Soul of Searing Steel

Under normal circumstances, a Silver-tier warrior who trains day and night by strengthening his body and Combat Aura would be able to run vertically along the wall while the fundamental laws of gravity. After all, a Gold-tier warrior could propel himself off the ground and fly. Although the idea of anti-gravity was amazing, in a world filled with magic and Combat Aura, sacred light and bloodlines, walking vertically along the wall was naught but trivial.

However, the difficulty of defying gravity for one’s self was a whole level lower than the difficulty of defying it whilst mounted, especially when the battlefield is chaotic. There was barely any leeway for anybody to prepare themselves.

Thud thud thud

Leading the knights on horseback, Joshua slayed four daemons that were at the pinnacle of Silver-tier and did not feel the slightest hint of fatigue. Instead, he felt refreshed. Endless streams of power gushed out of the Azurite stone, nourishing Joshua endlessly with unending stamina and strength. The sable knight led his band as they charged with great strength and vigor to tear through the formation of daemons impeding their way. They were crushing the daemons against the wall into meat pies. Meanwhile, the guards on the wall were bewildered after witnessing the brutality. Joshua and his knights had finally set foot on the inner walls.

“Halt!’

Reining Black to a pause, Joshua remained solitarily on the wall of the fortress. He patted the head of his war horse and infused some gentle force along with his Combat Aura into its body. His intention was to purge Black of its Berserk state as it was currently exhausted. After that, he immediately dismounted Black, and addressed the knights behind him.

“Alright, get down from your horses. We’ve arrived.”

“Yes…”

It seemed as though they were only able to react to the situation after a brief moment of respite. The knights felt as though they had just been roused from their dreams. They turned back and looked at their count with puzzled faces, their eyes void of emotion. They could not believe what had just transpired.

That… just then, how did they do it?

Their heartbeats were insanely fast; those knights did not know where they were at the moment. They could not recall what they should do next; their minds scrambled.

It was only approximately half an hour from the time they felt the hot blood surging in their chests as they began to charge until the time they arrived at the city wall.

They actually made it here just like that?! Without going through the city gates, they arrived by running along the wall?!

The knights had predicted a lot more possibilities on how they would arrive at the fortress. Most of the prediction involved a lot of them dying while they were fighting the daemons; none of them were idiots. None of them thought that they could be heroes. By engaging such a dreadful and powerful army of Berserk Daemons, even if they were to rely on the defenses of the fortress to fend off the daemons, none of them would be confident enough to claim that they could survive this battle. Therefore, a formation with merely fifty knights would be far from sufficient to charge through the Dark Tide. If they did not believe in the insane prowess of their own count, none of them would be bold enough to say that they could survive until the end. They had even imagined how they might die on the battlefield.

However, at this moment… they lifted their heads towards Joshua, the warrior in black armor who was armed with both his greatsword and his lance. A gigantic daemon wolf was skewered right at the tip of his lance. Even though it was dead, the ferocious aura of the dead wolf was still extremely intimidating. The knights believed that everyone in the vicinity would have been in a tough spot if they were forced to battle the wolf one-on-one.

However, the four similarly powerful daemons could barely survive long enough to take one or two breaths before getting slaughtered by their count.

Meanwhile, the knight whose horse was wounded prior to this gazed at Joshua with respect… no, it should be said that he was in admiration of Joshua.

Under the effect of ‘Stampede’, the wounds suffered by his warhorse eased immediately. Even though the wound was not completely healed, the wound did not worsen throughout the charge. The knight himself expected to die and mentally prepared himself. However, it turned out that it was even better than the best outcome he could imagine!

As for Joshua, he was currently standing solemnly. He adjusted his back to normal. He allowed all his muscles to gradually contract after they rashly swelled up the moment he went all out.

Although it seemed like the warrior was the one responsible for leading all the knights to the top of the wall safe and sound, Joshua knew better than anyone that he actually borrowed the strength of everyone in order to make that happen. He was merely the person leading them forward. The charging effect of the Combat Aura was able to persist throughout the journey by relying on the collective effort of the knights.

After all, the warrior was still in the first stage of being a Gold-tier warrior. Even if he was extremely powerful and very experienced in battling, his level of Combat Aura was still not very high.

Meanwhile, on the wall.

The defending army of the fortress was so weary that they looked like they could barely hold on for much longer.

The knights were unable to assess the situation of the battlefield because they were following Joshua’s lead. They were completely unaware that they were akin to an unstoppable tank bulldozing their way through the battlefield. However, the guards were able to monitor their entire progress from the start till the end.

Not long before that, one of the elven archers noticed the presence of Radcliffe’s reinforcements. It only took Joshua and the knights approximately thirty-five minutes to scale their way to the top of the wall. Most importantly, they only moved in a straight line, directly cutting through the Dark Tide from the hillside all the way to the top of the wall without making any turns at all!

What the guards and the soldiers saw was that there was a red beam of light projecting towards the wall at lightspeed. They could vaguely count the fifty-or-so people in the red beam. These knights were charging forward like an indestructible metallic fortress. Any daemon that positioned themselves in front of them were crushed into meat pies. Blood spilled and flesh splattered onto the surroundings. Even though there were also giant beasts that were at the pinnacle of Silver-tier, they were massacred in one hit by the Gold-tier warrior one after another as though their existence was worthless.

Was that the reason why they only sent fifty-plus men to provide support? What sort of monstrous reinforcements were they?!

While everyone was discussing how unbelievable it was to witness all that, Joshua looked around to inspect the Dark Tide.

Currently, the army of Berserk Daemons no longer possessed a formidable formation. Initially, one layer of defense would have approximately two thousand daemons in it. Quite a number of defensive layers of the Dark Tide had been disrupted. They became completely chaotic. That was also because the Gold-tier mage had activated her Glorious Strength from within the fortress and rained down stars upon the daemons, taking out at least 3,000 of them.

Truth be told, if that was the only thing that had occurred, the situation would not have developed as such. However, Joshua and his fifty knights had charged across the monster horde, disrupting them… Now, there were still many of the daemons who assumed that the enemies were still among them. They were focused on tracking and locating their enemies across the battlefield.

However, these brainless monsters could never imagine that Joshua and his knights had already arrived on top of the wall even if they were given tens of thousands of years to ponder.

It was time to hold their thoughts and emotions back.

That Gold-tier mage was the master of the fortress. So where was the countess of the Scarlet family then? His actions were clear as day for all to see on the battlefield. Thus, she could not have overlooked that.

Just when he was wondering about it, Joshua suddenly felt a strange presence approaching him from the rear.

That order was extreme. Having the same source as the power he inherited, he could also sense that the two powers were completely unique from each other. He turned his head around and saw a golden-haired swordsman with crimson eyes. The swordsman looked handsome. He wore a brown leather armor and two swords hung by his waist. He walked towards Joshua right now.

Joshua frowned a little.

This was a Gold-tier swordsman. It was not that mage he was expecting to see… The more alarming aspect of this rendezvous was the visage of the swordsman.

“That face, those eyes… and the pattern on those two swords.”

He was muttering all to himself in silence. He felt that the appearance of this swordsman seemed somewhat familiar. “Somehow, I’ve seen his appearance and his clothing in my previous life.”

Meanwhile, Brandon had no idea at all what the warrior in black armor was thinking at the moment. He walked up to Joshua in a very formal manner and greeted Joshua with the most traditional gesture of a nobleman. “Thank you for coming over to aid us, Liege of Moldavia of the Northern Lands, Imperial Count Joshua Radcliffe. As Brandon, the Baron of the Imperial City’s Kaos family, it is my honor to be in your presence.”

Kaos, Brandon… Brandon Kaos?

Upon hearing that name, Joshua could not respond to Brandon immediately. He was shocked as his memory was jolted. He finally remembered why the man before him looked so familiar.

This man, these two swords— isn’t this the prominent sword that protected the northern lands in his previous life, the [Sacred Sword of Annihilation], Brandon Kaos?!