Musou Knight: Crow of Cinders-Chapter 19: Escape 1

Chapter 19 - Escape 1

I ignored the two missing women and dashed to the camp.

At least a thousand torches illuminated the area, but the princess’s escort was merely a hundred men. By the time I arrived, the soldiers had already formed a defensive line against the approaching army. Fortunately, they hadn’t attacked the camp yet.

I grabbed an iron spear and knives from my cart. With one torch in my hand, I stood behind the formation and observed the interaction.

The uninvited guests were militia in yellow clothes. Half of them carried bamboo spears and rusty pitchforks, but the men at the front had proper military equipment and steel swords. About a hundred of them were horsemen, sporting halberds and spears.

The black wolf squad readied its bows and arrows. Meanwhile, the leader of the guests stepped down from his warhorse and waved a white flag.

He was too meaty to be a general, yet there he was in heavy knight armor. Based on my estimation, he must have weighed at least 200 kilograms or 440 pounds.

"I am Zoli Diripio, the Duke of Avaritia! Relax, friends!"

The men lowered their bows. They smiled and let out a long sigh.

But I stood there like an idiot. A chill traveled down my spine, and goosebumps spread across my skin.

’Why is he even here? I have detoured away from the ambush site. This encounter event shouldn’t have happened here!’

Why was I avoiding the encounter?

Well, that was Zoli Diripio in the flesh.

Zoli who, you ask?

He was an Earth-type heavy knight general and a stage boss. He could unleash a musou attack by stomping, and his unique ultimate musou instantly crushed everyone within 200 meters with gravity. That didn’t even include his multiple tricky attack patterns and random stun attacks. In the game, I had to kill him before he used the ult. Otherwise, game over.

Who was I?

A freaking mob character!

What should a mob character do when he runs into a stage boss?

Run!

After throwing my torch aside to hide my presence, I noped myself out of that place. Turning around, I sprinted to my cart and dragged it away.

I looked behind me. Zoli and his men were still focused on the crowd of soldiers and their captains. I overheard their conversation while I turned the cart around.

"Where is your princess? I don’t see her around."

"She is currently resting, sir."

"Oh. Where? Can I see her?"

"T-That might be difficult. She’s... er."

"What?"

"Relieving herself."

"Ha!"

Zoli’s laughter echoed. Despite his good mood, he stomped. A weird ringing noise pierced my ears and dizzied me. I heard the sharp ringing noise as though someone had unleashed a blast of radio frequencies right into my ears.

I fell to my knees. My ears felt wet. When I touched them and brought my hand closer to my eyes, I saw blood.

I couldn’t hear anything. The world had gone silent.

Dammit. We had been had!

That was Zoli’s stun attack! He had signaled the assault.

As I couldn’t bring my carts along, I broke everything. It took three seconds for the item to spawn. I gritted my teeth and waited. Not long after, several dumplings were spawned and grabbed a piece, shoving it into my mouth.

My dizziness was gone, but I was not fully healed yet. Holding the spear, I used it to help myself get to my feet.

Zoli’s lips moved in the distance, but I couldn’t discern his words. His troops began charging at the soldiers.

The black wolf squad raised their bows to retaliate, but more than half of them were still stunned. The soldiers in yellow cloaks threw away their poorly made weapons and drew their bronze short swords. They got close enough to fight up close.

At that point, I stopped paying attention to the battle. I glanced at the broken vase and noticed floating dumplings. I stuffed another one into my mouth, chewed twice, and swallowed everything. I kept the other three in my clothes as backups.

My hearing returned, and my knees steadied. I kicked off the ground, abandoning the cart while carrying only a spear and two knives.

Running in the dark was dangerous. Fortunately, I followed the road while glancing behind me.

Nobody noticed me.

I felt bad leaving the men behind, but there was nothing I could do against a thousand elite soldiers and a supervillain boss. I wasn’t a game character with infinite stamina who could swing weapons ten thousand times in an hour.

I didn’t know how far I had run. I kicked rocks, dead tree trunks, and boulders several times. Taking precautions in the dark, I walked instead of rushing.

The torchlights of Zoli’s men were now far in the distance.

I was safe, for now. The downside was that I had no clue where I was.

The sky was pitch black, and so was the world. I was blind as a bat.

I wanted to remain in the dark, but I grew wary of wild beasts, especially wolves and other predators. If I lit something up, Zoli’s men would find me.

How about traveling all night? It would be exhausting and dangerous.

If I lit a torch, their cavalry would find me. I couldn’t take that route. I would travel blind all night and slip out of their search net.

Putting my plan into action, I started moving, backtracking to where I had come from. I kept my head low like a four-legged animal. Using the faint light from the crescent moon, I followed the cart tracks.

While crawling, I glanced behind. No pursuers were in sight, but I couldn’t let my guard down. I kept moving.

Two hours passed. I probably covered about a kilometer at best, but that was better than nothing. After listening to nature sounds, my ears went numb.

The torchlights of Zoli’s troops were so far away I could barely see them on the horizon, but I wasn’t safe yet. The hunt should have started by now.

According to the game’s skirmish progression, Lenitia and Lia would successfully escape, but they would be poisoned and injured. Zoli would split his troops into multiple teams to search for Lenitia.

Looking in the other direction, about 800 meters southwest of my location, I saw another source of light. They were moving south.

That was probably the team that chased after Lenitia and Lia.

Again, I had no intention of risking my life for a damsel in distress. I turned around and kept moving, staying low in the dark.

As I looked ahead, I spotted another light source. It was directly ahead of me, about 500 meters away. They were moving in my direction.

Zoli’s reinforcements.

I clicked my tongue. Based on Lenitia and Lia’s story in the game, multiple reinforcement units of Zoli would join the pursuit all over the map. About 5,000 footmen and a thousand riders would quickly overrun the mountainous areas, and they would corner both women by morning.

This was where complications ensued. As I strayed into their story scenario stage, I would run into Zoli’s men if I kept loitering in the area.