Chapter 265: Sudden Change

Arnold felt that the muscles on his arms, back, and waist were no longer his own. They were really sore and numb. In the short time from the orcs' charge to the stagnation, he commanded the archers under his hand to quickly shoot ten waves of arrow rain, and one after another, enemies died under the sharp arrows.

It was just that now he had to issue an order to stop shooting, even if the enemy was just standing not far away without moving, because continuing to pull the bowstring might lose the soldiers' muscles, let them directly lose their combat ability, and become a burden on the battlefield.

The elven longbows equipped by the King for them could be said to be good at everything. The range was far enough, easy to maintain, and in this rainy weather, the arrows shot still had strong force and very good accuracy.

The only problem was that the strength required to pull the bowstring was really too high. The strong bow in his hand was like a wild horse that was difficult to tame. Every shot required Arnold to try his best.

Arnold also knew that this was a weapon designed by the elven race for their own service. He once had the luck to see the battle scene of the Elven Prince, which was as easy as dancing. Anyway, he would never be able to reach that level in his life.

However, Arnold, who was once a Rhodok Sharpshooter, also specially visited Mr. James, who had the highest medical skills in Fislate, in order to be able to recover his arm strength as soon as possible, and then learned some massage techniques, and then taught them to all the archers.

Arnold was different from his brother Arnold. As the captain of the archer brigade, he decisively gave up using weapons like crossbows, and spent a lot of time to improve his archery skills. He believed that only by using the same weapon as his subordinates could he better understand the actual situation of his subordinates, so as to make correct commands.

It was precisely because of this sense of responsibility that whenever the archer unit needed to exert its strength, the King of Rhovanion would order Arnold to become the shooting commander. If he unfortunately died in battle, it would be the turn of another captain to continue commanding.

Perhaps, after one or two battles, Arnold would take over the position left by Bandak and become the new shooting commander. At the very least, there were already such rumors among the soldiers.

Arnold didn't have too many thoughts about this rumor. "Loyal to His Majesty, dedicated and responsible" was probably his life creed at this time. It was just that the identity of His Majesty was upgraded from captain to regiment leader, from regiment leader to lord, and finally became the King.

In this process, Arnold's identity was also constantly changing.

More than ten years ago, Arnold and his brother were just silly boys planting land for the elders in the village, and now, he owned his own house in the most central area of Fislate, married a beautiful and virtuous wife, had a high-income and very decent job, and responded to the cabinet's call to give birth to two boys and one girl. The eldest son had reached the age and began to enter school to receive education.

For his current life, Arnold was very satisfied. If he were still in Rhodok, he would never be able to obtain such a life. And in order to keep this happiness, Arnold was willing to sacrifice his life for his king.

And at this time, across the sturdy scales, Arnold kept rubbing his sore muscles, his eyes staring dead at the wolf riders jumping and jumping on the western hillside. As one of the few officers in Rhovanion, he had received a barely systematic tactical teaching and knew that the approach of the wolf riders would definitely break the current calm situation.

Thinking of this, the action of pinching his muscles became faster. He needed to recover his physical strength as soon as possible, because once the orcs launched a charge, his archer unit would have only one choice, which was to draw the short sword from his waist and mix into the infantry queue to cover the flank of the entire formation.

If there was a suitable battlefield environment, he could actually choose to break away from the protection of the large army, wander to either side of the battlefield, and launch a side attack on the enemy entangled with the infantry. It was just that this operation had the cover of cavalry in the past, but now there were no such conditions.

At this time, being able to recover one more point of arm strength, the attack he would launch on the enemy next would be one point more powerful.

Soon, the howling of the wolf riders became closer and closer. The strange rocks and low slopes on the hillside had no obstruction for the agile wargs at all. As these vigorous and pitch-black creatures approached, a huge shadow squeezed out from the gaps between the mountains.

"Troll!

"

A cry of surprise was shouted from Arnold's mouth, and immediately closed his mouth. If he, as an officer, revealed a terrified emotion, then the blow to morale would be too huge.

However, it wasn't just Arnold who recognized the enemy that suddenly appeared on the hillside. Although they didn't see much, a large part of the soldiers present participated in the Battle of the Lonely Mountain ten years ago, and cries of surprise appeared one after another in the human team.

Even the Dwalin standing at the front of the team and his several dwarf companions showed nervous expressions on their faces, because the huge monster covered in moss and scales was not just one, but twenty or thirty.

Their huge right hands with thick joints held wooden sticks that were terrifyingly large, and on their left arms were tied crudely made wooden shields. Although the craftsmanship of building these shields was simple to the point of being unwatchable, the thick wood was enough to block the penetration of any arrows.

Clearly, in the past battles, these fearless monsters also suffered enough from the elven arrows, so their leader spent a lot of effort before the surprise attack to prepare for dealing with long-range attacks.

And this was also the biggest reliance for Ragash to launch this surprise attack. His original plan was to let the orcs entangle with humans first, and then send trolls to break the formation, so as to catch the other side off guard. It was just that the plan was broken by the fire breath suddenly released by the human leader, forcing Ragash to send trolls to break the current stalemate.

Allen, whose physical strength was still very scarce, looked at the trolls beginning to mix into the orcs' formation, and a solemn look also appeared on his face. His most elite subordinates, those Twilight Knights and Elven Rangers, were still on guard in the mountains and were afraid they couldn't rush back in time to deal with the current situation.

As for the ability Allen himself mastered, only chain lightning had a paralyzing effect on trolls. The lethality of fire to this monster that almost had no pain was extremely weak. Even if Allen's fire would not be affected by the rain, it was difficult to deal with these suddenly appearing huge monsters.

It might even have the opposite effect. Imagine a huge monster covered in fire rushing to his eyes with strength that ordinary people couldn't resist. Most soldiers couldn't deal with such a situation.

And the energy of chain lightning would be shared by the orcs beside the trolls, and without the cooperation of elite soldiers, it was very difficult for Allen alone to solve these trolls in a short time.

"Woo~~ Ha~~" "Awoo"

With the reinforcements of trolls, the orcs who were originally very uneasy let out hoarse and unpleasant cheers, and the wide crescent-shaped battle line also began

A large number of Orcs died under the assault of the rain of arrows, but even weapons crafted by Elves could not penetrate those thick wooden shields; the arrows merely stuck into the moss- and scale-covered arms and legs of the Trolls, causing these monsters to let out roars of anger at being attacked.

They were not crying out because of pain, but because they felt they had been provoked.

"Everyone, take up your bows and arrows, aim at the Trolls, and take them down."

Arnold issued the order to prepare to fire the moment the Trolls appeared, but this could not stop the enemy's approach at all; the pitch-black Orc army and the battle-ready soldiers were getting closer and closer.

"You are the most elite soldiers of Rhovanion; no matter what appears before you, you must hold this line. At this moment, His Majesty the King is with us."

Gale's resonant voice broke through the patter of rain beating against the armor, and the order to "hold the line" spread instantly throughout the entire infantry contingent, following the shouts of the officers.

The heavy infantry gripped the large shields in their hands, staring fixedly at the massive figures drawing ever closer, while sharp spears were extended forward from the phalanx as much as possible, aiming at those gradually approaching black shadows.

Watching the large number of Trolls that had suddenly appeared, Allen's brow also furrowed tightly; he had guessed that there was a high probability of Trolls being in the Orc army, but he had not expected that so many monsters would be entrenched in this area of the Grey Mountains.

However, upon second thought, this also fit the living habits of these fellows; except for the Trolls in Mordor who followed Sauron, most of the other clumsy creations that mimicked Ents liked to live in areas near the Northern Wasteland, such as the former Kingdom of Angmar or the Ettenmoors near the Misty Mountains, and that certainly included the Grey Mountains, which were the most severely eroded by darkness.

It was just that the appearance of these fellows completely disrupted Allen's previous plan; he had intended to wait for the Orc commander to approach the battlefield and then summon the Lion Knight Order on the northern hillside to launch a surprise assault on the enemy.

Although the northern hillside was somewhat steep and had rocks and trees in the middle that hindered the cavalry from picking up speed, the horsemanship of the Swadian Knights was barely enough to cope with the geographical environment there. That hillside was also the best place Allen could find; after all, this was between mountain ranges, and finding a piece of land where cavalry could charge was not easy, and at the same time, making the enemy take the bait willingly was even harder.

Now, the enemy had taken the bait willingly, but they had dispatched an unexpected force that disrupted Allen's rhythm, and that Orc commander riding a Warg was standing far away on a giant rock, watching the decisive battle about to begin, not approaching the battlefield at all—he was quite stingy with his life.

Facing such a crisis, Allen could not stand by and watch those tall Trolls use the Orcs as cover to charge into the formation under his command; even a phalanx composed of elite Dwarf veterans could not withstand such an impact, let alone humans.

These Trolls would likely only need one powerful swing to penetrate the infantry phalanx commanded by Gale. At that point, it would be a chaotic melee, and facing the Orcs, who held an absolute numerical advantage, Allen knew that although the combat effectiveness of his subordinates was already quite good, they would likely not have a very good outcome facing such a situation.

Thinking of the heavy casualties that the soldiers following him might suffer, Allen kept searching the hillside behind the Orcs, preparing to find terrain suitable for a cavalry charge to summon the Lion Knight Order directly.

It was also at this moment that the corner of Allen's eye suddenly caught an unusual sight: on the hillside covered by dark clouds, a mountain goat with huge curved horns suddenly appeared, and sitting on the back of the goat was a sturdy figure wearing heavy armor and a crown.

The person who had come was none other than Allen's good friend, the son of Thrain, the current King Under the Mountain, Thorin II.

As Thorin stood firm on the hillside, dense crowds of Dwarf knights also appeared under the dark clouds, tightly surrounding their king. Subsequently, a thunderclap rang out in the dark clouds, and the deafening sound, combined with lightning bright enough to illuminate the entire area, attracted the attention of everyone present.

Even the low-intelligence Trolls stopped in their tracks and looked toward the source of the rolling thunder behind them.

There were no extra movements, nor were there any inspiring pre-battle speeches; Allen only heard a faint "For the King" amidst the rolling sound of hooves, and then he saw the Dwarf cavalry launch a charge like a tidal wave along the hillside.

Seeing this scene, Allen did not hesitate further; he quickly summoned the Knight Order at the position he had chosen and directly issued the order for them to charge forward. Then, the Dinars in the simulator's vault disappeared with a clatter, and Allen buffed all the soldiers behind him with "Flame Ascension."

Compared to the members of the Knight Order who could be replenished with Dinars, Allen cared more about the flesh-and-blood soldiers behind him who had families. As long as he could let these warriors survive on the battlefield, Allen was willing to pay any price he could bear.

After completing all this in an instant, Allen, wearing Ancient Rune Armor, casually drew a Ruby Rune Greatsword from behind his back.

This was a new weapon Allen had just obtained from the Pendor Continent; its exquisite hilt was inlaid with a massive ruby, and the fiery red patterns started from the hilt and extended all the way to the tip of the sword, which shimmered with a sharp light.

When Allen's hands gripped this longsword tightly, the fiery red patterns on the blade began to flicker incessantly, and the rain colliding with it was evaporated into nothingness in an instant. For a time, Allen was shrouded in white mist, and a command like rumbling thunder also rang out from within the white mist.

"Soldiers, charge with me!

"