My Players Are So Fierce - Chapter 385

Chapter 385: Death Town in the Foul Swamp

Hog and his barbarian troops were venturing close to this swamp town for the first time, but they hadn’t just discovered it.

In fact, two days after Murphy asked Hog to send scouts into the swamp, the Blood Claw Chieftain had already received intelligence reports about this town.

It was situated near a muddy pit in the Foul Swamp close to Transia, perfectly positioned on the road leading to the Baroness of Shadow. To its east lay the only mountain pass leading to the “forbidden zone” in the depths of Foul Swamp that people feared. This terrain perfectly controlled the route from Transia through the swamp to the Dark Mountains.

This was enough to make one suspect whether these Gnoll sorcerers had planned all this from the beginning.

Moreover, this “Plague Town” wasn’t a small outpost. Just from its appearance, this gloomy place was about one-fifth the size of what Kadman City used to be.

Most of the town’s buildings were tents built of wood on stone ruin foundations, making it look like a cluster of stilted houses or bamboo dwellings. Vines grown from swamp trees twisted by spirit energy connected the buildings like bridges, creating a poorly designed three-dimensional swamp maze.

Additionally, the plague sorcerers had placed certain foul spirit energy curse formations here, creating a layer of “fog of war” of gray-black smoke surrounding the town and sky to prevent spying and reconnaissance.

In the dim light, this small town looked like a strange and sickly thing formed by a tangled mess when viewed from afar.

If there were a little player here, they would surely exclaim “holy crap, isn’t this just a dark swamp version of ‘Treasure Bay’?”

It’s really hard to imagine how much manpower and resources these Gnoll plague sorcerers spent to create such an unreasonable building in this godforsaken place. But considering Bella the Corpse Mage’s testimony, this swamp town already existed when he was awakened three years ago.

This indicates that the Dark Mountain Gnoll sorcerers had been staying in the Foul Swamp much longer than it appeared.

They had been searching for King Gnawbone’s secret treasure here for years without progress, even becoming desperate enough to venture into the lair of the most dangerous legendary creature in the Foul Swamp.

From this perspective, these Gnoll sorcerers were actually poor wage slaves, given an impossible task by their shameless superiors.

Worse still, in another world, the worst that could happen for failing at work was getting your pay docked, but here, if they couldn’t find that lost treasure, even if these Gnoll sorcerers could escape back to the Dark Mountains, given the Gnolls’ overly “wild” cultural style, their fate definitely wouldn’t be good.

For all these reasons, when Hog approached the plague town with several trusted barbarian soldiers, what he saw was large numbers of evil voodoo-enhanced skeleton armies and zombies guarding the town’s perimeter.

The defense was so tight that Hog couldn’t even get close to the first sentry post before being discovered by a Corpse Mage.

In the tremors of cold spirit energy, hundreds of skeletons rushed out from hiding places concealed by the dark barrier, almost instantly surrounding Hog and his guards.

Faced with bone spears and bone knives radiating cold air all around, plus the charging corrosive rays and gleaming bone arrows in the Corpse Mage’s hands up front, even the flexible Chieftain didn’t plan to show his bravery.

He immediately raised both paws and shouted “surrender” in Dark Mountain-accented Gnoll language, while Nash beside him followed suit with loud howls.

He even kicked a Gnoll barbarian soldier who was preparing to defend himself with weapons, making these burly fellows be sensible and quickly drop their weapons to avoid angering their overly powerful arrogant kinsmen.

As a result, Hog’s “swift and clean” response actually confused the Corpse Mage on the other side.

He had seen Gnolls who would surrender before.

But he had never seen someone surrender so smoothly and cowardly. Look at his raised hands and that sneaky, disgraceful appearance – hey, are you really a Gnoll and not a Kobold?

“I surrender! We mean no harm! We are loyal subjects of King Kenport, bringing first-hand war reports from Transia for the great plague sorcerer lords here!

You!

Quick, let us through.”

Hog shouted, his ugly face full of fear and anxiety, perfectly portraying the image of a lackey who had encountered trouble and urgently needed help.

But the Corpse Mage didn’t have such rich emotional fluctuations.

He just coldly looked at the Gnoll before him, and didn’t order the poisonous skeletons surrounding them to withdraw.

However, the jumping blue spirit flame under his hood indicated he was reporting what was happening here to the Gnoll sorcerers in town.

Seeing that the other side hadn’t immediately attacked made Hog feel relieved, but this also verified one of his guesses, that the Gnolls here must have a connection with Kenport.

At the very least they knew each other.

His calling out Kenport’s name just now was equivalent to speaking a “safe word” that would prevent him from being attacked.

The Corpse Mage still hadn’t moved, and the surrounded Hog didn’t dare move either to avoid triggering some bad consequences, but he still used his eyes to look around and observe, trying to learn more about this plague town’s defenses this way.

To avoid exposing their “identity”, before coming here Hog and his deputy Nash had hidden away their computation beads.

That thing was a spirit energy item, and probably couldn’t fool the Gnoll sorcerers’ keen perception.

And if Hog had learned any lesson from Kenport’s defeat, it must be to be careful, careful, and careful again in such life-and-death matters.

In Murphy’s words, this isn’t being cowardly!

This is just being responsible for your one and only life, only fools would gamble with luck on matters of life and death.

During the uncomfortable wait, Hog barely managed to note down the patrol routes of several skeleton armies at the front of the town. Their unique construction allowed them to move through the swamp as if on flat ground, and each patrol’s size of up to 50 men made them capable of facing any form of ambush.

There were quite a few Corpse Mages in command too. Hog also discovered that those leading these skeleton armies were all tall Netherworld Knights wearing black heavy armor and riding skeleton warhorses.

Just from these visible parts one could see how strong this swamp town’s defenses were, and Hog could be certain that the Gnoll sorcerers must have arranged some methods he couldn’t see.

These fellows had practically built a “secret kingdom” in the swamp. They could control corpses and were stationed in the Foul Swamp that had experienced countless bitter battles throughout history, which meant they had almost endless and uncomplaining perfect manpower to use.

“Not easy to fight,”

Hog secretly marveled in his heart.

Although he had no doubts about the warriors of Lord Murphy’s belligerence and bravery, what was before his eyes seemed somewhat too thorny even for undead warriors.

If he were commanding this raid, what would he need to do?

The Blood Claw Chieftain’s mind rapidly pondered this question, treating it as a brainstorm during the boring wait.

Professor Malcolm who taught him history had said that the brain is something that needs frequent use, the more you use it the better it gets, otherwise even the most excellent initial wisdom would quickly decline due to excessive laziness.

Hog could stay very patient.

But the few barbarian guards beside him were becoming somewhat impatient.

Especially after the waiting time stretched to 20 minutes, several hot-tempered fellows had already started whispering and staring at the wooden-like Corpse Mage before them with unfriendly gazes, as if considering from which spot to cut to make this hateful fellow die painfully?

No, that’s not right to say.

The Corpse Mages were already dead and couldn’t die again. Even if they were really cut down it would just be entertainment during boredom for them.

While Hog was lost in thought, his deputy Nash was also observing the surroundings.

But unlike Hog who was thinking about how to lead his clansmen to take this town, Nash was considering more practical issues:

If their true identities were discovered by the Gnoll sorcerers, which route should they take to escape the fastest? And if that really happened, could they actually escape?

Although Nash knew his chieftain definitely had some secret relationship with the newly crowned King of Transia, he after all didn’t have an intuitive understanding of the players’ combat power. He didn’t think the vampires of Transia had any advantages against this fortress-like swamp town before them.

“Chieftain, someone’s coming from up ahead!”

After waiting a few more minutes, Nash carefully nudged Hog, waking him from his thoughts.

The chieftain looked up to see a Gnoll guard riding a dire wolf galloping out from the town.

He wore a full set of chain mail that was very luxurious by Gnoll standards, wore a helmet that could protect his eyes, carried an imposing beheading greatsword on his back, clearly an elite.

Hog keenly noticed that the bone decorations and leather armor patterns on this fellow’s dire wolf were identical to those on Kenport’s dire wolf, and he realized this one was also a vanguard from the Gnawbone Clan. When the other approached, Hog’s eyes turned and he decided to take a gamble.

He howled and pounced forward, startling even the other Gnoll’s mount. The latter instinctively gripped the flail in his mount’s saddlebag.

But then he saw the skinny Gnoll before him fall to the ground, screaming in a hoarse voice:

“My lord! King Kenport died so tragically, his head is still hanging on the gate tower of Crimson Citadel, those savage vampires view it as a proud trophy.

You must avenge the wise and mighty King Kenport!”

“Get up first! Disgraceful fellow.”

How could the Gnoll vanguard captain on the dire wolf have seen such a scene? They don’t do things this way in the Dark Mountains either, but such a disgraceful posture was clearly from a Transian coward!

Indeed, the clan’s rumors were all true!

The great King Gnawbone brought the Gnoll bloodline to various parts of the continent, but other Gnolls became far inferior to the orthodox Gnolls of the Dark Mountains in both physique and will due to being far from holy land.

Look at this disgraceful posture!

Look at this weak wailing!

Pah, he was simply ashamed to associate with such fellows, their existence simply defiled the name of Gnoll that should be full of power.

However, this fellow wasn’t without merits.

The Gnawbone vanguard captain looked down at Hog with disdain, thinking in his heart:

“Daring to run here to report and seek help at the risk of being torn apart by the skeleton army, it seems this weak fellow’s loyalty is there. That arrogant fool Kenport did quite well in Transia. Although he was defeated and died due to underestimating the enemy, he actually managed to train such loyal servants.

I underestimated that bastard before.”

“Get up!”

The vanguard captain barked in the Gnolls’ hoarse tone:

“Follow me in, Lord Flesh Render wants to see you, to ask you some things. You must report truthfully, Lord Flesh Render is General Kenport’s closest friend, you must tell him all the details of Kenport’s death.”

“Awooo, alright! I’m ready to report all the stories of that night to Lord Flesh Render.”

Upon hearing he could enter the town, Hog immediately felt delighted in his heart.

He hurriedly got up and followed behind the Gnoll vanguard captain with a hunched back. The other allowed him to bring one servant, so the clever Nash was chosen to follow.

Hog used his eyes to signal him to look and listen as much as possible, Nash quickly nodded and shrank his head.

They followed the vanguard captain into the town. After passing through that strange gray-black mist, the true face of the plague town was completely revealed before Hog’s eyes. He was stunned to discover that two “mage towers” were also hidden in this mist.

Those were very classic human buildings, about 5 stories high, with outer walls already covered in moss and ivy-like plants, giving these faded towers a sense of heavy passage of time.

But such things definitely weren’t built by Gnoll sorcerers, which means these two towers were originally here, and the Gnolls found them and established this town with the two abandoned mage towers as the core.

Hog looked left and right, he quickly discovered that skeleton armies were constantly sending some corpses wrapped in mud into the tower on the left, while “newly manufactured” animated skeletons walked out in lines. A layer of phosphoric fire-colored pale green light enveloped that tower, filling it with cold and strange ominous power.

“That’s the Construction Tower, where the sorcerers and priests specially make skeleton armies and resurrect the dead. It’s also our barracks here.”

The guiding Gnoll vanguard noticed Hog and Nash’s curious gazes. With a sense of mockery and cruelty, he intimidated the two “country bumpkins”:

“If you dare steal anything or break rules in town again, that place will be your final destination.”

“We wouldn’t dare, we wouldn’t dare, how could we lowborn from Transia have such courage?”

Hog replied with a fawning smile, but the vanguard captain just snorted without responding, his arrogant manner exactly like it was cut from the same mold as Kenport.

The Blood Claw Chieftain felt this fellow before him already had a death flag, but he didn’t act rashly and chose to silently remember this grudge, while firmly memorizing the Construction Tower’s location before following him into the other tower under the vanguard’s urging.

This should be where the Gnoll sorcerers lived.

They had decorated it with “clan style”, using skull-adorned magical implements to divide different areas for different Gnoll sorcerers to use.

This was also Hog’s first time seeing real “Gnoll sorcerers”. Their dress wasn’t much different from those human cultists, all using full-coverage black hoods to cover their entire bodies, only exposing a grim face.

But even though Hog wasn’t proficient in spirit energy, he could feel very obvious spirit energy fluctuations from these silent fellows. Most importantly, because most of the spirit energy used by Gnolls was classified in the realm of “evil magic”, long-term use of such wild magic would always leave these sorcerers with various injuries.

Hog even saw one with only one-third of a face left, the rest being mummified face.

That dog thing even smiled at him, clearly trying to scare him on purpose.

Hog wasn’t scared.

But Nash was so scared his tail went straight and all his mane stood up quite comically.

There were quite a few sorcerers here. Hog climbed all the way to the top floor, seeing at least 40 Gnoll sorcerers along the way and twice that number of servant Corpse Mages. However, on the highest floor of this mage tower, the area where Lord Flesh Render, the leader of this sorcerer clan resided, was very spacious.

The huge top floor was occupied by him alone, with his laboratory, dissection table, prayer room and monitoring orbs all placed here… Wait! Monitoring orbs?

Hog was shocked!

How did he know about monitoring orbs? He had never seen them before, not even heard of such things! What was wrong with his brain?

Had he awakened some amazing ability?

Come to think of it, he did seem a bit strange today. He hadn’t noticed earlier, but thinking back now, his thoughts had been particularly active since entering the swamp, as if he had thrown away his old brain and grown a better new one?

“Only noticed now? You really are a slow fellow.”

Murphy’s voice faintly sounded in Hog’s mind the next second, startling him so much he almost jumped up, but he managed to suppress his shock with his mind that had seen great storms.

Then he heard Murphy say to him:

“Don’t be afraid, this ‘Scout’s Eye’ technique is being personally maintained by Grand Duchess Tris. Unless this Gnoll sorcerer before you is a Spirit Sovereign, you don’t need to worry about being exposed.

Your eyes are my eyes, Hog.

Now, finish this reconnaissance, my ‘Eye of Insight’, I will reward you!”