"Calculating wind speed and humidity! Trajectory calculations complete!"
With the trajectory fine-tuned by the Chip, Leilin pulled the crossbow's trigger.
"Whoosh!!!" The powerful bolt shot out, and the massive recoil made Leilin's arm go slightly numb.
Thunk!!! The bolt pierced through the Scavenging Wolf's left eye and out the right. The wolf let out two howls before collapsing straight to the ground.
"With the Chip, my advantage in high-precision tasks like this is overwhelming! A crossbow isn't a bow and arrow — once you've aimed, you just pull the trigger. So much more convenient!"
Leilin compared the difference between swinging a Cross Sword and using a crossbow. "Looks like long-range attacks are more my style going forward. It's safer too. The only problem is I still have no clue how to activate a Knight's Life Energy. Do I really have to go through a life-and-death battle?"
The reason Leilin hadn't used a bow or crossbow before was twofold — first, to vent his stress, and second, to try activating a Knight's Life Energy. Unfortunately, with the Chip as his trump card, he had never truly pushed himself to the brink of death, so he naturally couldn't experience what it felt like to trigger Life Energy in a desperate moment.
"Leilin! Nice one!" George finally reacted, clapping Leilin hard on the shoulder.
"From now on, this crossbow is yours!"
"Thanks!" Leilin grinned. Even without George offering, he'd been planning to get his hands on this crossbow.
"Oh!!! Leilin! Leilin killed the Scavenging Wolf! Lord Leilin! Lord Leilin! Please save us!"
At that moment, more Scavenging Wolves charged into the camp, and the apprentices screamed and cried as they rushed toward Leilin's position.
Thanks to George's advance preparations, their side had suffered the fewest casualties, and with two Preliminary Knights like Leilin and George present, this was arguably the safest spot outside the white-robed wizards' vicinity.
"Hah!!!" Olin gasped for breath as he swung his sword to block a lunging wolf. The tremendous force sent his Cross Sword flying out of his hands.
"I'm the heir to the family! There's so much I haven't enjoyed yet!!! How can I die here???"
Olin roared. Of the companions around him, two were already dead, and the rest had either perished or scattered.
Just then, cries of "Lord Leilin!" reached his ears, and his eyes lit up.
"Right! The Golden Flower Alliance still has fighting strength, and Leilin was so powerful before — he can definitely save me!"
Olin didn't hesitate any longer and sprinted toward Leilin.
"Leilin!!! Lord Leilin!!! Help!!!!"
"Hm?" Leilin reloaded the crossbow and looked over at the voice. "It's Olin!"
Olin was in a wretched state — not only had he lost his sword, but he was covered in wounds, and a massive wolf was hot on his heels.
"What a shame! You picked the wrong person! Did you really think I'd be that magnanimous?" A cruel smile crept onto Leilin's lips.
"With the white-robed wizards watching, I wouldn't dare secretly sabotage anyone to their death! But simply being too late to rescue someone? No one can use that as a pretext to cause trouble!"
Leilin looked at Olin and flashed a brilliant smile.
"He'll definitely save me! He has to!!!" Seeing Leilin's smile, Olin felt relieved and kept encouraging himself as he ran even faster.
"Oh!!! No!!!!" Then, in utter despair, Olin watched as Leilin fired the crossbow — but at a different Scavenging Wolf on the other side.
"How could you — how could you do this???" Olin's mind went blank for an instant. His foot caught on a stone, and he stumbled to the ground.
The Scavenging Wolf behind him pounced, its fangs biting down as blood poured forth…
"Thank you!!" On the other side, the girl Leilin had saved ran up to him. "Thank you so much!"
"Don't mention it!" Leilin smiled. Meanwhile, Lilisite looked at Leilin from the side, blushing as she lowered her head.
A whistle sounded. George glanced at Lilisite and then gave Leilin a look that said, "You know what's up."
"In a situation like this, George, can't you rein it in for once?"
"Even if I'm falling into the abyss of death, you can't stop me from yearning for beautiful love!" George declared in the tone of a martyr facing execution with resolve.
"You're not going to die. The white-robed ones will act any moment now." Leilin rolled his eyes.
Though the battlefield was utter chaos, the wolves seemed to possess an uncanny sixth sense — they never once troubled the three white-robed wizards, forming a strange empty circle around them.
And amid the noise, Leilin's senses — enhanced by the Chip — still managed to catch the conversation between the white-robed wizards. Perhaps they hadn't bothered to keep their voices down.
"Crow! Are you going to act or not? If too many apprentices die, it'll hurt our evaluation!" A woman's voice rang out.
"Relax, relax! I've been counting. So far exactly ten have died — we haven't exceeded the limit!"
A somewhat nonchalant voice answered — a man's voice.
"But we're at the edge. Hurry up and act. I need to think about the stable model for this spell! Damn it! The Negative Energy levels around here are way too high — I can't even construct 'Doguli' properly!"
"Then I'll handle it." The white-robed man who had been silent until now stood up.
"The mysterious wizards — the legendary beings who can command the forces of nature are finally going to act?" Leilin's eyes locked onto the white-robed figure.
"You contemptible, foolish beasts — how dare you disturb the rest of these honored wizards! Only death can be your eternal resting place!"
"Master — Creach!"
As the white-robed man's incantation rang out, Leilin's ears were flooded with frantic alerts from the Chip: "Warning!!! Warning!!! Radiation energy source detected!!! Negative Energy field detected!!! Recommend the host evacuate immediately!!!"
The bright red text was glaringly obvious, but Leilin wasn't frightened off in the slightest. He simply kept replaying the wizard's incantation in his mind.
"That doesn't seem to be the common language of the continent. It's some kind of ancient language, very tongue-twisting. Is this how wizards cast their spells?"
As the white-robed man rose, the surrounding Scavenging Wolves retreated at high speed, as though they had spotted a natural predator.
"Secondary Energy Fireball!!!"
After the incantation, a fireball materialized floating in the man's palm. According to the Chip's calculations, this fireball had a temperature of at least a thousand degrees — so hot that the surrounding air visibly warped and shimmered.
The fireball trailed a tail of flame and plunged into the center of the wolf pack.
Boom!!!!!!
"Get down!" Leilin bellowed, but it was already too late. Apprentices and wolves alike were sent tumbling in every direction.
A deafening explosion boomed out, followed by rolling waves of heat.
"Phew!!! Ptoo, ptoo!!!" Leilin scrambled to his feet and quickly spat out the dirt and grass from his mouth.
He was caked in mud from head to toe, looking like a clay figure freshly dug out of a pit.
"According to the Chip's calculations, that spot was right where the alpha wolf was. Hiss…" Leilin climbed onto the carriage and looked in the direction of the wizard's attack, involuntarily sucking in a sharp breath.
Where the fireball had landed, there was now a pitch-black crater three meters wide and long, two meters deep. The Scavenging Wolves surrounding it had all been reduced to charred husks.
The remaining wolves whimpered and quickly fled into the distance.
"To achieve this as a human being!!!! So — so this is the power of a wizard?" Leilin stared at the white-robed wizard, his eyes blazing with fervor. "The power of wizards! I will have it!!!!"
"Quickly, clean up the battlefield!" Ignoring the fervent gazes of the surrounding apprentices, the white-robed man spoke before returning to his original spot to sit with the other two wizards.
As he passed Olin's corpse, he paused briefly, pulled a small golden pouch from Olin's chest, and tucked it into his own robes.
"That… looks like the pouch Olin kept his Magic Stones in!" Leilin's pupils contracted.
"Evaluation. Threshold. Intervention. Magic Stones." Leilin's mind raced. "So those wizards took on a job — that's the only reason they agreed to escort us apprentices. There's a death quota built in, and only if the count exceeds a certain number does the evaluation drop and the payout decrease!"
"And I think I previously underestimated the value of Magic Stones. These white-robed wizards, letting apprentices die like this — they're probably planning to pocket the Magic Stones from the dead ones!!!"
"Thankfully, the number of dead apprentices has already hit the danger line, so things should be safer for us going forward!"
Once he'd worked through it all, Leilin's expression turned grim. "Is this the world of wizards? Rational to the point of cold-bloodedness! So icy that it's devoid of all feeling!!!"
"Everyone, finish packing up and get moving! The smell of blood here will attract other predators before long!"
Black-robed knight Angelei tore off his outer garment — shattered from activating his secret technique — and replaced it with a fresh cloak. Sweat streamed down his forehead, and he was panting, looking rather weakened.
A flicker of light passed through Leilin's eyes: "So activating a Knight's secret technique comes at a cost too…"
"Hey! Leilin, look!" Just as Leilin was about to board the carriage, George sidled over and slyly pointed to the side.
On another black carriage, Besta sat with her knees drawn up, bloodstains on her shoulders, looking as though she had just finished crying.
"Olin was always Besta's number one protector. Now that nearly their entire group has been wiped out, Besta's situation doesn't look great either!"
George whispered in Leilin's ear, wearing an expression that said, "Here's your chance."
"I've lost interest in her! Besides, given how dangerous our situation is right now, can't you keep it in your pants for once?"
Leilin was exasperated. He pointed at George's collar — there was still a girl's lipstick mark on the fabric. Who knew when this guy had hooked up with someone.
"Heh heh… My brother, it's only in moments of crisis like this that we Preliminary Knights can really show our worth! And girls always develop feelings for the guy who saves them — it's the most basic technique!"
George pulled a few handkerchief-like items from his pocket and proudly displayed his haul. "See? Just today alone, I've already earned the affection of three lovely ladies…"
"Mm…" Leilin was speechless.
He recalled the original Leilin's past behavior. "Seems like the previous Leilin, whenever he liked a girl, always resorted to force. How barbaric…"
"All right, time to move out!" Leilin spotted several black-robed figures gathering the apprentices' bodies, extracting their Magic Stones, and handing them over to the white-robed wizards. He quickly changed the subject.