【 FALL OF THE GOLDEN CANOPY TRIBE 】

Boom!

A deafening explosion shook the entire battlefield.

Everyone watched in stunned silence as a bolt of purple-black lightning cleaved through the sky, piercing the dense, roiling storm clouds before crashing against the divine barrier that shielded the Golden Canopy Tribe.

Just the sheer power of the strike carried along with it an overwhelming sense of authority, filling all who witnessed it with awe and dread.

Once again, the players had overstepped their bounds, triggering divine punishment and drawing the wrath of a True God.

Although it did waver for a fleeting moment, in the end, the punishment ultimately descended with full force.

The very instant the lightning fell, the tribe’s barrier, which was already weakened by the relentless bombardment of the players, finally reached its breaking point.

With a shattering burst, the barrier disintegrated into countless silver fragments, swirling through the air like dying embers before fading into nothingness.

Above the Golden Canopy Tribe, bolts of purple-black lightning roared, crackling hungrily as they surged along the fractures left by the barrier’s collapse.

On the ramparts, the orc priests who had desperately maintained the protective spell never even had the chance to cry out as the divine lightning consumed them in an instant, reducing their bodies to nothing but charred flesh.

Only the high priest, who was a Gold-ranker, barely withstood the onslaught.

Nevertheless, his once-imposing frame had withered into frailty, his pallid skin marred by darkened veins. Whilst coughing up blood, his whole body trembled as if the very essence of life had been drained from him.

He wavered where he stood akin to a man on the precipice of death.

It would not be long before he, too, perished.

An eerie silence fell over the settlement walls.

The surviving orcs stared blankly at the sky, dazed, as if they were still processing what had just happened.

Above them, the heavens rumbled with thunder, its echoes reverberating through the storm-laden sky, still heavy with the dissipating charge of the divine punishment.

A couple of seconds passed before the sky finally broke open. Raindrops as large as beans, mixed with ice and snow, began to pelt the earth in an unforgiving downpour. The freezing water drenched the orcs, seeping through their fur and armor like icy tendrils.

The cold bit deep, numbing their hearts, whilst sapping what little warmth remained in their bodies. Yet, the chill was nothing compared to the dreadful realization that settled upon them.

—That their tribe’s protective barrier was indeed gone.

To add insult into their despair, a loud tidal wave of cheers erupted from the direction of the elven army.

Li Mu, his face flushed with excitement, raised his sword high and roared with all his might:

“Their barrier is now gone! Hear my command, all legions—charge forth! begin the full assault!”

At his behest, all the elven soldiers surrounding the perimeter of the Golden Canopy Tribe stirred like a provoked hornet’s nest, buzzing with restless intent.

A moment later, the grand orchestral BGM playing in the background shifted its tempo, growing even more majestic and powerful, akin to a war horn heralding the final battle.

Hearing it, the players’ eyes burned red with fervor, adrenaline surging through their veins.

“Charge!”

A voice rang out from the crowd, shaking with exhilaration.

“Charge!”

Others quickly joined in, their shouts overlapping, feeding off each other’s rising fervor.

As if igniting a chain reaction, more and more voices erupted in unison.

“Charge!”

“Charge! Charge! Charge—!”

The cries swelled, rolling across the battlefield like a tidal wave, rising from scattered shouts to an earth-shaking crescendo. Then, at last, all thousand elven troops roared as one, their voices merging into a singular, thunderous war cry:

“Charge!!”

“For the Goddess! For Elvenkind!”

Their mighty roar drowned out even the rumbling thunder and the relentless downpour from above, echoing across the battlefield like the drumbeat of an unstoppable tide. The very ground trembled beneath its force, as if the earth itself recoiled from the sheer momentum of the advancing elven army.

On the ramparts, the orcs who heard their shouts turned pale, their faces twisting with fear. Hands tightened around weapons, knuckles white, but no amount of force could still the tremors running through their bodies.

They were shaken.

And beyond that—something else flickered with their eyes.

Doubt.

Uncertainty.

This kind of army… this kind of war…

The realm of Seigües, which had basked in relative peace for hundreds of years, had never witnessed anything like it.

Siege rams and ballistae rumbled forward, their massive frames rolling steadily across the rain-soaked earth, while ladders were hoisted onto the players’ shoulders, ready to breach the crumbling walls.

Then, with a unified battle cry, the players surged forward, advancing from all four directions at the same time.

High above the battlefield, several banners depicting a golden iris was lifted high as the players charged forth with unyielding determination.

The archers fired as they ran, loosing arrows in a continuous barrage. Meanwhile, trebuchets continued their relentless bombardment, their wooden frames groaning under the strain as they launched payload after payload.

But this time, with their divine barrier shattered, the Golden Canopy Tribe had lost its final line of defense, leaving nothing to shield them from the onslaught.

Massive boulders, enchanted with magic and wreathed in flames, hurtled through the air like falling meteors. They crashed into the orc settlement with earth-shaking force, striking the walls and watchtowers, triggering devastating explosions. Thunderous booms echoed across the battlefield as fire and debris continously rained down.

Even the torrential rain could not extinguish the flames unleashed by the enchanted munitions.

Within moments, the entirety of Golden Canopy Tribe was engulfed in flames.

The crude walls, which was already weakened by the ongoing siege, trembled under the ceaseless bombardment.

They could collapse at any given moment, their impending ruin only exacerbated by the relentless storm of arrows and elemental bullets hammering them without respite.

Alas, this time, it was joined by something far more devastating—

Magic.

The air crackled with magical energy as the mages, having advanced within their optimal range, finally joined the fray.

A brilliant array of spells streaked through the air, mingling with the rain of arrows, transforming into a deadly storm of light that engulfed the orcs’ defenses.

The orcs manning the walls fell at an alarming rate.

Without spellcasters aside from their priests, they had no way to counter this magical bombardment.

Now, with their protective barrier gone, they could do nothing but cower behind the ramparts, barely holding their ground.

They had lost the power to fight back.

And soon enough, the vanguard of the elven forces finally reached the base of the Golden Canopy Tribe’s walls.

From a bird’s-eye view, the entire settlement was now engulfed by a sea of elves, their formations closing in like the jaws of a relentless beast.

The trebuchet attacks ceased, their purpose fulfilled. There was no longer a need for distant bombardment, as the final phase of the assault, which involved direct close-quarters combat, had begun.

Players rushed forward, lifting their ladders and hooking them onto the stronghold’s walls. Metal clanged against stone as the tanks, clad in heavy armor, scrambled up with unwavering determination.

At the same time, ballistae took aim at the watchtowers, their operators adjusting for precision before unleashing three-meter-long enchanted bolts. Each shot struck with devastating force, shattering wooden structures and systematically wiping out the orcs’ final defensive positions.

Meanwhile, at the city gate, a dozen players surrounded a massive battering ram, its frame inscribed with reinforcement and piercing enchantments. With coordinated movements, they drove it forward, slamming it relentlessly against the tribe’s main gate.

Bang… Bang… Bang…!

Each impact sent tremors through the iron-reinforced wood, splintering it bit by bit. The reverberating crashes echoed across the battlefield, ringing in the ears of the orcs like the tolling of a death knell.

The high priest, barely clinging to life, was helped to his feet by his subordinates. His body was on the verge of collapsing but he forced himself to stay conscious. Straining against the searing pain wracking his body, he clenched his fists and let out a desperate command:

“Stop those elves! Don’t let any of them climb up!”

“Defend the gate! Protect the gate at all costs!”

His voice was hoarse, barely more than a whisper, yet seeing their leader still standing despite his grave wounds, ignited a spark within his fellow tribesmen.

With renewed determination, they rushed toward the walls, gripping their weapons tightly, ready to resist with all they had left.

Alas, the fastest players had already managed to scaled the walls.

Leading the charge were a Silver-ranked tank.

Although this particular player had chosen the Guardian specialization, which had limited attack power, it made their defense incomparably terrifying, like a living titan as they rampaged across the walls.

The orcs were supposed to be physically stronger as their bodies were larger. Yet against these lumbering masses of metal fortresses layered with magical buffs, their weapons, whether spiked clubs or curved blades, might as well have been mere toys.

Once they collided with the heavy armor of these tanks, they failed to leave so much as a dent.

Led by Demacia, the tanks who climbed up first cut through the orc defense lines like a blade through paper. With them absorbing the brunt of the attacks, more and more players managed to climb onto the walls, before joining the brutal melee battle.

The clash of steel, the crackle of shattering spells, and the anguished cries of the fallen filled the air, merging with the relentless downpour.

The tanks at the front eventually fell, but before their weapons could even hit the ground, others had already surged forward to take their place, fighting without hesitation.

In that moment, none of them seemed to care about their own lives anymore, having become lunatics fighting to the death with only one goal.

—To breach the orc stronghold.

More and more players scale up the walls, their numbers swelling like an unstoppable tide. On the other hand, the orc ranks had descended into chaos.

Their formation by now was utterly broken.

In hindsight, this outcome was hardly surprising, as the players’ average level was simply too high for the Orcs to contend with.

Even the lowest-level public beta newcomers were already at Level 31, while countless max Level 40 Iron-rank veterans led the charge.

These level-capped Iron-rank players, alongside the few Silver-rankers, formed the razor-sharp edge of the elven army’s blade.

Compared to the orc warriors, who only averaged at around low to mid-Iron rank, the power gap between the two was insurmountable.

The entire battlefield had become a slaughterhouse.

But the ones being slaughtered… were the orcs.

What should have been a brutal melee had turned into a one-sided battle, with the orc defenses crumbling at a speed visible to the naked eye.

And then—

Boom!

A deafening explosion marked the climax of the battle.

The Golden Canopy Tribe’s main gate had finally fallen.

After countless battering strikes, the already fragile gate gave way, shattering under the combined might of brute force and magic.

A deafening roar erupted from the elven army.

Cheers and battle cries mixed together in a triumphant cacophony.

Abandoning the battering ram, the players surged forward like a tidal wave, pouring into the fortress with unstoppable momentum.

“This is bad…”

The high priest’s face turned deathly pale.

With their gate breached, it was as if a dam had burst.

Like a flood, players stormed into the stronghold, engaging in even fiercer combat with the orcs inside. The orcs’ Silver-ranked warriors rushed toward the entrance, desperately trying to halt the invasion.

There was no retreat left for them now.

“Kill them all!”

“For the tribe! For our home!”

The orcs roared, their morale surging once more as they threw themselves into the fray with reckless abandon.

Beneath the broken gates, the bloodiest melee yet had begun.

Even the near-dead high priest struggled to his feet, his breath ragged along with his vision swimming.

Burning the last embers of his life force, he unsheathed a long-unused curved blade, its edge gleaming faintly under the storm’s dim light.

Then with one last roar, he charged forward, wading into battle, determined to take as many enemies with him as he could before he met his demise.

The rain poured down in torrents.

Blood pooled on the muddy ground, turning it dark red—only to be washed away by the relentless downpour.

Yet the rain could not cleanse the battlefield fast enough.

The stench of blood now overpowered the fresh scent of rain.

Faced with annihilation, the remaining orcs fought with a ferocity born out of despair.

Many seasoned warriors, long trapped at a bottleneck in their strength, suddenly broke through in the heat of battle.

With bloodshot eyes and faces twisted in fury, the orcs roared and fought back against the players’ relentless charge.

However, rather than dampening the elves’ morale, the orcs’ desperate resistance only fueled the players’ excitement.

The orcs of the Golden Canopy Tribe were still too weak.

Even with their elite warriors achieving last-ditch breakthroughs, the players had even more elite fighters among their ranks.

With continuous healing support from priest-class players and their pain settings adjusted to the lowest, the players laughed maniacally, undeterred by injuries, fighting with even greater fervor.

The ground was littered with fallen equipment—some from the orcs, some from the fallen players—but far more belonged to the former.

As the battle raged on, the players’ forces pushed deeper and deeper into the heart of the Golden Canopy Tribe, their relentless advance carving a path of destruction through the orc stronghold.

Then, after a series of piercing dragon cries, several dragon knight players also joined the battlefield.

They descended from the stormy skies, their young dragons roaring as they dove into the fray. Attacking from behind, they cut off the orcs’ escape routes and coordinated with those who had stormed the gates, tightening the encirclement around their foes.

Each dragon knight player possessed the strength of a lower Silver-rank warrior.

Their dragons, having already broken through to the same level before the battle, only amplified their power.

Together, both rider and their dragon partner became an unstoppable force, turning the tide of battle almost instantly.

The orcs defending the gates crumbled beneath their assault, their desperate formations breaking apart under the crushing power of the airborne assault.

Within moments, the players seized control of the entrance.

Working in tandem with those holding the ramparts, they cut down the last of the defenders and swung open the other gates, throwing the stronghold wide open.

At that moment, the last obstacle to their victory had finally fallen.

With nothing left to hinder them, the Heart of Nature’s legion surged forward.

The players shouted and cheered, their voices rising in a triumphant chorus as they flooded into the Golden Canopy Tribe like an unstoppable tide.

Throughout the stronghold, the sound of clashing steel and dying roars echoed through the air, reverberating off the crumbling walls.

The battle had been decided.

༺⟐༻

The Desert of Death was a land that rarely experienced rainfall.

And that rain and snowstorm, which had blanketed the battlefield—a spectacle so rare it could be considered a once-in-a-decade event—swiftly came and went, lasting less than half a day before vanishing without a trace, as if it had never happened at all.

With the retreating storm, the battle, too, had drawn to its inevitable conclusion.

The once-deafening clash of weapons, the roars of warriors, and the cries of the fallen had faded into silence, leaving behind only the occasional clink of metal.

No longer the sounds of battle, but the telltale echoes of players scavenging through the conquered orc stronghold.

Armor scraped against stone as figures moved between the ruined buildings, rifling through weapons, artifacts, and anything of value.

The Golden Canopy Tribe had been completely conquered.

The blood-soaked ground, muddied by the rain, remained a dark, rust-red, untouched by the downpour, as if the earth itself refused to cleanse the remnants of battle.

Scattered across the battlefield were bloodstained weapons and shattered armor, discarded amidst the corpses of fallen warriors. Players moved swiftly between them, eagerly collecting anything of value, their hands sifting through the spoils of war.

The once-raging fires that had consumed the stronghold had finally died out, leaving behind only faint wisps of white smoke curling lazily into the sky, like the final breath of a dying beast.

The air was thick with the stench of blood and damp earth, a suffocating reminder of the carnage that had unfolded mere moments ago.

In the heart of the stronghold, within the central plaza, over a thousand orcs sat huddled together, heads bowed.

These were the only survivors—their fate now sealed as prisoners of the players.

Stripped of their weapons, armor, and pride, they were all that remained of their once-mighty tribe.

From this day forward, the Golden Canopy Tribe would become mere anecdotes in the annals of history.

Li Mu walked through the mud-caked streets before arriving at the tribe’s shrine tent.

This was the settlement’s most sacred place, enshrining the holy statue of Uller.

So far, it had yet to be looted by the players.

As the leading figure in this attack, his guild, Heart of Nature, had claimed everything inside the shrine tent as their spoils of war.

Outside the tent, countless orc corpses lay strewn across the blood-soaked ground.

Each bore horrific wounds—gaping slashes, punctures, and seared flesh.

There must have been hundreds of them.

These were the ones who had fought to the bitter end, choosing death over being captured.

They had refused to fall under the players’ blades, and in their final moments had taken their own lives instead. Thus preventing their bodies from disintegrating into ashes.

Among them, Li Mu spotted a familiar figure—the high priest of Golden Canopy Tribe.

The old priest who had fought to his last breath.

His body was mangled beyond recognition.

Only his eyes remained clear—wide open, staring into the sky, still filled with rage and defiance.

Even in death, his hands clutched his weapon tightly.

For reasons he couldn’t quite fathom, Li Mu suddenly recalled High Priest Jushan of the Caverock Tribe from his early days…

He let out a quiet sigh.

With practiced ease, he collected the old priest’s weapon and ceremonial robes, then chanted a spell, summoning flames to cremate the body completely before performing the same honorary rites, just as he had done back then.

Next, he disabled the BGM with orchestral vocal soundtrack and instead, only allowed the environmental ambient sounds of the desert play in his ears.

Hearing the natural whisper of the wind over endless sands, along with the distant crackle of lone smoke rising from unseen dunes over a desolate horizon, Li Mu suddenly felt the vicissitudes of time and the weight of history’s endless cycle.

The storm clouds had dispersed along with the setting sun, which cast its golden light across the battlefield.

A rainbow arched across the sky, refracting through the lingering mist.

From a distance, he could hear the laughter and shouts of his fellow guild members celebrating, intertwined with the wails of the surviving orcs.

Seeing such contrasting scenes of joy and sorrow, Li Mu lowered his gaze, a deeper melancholy settling within his expression.

“So this is… war.”

He murmured softly, remembering a certain phrase from earth.

There is no right or wrong in war,

Only different standpoints.

— 517 —

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