Ch. 38 - Fatal Oversight
The moment the 'sun' fell, all sounds ceased.
Everything seemed to disappear.
A faint ringing filled his ears, drowning out all else. After what felt like an eternity, sounds finally returned, but they had melded into an indistinguishable cacophony.
Yet within the dizziness and blurred vision, that noise gradually became orderly and uniform.
Even Starshine's body trembled along with it.
"Rumble, rumble—"
The tremors were far more intense and heavy than a troll's footsteps.
Some even more massive creature must be slowly approaching in his direction.
He slapped himself on the head, trying to force himself awake—
In the instant the sea of flames erupted and fire swept across the earth.
Realizing he was about to be burned to ash, Starshine used his last remaining spell slot.
Borrowing Misty Step, he transformed into a silvery-white, thin wisp of smoke, nearly merging with the forest's layered illusions.
In the blink of an eye, he drifted thirty feet away to beside a tent, not even touched by a spark.
But the flames detonated the fire gel near the campfire, along with every other flammable item.
The chain explosions, combined with the Fireball's roar, still damaged his eardrums.
Now barely recovering his senses, only one thought remained in his head—
Flee!
For spellcasters, once they reach the realm of third-circle spells, their status and position undergo a fundamental transformation.
The Fireball came like a meteor, so sudden that few mercenaries could react.
Now with flames searing their faces and their red-hot armor clinging with scorching heat, most could only wail in the fire, losing all combat capability.
Those who narrowly avoided the flames fled desperately beyond the sea of fire.
A single spell had routed the previously valiant mercenaries into complete disarray.
Spellcasters were just that unreasonable.
And that trembling sound drew ever closer.
Through the re-condensing mist, a towering figure gradually revealed itself.
Because it was massive enough, and slow enough.
Its true form couldn't yet be glimpsed.
One could only hear from afar, accompanying that figure's advance, the thunderous drumming and roaring war cries:
"Huh, ha!"
"Huh, ha!"
"Huh, ha!"
Whatever was hidden within that shadow was something Starshine had never encountered and had no power to resist.
As he turned without hesitation and fled toward his tent, Explosivewolf's shout beside his ear sent chills down his spine:
"It's orcs—it's a damn orc tribe!
Everyone, retreat—retreat into the forest!
How the hell did they appear in this godforsaken place!?"
The Lord's Alliance was a fragile treaty on the eastern coast of the Forgotten Continent, uniting independent city-states through trade, diplomacy, and strategic cooperation.
The reason these city-states could maintain this tenuous agreement wasn't because the lords were particularly noble or unwilling to encroach on other cities' territories.
It was solely because of that southern battle line—
In the thousand years since history was lost, war on the continent had never ceased.
It wasn't just about the rise and fall of power, but filled with racial hatred.
Orcs—these green-skinned creatures as ugly as wild boars, as vicious as jackals, and as fierce as tigers—had never stopped their desire for conquest and slaughter.
They abducted women of all races, forcing them to bear new warriors to strengthen their tribes during their nomadic lives, turning everything into a sea of carnage and blood—
From a value perspective, violence and slaughter were their 'aesthetic.'
This was something most races couldn't accept.
The Lord's Alliance's primary tenet was to keep them beyond the border wall at all costs, in exchange for internal peace.
And Explosivewolf was a warrior who had truly participated in the southern defensive campaign—
Naturally, for generous rewards.
Though the mercenaries around him were no longer the same brothers from back then.
His fear of orcs had never ceased for even a moment:
"How could they possibly cross the wall and migrate thousands of miles to Dawnmist Forest!?"
Their appearance was enough to explain that vanguard composed of goblins and trolls.
Only orcs could enslave them and use them as cannon fodder.
But this proved they were a complete tribe, not scattered deserters.
Unless the major cities in the south had been crushed to rubble and the druid tribes in the forest slaughtered to extinction, there was no reason for them to appear in this forest!
They couldn't even navigate in the forest.
Why did they happen to stumble upon this returning caravan while lost?
Explosivewolf finally understood how several of his brothers had gone missing.
The facts defied common sense.
But there was no time to think.
In his haste, Explosivewolf grabbed the merchant and his servant who had fled in panic from the Fireball's explosion, staring into Melade's eyes as he commanded:
"Use that eye on your shoulder to lead us back!"
"Mercenary, watch your—"
Steward Huss stepped forward, but before he could finish, Explosivewolf punched him to the ground.
"Don't fucking make me repeat myself a second fucking time!"
Melade was also terrified.
He was just an ordinary noble who thought this would be a safe vacation, no different from previous years.
That he hadn't pissed himself already showed considerable courage:
"Okay, okay—the town, the town... is over there!"
He patted the bottled eyeball on his shoulder, waiting for it to spiral up and fly toward the forest on the left—
Affected by the mist, that wasn't the 'return route' in their memory, but Explosivewolf wouldn't question a construct.
He called to the brothers who could still move.
As for the severely wounded...
May they have good luck:
"And Starshine... damn it, where is he? Forget it—everyone follow me!"
That giant shadow in the fog moved slowly, with only the orcs' war cries drawing near, meaning they still had a chance to escape.
As for the missing Starshine he mentioned, the young man wasn't fleeing blindly.
The young mage was now rushing back to his private tent to retrieve his dimensional bag—
It contained some food, materials, and all his research on spells.
It also included a third-circle spell, the key to his future advancement.
He was a scholar. Knowledge was his most precious possession and absolutely couldn't be lost.
That tent was deliberately pitched in a remote location. As long as he hid properly and the mist provided cover, there should still be time...
This wasn't wishful thinking, but a judgment Starshine made after calculating the tribe's advance speed and assessing his available resources and mobility.
Like a neat formula.
The answer was 'retrieve the dimensional bag and leave safely.'
Listing all known elements before him and analyzing them would naturally yield a perfect result matching the answer.
Unless.
Some factor he overlooked appeared—
When Starshine burst into the tent and saw his belongings neatly stacked.
Realizing the two prisoners seemed to have fled the Fireball and hadn't yet reached the tent, he first breathed a sigh of relief.
Then, not daring to delay, he hurried to pick up the dimensional bag in the corner and that precious curved blade.
But then he realized:
"The blade is gone?"
This meant someone had already entered the tent...
"Not good!"
He cried out and was about to turn and flee.
"Schwick—"
A pitch-black curved blade suddenly pierced through his chest.
"Human, destroy!"
Beside his ear rang a kobold's sinister and furious hiss,
"My treasure!"
When caught at close range, spellcasters were always vulnerable.
Especially spellcasters who had exhausted their spell slots.
Starshine collapsed to the ground, a feeling of weakness invading his entire body.
He realized death was imminent, and fear made him tremble uncontrollably.
Once upon a time, he had envisioned his own death.
Imagined he would write legends during his adventures and die with dignity.
Imagined he would be eroded by time on his path of research, dying of old age.
But he never imagined he would die at the hands of a kobold—
They were so weak.
Even their scales should be ground into powder, becoming insignificant spell components in his hands.
More ridiculous still, he couldn't even remember when he had destroyed this kobold's treasure.
In his eyes, treasures were treasures.
They were wondrous items, magic, knowledge.
Not just a stick.
Just as Kuru couldn't understand why what it considered a treasure was worthless in others' eyes.
Starshine would never understand why a kobold would consider this worthless staff so important.
Because he didn't understand, he didn't care.
So when the outcome went wrong, this erudite tactician.
Starshine in the adventurers' eyes.
Couldn't even realize that overlooked critical factor...
And it was fatal.
The young mage stared blankly, perhaps never able to close his eyes in peace.
Letting his breath fade in incomprehension, until in unwillingness, he reached life's end.
The kobold cautiously hacked at the corpse. After confirming it was truly dead, it grabbed the dimensional bag to leave.
Outside the tent, however, an argument suddenly arose—