Chapter 172 : Chapter 172

Chapter 172. One Against Three

Cliff turned his head and looked toward Knight Eric, who was currently being besieged.

By now, it was no longer a case of Finley running in front while everyone else chased after him from behind.

With Cliff gone, Finley and the others seized the opportunity at once. They immediately slowed down, then swung their axes and hacked furiously at Eric.

Finley also knew that Eric’s armor had outstanding defensive power. Even if he struck until sparks flew from his axe, he still might not be able to do much damage to the man.

So after hacking at him twice, he changed targets.

He and another knight boxed Eric in from both sides and brought their blades down hard on Eric’s horse.

The horse was armored as well, but in the end, it was still only an ordinary horse. Every heavy blow made it suffer terribly. It began shaking violently and gradually stopped obeying Eric’s commands.

Right now, Eric was counting on Cliff to hurry back. Only with the two of them together would they still have the strength to fight.

But the fierce back-and-forth of offense and defense left him with no time to care about what exactly had happened to Cliff.

All he could do was curse inwardly, over and over, wondering why Cliff still had not returned.

Fran saw that Cliff had stopped in place without making any move at all, and just as she was wondering why he was not moving, Cliff did something that left everyone present utterly dumbfounded.

He took off his helmet, threw his weapon to the ground, and gripped the helmet tightly in both hands, making no other move.

Everyone in the stands understood what that meant.

It was a signal of surrender.

It meant Knight Cliff had already decided to concede. As long as he left the fenced arena, it would count as him withdrawing from the duel.

And Cliff did not hesitate in the slightest. Ignoring the emotions of the horse beneath him, he rode straight for the exit.

He understood very clearly that if he kept fighting, there was a very real chance that Fran would cut him down with a single stroke.

That technique of hers was simply too terrifying.

He absolutely could not tolerate being cut down by a mere Apprentice like this. That would be no different from sacrificing himself to build up her reputation.

So although he knew he might not necessarily lose if he continued fighting, the odds of defeat were still far from small.

He was unwilling to gamble on that chance.

And he could sense it clearly—Fran’s horse was vastly superior to every other horse in the arena. Even horses that had been injected with enhancement drugs could not compare.

In a duel where mounted combat was the primary means of battle, that was simply too great an advantage.

When they saw Knight Cliff flee for the exit without even looking back, the people on the high platform were all stunned.

For a moment, not a single one of them said anything. Everyone’s expression looked rather unpleasant.

Just moments ago, when Fran had cut Cliff’s weapon in half, they had still been exclaiming over how powerful her technique was, to be able to directly sever his weapon.

But even so, their words had still carried speculation about how Cliff would use that half-broken weapon to defeat Fran next.

Some had even predicted that Cliff had already figured out how the technique worked, and that within the next three exchanges, they would see Fran fall from her horse.

But what lay before their eyes now made everyone feel as though they had swallowed something foul, leaving them speechless for a long while.

In the end, it was Maeve, still wearing a smile, who spoke up to ease things for Knight Cliff.

“I imagine Knight Cliff saw that he might not be able to take down his opponent quickly, while Knight Eric perhaps would not be able to hold out that long, so he simply chose to withdraw.”

“Knowing when to give up and find the correct direction is also a kind of wisdom...”

After Maeve finished speaking, no one answered immediately.

Only after a pause of two seconds did one of the young nobles change the subject.

“Now that Knight Cliff has left the field, then Knight Eric next will also...”

Eric was now struggling desperately to hold out.

If those two had only been attacking him, it would have been one thing.

But both of them had fixed their sights on the horse beneath him and were laying into it with savage blows.

Where the hell is Cliff? Why isn’t he here yet?!

Rage blazed inside Eric’s heart. At this point, he wanted to kill Cliff a hundred times over.

At such a critical moment, the man had failed to help him in the slightest.

He had truly allied himself with Cliff for nothing.

Just then, a burst of rapid hoofbeats rang out behind him, and his heart leaped with joy, thinking that Cliff had finally returned.

But immediately afterward, he sensed that something was wrong.

Why are those hoofbeats so fast? That’s not the sound of the steppe warhorse at all.

He had no time to care that the two men were battering his horse again. After throwing up a hasty block, he twisted himself around with all his strength to look behind him.

What he saw made his mind go blank.

Fran was riding her black horse straight at him at high speed, and she was clearly much faster than the three of them racing abreast.

Where’s Cliff? Where’s Cliff?!!!

Cliff...

No, tell me where exactly Cliff went—and why is that black-robed bastard still alive at this point?

He felt as if his whole world had gone wrong.

A minute ago, it had still been him and Cliff chasing Finley all over the arena.

So how had Cliff suddenly vanished, leaving him alone to deal with the remaining three?

Finley also noticed Fran pursuing from behind.

He too could not quite understand why Fran was now chasing after them.

The most he had hoped for from her was that she would quickly clear out the enemy retainers, leaving him and the other three knights a fair chance to settle things in single combat.

But now, not only had Fran caught up, she even looked as though she could help him delay Eric’s attacks a little longer.

And as for Cliff, no one had any idea where he had run off to.

At that very moment, the horse beneath Eric let out a miserable, drawn-out scream.

It was so long and desperate that it sounded like the beast was squeezing out the very last of its strength.

Eric wanted to stab the enhancement drug in his hand into the horse again, but he knew that the moment he did, the horse would die on the spot.

It had already reached its limit.

No matter how much it was enhanced, there was still a limit to what the animal itself could endure.

His heart hardened.

With a look of hatred, he turned toward Finley on his right, making Finley instantly sense that something was wrong and try to pull away.

But Eric moved even faster.

He directly hurled himself sideways onto Finley’s horse, making Finley’s mount nearly collapse under the sudden burden, able only to keep charging forward by inertia.

“Fuck! Eric, you’d even do something like this—”

Finley was on the verge of going mad.

He had never imagined that when Eric was clearly on the verge of collapse, he would still try to drag Finley down with him.

As long as Finley was tied up for even a moment, the other knight would have his chance.

A moment ago they had been teammates, but now they were enemies.

Finley could already see the smile on that knight’s face to the side.

But at that very moment, Fran leaped up from behind with explosive force, accelerated through the air with Elven Swordsmanship, and slashed her glowing red longsword straight across Knight Eric’s back.

The red light tore through the hard armor, exposing the savage wound beneath and making Eric feel, for the first time in a long while, the pain of flesh being split open.

Immediately afterward, his spine was nearly severed in two by that single blow.

All strength left his body, and he could only fall limply from the horse.