Season 3: Chapter 117: Tres vs. Almond (4)
Thud, thud, thud!
Drums echoed out and those in red clothes shouted at the top of their lungs. The excitement in the stands was higher than ever. If Korea won this match, they would advance to the finals. This thought drove them wild.
Moreover, it had been a clash between the aces of each team.
"Whoaaaa!"
"Did we win!? Did we kill him!?"
To the average spectator, it was just a fleeting moment.
"What happened? Huh!? We won, right!?"
"Yes! He's falling! Right now!"
Almond had chased after Tres. As Tres turned back, they charged at each other and passed by. That was all anyone watching could see.
Those with better concentration caught the sharp angles of the arrows and Tres’ beastly bayonet parries, but that still wasn't the whole story of this duel.
The commentary team probably saw more.
"OrangeKing! What was that at the end!?"
OrangeKing had been shouting so much that his voice was hoarse and replied, "It looked like Almond anticipated the bayonet swing, right!?"
At the final moment, Almond lay back with his bow already drawn.
"Almond usually dodges after watching, but he dodged by predicting it this time! That’s why Tres was caught off guard!"
Almond usually evaded after the opponent already moved, making predictive attacks from the opponent meaningless. Therefore, Tres tried to feint at close range.
"It's coming up in the replay!"
In slow motion, Tres’ intent to deceive Almond was clear.
"Tres had only been shooting and suddenly swung his gun after pretending to shoot! There was no time to dodge that, right?"
If Almond had been watching the muzzle or the trigger, he would have been defenseless against the bayonet swing. The angle and method of attack were entirely different.
"Even if Almond could dodge it, he wouldn’t be able to counterattack!"
Even if Almond had supernatural reflexes and dodged it, counterattacking instantly like that was impossible.
"Exactly. It seemed like Almond decided he had to shoot an arrow to counter at that moment. Tres doesn’t easily get hit, after all!"
Tres had bayonet skills with his gun, but Almond only had his arrows and Tres rarely got hit by ranged attacks.
What could Almond do? He decided to counter Tres. Not a reactive counter, but a preemptive one that coincided almost exactly with the opponent's movement.
"A short predictive counter? What should we call it? Anyway, thanks to this, the opponent couldn’t react at all!"
— Insane.
— After watching the replay, it looks real.
— Wow.
— Santa, please make me like Almond! Santa, please make me like Almond! Santa, please make me like Almond!
— He can predict now too… Just amazing.
— Does he have the sharingan? How does he do it?
The caster felt astounded.
"This is impressive. Actually, if it were other players, dodging after watching would have been more impressive! For Almond, the fact that he can now predictively dodge is significant!"
— LOL, true.
— Has he finally equipped his internal walnut?
— We need to check if anyone connected a USB to Almond's capsule.
— LOL, seriously.
— Has his game understanding improved?
OrangeKing agreed.
"Exactly! Sharp observation! If Almond dodged by predicting it, that means he now has confidence in the game!"
Under normal circumstances, if a player stopped reacting and started predicting, OrangeKing would have said they were aging or in bad condition. However, he was praising it right now.
Was it because it was Almond? No. Almond could be in bad condition and he could also be aging already.
"Ah, confidence in the game! To that extent!?"
"He precisely predicted and dodged what was necessary and reacted to everything else! This means his understanding has greatly improved! At least in terms of combat!"
They praised Almond's predictive reaction because he used it at the perfect time. It was different from bad predictive reactions where players reacted prematurely to feints or failed to dodge varied attacks because they stuck to memorized patterns.
Almond's predictive reaction was clearly not like that. Of course, if his prediction had been wrong, he would have looked quite foolish.
However, the world of competition was always about results. In the end, Almond succeeded in his prediction and achieved a complete victory in the one-on-one duel.
— Hmm, is it that significant… LOL
— Using predictions only when needed is legendary.
— Just accept that his combat skills are GOATed. Nothing more to say.
— Amazing.
— That fight was near perfect.
— Tres did well too, but this clip will haunt him.
After Tres fell, the tide naturally turned heavily in Joseon’s favor.
The Spanish camp turned into chaos.
"Ah. Spain is greatly shaken! An assistant commander dying is a different story!"
A regular soldier could be revived, so the weight of such a death wasn’t heavy. It was just a resource loss. Even if the fallen soldier was an ace, it didn’t affect morale much.
Most of the time, other soldiers didn’t even know about it. Only those who fought alongside that player would know.
However, an assistant commander was different.
"Exactly. They don’t revive and the population limit drops by one."
They couldn’t be revived and the fighting force dropped to one hundred ninety-nine.
"All the soldiers know when an assistant commander changes. How could they not notice that the person giving them orders has changed?"
Because of the command structure, all the soldiers knew when something went wrong.
"Even in a game, this affects morale! It has an impact!"
"Of course! It's still humans playing! It affects them! In real war, it would be absolute chaos!"
"Right! That's why Admiral Yi Sun-Sin said what he did!"
Indeed, even though it was a game without real lives at stake, victory and defeat were on the line. Especially for Spain, losing here meant almost no chance of advancing to the finals.
That desperate situation would haunt them now. The death of the assistant commander was devastating news.
"The mounted archers completely subdued the conquistadors!"
"Ah! The morale difference is clearly visible! This shouldn’t have been such a one-sided fight!"
"Originally, many thought Cookie was possibly overreaching!"
Cookie's decision to push with the momentum was ultimately correct.
The mounted archer unit’s morale reached its peak. Their superhuman focus and coordination were evident as their arrows precisely pierced the enemies' foreheads.
Meanwhile, witnessing such scenes made the Spanish forces falter. From the smallest details to the largest…
"Ah… now the conquistadors are lost on where to go."
"The workers aren't coming out for resource gathering either! Even with the highlands, they’re now similar to Joseon!"
Joseon had secured more bases in the meantime while the Spanish highland resources hadn't been functioning properly.
Ultimately, Joseon reversed the resource intake.
"Joseon! The trebuchets are out now!"
"The main force is moving in!!!"
The mounted archers' disruptions allowed Joseon's main force to safely retreat to the rear. They began to advance with siege vehicles.
Bwooong!
The war horn echoed and all the Joseon soldiers launched a full-scale attack.
“They could have just used the trebuchets from the rear to destroy the fortress and enter, but they’re going all in!?”
“Cookie knows how to make a move! He knows how to ride the momentum and the beat!”
— Haha, what is this?
— Turn the volume to max~!
— Go Cookie!
— Let’s go to Mars!
The safest and surest method would have been to use the long-range trebuchets to break the fortress, but that could delay the momentum and make things weird.
“In the end, it’s about the people! When the momentum comes, you need to push like crazy and strike!”
“That’s right! If you drag it out to make sure, it can get weird! Civil Empire often sees comebacks!”
Enemy soldiers commonly gathered to counterattack during a slow siege or they could sneak back to their home base and cause confusion. A comeback could happen in many ways.
Cookie decided to eliminate all these uncertain variables.
“The fortress is falling!”
Crash…!
The Spanish fortress crumbled. It took so long to build, but collapsed in an instant.
The expressions of the Spanish spectators could be seen on camera. It looked like their souls had left them. Some stood and forgot to sit, staring blankly.
— Soulless haha.
— Lol, serves them right.
— They’re mentally crushed haha.
— Their spirits are crumbling too.
The scene of the fortress collapsing was shocking.
Boom!
Huge bricks fell like rain and dark dust covered the highlands. The scene was utter chaos.
Whoosh!
The infantry entered and set fires with torches.
The highlands were no longer functional.
“Ahhh! In the end! In the end! Spain abandons the highlands!”
Their proud missionaries and musketeers fought back, but the missionaries’ conversions were useless against the hit-and-run tactics of the mounted archers.
While the missionaries were being dealt with, Joseon swordsmen rushed in and cut down the musketeers. No matter how much the missionaries healed, they couldn't withstand the swordsmen’s direct attacks.
Slash!
“Their soldiers need to retreat! Nacho, some soldiers are scattered!?”
The Spanish soldiers under attack were supposed to retreat. In the chaos, they didn’t receive the orders properly.
“No, this isn’t because Nacho didn’t give the orders…”
“Didn’t they see it!?”
“Right! After such a large-scale disaster, he would’ve issued a general order!”
“Ah… This happens a lot! In extremely chaotic battles or when players are mentally broken, they miss the order messages!”
The Spanish soldiers hadn’t properly seen their orders because their focus hit rock-bottom.
“Spain is getting pushed back! Joseon’s speed is unstoppable!”
“Is this the power of a full military investment!? Spain is getting thoroughly beaten!”
— They’re getting pushed back to their base haha.
— Dempsey roll!
— So satisfying.
— OMG, are we making it to the finals!?
On the mini-map, the blue dots started pushing out the red dots. The highlands were already filled with blue dots. Now, they infiltrated the starting point of the red dots.
“Ahhh! The main base! The medieval vultures have reached the enemy’s main base!”
The mounted archers had now completely disrupted the enemy’s main base.
***
“Hiyaaa!”
Riding like mad, Almond shot and killed every worker he saw. Any worker caught in his sight was skewered within seconds.
‘More… I need to kill more…’
Even Almond could tell that they had seized the momentum. In this game, failing to capitalize on the momentum meant a greater backlash later.
Civil Empire was far more forgiving to comebacks than LIL, so he didn’t let his guard down and maintained maximum focus. No, he raised it even further.
“More! Find more!”
“Got it!”
His relentless charge and slaughter inspired the following mounted archers, making it impossible for them to stop.
Even though orders had been given to them, most of them didn’t notice in this state of complete immersion. Their minds went completely white, turning from darkness to blinding light. Not just their sight, but all sounds disappeared. All that remained was the feeling of drawing the bow and the sixth sense of arrows hitting targets.
Pew…
Thunk!
Pew…
Thunk!
They even forgot that they were riding horses. The vibration of their bodies going up and down was no more meaningful than air.
‘We have to sweep them all.’
This thought filled Almond’s mind.
Pang had said this was the last of Cookie's resources. They had to kill as many enemies as they could.
‘More… More…’
Several more enemy workers fell.
Later, Almond couldn’t even remember why he killed them.
‘Just.’
Almond just had to shoot as if he was addicted. No other meaning came to mind. The act of riding and shooting arrows became meaningful in itself.
Then, it happened. The rhythm suddenly broke.
‘Huh?’
Like a broken tape, all his senses got tangled up and made a strange noise.
Siyuuung…
‘Ah. The horse…?’
The horse was slowing down. Only then did he realize that he was on a horse. Was the horse tired? No, all the other players’ horses slowed down too.
The targets also stopped. As if they weren’t alive, all the workers stopped in place.
The horses that slowed to a walk stopped altogether.
“… Ah.”
Only then did Almond notice.
[Victory]
The game had ended and the message had been up for a while.