Before they could join the battle, the Long Ears tribe were watching, dumbstruck as the ranks of the Hyena-men crumbled directly, beaten by the Players who were less than a tenth of their number.
It wasn’t just the cannon-fodders either—even the ranked Hyena-men crumbled when they realized that the Players could see through their identity and attacked them with inch-precision, and that they were no longer the hunters but the hunted.
Morale of the entire Hyena-men army kept dropping, reducing them to losers ruled by fear with no chance of salvaging the situation.
Now, both cannon-fodders and ranked were running as fast as they could while cursing why they didn’t have an extra pair of feet.
Most of the Players saw the timing and stopped advancing to clean up the battlefield. The reason they were sparing the Hyena-men was naturally not because of something nonsensical like ‘the heavens smile upon the merciful, but because…
Those Hyena-men were so freaking poor! The Players had managed to take down more than two hundred of them in that brief battle but their item drops just a handful, with most of them being drops from ranked Hyena-men.
Whatever few Players who were chasing the Hyena-men would naturally ignore the cannon-fodder, and probably chasing down the ranked ones.
Still, Rangka, elder of the Long Ears had never seen such a battle.
Battle on the plains—or indeed battles between nonhumans had always been limited to armed confrontation between tribes. The victors had always been those who were stronger, fitter and numerous.
The Players, however, had completely destroyed that rule which had been common sense and dragged towards the direction of the illogical, displaying overwhelming might.
Rangka couldn’t help but feel lucky that he wasn’t a part of the Hyena-men when he saw the sad ending of the Hyena-men, and find wisdom in his chief’s foresight.
He turned towards the Players, his eyes getting warmer when he looked at them—especially Zonyan, their leader. Being able to get into friendly terms with the humans of another continent was the Long Ears chance for a revival!
It was time to really consider how they should swear fealty to Zonyan Grayclaw.
***
Hyaena, the tribal chieftain of the Hyena-men simply couldn’t understand what just happened.
The Hyena-men were eight-hundred strong until they charged at the Long Ears’ village a moment ago, five hundred of which were strapping youth ready for a fight. In fact, they were the third strongest tribe in the Vierlin Plains, next to the Graywolfmen and the Leos!
And yet, one direct confrontation led to severe casualties, and even those who survive would probably had lost their edge as warriors and could no longer develop.
What actually happened? They were facing just over a dozen people—feeble humans they usually thought nothing of at that. But somehow the most powerful warriors of the Hyena-men were now slain in such ease, even chasing him, the King Hyena-man over more than ten miles!
Yes. He was not merely a ranked Hyena-men but one who would only appear amongst his tribe once every few centuries, an individual able to unleash the full-power of all Hyena-men serving him and lead them to new heights: King Hyena-man, who stood above the rest of his tribe!
He had thought that the Hyena-men would rise to the peak above all other nonhumans like the legends foretold, but he never imagined that someone so frightening like Swordtail would amongst the Grayclaw tribe.
Not even Hyaena would dare to resist him being what he was—and it wasn’t out of mismatched power, but it was simply crushed in spirit.
And though Hyaena had assumed that its tribe could at least take second place, the Mountain Tiger tribe had suddenly gained strength over the last two years, with several heirs awakening their ancient warrior bloodlines…
Now, having lost so many ranked warriors, whatever was left of the Hyena-men would never be able to oppress the Graywolfman beneath them, and their tribe were probably going to drop from third to fourth.
“What the hell are they!” Hyaena seethed.
“Aren’t they humans?” A retainer said softly.
“You call those monster humans?” Hyaena turned to glare fiercely at the retainer. “Don’t tell me you never preyed on humans! We would’ve been extinct if their kind were that powerful!?”
“Could they be ‘bishops’?” The retainer suggested, still speaking softly.
“I have not fought a human bishop before, but it had been said that such champions aren’t many amongst the humans. Or what, every single one of those humans were bishops?” Hyaena calmed down at that, and began to consider what kind of creature was it that inflicted such horrific losses upon him.
But suddenly, he sensed something approaching—he looked up to find that it was an envoy of the Mountain Tiger tribe.
The Tigerman’s body was concealed beneath a cloak, revealing only the signature furry face of his kind. Slightly frowning, he growled. “How sad, Hyaena. That look on your face is so terrible.”
“Your tribe misinformed us!” Hyaena’s lips parted to expose the canine teeth beneath as he bellowed angrily in return. “Those things that showed up at the Long Ears’ village are definitely not human! They are far more powerful than any normal humans!”
“But that doesn’t hide your failure and incompetence.” The envoy icily retorted.
“Are you looking for a fight?” Hyaena charge his King Hyena-man ability that resembled magic, immediately calling every Hyena-man to him and discreetly surrounding the envoy.
The envoy, however, remained unconcerned even when he saw that the Hyena-men were glaring fiercely at him, their enmity almost materializing.
“Trust me, you wouldn’t want to fight me.”
Hyaena said nothing. The two merely stood off against each other while the air grew heavier.
That was when the figures of two Players—one skinny, one fat—appeared behind them.
“Aha! I knew it! Look, Silva—there’s still elites here!” The fat one cheerfully dashed up at the nonhumans.
“As expected of you, Brother Terrosche!” The skinny one praised sincerely while keeping up.
Hyaena’s face dropped at the sight of those two.
Even if there was only two of them, he was too traumatized to underestimate them.
And yet, the envoy from the Mountain Tiger tribe sneered darkly and suddenly moved.
In the next split second, he reappeared in front of the two Players—in two flashes of crimson, the two Players stopped completely.
“Silva, oh Silva! There’s actually a Boss here! And it’s a Hyena-man who doesn’t look thrifty!” The fat Player exclaimed cheerfully, his eyes fixed on the Tigerman envoy even though he had been cut in two from the hip, with his upper body dropping to the ground.
“Brother Terrosche, I’m split apart!” The skinny one named Silva was split in two as well, but down the middle.
And then they were dead.
The Tigerman envoy who wanted to show off his power to threaten the ignorant Hyena-men was silent.
There definitely was something wrong with those two humans.
Why are they behaving as if they had found treasure when he killed them?
And they died looking so overjoyed…
