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Chapter 244
Chapter 244 - Chasing Zou Jing
Tong returned to his camp with complicated emotion. He was not satisfied with the result of the fight as his bow was broken. He tried to scour for a bow from the dead bodies, but he could not find a replacement. All the dead soldiers were spearmen and shield bearers, which did not carry what Tong needed.
However, killing thousands of enemies leveled up his homing arrow skill, and he reaped several hundred thousand years of lifespans.
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**Status**
Name: Zhang Tong
Age: 18
Lifespan 929, 767 Years
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Tong had lost count of how many soldiers he had killed. They were too many as he spammed 25 arrows for every two seconds for over half an hour. One arrow might not kill an enemy right away, but it usually took two or three arrows to finish a soldier as Tong did not have a good visual on the targets. Thus, the lock-on was placed on random parts of their bodies instead of the vital spots.
He had spent 200, 000 years to get two of his skill back, yet he still profited from killing Liu Yan's soldiers. The number of years gave Tong a butterfly feeling in his chest as he imagined that he could live for so long.
Calmed his emotion after a few minutes of excitement, Tong sighed.
'The dream of immortality... It would have been nice had the system not existed. '
To Tong, the number in the system menu was just an illusion as the system would oppress him in the future to extort his lifespans and return it to the system pool.
Glancing at the skill status, [Homing Arrow] had reached max level, which increased the range to 600 meters.
'I don't think I'll need all the troops. I can solo Liu Yan Army as long as I have a workable bow. '
...
Next morning, Tong secured two wooden bows from the supply convoy in his army. However, they were not up to Tong's quality standard.
The rest of his army projectile weapons were repeating crossbows, which Tong had tried to use his homing arrow skill with it, however...
>
The repeating crossbows they were using were not standard crossbows with only a string and a lock, but they were like wooden mechanical tools which each of it had a lever and a handle, which the system did not treat it as a bow or a crossbow.
As his force had changed their range weaponry technology to repeating crossbows as their army standard, they had stopped manufacturing traditional bows. All former bows had been sold to the merchants, while the substandard bows were kept to be used as firewood as they were unsellable.
In addition, Zhen Yi troops also used ancient crossbows, which was not compatible with Tong's homing arrow skill.
He could fire homing arrows with normal crossbows, but it always took him several minutes to draw the bowstring back to its ready position, which was inefficient in a solo combat.
Tong grumbled after he left the supply camp. The bows on his back were defective bows which were destined to be scrapped.
'These bows won't last ten minutes. The bowstrings are too fragile!'
Feeling helpless, Tong had to stop going after Liu Yan or Zou Jing alone at night.
20, 000 Yellow Turban troops continued cutting the woods, paving a road toward Ji City in leisure.
...
...
Meanwhile, Zou Jing retreated five kilometers from the previous trap-camp location.
At this place, another camp had been built beforehand two days ago. The retreating troops gathered inside the camp to regroup and reform their platoons.
The number of survivors and the stats of troops depressed every soldier and Zou Jing. Less than 10, 000 men from the initial 20, 000 soldiers survived from last night.
Zou Jing bit his thumb fingernail. His pale face distorted while sweat drops were rolling down his cheeks.
In his mind, it was impossible for one man to kill over 10, 000 soldiers in a night, yet the reality disagreed with him. The nightmare of Tong's existence haunted Zou Jing the second time.
"Put scarecrows around the camp and disguise them as guards! We'll continue to retreat!" Zou Jing ordered.
"Sir? But the strategy was to buy times and lure them to our territory..."
"Nonsense! I say we're going to retreat, then we'll retreat! Do you not understand the human language?"
The lieutenants paled as they also recalled that their loss was massive. Their current troops would not be able to handle Tong's illogical magic and his 20, 000 elites.
At late noon, Zou Jing Army departed from the pre-made camp, withdrawing north to another pre-constructed camp 10 kilometers away.
...
At night, the Yellow Turban moved their camp five kilometers further north, securing the areas with cautious. They were five kilometers away from the trap-site where Tong had raided yesterday.
Horsemen scouts relayed their discovery back to Tong. They found three camps further away beyond the forest. One was the burnt camp, the second camp was abandoned, and the last camp was 15 kilometers away to the north.
All signs indicated that Zou Jing was running away from them.
Sweat drops appear on Tong's face as he had his worries. The forced mission by Lilim had a short time limit as he had less than 40 days to kill Zou Jing.
Furthermore, a part of Liu Yan troops was missing. There were only 20, 000 soldiers last night while the spies from Jia Xu said Liu Yan had more troops than that.
There should be another army or a detached force somewhere!
"Second uncle, I want you to take all blue troops back to Zhongshan."
"What? Are we not sieging Ji City? Why are we retreating?"
Tong shook his head, "You misunderstood me. I have a feeling that they are baiting us. I want both of you to go back and fortify Zhongshan. I'll take 5, 000 men and chase after Zou Jing. Bo Cai and 5, 000 men will continue cutting the path to making a road as planned."
Though Zhang Bao was confused, he accepted Tong's suggestion and arranged his men to return.
...
February 19th.
Zhang Bao withdrew with 10, 000 soldiers while Bo Cai and his 5, 000 soldiers were clearing the forest. Both of them did not know why Tong wanted to pave a road to Ji City in this time of war, but they did it anyway.
This road project was Tong's idea as he had studied about merchant trade routes and main roads between cities.
Currently, no road connected between Ji and Zhongshan. To travel from Zhongshan to Ji or the other way around, they had to pass Nanpi City, which was controlled by Yuan Shao.
Since Yuan Shao was a strong foe that Tong had no confidence that he could capture his headquarter city in a year or two, he decided to capture Ji City first before he could target the Yuan Clan.
Once he controlled Ji, he could amass his troops from this border city and pincer Nanpi with armies from four cities, Ji, Julu, Zhongshan, and Ye. No matter how talented Yuan Shao's generals, otherworlders, or strategists were, they would not have enough personals to handle four major armies.
"Serving Karma, one asshole at a time."
It was the phrase that Tong told Jia Xu about his future plan, which was approved.
Tong and his men force-marched through the forest to catch Zou Jing. They formed two columns instead of the usual ten columns during the march as Tong was wary of small traps, such as bear-traps, tree-traps, or a pitfall.
The path was rough and bumpy as obstacles, such as bushes, swamps, mud, and tree roots were blocking their way. However, the rough passage lasted only five kilometers.
As soon as they got through the unclear forest, they reached the burnt camp.
"Ignore the camp! Keep moving forward. The scouts already checked this area, there's nothing to see here! Bo Cai unit will come to clean this place later."
After this camp, the road was easier to get through as Zou Jing had cleared the forest when he had gotten here as well. It seemed he also wanted a path between Ji and Zhongshan.
Because of the cleared road, the marching pace quickened as they began jogging instead of walking. An hour later, their front troopers could see another camp ahead of them.
Tong's scouts had already explored the areas. Zou Jing had left several scarecrows, dressed as soldiers, inside the camp.
'Did he want to scare my scouts and me?' Tong was baffled by Zou Jing's logic.
'It might have worked if I'm paranoid enough. '
Tong ignored this camp and pointed his finger toward the north.
"We continue! But we'll slow the pace. Save your strength and keep your eyes open!"
Four hours later, they traveled another ten kilometers and saw another camp. This time, living soldiers were garrisoning the interior of the camp.
"Form ranks! Wait for the logistic troops. I'll handle this myself."
Not bothering using his soldiers to attack, Tong took out his broken bow and tried to lock on the soldiers inside the camp.
>
Listening to the system warning, Tong frowned. The other night, he had used his sense to feel the surrounding and acquired the targets, but he had yet to expand his sense today. In addition, Liu Yan soldiers were too far away that Tong could only see small dots from a distance.
'Right, I forgot. Sunday has that [Hawk Eyes], so her vision is better than mine. '
Tong exerted more mental strength and spread his sense. Spiritual vision about the surrounding appeared within his mind.
He opened his eyes to lock on the targets. However, he could see that the red cross-hairs were moving around the bodies of the targets.
'Huh? I can pinpoint the lock on location?'
Tong smacked his forehead as he forgot that he had a clan chat system. He texted Hua Shi to ask her about the skill.
"You have to see the targets first to lock on. Then, you can specify the body part that you want the arrow to hit. If you lock on the target roughly, the cross-hair will randomly pick a body part for you. Try to manual control it if you can."
The comment of his wife made Tong facepalmed again.
'I wasted too many shots the other night! I should have aimed for the head like the Great Thanos said!'
Enlightened by Hua Shi, Tong moved closer to the camp to get a good visual on the soldiers inside.
[Homing Arrow] activated.
After Tong maxed his skill, he could lock-on 40 targets at once. Ten sets of 40 light arrows chased after the head of garrison troops without mercy.
However
'It's too quiet. I fired probing shots, but they did not sound an alarm or mobilize their army. '
The camp was still quiet after 400 light arrows killed the targets.
"Get me a hundred men. Go search the camp! Scout teams, I want you to double check the surrounding areas. Report to me if you see anything in the range of 5 li."
A hundred men rushed into the camp, and the scouts galloped away. Tong did not stay idle, he used his sense to search for a living being signature in the woods or inside the camp.
At dusk, Tong got his reports which answered his suspicion.
| ← Ch. 243 | Ch. 245 → |