Night Ranger
chapter-44

Chapter 44: Wall of Fire

The battle had already started. The gnolls took the initiative to start the fight.

Just as the first lights of dawn could be seen, the six mutated aardwolves rushed forward. They were followed by a dense wave of gnolls.

Ordinary people would feel shivers running down their spine when looking at this.

Even though gnolls weren’t that strong, those numbers were enough to overpower anything.

Without troops from River Shore City, it would be quite difficult to face those gnolls with only White River Valley garrison members.

Everyone was hiding behind the fortifications and holding their breaths.

They picked this mine entrance because it was the closest to the edge.

There was a hill on the left and a forest on the right, making it relatively easy to defend.

The garrison’s young men were tightly clutching their weapons, ready to deal with any surprise attack coming from the gnolls.

The last time they were in this situation, Marvin had ordered them to retreat due to being heavily outnumbered.

But they couldn’t retreat this time!

This was the only way for them to get back their homes!

…

“I need some time!”

Hearing Masked Twin Blades calling for him, Joey the archer didn’t make things difficult. On the contrary, he was straightforward.

All veteran adventurers knew what to do in battle.

Although they agreed to let Marvin handle the gnoll Sorcerer, but he was only a lone Ranger. If he couldn’t find his target, the hiding Sorcerer, the battle would turn quite troublesome.

Joey was indeed quite outstanding, or else he wouldn’t have been able to become famous in River Shore City by only relying on himself.

His farsight specialty wasn’t only used to restrain those using stealth. It was also extremely useful for reconnaissance!

Despite the lack of light, he soon found that short gnoll!

That peculiar short gnoll was standing in the southeast hill. He had a few dozens of guards protecting him.

They didn’t charge with the others. They were merely standing there.

As for the other gnolls, they split into three waves and kept a fixed distance from each other while charging toward the human camp.

‘Seems like that gnoll knows some military tactics!’ Marvin thought. ‘This guy really seems to have high intelligence.’

Usually, when gnolls attacked, it would be messy and disorganized. But they seemed a lot more organized under the Sorcerer’s orders.

This wouldn’t be easy to handle.

Under Joey’s directions, Marvin also quickly found the Sorcerer.

As long as he was able to kill that gnoll, the battle would become a lot more simple.

But there was a problem.

They were quite far from each other. Marvin was hiding in the camp and that cunning Sorcerer was quite far in the southeast hill.

And he also had guards.

Stealth would definitely not work. This Sorcerer had the eye of pain, so anyone using Stealth around him would be in for a lot of trouble.

“Joey, help me!” Marvin thought hard, and then called out to the archer.

The latter straightforwardly rushed to Marvin’s side.

He moved very carefully and wasn’t noticed by the gnolls.

“I’ll go kill that gnoll Sorcerer.”

“But I need your help. First we have to approach from behind.”

“Can you use Stealth? Never mind, we don’t really need to get too close. The eye of pain has a range.” Marvin quickly explained his battle plan.

After hearing the plan, Joey thought about it for a short moment and felt it was doable.

Marvin waved at Anna, and then the two used stealth and left from the eastern part of the camp.

…

As for the front line of the battlefield, the six rushing mutated aardwolves would soon reach the camp.

“Is that woman, Anna, frozen in fear?”

“The time has come and she still hasn’t called for us?”

Inside the mine, Cat was looking at the situation and was somewhat unable to hold back.

Everyone else in the Lynx team was also restless.

In their eyes, White River Valley garrison would simply be unable to resist this assault.

If they collapsed, they would also fall into a crisis.

They should have been sent to kill those gnolls in one breath.

Why hadn’t Anna given the order yet?

This made them quite puzzled.

However, Gru, the other captain was actually very calm.

He kept watching the situation while holding onto his heavy sword. He only said one sentence to his restless team members:

“Wait a bit more.”

The Bramble members immediately relaxed.

After experiencing a lot of battles, they had total trust in their captain’s words.

Since their captain told them to wait a bit more, there was definitely no issue.

But they were also quite curious. When those from White River Valley built the fortification yesterday, a few of them had disappeared for some time. What they did was unknown.

How would they stop those seemingly unmatched aardwolves?

…

They quickly had their answer.

Just as the aardwolves were about to charge on the fortifications, Andre who had been watching the situation, suddenly shouted, “Cut it!”

“Slam!””Slam!”

A few sounds started echoing in the forest!

Everyone blankly looked to the side.

At that time, the reckless adventurers paid attention, unaware of when it had started. The two big trees near the mine entrance had a few ropes attached.

The ropes were tied to other big trees.

Andre just ordered those two garrison members hiding in the woods to cut those ropes.

“Snap!”

The two big trees began to tilt!

And surprisingly, they were falling in the direction of the battlefield!

The mutated aardwolves were startled and attempted to slow down, but their previous speed was extremely fast. How could they suddenly slow down that easily?!

Two breaths later, those two big trees hit the ground with a loud sound!

“Rumble!”

Dust flew everywhere.

The ground was shaking!

…

“That’s why!”

“Those two trees were cut down before and were only remained standing thanks to the ropes. That pack of gnolls didn’t pay attention to this. Serves them right.”

“The one who thought of this tactic is really a genius.”

Verne’s eyes were shining while giving out praises.

The other adventurers were also showing admiration. For them, getting rid of their opponent without fighting was the most beautiful thing in the world.

…

The big trees falling down frightened the gnolls!

Wails could be heard coming from the rushing mutated aardwolf in the frontmost position, due to being flattened by those falling trees.

The aardwolf directly behind was also not able to stop on time and his head burst open from knocking against the tree at such a speed.

Unfortunately, the rest of the aardwolves had some good luck. They managed to slow down and attempted to jump on the thick trees!

But at that time, a garrison member threw a torch!

The torch fell on top of the tree. The tree trunk which was fully covered with pine grease immediately burst in flames!

Two fire walls were formed in an instant between everyone in the camp and the gnolls.

The two mutated aardwolves who had jumped on the trees ended up with their fur on fire.

The other two were scared to move forward.

As for the gnolls, they were even more frightened. They didn’t know what they should do.

The humans on the other hand, were full of energy due to the great victory!

Anna lifted her sword and yelled, “Gru! Verne!”

“Move in!”

The two captains immediately rushed out from the mine.

The two mutated aardwolves who had jumped past the fire walls had just managed to avoid a calamity… But ended up surrounded and killed by the adventurers!

The tables have turned!

…

Outside the mine, White River Valley’s garrison members tactics of chopping down the trees and setting them on fire attracted the attention of the gnoll Sorcerer.

The short and thin gnoll Sorcerer had a stunned expression on his face.

He didn’t think the enemy would use this kind of strategy to block his attack.

He immediately roared a few times, taking advantage of his innate racial skill, [Communicator] to give new orders to all the gnolls.

The [Communicator] skill was a very rare innate skill. It would help the gnoll Sorcerer to issue better orders a lot faster.

Ignore the fire walls. Go around. All out attack!

These were his orders!

Under the gnoll Sorcerer’s commands, a lot of gnolls found a path to follow and began an attempt at circumventing the wall of fire from the east side in order to attack the enemy camp.

But at that time, two stealthed people stopped 80 meters away from the hill.

“Almost there,” Marvin whispered. “Any closer and he might notice us. Do your best to make it work.”

The archer Joey silently took out his bow and said with a serious expression:

“I’ll do my best.”