My Computer Leads to an Instance Dungeon-Chapter 54: Annihilation

Fang Zhen held the Dragon Gall Crossbow in his left hand and the longspear in his right, letting out a long breath.

He could feel the effects of Combat Intuition and Combat Focus fading, returning him to his normal state.

’Combat Intuition is really useful.’

Just now, cocking the Dragon Gall Crossbow with just his left foot had been a complete flash of inspiration.

An instinct had told him it would be fine—that he would definitely succeed.

Fang Zhen had followed that instinct, executing the move in one smooth motion.

At that moment, letting go of his spear to draw his Dog Leg Saber would have been another option.

But guided by his intuition, Fang Zhen chose to use the Dragon Gall Crossbow.

It turned out his intuition was real. The solidified Combat Intuition wasn’t just a feeling; it was genuinely effective.

Combat Focus and Combat Intuition were a perfect match. One cleared his mind of all distractions while the other provided a constant stream of inspiration. Solidifying these two skills created a synergistic effect, making both of them feel even more powerful.

It seemed he had made the right choice in solidifying these two combat skills.

He didn’t let his guard down. After catching his breath for a moment, he placed the Dragon Gall Crossbow back on the ground and walked out of the mine tunnel, longspear in hand.

Outside the tunnel, one injured Dogman Miner was still alive.

As Fang Zhen emerged, he saw the Dogman Miner limping, coughing up blood constantly. Its pickaxe was gone, and it could only bark at him.

After a few barks, it coughed up another mouthful of blood.

"Heh..." He could tell the Dragon Gall Crossbow was still plenty powerful. Although it hadn’t killed this Dogman Miner outright, the steel ball had likely pierced its lung. The creature before him was half-dead.

Fang Zhen strode forward, gripped his longspear with both hands, and thrust forward with a basic ’Thrust’ technique.

The spear’s gleaming blade plunged into the Dogman Miner’s forehead.

Fang Zhen had aimed there on purpose. With the threat from the Kobolds mostly gone, he deliberately struck what was likely the hardest part of a Kobold’s body to test its toughness.

The longspear traced a perfect line through the air as Fang Zhen transferred nearly one hundred percent of his force into the weapon. The gleaming blade struck the Kobold’s forehead.

Fang Zhen felt as if he were ramming a sharp knife into wood; the resistance was considerable.

Nevertheless, the longspear’s blade pierced the Dogman Miner’s forehead, entering between its brows and driving into its brain. The tip even burst out from the back of its skull!

The Dogman Miner didn’t even have time to let out a cry. With its forehead skewered, its body went limp.

Fang Zhen held the spear with both hands, thrusting downward from a high stance. His posture at that moment was perfect; seen from a distance, it would have had a certain violent beauty.

’They look tough, but their bones are still pretty brittle. Their skeletal and muscular strength is higher than a goblin’s, but not by much—maybe only twenty to thirty percent stronger.’

Having gotten a feel for it, Fang Zhen shook his longspear, and the Dogman Miner’s corpse fell from the blade.

Fang Zhen let out a long sigh, gradually calming down from his tense combat state and returning to normal.

He looked around.

Not all the Kobolds were dead. A few that had been hit by the Dragon Gall Crossbow were heavily wounded but still alive, writhing and wailing on the ground.

Fang Zhen thought for a moment, then decided to finish them off.

Carrying his longspear, he walked over to a Kobold with half its face shot through and one eye blown out.

Fang Zhen raised his eyebrows.

He didn’t immediately stab the Kobold to death. Instead, he wondered how he could cripple it without killing it.

During the battle, a flash of inspiration had struck him: if he created wounded Kobolds, the chieftain of the Dogman Tribe would face a dilemma.

Either the Kobold chieftain could kill the wounded for a clean solution, but that would surely lower the tribe’s morale.

Or, he could treat and care for the wounded, but that would tie up the Kobolds’ forces and put immense pressure on the Dogman Tribe’s logistics and supplies.

From this perspective, killing the crippled Kobolds now wouldn’t yield the greatest benefit. The best return would be to maim all these wounded enemies, but keep them alive.

’Isn’t this a little cruel?’ Fang Zhen couldn’t help but think.

Having lived in modern society for so long, he felt that doing this might be a bit inhumane. After all, even war had the Geneva Convention.

As Fang Zhen was hesitating, something in his peripheral vision caught his eye—a pile of human bones. 𝐟𝕣𝕖𝐞𝐰𝕖𝚋𝐧𝗼𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝗰𝐨𝐦

Fang Zhen focused on the pile of bones.

A few seconds later, he looked away, his gaze turning cold and resolute.

’I was overthinking it.’

’These dog-like things aren’t human. I don’t need to hold back.’

’Mercy toward the enemy is cruelty to oneself.’

’Mercy has no place in warfare. I shouldn’t waste my sympathy.’

Fang Zhen’s expression turned frigid. He drew the Nepalese Curved Saber from his waist and went to work on the wounded Kobolds.

After a flurry of barking wails, Fang Zhen had crippled all four of the remaining living Kobolds.

Fang Zhen wiped his Nepalese Curved Saber clean on a Kobold’s linen clothes and let out a long breath.

He had expected to feel some psychological pressure, but as he severed the Kobolds’ tendons, he felt surprisingly little.

On one hand, perhaps it was because of the lingering anger in his heart. On the other, it was because his actions had tactical significance.

In Fang Zhen’s mind, one of the definitions of evil was the creation of pointless suffering.

In the chaos of battle, it was all a matter of skill. If you lost and died, there was no one to blame and nothing to be said.

But to torture an animal or another intelligent being for malevolent reasons, or purely for amusement—with no practical purpose other than fun—that, in Fang Zhen’s mind, could be classified as evil.

It was one thing for a child to do so, but for an adult, it was just plain wrong.

Take King Zhou from the legends, who was said to have cut open a pregnant woman’s belly and roasted his ministers on a heated pillar just for his own amusement. That was definitely evil.

Of course, Fang Zhen had no way of knowing or investigating whether that part of history was real or simply written by the victors.

However, consciously creating casualties as a tactic of war was acceptable.

The "God of Slaughter," Bai Qi, burying 400,000 prisoners of the Zhao Army alive was cruel, yes, but it was done for a reason. It wasn’t purely evil.

There were justifiable reasons for it, whether they were strategic—to destroy the enemy’s effective strength; logistical—to relieve pressure on supplies; or psychological—to intimidate the foe. It could also have been driven by the Qin Kingdom’s military culture of collecting heads, or simply a preventative measure to highlight the brutality of war.

Thinking about all this, Fang Zhen suddenly chuckled.

"Heh."

A man does what he must and accepts the consequences.

It’s not a major flaw for a man to be ruthless sometimes.

You do what you have to do, and you own it. No need to find excuses.

Once he stopped agonizing over it, Fang Zhen immediately felt refreshed and invigorated.

He had vented the anger he’d felt upon seeing the pile of bones. With that frustration released, the tightness in his chest vanished, and he felt a sense of clarity and relief.

He chuckled.

Now it was time for everyone’s favorite part.

’I heard these Kobolds like to collect shiny things, right? Like Gold and gems?’

’Alright, let’s see what they have on them.’

Fang Zhen began searching the Kobolds for loot.