I Became the Commander in a Trash Game Who Copies Skills

Chapter 45. The Pale Moon (5)

The beastmen were a unique faction.

It is commonly said that there are three elements to forming a nation.

People, sovereignty, and territory.

Whether the people are of the same ethnicity or not, whether the owner of sovereignty is the people, the parliament, or a dictator, are issues that numerous scholars have put forward various interpretations for, argued about, and are also the cause of a significant portion of the wars that actually occur.

However, no one disagrees about the last one, ‘territory’.

Territory is a visible piece of land.

The presence or absence of territory is the presence or absence of a nation.

It was no different in ‘Warlord Conquest’.

The Empire, the City League, the Dwarven Federation, the Theocracy, the Vampire Archduchy, and even the ratmen who lived underground.

Almost all factions maintained their own territory and formed a state.

The beastmen were different.

They did not possess territory and wandered in packs.

The small packs commonly seen would wander around eating dried mushrooms, which were their staple food, in sacks, and when their food ran out, they would spread spores, grow them instantly, harvest them, and move on again.

Sometimes, they would encounter travelers or merchant caravans and eat them.

This method remained the same even when the packs gathered, grew in size, and attacked cities or villages.

They did not settle down even if they occupied a city.

Instead, they would completely destroy it and turn it into ruins, eat everyone and everything, people and livestock alike, without leaving anything behind, and then leave.

What should I say?

From a player's perspective, it was a real ordeal.

There was a limit to the growth of the faction itself, and since each pack had a different leader, it was difficult to command them.

However, it was just as troublesome from the opposite perspective.

The beastmen themselves were not a national-level threat, but if you let your guard down, a city or two would suddenly be wiped out.

Even if you wanted to nip it in the bud, it was impossible because they had no home base.

It was like seeing a band of bandits with a poorly applied balance patch.

There was one more unique characteristic of the beastmen.

Their strength changed depending on the state of the moon.

Let's take the main warrior, the ‘Horned One,’ as an example.

The Horned One was a horned half-human, half-beast close to 2 meters tall, but without a moon, it became as weak as an adult woman.

Conversely, during a full moon, it became strong enough to chew up two or three Imperial spearmen alone.

And twice a year.

There was a night when the full moon took on a pale hue.

On the day called ‘Walpurgis Night,’ the Imperial army raised its alert level to the maximum.

This was because under the ominous blue light, as if the moon itself had caught a disease, the beastmen became much stronger than during a full moon.

System-wise, it was a 30% increase in all stats.

The trait possessed by the Beastpriest of the Full Moon.

[Chosen of the Moon] was a trait that could artificially create that pale moon.

Boom!

A loud noise echoed.

The northeast wall.

I stood up.

Today was originally supposed to be a day with a thin crescent moon.

But what was illuminating the city now was a pale full moon.

Under the moonlight, I looked towards the direction of the sound.

The northeast wall was where their main attack was located.

Even in the city center filled with tall buildings, the roof of the church offered a quite unique view.

I could see the scene of beastmen and Imperial soldiers fighting a desperate battle inside the walls.

It was breached.

An expected event.

“Crossbowmen! Load!”

“Load!”

“Spearmen! Prepare for battle!”

“Yes!”

I prepared the troops and checked the arrangements I had laid out everywhere.

As I said, choosing the battlefield was an important ability for a commander.

The story was long-winded, but the conclusion was that I had assumed the walls would be breached.

As a commander, I had to think about the next line of defense.

Dudududu…!!

They were approaching.

The sound of the beasts’ hooves shook the ground.

This second line of defense had to be able to block a large number of enemies with a small number of troops.

I had learned numerous tactics, but there weren't many types that could overcome a numerical difference.

The method I preferred was to drive the enemies into one place with a defensive line or a lure, and then annihilate them with overwhelming firepower.

The overwhelming firepower didn't necessarily have to be an artillery corps.

The artillery corps here was not well-trained.

Therefore, I used a substitute.

Like during the defense of Burken.

***

Dozens.

Hundreds.

A wave of horned beast-humans rushed through the alley into the square.

Guoooooh!

Grrrk!

The several dozen at the front immediately collapsed.

I had spread caltrops evenly at every entrance to the square.

Meeek!

Guuuuh-

Their cries from the pain of the sharp steel needles piercing them were brief.

Dudududu- Crack!

They were trampled to death by the hooves of their comrades following behind.

The excitement of the beasts in front of the Imperial church had reached its peak.

It was natural, as I had piled up the symbols of the Luark Church inside the largest and most splendid cathedral.

I took in their movements, which were like a single current of water.

I raised my staff.

“Wall of Fire.”

[[Wall of Fire] is activated.]

A wall of flames reaching a height of 3 meters blocked their path.

“Crossbowmen, fire!”

[The crossbow unit activates [Volley].]

Arrows released from the pulley crossbows pierced through them.

[[Wall of Fire] is activated.]

[[Earth Flow Reversal] is activated.]

[[Wall of Fire] is activated.]

[The crossbow unit activates [Free Fire].]

I repeated.

Blocked their path with spells.

Fed the slowed-down beasts a rain of arrows.

In between, I gulped down the mana potions I had prepared beforehand.

As always, half of the contents spilled, but it didn't matter.

[[Earth Flow Reversal] is activated.]

Kwarurururu…!

What was important was the speed of the spells.

Only how nimbly I could block their advance.

It wasn't for killing.

The purpose was literally just to slow them down.

Even at this moment, dozens more beastmen were entering the square.

I would buy time from the vanguard to trap as many as possible in this square.

That was the first step of the plan.

Guuuuh…!

A beastman with dozens of arrows stuck in its upper body like a hedgehog collapsed.

Meeeeek!

Mek!

A beast pushed by its comrades through the wall of fire became a living torch and writhed in pain.

Thump!

Thump!

The beastmen who had pushed their way in despite dozens of them dying were now pounding on the barricades.

I felt a slight sense of crisis, but the carts and iron plates, appropriately tied together with ropes and chains, withstood their axe blows.

The barricade was sturdy.

My thanks to William.

Of course, that didn't mean the threat was over.

The sound of something tearing through the air drew closer.

Shwiiii-

A javelin.

[[Shield] is activated.]

Crack!

I swallowed my saliva as I looked at the spear shaft shaking in front of my nose.

It had been aimed precisely at my head.

A Centaur javelineer.

The half-human, half-horse beasts that had belatedly entered the square had begun to throw spears from a distance of nearly a hundred meters.

“Aaaargh!”

A crossbowman with his shoulder pierced fell inside the barricade.

His neck was bent excessively as he hit the ground, and he no longer moved.

In an instant, three or four more fell to the volley of javelins.

This was the limit.

“Crossbowmen! Retreat into the church!”

I sent the crossbowmen down from the barricade.

I had them enter the church and lock the door.

[[Wall of Fire] is activated.]

[[Shield] is activated.]

It was possible to hinder their movement and buy time with just spells.

The volley of javelins continued to focus on me, but it was not as threatening as the first blow.

Dududududu…….

Their numbers were increasing.

The sound of hooves seemed to shake the square.

Two hundred.

Three hundred.

Four hundred….

The beastmen covering the square, with their characteristic drab fur, looked like a brown wave was surging.

Crack!

Kurrr…!

That wave pounded the barricade.

I had built it quite sturdily, but it wasn't a castle wall.

Chains broke under axe blows and carts came crashing down with a creak.

It was almost destroyed.

I estimated their numbers one last time.

At least five hundred.

Now was the time.

“William!”

I commanded the priest who would be waiting inside the church.

“Detonate!”

The detonator he was holding was connected to hundreds of kilograms of gunpowder.

“Detonated!”

Hearing the report that followed, I started a countdown in my head.

Since it wasn't a state-of-the-art dwarven detonator, it would take time until the actual explosion.

For reference, the fuse was connected to the church's basement.

As Alina had read in a book, countless abandoned mine passages were entangled like a spiderweb under the city center of Gunterburk.

Buildings were not erected in places where such passages were concentrated because the ground was weak.

The square in front of me was one such place.

Most of the tangled abandoned mine passages under the square were being used as sewers.

William had installed over hundreds of kilograms of gunpowder at key points in those passages.

As a skilled explosives expert, he had arranged it so that the fuse would not get wet in the water, and had meticulously set it up so that all the explosives would detonate at once, collapsing only the square.

The countdown was over.

It was about time.

Gugugugung─

A low explosion sound rose from the ground.

“Get down!”

[[Commander’s Roar] is activated.]

I commanded the soldiers inside the church and lowered my posture.

Guuuuuh…….

An ominous vibration tickled the soles of my feet.

A bizarre roar as if a demon was wailing.

The beastmen who had been hacking at the barricade also froze in place as if they were frozen.

A moment of silence.

And then.

Kugugugugu………!!!

The square collapsed.

It sank as if someone had pulled out the supports.

A group of nearly five hundred beastmen fell into the basement without a chance to react.

A cloud of dust rose hazily.

The screams and cries of beasts.

The sounds of remaining gunpowder exploding and stones rolling.

If they were human, the explosion and fall alone would have done them in.

But the bones and hides of the beastmen, buffed by the pale moon, were unimaginably hard and tough.

Most of them would be injured, but they would be alive.

I had a plan.

Gush gush gush gush…….

Water flowed.

The passages under the square, which had been converted and used as sewers.

As those passages were shattered, all the water from the entire city flowed into this place.

The hazy cloud of dust that had risen quickly settled.

A shallow lake had already been created on the collapsed floor.

Between the streams of water pouring down like a waterfall, the injured beasts floundered, completely soaked.

I chugged a potion and raised my staff.

[[Lightning Strike] is activated.]

Time to get electrocuted.

***

When I was young, I once went to a valley with my relatives.

Small fish lived in the valley.

While the adults were taking a nap, I tried to catch the fish.

The results were poor.

Unlike what I had seen in picture books, the fish escaped the net quite well.

‘Aigoo, our little cutie.

Should uncle help you?’

At that time, I had a superman for an uncle.

In the eyes of a child, he was an uncle who seemed to be able to do anything.

That day too, my uncle approached me as I was struggling.

He lived up to the expectations of the child who was staring at him with sparkling eyes, unable to hide his anticipation.

‘Watch carefully.’

My uncle brought something that looked like a brick.

He skillfully stripped both ends of the brick, wrapped something like a thin wire around it once, and then threw it into the water.

‘Wow!

Uncle, that's awesome!’

The fish that had been so hard to catch floating to the surface of the water was one of the memories that remained clearly in my mind even after decades.

It was only after a considerable amount of time that I learned that the brick was a large-capacity battery, and the fish that had been electrocuted by the discharged current had floated up.

The scene unfolding before my eyes now was reminiscent of that time.

[[Lightning Strike] is activated.]

Bzzzzzt!

The battery became lightning induced by magic.

Zzzzzzz-

What was being electrocuted was not fish, but man-eating beast-humans.

Guuoooh!

Meeeeek!

The sounds of the goat-like monsters were mixed together.

A pungent, burnt smell pricked my nose.

Thinking about it now, my uncle's electric fishing was clearly illegal in the Republic of Korea, and it was a scene that would make environmental groups flip out.

But this wasn't the Republic of Korea, and there were no environmental groups.

[[Lightning Strike] is activated.]

Pajijijijik!

It was ending.

I struck them with lightning nearly twenty times.

I drank nearly ten mana potions.

Watching the floating corpses, I finally let out a sigh of relief.

I threw the empty bottle and picked up a regeneration potion bottle.

My hands were trembling.

‘…I went to the brink of overload.’

I leaned against the double cross and calmed my breathing.

I had annihilated five hundred enemy troops, but the battle was not over yet.

The final stage remained.

It was impossible to catch over fifteen thousand beastmen in this way.

Leaving aside the fact that this body couldn't take it, I couldn't just collapse the entire city to catch beastmen.

What I was aiming for was something else.

Let's imagine being a commander.

You are successfully attacking a city, and a force of nearly five hundred is annihilated in an instant.

And in one place.

Any commander would feel like they'd been hit hard in the back of the head.

They would not only dispatch additional troops but also head to that place to command directly.

This was the gist of this operation.

To lure the enemy general and cut off his head.

Just one person.

I just had to lure the Beastpriest of the Full Moon.

As if on cue, new beastmen appeared at the entrance of the collapsed square.

Minotaurs.

The Beastpriest’s royal guard.

‘…He’s here.’

The blade to slaughter him was already prepared.