would all hit their targets, without needing to be aimed.
Upon seeing that the dwarves had already retreated, some of the dwarves also stood tactfully in the back. Han Shuo thought for a moment and summoned the little skeleton. He wanted to use the seven bone spurs on the little skeleton’s back to shed a last wave of blood and create some trouble for the forest trolls.
However, out of Han Shuo’s expectations, when the bone dagger wielding little skeleton appeared at the village entrance, he hadn’t even had the time to shoot out his bone spurs when the forest trolls in the very front all displayed very excited expressions. They laid down their weapons with a thud and bowed down to the little skeleton with highly raised hands, calling out continuously, “Datara, Datara, Datara…”
Han Shuo was flabbergasted and stunned where he stood. He didn’t know why the forest trolls were worshipping the little skeleton so faithfully.