" I can't do it, Furio, I can't look these people in the eye when they wave at me" Maki said as he rode his horse slowly through the Unakku valley.
After 60 years of being chieftain, Maki was forced to make the tough call of abandoning his sick troops and leaving the fort with the healthy men.
It was a decision that was sure to sully his name as a great warrior, however, he was sure that nothing but a painful death awaited him and his men should they not have left.
Had he been riding at a normal speed, the distance between his fort and the southern fort was only about 2 hours on a mount, however, with morale being low, Maki only rode a trotting speed which would take him 4 hours to reach the fort.
Maki rode through the heart of the Unakku valley, where every farmland he passed he was greeted with the warm smiles and respect of the locals, but the warm smiles made Maki's heart sting with guilt as he could not look back and greet them with the same enthusiasm.
Although Maki had abandoned his fortress today, he did not expect it to fall into enemy hands anytime soon.
He expected the enemy to be needing 2-3 days to figure out that there was a change in patrol pattern on the other side, and then adopt a cautious approach as to scaling an attack and testing the waters, by which time he could be on standby with the southern troops and ready to intercept any incoming regiment before they could ever reach the slopes of the northern fort.
Hence when he heard shouts of " INCOMING " , when he was still about 50 minutes away from the southern fort, Maki was completely caught off-guard.
" INCOMING! THERE ARE VAMPIRE'S ON OUR TAIL "
" TURN AROUND, FACE THE BACK, WE HAVE VAMPIRES ON OUR TAIL "
Shouts like these prompted Maki to turn around, as he was horrified to see an army of at least 4000 riders coming towards his unit at full speed.
" How the fuck? " Maki wondered as he grit his teeth and dismounted from his mount as he pulled his massive sword out.
" DRAW YOUR WEAPONS, PREPARE TO FIGHT! " Maki shouted as he started making his way towards the frontlines where the fighting would hit the hardest.
" PREPARE FOR BATTLE "
" DON'T GIVE THEM AN INCH "
" BARBARIANS ON THE READY "
The barbarians quickly reformed themselves into a tight shoulder to shoulder formation for the entire length of the road and became prepared to fight.
By the time Max was only 50 metres away from the Barbarian unit, Maki had already made his way to the frontlines as he stood there waiting for Max as a mountain of a man with no fear of death in his eyes.
Banging his own chest with his fists, Maki shouted " BRING IT, YOU VAMPIRE BLOODSUCKERS, COME FIGHT US IF YOU DARE ".
It was supposed to be an intimidating scene of a giant man taunting his enemies into charging headfirst, however, Max thought nothing of it.
Max used [ Fire Compression ] as he increased the strength of [ Dragons Breath ] to the extreme to the point that it became powerful enough to rival a tier4 spell as Max stood in front of the Barbarian frontline alone and said
" Okay, here take it "
[ DRAGON'S BREATH ]
A devastating dragon's breath was unleashed by Max that was like one unleashed by a dragon itself, covering the width of the entire frontline and incinerating the weaker troops around Maki who could not tolerate the heat of the attack.
Cheers erupted from Max's underlings as the moment the attack ended, Max's hounds pounced onto the burnt enemy lines with vigour as Max himself threw himself at Maki with the rest of his army following suit as they charged straight into barbarian lines.
" You are messing with the wrong opponent" Maki said as he clutched his two handed sword with both hands and brought down an overhead slash towards Max with full power.
[ Block ]
Max blocked his attack using Kremeths teachings but the attack's strength still created a crater underneath his footing from the distribution of energy.
Max's block greatly shocked Maki as it was supposed to flatten a weak individual like Max easily.
[ Energy Blast ]
Max used an energy blast at Maki's chest and caused a small amount of damage as Maki was forced to reel back two steps.
" You are a mage? " Maki wondered as he could not figure out what exactly was Max with his sword and his mage type attacks.
[ Fireblast ]
[ Fireblast ]
[ Fireblast ]
Max used three Fireblasts back to back and while Maki blocked the first two from the swing of his swords, the heavy weapon was not agile enough to block the third one as well as it hit him again square at the chest.
" I'm your worst nightmare" Max said as he came extremely close to Maki's face by the time maki recovered from the fireblast damage.
Max used [ Fake out ] as he swung for Maki's head promoting Maki to bend his knees and dodge the strike, but the moment he did that, Max's sword in his hand turned to a cloud of dust as his leg which looked like a piece of flesh turned into a sword as Maki could do nothing but stare at it in horror.
[ 9 Asura Sword Slice ]
9 deep cuts left Maki's face in shambles and his nose completely cut-off from his face as the giant warrior howled in pain from the disfiguration.
For the first time in his life, he was facing such an efficient and an interesting opponent who gave him not a single moment of respite and it was both a rewarding and frustrating feeling for Maki.
He was not afraid of death, and he was not afraid of Max although his HP bar was at a low 25% of its maximum after all the fighting.
The only thing he was afraid of was the consequence of his death for his troops, as morale would plunge and his troops would be wiped out much faster.
At this instance, he knew this was a losing fight and that he and his party were most likely doomed. But Maki's only desire in these last moments was to stand out and face the vampires till the end, or at least be the last one to die from his entire division to show his men that he was there for them till the very end.
And for that desire, Maki was ready to do his very best.
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/// A/N - Bonus chapter for hitting the PS target, good job everyone ///