Chapter 72: A Brutal Melee

"Fire!" Elenthor commanded from the city wall, waving his curved blade. His eyes were bloodshot; he hadn't had a proper rest in two days.

"Your Majesty Elenthor! The orcs are attacking the west wall! Our king has already led the troops to defend it, so this area is left to you!" Maple Leaf, panting, leaned on his longsword.

"Don't worry, elves are tougher than you think!" Elenthor replied with a booming voice, glancing at the exhausted Maple Leaf.

"Kill!" The distant west wall had plunged into a bitter battle. The defenders of Loshanier, clad in dwarven-forged iron armor, were pouring a rain of arrows down from the battlements.

"Whoa!" A orc, carrying a burlap sack filled with dirt, was pierced through the chest by a piercing arrow. It staggered forward two steps before throwing the sack aside, falling silent.

"Bang!" The sharp arrowhead shattered the orc's skull, sending a spray of warm, white brain matter flying.

"Mmm~" Through the rain of arrows, a spinning throwing axe from a orc flew upstream, piercing a human soldier's body. The unleashed battle energy ripped the ordinary soldier apart in mid-air.

"Orc warriors! Their professionals are coming up!" The brutal scene immediately caught the attention of Aranthor, but the barrage of flying axes raining down made his expression drop instantly.

"Do they see us as soft targets?" Aranthor's face darkened.

"Keep shooting! Don't let the orcs fill the moat!" Maple Leaf shouted, slashing a flying axe that was headed for Aranthor.

"Swish~" Under Maple Leaf's command, the previously sparse rain of arrows suddenly intensified.

"Not good!" Maple Leaf suddenly noticed a ten-meter-long "path" in the moat had been filled.

"Suppress them! Don't let them up!" Aranthor also spotted the deadly "route."

"Don't fear sacrifice! Charge forward! Quickly defend below!" The orc commander on this side noticed the fatal gap as well.

Both sides immediately engaged in a desperate struggle around the protruding area that the orcs had forged with blood and flesh.

"Damn it! Maple Leaf, we have to break the orcs' momentum!" Aranthor shouted at Maple Leaf, who was frantically filling the moat with orc bodies and burlap sacks.

At this moment, the path was gradually widening under the accumulation of orc corpses and sacks… and the blood of the orcs was staining the river a dark green.

"Ha!" A sword light like a swift ribbon descended from the sky. 

Seeing the orcs approaching ever closer and realizing that mere arrows were insufficient to halt their advance, Maple Leaf decisively leaped down from the city wall to intercept the orcs head-on.

"Flame Slash!" Maple Leaf swung his longsword in a semicircle, a fierce surge of hot battle energy erupted, and a flame blade nearly three meters long was unleashed.

"Knights! Head down and suppress them!" Aranthor, seeing Maple Leaf, who was at a disadvantage, grit his teeth and finally sent out his last reserve of knights.

"Thud!" A series of heavy impacts resonated as the knights of Loshanier, armed with shields and greatswords, descended from above.

"For the glory of the knights! Kill!" The knights from the prairie shouted in thunderous unison.

In the next moment, the orcs successfully filled the moat. This twenty-meter path had been paved with the lives of nearly a thousand orcs...

"Boom!" The knight, wielding a shield, clashed fiercely with the orc vanguard, led by the great knight Maple Leaf!

There were a total of fifty-four knights present! 

Aranthor had summoned even the aging knights; from the grand knights to the apprentice knights, they formed a square and bravely fought to the death with the orcs.

"Thud!" A knight, after fending off an orc warrior's strike, suddenly thrust out his longsword. 

The longsword, infused with wind-element battle energy, faced little resistance as it pierced through the orc's protective battle aura and effortlessly shredded its internal organs. 

The orc, of the same rank, struggled for a moment before collapsing lifelessly to the ground.

"Bang!" 

Through the dented chain mail and the figure that flew backward, it was clear that this elderly knight had sustained serious injuries, still being heavily wounded by the orc in front of him, even while under the protective skill.

"Mercy!" The knights on the frontline activated their skills—Mercy—to reduce the damage they received under immense pressure.

"Guardian!" The last line of apprentice knights hurriedly cast the Guardian skill on the knights in front of them.

"Maintain formation! Don't let the orcs compress our living space! Follow my orders! Push them out! Shield charge!" Maple Leaf bellowed.

"Boom!" A thunderous sound echoed as dozens of shields, imbued with the knights' battle energy, crashed forward. 

The raging battle energy knocked away surrounding orcs; those directly hit either shattered into pieces due to the overwhelming power or were smashed to the ground, bloodied and unable to rise. In an instant, the orc offensive slowed.

Looking at the countless orcs who had been knocked into the water, the knights instinctively huddled together, forming a square for both offense and defense.

"Phew!" Seeing the orcs pushed back, Aranthor let out a long sigh. Just moments ago, he had feared that the knights' formation might be breached.

…

"Aranthor is under tremendous pressure!" Elandor approached Elenthor, who was leaning on his curved sword.

"His forces are too few; the orcs might use him as a breakthrough point. We need to be careful! The orc lord in front of us is cunning!

He knows how to deal with elves and how to wear down our morale and stamina!" 

Elenthor observed the regrouping orc army in the distance, his eyes showing a hint of wariness for the first time.

"No wonder he's Sauron's lackey! Without any real skills, he's truly useless!" Elenthor sneered in anger.

"Knight Caslow, prepare yourself. King Aranthor may need your support at any time," Elenthor turned to Caslow, the dragon knight under Rynar.

"The king sent me here precisely for this moment," Caslow nodded in agreement.

"The difficult times have not yet come! The orcs have not yet launched a full-scale attack; they are just wearing us down!" 

Elenthor casually glanced at the disorganized orc army in the distance.

The orcs had already moved past the initial panic; they chopped down trees to create thick wooden shields and then packed them with dirt and poured water over them.

In the cold weather, the water quickly froze, giving the wooden shields defense comparable to iron shields. As for their lifespan? Who cares about that!

"Full alert!" Elenthor looked at the exhausted elven soldiers slumped on the ground, then at the five orc thousand-man formations advancing painfully in the distance. 

His kin were already extremely fatigued, but he couldn't allow them to rest... The war wasn't over!

"Target two miles! Fire!" Elenthor roared in fury, and a rain of arrows soared into the sky.

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