Hrm?” Reynolds suddenly frowned.
He suddenly had the sensation of impending danger, as though an invisible, murderous force was stealthily creeping towards them. As a magus, Reynolds had an extremely powerful spiritual force, and his premonitions were far stronger than most people’s.
“Everyone, be careful!” Reynolds suddenly shouted coldly.
“Yes, milord!” All the surrounding knights answered, but right at this moment, the sound of frantic hoof beats could be heard, drawing closer to them at high speed.
“Enemy ambush!” Enemy ambush!” That fierce shout shattered the calm skies.
Virtually all of the knights reacted very quickly, snatching up their spears and raising their shields as they all charged at high speed towards their horses. But just at this moment, sharp arrows began to rain down upon them from afar….
“Swish!” “Swish!”
The arrows rained down upon them at high speed like a plague of locusts. All of the knights immediately knelt down while raising their shields to protect themselves, while moving closer to each other.
The Empire’s shields were of very high quality. In battle, it was rare that ordinary arrows would be able to pierce through them. And indeed, many of the arrows struck the shields, but the shields would only tremble slightly as the arrows fell to the ground, spent. But ten or so arrows passed straight through the shields, as though they were made of paper…
“Pierce!”
A fast-moving arrow tore straight through a shield, then pierced straight through the knight’s head. Brain matter exploded out.
Reynolds, seeing this, felt heartsick. These knights were his personal squad, and had followed him for six years. Six years of living together had resulted in deep bonds of affection. But Reynolds instantly could tell: “To be able to pierce through shields from hundreds of meters away means they are definitely experts of the seventh or eighth ranks. And there are quite a few of them.”
“Rumble.” As those distant people moved nearer, the sound of their horses’ hoof steps grew clearer. This group of people all wore gray armor, and the hooves of their horses were covered with cloth.
In front of these people, over ten bloodstained knights were fleeing.
“Rossi [Luo’xi].” Reynolds’ face changed. Those ten knights belonged to his squad.
“Milord, flee, quick! These are the soldiers of the Rohault Empire, and they number in the thousands! Quick…ah!!!” A bloodied knight ran past at high speed, but in the blink of an eye, an arrow went straight through his throat.
“Kill them all! Let none survive!” A cold voice rang out from afar.
“Flee!”
Reynolds shouted loudly. Fight against an opponent numbering in the thousands, while he only had a few hundred people? And what’s more, they were being ambushed, and the enemy had multiple elite warriors of the seventh and eighth ranks.
In addition, their duty was reconnaissance. They had to go back and spread the news.
The lucky survivors immediately vaulted onto their warhorses. Perhaps because their enemies wanted to acquire those several hundred horses, the arrows that had rained down on them just now had only struck the knights. Not a single warhorse had been killed.
Flee!
Flee!
The only thing on Reynolds’ mind was to flee at high speed. At the beginning, four hundred men had tried to flee, but right now, only a hundred were left. That a hundred were left was because Reynolds had used magic to intimidate their enemies. While fleeing, Reynolds was still muttering the words to even more magical spells.
With Reynolds at the center, eight swathes of flame shaped like greatswords suddenly exploded forth, scattering in every direction and charging directly towards the pursuing armies.
Fire-style magic – Decapitating Inferno!
“Crackle, crackle.” The blazing flames slashed down on the bodies of those knights, who immediately began to scream in agony. Their metal armor rapidly melted, and in the blink of an eye, they were turned to char. The surrounding grass began to blaze as well, and the following knights were forced to slow down.
“Chase, chase!” That blonde, tousled-haired leader stared angrily at the distant Reynolds.
If it hadn’t been for that distant magus, he would’ve wiped out this group of people long ago. But because of that magus and because it was autumn and the grass was dry, the grass had easily begun to burn and caused a huge wildfire, blocking their pursuit.
Magical force wasn’t endless.
Reynolds didn’t dare to use any actual spells of the seventh rank. All of the spells he had used were of the sixth rank. But despite that, nearly all of the mageforce in Reynolds’ body had been exhausted.
Only a single squad of three hundred soldiers of the Rohault Empire continued their pursuit, but this squad had over ten experts of the seventh rank. Clearly, this was an elite squad. And in Reynolds’ squad, there was only a single warrior of the seventh rank, and of course himself, a magus of the seventh rank.
“The city of Neil! I can see the city of Neil!” One of the knights shouted loudly.
“Neil city!” Reynolds saw the distant, hazy outlines of the city. His eyes were filled with hope, and he frantically urged his horse forwards.
“Swish!” Yet another arrow shot at them from behind, and the exhausted Reynolds once again frantically dodged while raising his shield to block. With a ‘slash’ sound, the arrow pierced through the shield and into Reynolds’ shoulder. The powerful force of that arrow actually caused the exhausted body of Reynolds’ to sway, and he nearly fell from his horse.
After running for two hours, it was almost dusk.
The walls of the city of Neil were manned by quite a few warriors, as well as a number of nobles who were on the walls strolling about aimlessly.
“Open the city gates, quick! There are soldiers of the Rohault Empire behind us. Kill them all!!!” Reynolds roared furiously.
In the blink of an eye, Reynolds and his tens of wounded surviving soldiers reached the outskirts of the city of Neil, but the gates to the city didn’t open.
“Swish!” An arrow shot out at one of the nobles on the wall.
“Don’t open it! Don’t open the city gates!” A shrill, ear-piercing voice could be heard coming from up above. “Fire your arrows! Shoot the enemies to death!”
That pursuing squad of the Rohault Empire stopped just outside of bow range. Ten of them actually dismounted, then charged directly towards the city walls. They easily dodged the arrows aimed at them from above, and all of them were covered with a sheath of battle-qi.
These were mighty warriors indeed.
“Kill that magus.” The leader of those ten men stared fixedly at Reynolds. They had chased all the way over here for the sake of killing Reynolds. A magus without mageforce was simply far too weak.
Right now, Reynolds couldn’t fight back at all.
“Open the gates!” Reynolds’ squad of knights felt totally hopeless now. Although they had several dozen people and their enemy only had ten, just from looking at their opponents’ battle-qi, they could tell that the leader of their enemies could probably kill them all by himself.