[Unlocking... Consuming one layer of role-playing progress. Unlocking weapon: Krieg entrenching tool.]
[Krieg entrenching tool: One of the Krieg's most commonly used weapons. Skilled in trench warfare, the Krieg made entrenching tools to dig through the hardest sand and soil to create trenches. The tool's edge is self-sharpening monomolecular structure. If the weapon is damaged, it will refresh after one day.]
Evan suddenly felt his waist grow heavy. Looking down, a folded entrenching tool had somehow appeared hanging from his belt.
He silently took down the shovel, skillfully flicked his wrist. The blade traced a cold gleam in the sunlight and locked into position with a click.
"Where'd that come from? Damn it, weren't we supposed to confiscate all weapons?"
Riding his warhorse on the hillside, the bald man's face darkened. That shovel had appeared out of nowhere, like magic. He hadn't seen where it was hidden at all.
And as a mercenary, he understood the difference between unarmed and armed was night and day.
"Ha! This lunatic's going to fight us with a peasant's farming tool?"
But the scarred soldier didn't care at all. He laughed so hard he doubled over, waving at the goblins.
"Go! Leave me a leg as a souvenir!"
Whether he could actually command these little monsters or these bloodthirsty things just couldn't wait to feast and release their cruel instincts, over a hundred goblins let out piercing laughter, surging forward like a green tide.
These goblins averaged about four feet tall, similar to human children. Their muscle mass didn't look high either. Most were skin and bones. But basically all of them had weapons. Once they got close, they'd be hard to deal with.
Evan held the shovel horizontally before his chest. The breathing beneath his gas mask became regular and heavy.
Krieg combat memories flowed through his entire body like electric current. This wasn't an ordinary entrenching tool, but a monomolecular weapon that could cut through Ceramite. And he'd already swung it thousands upon thousands of times.
"A shovel? You... alright then! Better than waiting to die..."
Rowena froze for a moment, but seeing Evan maintain a combat stance, she also gritted her teeth and came back from despair. She randomly picked up a rock from the ground and hid behind Evan.
The instant the first goblin jumped up, Evan sidestepped and swung the shovel. The green head traced an arc through the air. Foul blood shattered into spray on the blade. The second pouncing monster had its chest caved in by the flat of the shovel. The third got the shovel point precisely driven into its eye socket.
But these monsters didn't seem to retreat because of death. Instead, two of them took advantage of the opening while he was swinging the entrenching tool, screaming as they jumped up from the ground left and right, swinging wooden spears toward his throat and under his ribs—
"Die!"
They could even speak some human syllables, though it sounded strange and broken. Evan temporarily didn't think about why he could understand another world's language. His body had already instinctively reacted.
Creak.
Evan expressionlessly caught one of the leaping goblins midair. Amid its screaming, he crushed its entire throat bone. The entrenching tool in his other hand traced a bright silver semicircle, severing both spear shaft and the green arm holding the spear.
Before the severed limb hit the ground, Evan's left leg shot out. The steel toe of his military boot slammed hard into that goblin's chest. With a dull sound of breaking bones, that small body flew backward like a cannonball, knocking over seven or eight of its kind rushing up behind.
Though these monsters numbered in the hundreds, they fell like wheat being harvested. The seemingly surging goblin assault broke against him like waves on rocks. Every flash of silver light came with the dull sound of severed limbs and short, piercing screams.
"Dear God..."
Rowena stared dumbfounded at that figure standing in the sea of blood. The not particularly tall man had completely become a silent, efficient killing machine, easily taking these monsters' lives as if he'd been honed on battlefields hundreds or thousands of times.
"Bunch of worthless..."
Not far away, Scar-face's wild laughter froze on his face. His warhorse stamped its hooves uneasily beneath him, letting out neighs, as if disturbed by that figure standing in the center of the blood-soaked battlefield.
But just as the killing proceeded steadily, a sharp bone whistle tore through the air.
The remaining goblins began scattering as if receiving amnesty. Visible fear appeared in their murky yellow eyeballs.
From deep in the burning village ruins, an even thicker stench spread. A hunched, deformed shadow stumbled out from thick smoke and flames.
It was a head taller than ordinary goblins. Its skeletal body was wrapped in a ragged, filthy robe covered in suspicious stains. On its head was a crown haphazardly assembled from various skulls.
In its claw-like hand, it gripped tightly a twisted bone staff. Bizarrely, living tree branches served as rope on the staff, binding a woman whose limbs had been severed but who still wailed. It was the same woman the scarred soldier had pushed out earlier.
Despite clearly fatal wounds, her limbs already cut off and eaten, her body was surrounded by some kind of strange green light, maintaining the most basic life signs.
As this shaman sang loudly in an incomprehensible language, constantly waving the bone staff, those branches suddenly came alive and drilled into that poor woman's ears.
Branches pierced out through her skull, jutted from her eye sockets, stringing those two windows to the soul together. The intense pain somehow caused an effect Evan completely didn't understand. The woman finally went mad from this extreme agony. Her screaming turned into pained laughter as waves of shadow circled its emaciated body.
What the hell? Some kind of alien psyker's blasphemous trick?
Evan immediately grew alert. The air clearly carried an additional strange oppressive feeling. Whatever it was, it wasn't good news for him.
"A goblin shaman! It's praying to the demon gods. After the sacrifice is offered, an Iron Rank spell will appear!"
Rowena's voice already carried terror, completely unlike her earlier casualness. Of course, that casualness was most likely faked. How could a fifteen or sixteen-year-old kid face death calmly?
Iron Rank spell? Sounded like the weakest category. But any power related to the supernatural absolutely couldn't be taken lightly. This was experience Evan had earned from surviving thirty-plus years on battlefields.
"I still have enough magic power for one invisibility spell. To be honest, I was planning to use it myself, but now I probably can't escape. I'll use it on you. See if you can..."
Despite being scared to death, she still used her badly shaking left hand to draw something in the air, muttering under her breath. A ghostly blue light gathered in her hand, but the speed was too slow. Who knew when she'd finish.
She was also a psyker?
Evan narrowed his eyes. Psyker wasn't quite the right term. This wasn't Warhammer anymore. It was more like some kind of Western fantasy world magic. Could everyone here use some magic? That wasn't impossible.
"When I die, you run. Take them with you. As far as possible."
Evan responded to the girl with a hoarse, brief sentence. He had only one goal: get all these people out alive. If sacrifice was necessary, then only he would die. After all, he could live one more time.
"Wait! I..."
Before the girl could speak, Evan gripped the entrenching tool tight and charged silently toward the enemy.
"This idiot. Survive. You have to survive..."
Watching Evan tear through the green tide like a reef shattering waves, Rowena bit her lower lip hard. For some reason, though this was their first meeting, she found herself praying for a complete stranger for the first time.
The entrenching tool became a lethal weapon in Evan's hands. Every thrust precisely pierced an ugly skull. Every horizontal slash brought up a rain of filthy blood. Goblin corpses fell along his charge path like wheat swept by a scythe.
Nothing could stop Evan's advance for even half a second.
Facing a true monster, monsters had to retreat. The fear in those goblins' eyes finally became tangible. They screamed, no longer daring to face this strange human who killed in utter silence.
The goblin shaman roared, forcibly gathering those fleeing goblins. It raised its bone staff high, pointing the staff head toward the sky. A dark green, mucus-like acid ball rapidly condensed, whistling downward with a pungent corrosive stench.
But Evan didn't retreat. Instead, he drove forward, suddenly plunging the entrenching tool deep into the blood-soaked earth before him.
His arm muscles bulged. He actually pried up a large chunk of dirt mixed with grass, soil, and goblin remains, letting the acid ball slam hard into this improvised shield.
A heart-stopping corrosion sound exploded instantly. The soil and grass bubbled and dissolved frantically under the dark green acid's erosion, turning into foul smoke.
A few goblin bone fragments were instantly eaten through with honeycomb holes. But this hasty shield ultimately deflected the acid ball's core impact. Most of the deadly acid splattered outward, corroding the surrounding ground full of pits and raising huge clouds of choking yellow-green smoke.
Though it caused no damage, the shaman let out a triumphant shriek. This kind of mist would make skin rot within seconds of contact, bringing uncontrolled severe pain and fear.
The bone staff rose again. That inexplicable power finally gathered and took shape. That poor woman's broken body was completely swallowed by darkness amid a mixture of crying and laughter. From the shaman's mouth, a tall monster was vomited out.
It seemed to be a creature with a bull's head and human body. Its body was a full six to nine feet tall. The shaman's mouth was a portal, slowly pulling its upper body into this world.
But right then came the sound of air being cut.
The hem of the military greatcoat snapped loudly. The cracked gas mask reflected leaping flames and the twisted monster's image.
Evan's charging momentum wasn't weakened by the toxic fog at all. When he was still five steps from the shaman, his right foot slammed the ground hard. His entire body shot into the air like a cannonball. The entrenching tool covered in filthy blood rose high. The blade reflected a heart-chilling cold gleam in the firelight.
No dodging, no avoiding. Clothes and flesh were both corroded by the toxic fog. Even his collar was dripping blood. But he still descended like death itself.
The shaman only had time to let out one short, terror-filled hiss. It completely hadn't expected someone would dare charge silently through this kind of fog.
Even crying out once, panicking for an instant from pain, would let the ritual complete.
Swish!
Silver light fell vertically!
Time seemed to freeze for an instant. The shaman's raised bone staff along with its skull crown were split precisely down the middle. Its hunched body froze in place, then slowly slid apart along that terrifyingly smooth cut.
Dark green organs and foul blood poured out like garbage from a torn bag, splashing onto the scorched earth.
That monster still being vomited from its mouth seemed to sense all this, desperately trying to crawl out from the mouth losing its life force.
Splat.
Evan's military boot stomped down hard. That dark shadow still wanted to resist, but couldn't withstand it. That head was instantly crushed to powder. The darkness surrounding the air suddenly vanished.
Dead silence.
Only the crackling of the burning village and the suppressed groans of the injured remained. The remaining goblins let out screams of extreme terror, fleeing into the forest depths on hands and knees, never daring to look back.
[Heretics should tremble and beg for survival under humanity's will, and Krieg's will eternally shines among the stars. Role-playing progress +80%.]
Not bad rewards. Soon another layer.
Evan slowly raised his head, trying to stand straight, but his body uncontrollably half-knelt on the ground.
Damn, that hurt like hell.
Krieg uniforms sealed well, but there were still exposed parts. That pain was no joke. Even his muscles were nearly melting into bloody water.
"My chance!"
Scar-face soldier was somehow already charging over with a vicious grin on his galloping horse, his longsword thrusting straight at Evan's completely unguarded back with the momentum of the charge.
"Watch out!"
Rowena's terrified voice rang out simultaneously.
At this critical moment, combat reflexes carved into Krieg bone forcibly suppressed the intense pain in his brain. Evan didn't even turn around. Using his left foot as an axis, he violently twisted his body. The entrenching tool swept out with the force of his entire body's rotation.
Crack!
The iron shield exploded. Scar-face only felt an irresistible tremendous force transmit from the shield. His wrist let out an overburdened groan. He was nearly thrown from the saddle. He could only hastily throw the longsword in his hand randomly.
But he was still a step too late.
Splat.
The longsword pierced precisely into Evan's lower abdomen.