Chapter 205: Running for Their Lives

"You are right, we truly cannot continue to be sitting ducks like this." Sinuoli acknowledged the Engineer's suggestion. "Bring the map!" he ordered at the same time.

"What do we need a map for? We are definitely going down the mountain from the northern foothills!" Buluokesen handed over the map while grumbling.

"If you ask me, we must head south!" Sinuoli stared at the map for a moment.

"What kind of joke are you making! That is Athel Loren, and it is full of green-skinned pointy-ears!" Captain Gelunsen shouted. Under normal circumstances, he would not contradict Sinuoli like this, but the previous statement was truly absurd in the eyes of this Longbeard elder.

"You cannot trust..."

"Listen to me, kin!" Sinuoli raised the map and increased his volume. "Heading north, what is there?"

"Wissenland, isn't it?" Balin asked.

"Indeed, the Empire of Man's Wissenland, a vast plain under the jurisdiction of Wissenland!" Sinuoli did not directly deny it.

"We have no defensive terrain, and there are Harpies scouting from the air. At our previous marching speed, we will inevitably be caught up to and blocked by those filthy mutated monsters. Fighting in the open wilderness will only be even more difficult for us!"

"But..." Captain Gelunsen persisted.

"Yes, the forest is the territory of the Wood Elf. According to the intelligence provided by that traveler, they are the direct reason the Beastmen appeared here. Although there is indeed a Grudge between the two races, it is not worth mentioning compared to the Grudge we have with the Beastmen!"

Sinuoli stated his point of view rapidly. The origin of the Wood Elf must also be traced back to the War of the Beard. After the Dwarfs won and killed the Phoenix King Kaleduo Ershi, the Dark Elf led by Malekith launched an attack on Aosuan—the home of the High Elf.

The successor Phoenix King Kalade called for the Elf in the Old World to return to Aosuan to defend their original homeland.

But there were also some who firmly refused to leave the new home they had lived in for a long time. These Elf later entered Athel Loren to settle down and were also called Wood Elf.

The Wood Elf were regarded as traitors by the High Elf of Aosuan. They lived in seclusion in Athel Loren and had no direct conflict with most Dwarf holds. The Dwarf of the World's Edge Mountains did not like these fellows simply because of their pointy ears.

"In the dense forest, aerial scouts cannot function! I believe that as long as we do not take the initiative to attack the Wood Elf, they will not move against us. If we are truly attacked, Huangwu Bao, Haojiaobao, or even Weifengbao and Everpeak will take revenge on them!"

Sinuoli convinced his kin. Even with all their prejudices, the Dwarf admitted that the Wood Elf were still a wise race. They would weigh the pros and cons rather than fight blindly driven by bloodlust.

According to Sinuoli's analysis, entering the forest to take temporary refuge and waiting for the Wood Elf to completely drive out the Beastmen before asking them for passage was indeed more feasible than entering Wissenland.

The Dwarf had a closer relationship with the Human, but Wissenland had not yet fully recovered from the Greenskin invasion, and it was hard to count on the lords there to take the initiative to leave the city to meet the Dwarf.

After a brief discussion, they quickly decided to find a place on the southern foothills of the Grey Mountains to hold out for the night. The Beastmen had already been driven to the edge of the forest, and the fighting would likely end soon. By then, it would only take another half day to reach Huangwu Bao, and the caravan's supplies would be enough if they were frugal.

Sinuoli quickly marked a logging outpost and an abandoned mine on the map. No one knew what the situation in the forest was like; they needed to adjust their direction at any time based on the enemy's situation, so more than one overnight location was under consideration.

Sinuoli scattered the Ranger and the Slayer. Like a spider weaving a web, he acted while waiting for feedback so that he could react.

In Sinuoli's plan, he himself would stay in the center to coordinate the caravan's advance. If they encountered small groups of enemies, they would quickly annihilate them; if they encountered large groups, they would change direction to avoid the brunt of the force.

But in practice, his ideal was full, but the reality was somewhat thin; commanding a team carrying a large number of non-combatants was not as easy as it originally was.

Sinuoli felt a strong sense of stagnation, or perhaps this feeling had existed during the original march, and the special circumstances only highlighted it.

Traces of the enemy came from all directions. The protection of the forest could indeed prevent the Harpies from easily discovering Sinuoli and his kin, but this could not change the fact that this was the home turf of the Beastmen.

"Only in the west are there slightly fewer enemies. Should we move in that direction?" The person in charge of defense on each side gathered the situation.

"What is in the west?" Sinuoli tugged at his beard. He was now also caught in a dilemma. The ordinary kin accompanying the team were not like professional soldiers who could withstand long-distance trekking.

Their footsteps were getting slower and slower. If they could not find a place to camp and rest soon, he feared that someone would fall behind. These kin chose to join the caravan migration out of trust in Sinuoli; no matter what, he could not abandon them.

"I don't know! Make a decision, Master. Right now we still have the strength to fight, but if things continue like this, I fear the team will risk collapsing!" Qiangsen reminded Sinuoli. Besides physical function, ordinary kin were also worse in terms of psychological endurance.

"Fine, then let's head that way! As for the rest, let's leave it to our Warhammer and sharp axes!" Sinuoli stood on his Doom Anvil so that more kin could see him and boost their morale.

The roars and howls echoing in the forest were like the drumbeats of death; every Dwarf was trying their best to move their feet.

Sinuoli suddenly had a foreboding feeling: the enemy wanted to keep his troops in a state of constant tension, consume their physical strength as much as possible, and then launch an attack to crush them at the most opportune moment.

"You must come and see over there!" Two Ranger returned and whispered their report into Sinuoli's ear.

Upon hearing this, Sinuoli jumped off the anvil to investigate. He discovered that this area of the forest had already been twisted and profaned. Large tumors and spikes had grown on the trees, and the power of Chaos had altered their physiological structure.

"The Forest Spirit of this area have suffered!" Sinuoli muttered. He remembered the malicious tree spirits and their lord, the Drycha.

"This, indeed, but the real trouble is over there!" The Ranger signaled for Sinuoli to walk a little further. Placed before them was a set of giant footprints. These footprints were large enough to fit Sinuoli himself!

"A Giant? A Ghorgon? Or a Jabberslythe?" Sinuoli's heart skipped a few beats as he looked at the footprints. If he let these behemoths charge into the ordinary kin to slaughter them, then, then he would truly be a sinner.