I, the Villain, Want to Save Myself, But the Yandere Heroines Disagree-Chapter 8 - The Troubles of Happiness (1/4)

Time moved on to evening. The beastmen of the Bloodfire Clan’s army began to retreat in batches. To maintain morale, Swin, the chieftain of the Bloodfire Clan, did not order his clan to retreat first but arranged them in the middle.

Actually, the positioning was carefully planned.

His clan’s troops were in the middle of the retreating formation. On one hand, this allowed the units that retreated earlier to scout the path ahead, avoiding ambushes. On the other hand, it allowed the units that retreated later to cover their retreat from enemy pursuit.

In short, the Bloodfire Clan took all the advantages.

Although the other clans knew the benefits of this arrangement, they dared not voice their anger.

Even before, when distributing supplies, the Bloodfire Clan always received the most.

The reason was simple: the Bloodfire Clan had the strongest fighting force in the army.

On the other side, Virgil had gathered a group of mercenaries in the beastmen’s rear, numbering around five thousand.

Because they were unfamiliar with the terrain, the beastmen had overlooked Virgil’s army during their search.

Upon acquiring this army, Virgil immediately contacted Orson. Subsequently, after discussing with Orson, they decided to act according to the situation.

The recent severe weather had provided Virgil with an opportunity.

He then contacted Orson using magic carrier pigeons, and together they formulated an ambush plan.

Although a large portion of the mountains and forests here had been burned by the beastmen, there were still a few independent mountain areas behind the beastmen’s camp that were spared from the fire.

The reason was the negligence of the beastmen who started the fire at the time, coupled with the fact that there had never been an instance of human mercenaries ambushing beastmen here, leading the beastmen to lower their guard and believe that humans would not appear from these mountains.

Thus, these mountain areas provided cover for Virgil’s mercenary army during peacetime.

When Swin led his army out, he happened to pass through this area of mountains.

He glanced at the nearby terrain and asked the military officer beside him.

“Didn’t this area get burned when we came?”

“Um... yes.” The military officer nodded. “Because we had already advanced further ahead by then, and there were no human troops in the vicinity, we didn’t burn this area. Otherwise, there might have been mudslides here too.”

“Good,” Swin nodded upon hearing this, then suddenly burst into laughter.

“General, why are you laughing so heartily?”

“Hahaha, look at the terrain here,” Swin said, pointing to the mountains on both sides.

“It’s high at both ends and low in the middle. We’re passing through the valley. If there happened to be an army ambushing us here at this moment, what would happen to us?”

He then laughed again.

The military officer looked at the forests on both sides in surprise upon hearing this.

If the enemy had indeed ambushed an army here, their side would suffer quite significant losses.

Fortunately, when they first advanced, their side had already cleared out the enemy.

Just as the military officer was thinking this, a sudden clamor of drums and gongs erupted from the forests on both sides, followed by countless arrows and crossbow bolts being fired from both sides.

The beastman army in the middle instantly panicked.

No one expected that within what they considered safe territory, there would be an enemy ambush.

Moreover, Swin never expected that the enemy wouldn’t attack the retreating forces ahead but would choose to surround and attack their own army.

He couldn’t understand, but Virgil’s target was precisely Swin’s army.

After a few volleys, the beastman army began to scatter and flee in all directions. No matter how much Swin shouted, he couldn’t stop the fleeing troops.

Their morale was originally as taut as a drawn bowstring. At this moment, just as they finally relaxed, they were suddenly ambushed by the enemy. The result of the bowstring being drawn taut again before it could recover was that it snapped.

And even the warriors of Swin’s own clan showed such a reaction. Clearly, the reaction of the other clans was even more chaotic.

What was originally a normal small path was now crowded with people. Those behind constantly pushed forward to escape, while those in front desperately tried to flee.

Swin successively executed several of his subordinates. Only then did a portion of the surrounding troops barely regain their organization and begin to follow Swin’s orders.

Swin scanned the soldiers around him, then glanced at the scale of the arrows being fired from the forest. Finally, he gritted his teeth and ordered the soldiers to retreat with him.

After this round of ambush, over five thousand of Swin’s subordinates were ambushed, directly leaving behind over a thousand corpses. More importantly, after the rout, the number of soldiers Swin could rally was now less than a thousand.

On the other side, Virgil was leading his soldiers in cleaning up the battlefield.

Targeting the middle, Virgil had planned this from the beginning of the ambush. Compared to attacking the enemy’s vanguard or rear guard, launching an attack on the enemy’s middle forces often had a greater effect.

Virgil’s actions had indeed achieved the effect he desired.

Although the number of enemies annihilated was not very large, after the enemy scattered, their morale also dispersed. It would take a great deal of effort to regroup them and boost their morale again.

This was what Orson had proposed: attacking the heart is superior.