The Amber Sword

Chapter 164 – Gambler’s roulette (1)

A thin blade pierced through a skull, and the final Zombie Outlander lost its strength and fell to the ground heavily.

The female commander with fiery red hair gripped her sword with a single hand and looked at her surroundings. The reflection in her emerald eyes showed many skeletal bones and mercenaries’ corpses. The battle had finally ended. Even though they paid a hefty price, they had managed to fight the attackers off.

Jana exhaled slowly and returned her rapier into a sheath covered with black leather.

“Commander!” A shout came from behind her. She turned back and saw one of her youngest mercenaries run over.

“Leave your protests for later. Get some men to stay behind and take care of our injured, while the rest advance. We have wasted too much time, and we need to control the west gate before Madara arrives!”

“Wait!” The boy bent over and held on to his knees in support while he tried to catch his breath.

“What?” She frowned and said with impatience.

It was one of the reasons why the living feared the undead—

“Crossbowmen, ready yourselves—”

“Reload your blunt bolts—”

One of the squadron’s captain took up the position of calling the timings for the ranged mercenaries on the walls. The veteran men once again pulled upon their bottles of Blessed water and poured them all over their bundles of crossbow bolts. They felt somewhat pained and reluctant to do so, as they rarely spent this much coin to use in a normal battle.

“Aim—”

They raised their fortified crossbows and aimed at the skeletons marching in droves into the hole.

“Fire!”

Sharp twangs resounded in a single moment, and the whistling bolts seemed to form an invisible barrier, striking the skeletons down and turned into ashes with burning flames.

Raban was nearby that hole, crushing a skeleton below with his feet. He carried his greatsword shoulder with one hand. He had just swapped the first squadron of exhausted mercenaries with the second squadron. He quickly barked out his next order and ordered a few sellswords to bring down the injured men from the city walls. The battle was slow and unending, just like the battles he had experienced in Karsuk.

He did not waver against the endless number of undead, knowing quite well what he was capable of, as well as knowing what Madara’s undead was capable of.

When the pillar of light shot into the sky, he laughed heartily: “A noble killing another noble. It seems like I received an appropriate compensation. It’s the first time I have seen them kill each other than poison or assassinations or political scheming. This young man is more than a brute that I expected.”

“What things are these nobles not capable of?” His adjutant replied.

Raban cast an amused glance at him.

“You don’t understand,” he said before he put his focus back onto the battlefield: “How long more?”

“Thirty minutes.”

Raban raised his hand: “Go and make sure to place our Warflags higher. After this wave of undead, the necromancers will be coming out. Since that brutish noble has given me an answer, I need to have a reply ready as well.”

“Dawn……” The commander of Firebrand’s mercenary looked out to the horizons: “It’s coming soon enough. That’s the completion of the Head’s first order. ”

“Head?”

“Let’s call him by that title,” Raban muttered to himself.