Genius Archer’s Streaming - Chapter 820
—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————
The Genius Archer’s Streaming Season 3 Episode 290
94. Vanguard (3)
Clop! Clop!
Atop his horse cutting through the wind, I glanced back briefly.
‘This much should be enough….’
The enemy’s archer unit was no longer functional, even if not completely annihilated.
I had to choose whether to push forward to the bitter end or preserve my soldiers and retreat.
My gaze swept across the soldiers.
They all looked like they were about to collapse, but they were still breathing.
“Then a bit more….”
“Now! Now go! Please!”
“….”
Danggeun screamed from behind as if begging for mercy.
I immediately understood what she wanted.
“Everyone’s at their limit! We need to regroup and return!”
Even if it’s a game, dodging spears thrust madly from mounted cavalry while firing arrows at enemies? It’s possible with advanced training, but only for a moment. Maintaining this continuously was impossible.
‘That bastard keeps doing what only he can do.’
From Danggeun’s perspective, the soldiers’ exhaustion partly stemmed from keeping pace with my tempo.
Because I held the vanguard, all pacing standards were based on me.
Needless to say, ordinary humans cannot maintain such a tempo for long.
“It was practically insane from the start!”
In fact, she had believed this operation was impossible from the beginning.
“But it worked, didn’t it?”
This response left her speechless.
‘Yet he did it….’
Danggeun gazed at the now-empty enemy archer encampment and marveled inwardly, but only inwardly.
If she voiced such admiration aloud, there was no telling how much more confidence I might gain.
‘Could we push further?’
But amid all this, Danggeun found herself reconsidering my suggestion.
Even she was shaken by that tremendous confidence.
Thud!
Had one of the mounted archers following behind not been pierced by a spear and thrown from his horse, she might have been swayed once more.
‘No. What was I thinking….’
The situation they faced was far too dire for such complacent thoughts.
“No! We have to go!”
Danggeun screamed with all her conviction.
“Roger.”
A nod.
Even the most brilliant strategist heeds their advisor’s counsel. With that thought, I turned my horse toward the escape route.
With my bow slung completely across my back, I gripped the reins with both hands and urged my horse into a full gallop.
“Hyriaaaah!”
Clop clop! Clop clop!
The Cavalry Archer Unit swiftly navigated through the labyrinth, drawing closer to the exit.
‘Huh?’
At the edge of my vision, a peculiar cloud of dust rose up.
It wasn’t the level of dust that mere Soldiers would kick up.
‘Cavalry?’
A Cavalry unit was approaching them.
At the vanguard stood a Commander wielding a long crescent blade.
[Guan Yu]
The Assistant Commander had personally taken the field.
* * *
“Ahhh! They’re actually breaking out!?”
“Is it possible for them to escape!?”
“They’re actually surviving and getting out!?”
“They’ve infiltrated deep into enemy territory and are somehow extracting just the Archer unit and escaping!?”
-Insane
-If they pull this off the game’s literally over lol
-They’re actually getting out?
-Can’t they just block them?
As it seemed the Cavalry Archer Unit might actually escape alive, the Audience stirred with excitement.
“Ooooooh!”
“Are they getting out!? Go!”
“Get out of there!”
If the Mounted Archers escaped alive, Joseon would gain an overwhelming advantage.
Of course, escape didn’t look easy.
Youbi was gradually closing off the formation’s exits, and Spearmen moved frantically in all directions, making things as difficult as possible for the Mounted Archers.
But the Cavalry Archer Unit couldn’t simply charge through the Spearmen’s formation like heavy Cavalry would.
They had to find their way out through the constantly shifting labyrinth somehow.
And within that labyrinth, a pursuing force was chasing them down.
The path for the pursuers opened completely, while the path for the fleeing unit remained sealed.
Fortunately, since nearly all the Archers were already dead, there were barely any Mounted Archers dying from arrows at range.
“Ahhh, they’re just going in circles again!?”
They were still getting lost in the labyrinth.
“Uh, uh…!?”
“And now Cavalry is chasing them!”
Moreover, this labyrinth had an Enemy pursuing from behind.
“Guan Yu appeared!? The Assistant Commander showed up!? China’s Assistant Commanders are generally as strong as Tres!?”
“Ah yes! I’m aware they have tremendous combat power!”
Tres of Espana.
He was regarded as the Assistant Commander with the highest combat power. The very embodiment of a force-type Player.
China has two such warriors.
“But Tres’s weakness is that he has basically none!?”
Moreover, unlike Tres, these two possessed at least some command capability.
Among them, Guan Yu was the more skilled one.
“Yes. At least according to the power ranking analysis! That’s correct!”
“Right. But what good is the power ranking now!! Joseon is already in the semifinals!!”
-lmaooo
-Was Japan’s power ranking low too lol
-A Joseon player poisoned the power ranking.
-True lolol
-Hahahaha
-Power ranking analysis is broken~
“Ah, but they’re gradually catching up!?”
“It seems like the maze is a red-sided broken map! It’s moving only to suit Guan Yu! So it’s not easy to escape!!”
-Red-sided broken map lololol
-Red… red…? Oh no…
-Hahahahahaha
-Lmao
The numbers of the Cavalry Archer Unit were gradually decreasing.
Just as I was thinking that escaping might be impossible after all.
“Huh!?”
Suddenly, Almond at the very front spun his horse around 180 degrees.
“Whoa whoa whoa!?”
He charged forward, cutting across all the allied horses rushing toward him.
Following him, Danggeun did the same behind Almond, and Pangeo followed after her.
In an instant, the direction of advance reversed completely.
“If you do this!?”
“Just as the Caster mentioned earlier, the number of Spearmen is fixed, so the number of walls in the maze is fixed!? Right now all those walls are invested only in blocking the front of the Cavalry Archers!? The back is completely wide open!?”
The Spearmen could not move faster than horses.
They could only predict their movements from the larger flow and block them in advance.
But when they suddenly turn in the completely opposite direction, there’s no way to catch up.
Even if Youbi gives an order, it takes time to execute.
However, Youbi was not particularly concerned.
‘If they do this…’
There’s a pursuit squad following behind anyway.
If they run in that direction now, they’ll collide head-on with the pursuit squad, and the Spearmen can slowly tighten the noose again.
When that happens, they’ll eventually be sandwiched and driven into a dead end.
‘A terrible judgment at the final moment.’
The leader of the Cavalry Archer Unit was making a terrible decision right now.
“Wait, behind us!! Guan Yu was chasing us!?!”
“No, is this right!? Why are we charging straight into the pursuing force!?”
Moreover, the cavalry under Guan Yu’s command were the Liao Dynasty’s elite unit: the Iron Armored Cavalry.
They possessed exceptional defensive capabilities against ranged attacks.
They were essentially poison to the Cavalry Archers.
Now the Cavalry Archers were about to collide head-on with them.
“Wait, hold on!? This is…!”
At that moment, King Gul spotted something and bellowed loudly.
“Cookie! They’re finally moving!?”
The Joseon Main Force, which had been holding position until now, began to move.
But the direction was strange.
* * *
Thud-thud! Thud-thud!
As I galloped on my horse, I thought carefully.
This was the only way. Escaping the maze was nearly impossible.
Because Youbi wasn’t leaving the maze alone—he kept changing it continuously.
‘The rear is open.’
In the midst of all this, I realized the rear was completely clear.
After all, this maze opened up a clear path for Guan Yu’s pursuing force chasing behind me.
‘Then!’
With an open path before me, there was no need to struggle through the maze.
“Turn around and charge back!”
I completely reversed direction.
But doing this meant a head-on collision with the pursuers.
More than a head-on clash—we were charging at full speed toward each other.
Like a head-on collision between vehicles traveling in opposite directions. Except here, I was a compact car and they were a tank-like SUV.
“They’re coming! We’re going to collide!”
Even without a direct collision, just grazing past them would favor the Iron Armored Cavalry.
They would sweep everything away with their melee weapons, while I had to shoot arrows one by one to hit them.
I had to reduce their numbers as much as possible with arrows before we collided.
Just before the collision, every Cavalry Archer had their bowstring drawn taut.
The enemies gripped their menacingly massive crescent moon blades and prepared to swing them freely.
The enemies entered within the range of the Gakgung bows.
“Fire!”
Whoooosh!
All the Cavalry Archers released their bowstrings in unison.
Arrows flew straight ahead in a direct line toward the front.
But─
“!?”
──Thud-thud-thud-thud-bang!
For the most part, the arrows struck their armor and bounced away, or were even batted aside by their crescent blades.
Because they came flying in from directly ahead at far too obvious an angle.
“Keep firing!”
Even so, I commanded my Mounted Archers to keep shooting right up until the moment of impact.
Pap-pap-pap-pap-bang!
‘I just need to obstruct their vision.’
The arrows flew in succession, bouncing off the armor of the iron-clad cavalry.
The damage was negligible.
But their vision was being disrupted.
Because Joseon’s arrows flew with brilliant white flames trailing behind them, continuous fire from the front made it difficult to see ahead.
Guan Yu gritted his teeth and swept away the incoming arrows.
“Forward! Rats trapped in a jar! Annihilate them!”
Can’t see? It didn’t matter.
In a situation like this, I could strike my enemies even with my eyes closed.
Guan Yu didn’t slow his horse’s pace at all.
“It’s coming now!”
He shouted loudly to those behind him.
Now they would meet.
“!”
This moment.
Their horses crossed paths with each other.
Guan Yu cried out.
“Slaaaaaash!”
I cried out.
“Duuuuuck──”
Completely different commands erupted from both sides.
─Whoosh.
All of Joseon’s Mounted Archers moved in unison.
Following my lead, Danggeun, Pangeo, Ratte, and the others gritted their teeth and twisted their bodies.
“Hnnnnngh!”
“!”
In that instant, the eyes of all those watching widened in astonishment.
Whoooosh…!
“…?!”
In Guan Yu’s eyes, everything suddenly moved in slow motion.
He couldn’t comprehend it.
Countless crescent blades sliced through empty air with only the sound of their passage, producing no solid impact whatsoever.
The only casualties were soldiers from both sides who collided with each other’s horses and fell.
Everything else proceeded as if nothing had happened.
‘How?’
Guan Yu stared at his own crescent blade that had slashed through empty air, and the answer became clear.
He had literally cut through nothing but air.
He had tried to strike the rider on the horse, but there was no longer anyone on the horse.
More precisely, their upper bodies were gone.
They had passed by, hanging from the side of the horse by their lower bodies.
He instinctively tried to turn the horse’s head, but it was already too late.
They hadn’t simply passed by.
Twang─
From somewhere unseen, the sound of a bowstring being drawn reached his ears.
Guan Yu couldn’t believe his eyes.
0.3 seconds?
It might have been even less than that.
In that fleeting instant of passing, they had dodged the enemy’s attack and launched their own assault.
This wasn’t a fighting game.
This wasn’t a place where frame-by-frame attacks like this were exchanged.
Yet it had happened.
“!”
Whoosh!
The arrow curved strangely and shot forth.
Guan Yu resented his own eyes for widening in shock.
Because that projectile was coming straight at his eyes.
──Boom!
White flames erupted from his eyes.
[Health 20%]
His health had plummeted in an instant.
“Ugh!”
His upper body shook violently, and the horse panicked, rearing up.
‘I… I have to catch up…’
Even so, he tried to change direction and charge forward.
But─
“Gack!”
“Argh!”
There were others experiencing the same phenomenon as him.
Since they were not Assistant Commanders, they either collapsed or died in a single hit.
As they fell below, they blocked the path of their allies.
Numerous Mounted Archers hung from the sides of horses, evading the crescent blade strikes, and among them were those like Almond who had been hit in places their faces or armor couldn’t protect.
‘There are more…?’
Guan Yu couldn’t believe that multiple enemies had executed that same attack.
Thud-thud-thud-thud-thud-thud-thud!
In that instant, the Mounted Archers had already pierced through them at tremendous speed.
There was no way to catch up.
The path they had carved lay wide open, yet they alone stumbled over the corpses of their own comrades, unable to change direction swiftly.
And so—
“──WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!”
With an earth-shattering roar, the Cavalry Archer Unit burst free from this labyrinthine formation.
And then, from the distant hillside, the Joseon Main Force emerged one by one into view.
‘An encirclement?’
They had already surrounded China’s formation in a wide arc.
Had they wanted to fight more efficiently, they would have simply crashed through with a triangular formation.
That would have shattered China’s soldiers.
But that was not Cookie’s intention.
“This is insane.”
Indeed.
Guan Yu cursing alone was because he understood that intention.
Cookie’s goal was not merely to dismantle the formation.
He intended to annihilate these 200 soldiers completely.
To turn this central plain into their grave.
—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————