Chapter 575: Molten Iron & Heavy Cavalry
“Boom!”
Another barrel—filled with strong alcohol and gunpowder—exploded mid-air, engulfing hundreds of orcs in a torrent of roaring flames. The wall of fire burned fiercely before the city gate, like a wall of molten heat, forcing the orcs to halt in their tracks.
“Fear not!”
“The Father God Gwush watches over us! The brave shall be reborn in the Blazing Fire!”
An orc officer surged forward from the crowd, raising his spear high and letting out a frenzied roar.
“Charge!”
“For the Father God Gwush!”
Under his lead, hundreds of orc warriors surged forward, heedless of the blazing inferno, pressing onward toward the city wall.
But the ground before the wall suddenly collapsed. The orcs tumbled into deep pit traps, impaled one after another by jagged steel spines buried beneath.
“Damn it—traps!”
“No! Help me! I haven’t even fought the dwarves yet—I can’t die like this!”
On the chaotic battlefield, explosions roared and war cries echoed. The wails from the pits were drowned beneath the storm of noise.
The orcs behind remained oblivious, pushing forward, crowding, driving onward in relentless charge.
—Until they saw the chasm ahead: a pit bristling with spikes and corpses. Too late to stop. One by one, they fell, their flesh and blood filling the abyss.
At last, the orc officer atop the hill noticed the anomaly. A Hill Giant and a Half-Orc Giant lifted a log, placing it across the pit to form a bridge. Orc shamans raised their bone staves, chanting ancient incantations. Stone began to grow rapidly, and the earth slowly closed over the pit.
Dwarf archers atop the wall continued raining arrows—some blazing with fire, others coated in poison—like a relentless storm.
In just a few hundred meters of open ground, the battlefield became a grinding mill of flesh, reducing every orc who entered to bloody pulp.
For thousands of years, the dwarves’ unmatched craftsmanship had been honed into deadly traps and razor-sharp weapons, mercilessly harvesting the life force of their enemies.
But when the orcs closed within a hundred meters of the wall, another hidden mechanism triggered.
The stone statues lining the wall suddenly opened their mouths, revealing metal tubes within. From them erupted a hail of silver needles—coated in deadly poison.
“Zzzzzzzz—”
A shrill, tearing scream split the air. The entire line of orcs collapsed instantly, their corpses exuding a faint, toxic mist.
The orc shamans raised their hands in solemn reverence, their voices hoarse but fervent.
“Praise the great Father God, One-Eyed Gwush! You are the Avatar of Strength, the Gale, the Storm, the single eye that shakes the world, bringing the will to revenge!”
Their chant echoed across the battlefield, lasting long into the air—like a miracle was unfolding.
“Shhhhh—”
A wind, thick with the scent of blood, howled across the field, scattering the poison mist. The orcs’ morale soared. Cheers erupted, thundering across the land.
Through a storm of arrows, exploding barrels, and falling iron balls, the orc army finally reached the base of the city wall—after paying a terrible price.
“Aivendeldan is ahead!”
“Scale the wall! Crush the dwarves! Conquest Aivendeldan!”
“Move! Charge! The great Gwush watches us! The warrior who takes the wall shall be blessed by the gods!”
Hill Giants, Half-Orc Giants, and Ogre tribesmen heaved down their ladders, propping them against the towering city wall.
The orcs swarmed like a swarm of ants, scrambling up the ladders, desperate to be the first to scale the wall—believing that only the first to reach the top would earn the Father God’s favor.
But the dwarves fought back fiercely—toppling ladders, shooting down orcs, and crushing those beneath with the falling wood. Dozens fell to their deaths in an instant, creating hundreds of casualties.
“Kill them!”
“Die defending Aivendeldan! No filthy beasts shall climb here!”
“Molradin above! For the honor of the dwarven people!”
Yet now, the orcs’ overwhelming numbers had broken through the traps and arrow barrages.
They packed tightly beneath the wall, surging like a chaotic, relentless tide—crashing again and again against the seemingly unbreakable fortress.
Biyao stood atop the wall, frowning. At over four hundred years old, he looked smaller and more hunched than most dwarves—but his eyes burned with unyielding resolve.
“Molradin above… the orcs will pay for their greed and stupidity. Three hundred and eighty-seven years ago, I saw with my own eyes how our brave warriors drove them north. Today… history repeats itself.”
The old general stepped into the city tower, gripping the iron lever with all his might and pulling it slowly.
Clack.
A sharp mechanical click rang out. Then, from the central furnace of Aivendeldan, flames erupted—spewing forth scalding steam.
The molten iron, meant to flow to the dwarven homes, was diverted by the valves. Tens of thousands of catties of blazing molten iron surged toward the city wall.
The orcs looked up, feeling the searing thermal wave, hearing the deep boom of the flow—and their hearts froze.
“Danger!”
“Look out! What are these dwarves planning?”
Metal grates on the wall clattered open.
Then, with a thunderous boom, molten iron—red-hot and glowing—gushed forth like a waterfall.
Instantly, fire blossomed. The scorching molten iron poured down upon thousands of orcs and Half-Orc Giants, consuming them utterly.
“No—!”
“It burns! It burns!”
“It’s molten iron! Run! Damn, treacherous dwarves!”
The orcs screamed in agony, writhing in the liquid metal, trying desperately to escape—but it was useless.
Their bodies first vaporized moisture, then flesh, then bone, as they came into contact with iron hotter than a thousand suns.
Steam billowed across the battlefield, drowning out all but the hiss of liquid evaporating and the crackle of burning flesh. The screams of pain faded to silence.
In this hell of iron fire, no mortal body could survive. The first orcs to reach Aivendeldan were melted into slag, refined by the dwarves’ mastery into mere residue.
When the molten iron cooled, not a single orc remained standing. Only irregular, still-hot iron blocks remained.
“Scum of orcs—taste the heat of your own destruction!”
“Ha! This is Molradin’s punishment!”
The dwarven warriors atop the wall laughed freely, reveling in the orcs’ suffering—finally feeling the sweet release of justice.
“Such fine iron… how many weapons could be forged from this?”
“Indeed. Wasted on these Gwush-worshipping vermin.”
“Molradin above… forgive us for our cruelty,” sighed the old dwarven artisans, watching the cooling slag below—regretful, yet awed.
Though the orcs were stunned by the sight of steam and cascading iron, they refused to yield. They still believed in conquest.
They still believed Aivendeldan would fall.
So more orcs gathered, pressing against the iron-covered wall, launching a new wave of assault.
“For the Father God Gwush!”
“Crush the dwarves! Conquest the fortress!”
Ladders were raised again, each one bristling with hundreds of orcs—climbing like fangs embedded into the fortress wall, horrifying to behold.
On this narrow battlefield, death swung its scythe without mercy. Yet the orcs pressed on, bloodied and driven by the shamans’ cries.
Inside Aivendeldan’s gate, the air was thick with tension.
Hundreds of dwarf cavalrymen stood in heavy armor, gripping massive war hammers and iron rods, mounted on sturdy horned goats. They waited—silent, motionless—for the king’s command.
Their armor gleamed under the sun. Even their goats wore finely crafted leather armor.
The Heavy Cavalry of the High Mountain Kingdom—the most fearsome force in the realm for centuries—had once been praised by minstrels as:
“They charge down the slopes like shattered mountains.”
Now, five hundred of them stood at full readiness, poised for counterattack.
With the orc tide pressing relentlessly, Aivendeldan’s defenses were thinning. If the orcs breached the wall, the fortress would fall.
“It’s time.”
“Retreating only emboldens the orcs and weakens our warrior spirit. We must counterattack! We must ride out, and with blood and death, teach these filthy beasts one truth—dwarves do not submit. Aivendeldan will never fall!”
The dwarf cavalry roared in unison—voices thundering across the land.
Aid finally made his decision.
He mounted his massive horned goat, gripped his heavy hammer, and barked his order.
“Open the city gate!”
He slowly pulled down the metal mask covering his face.
Boom—
With a deep, grinding rumble, the dwarven guards turned the massive winches. The heavy city gate creaked open—slowly, steadily.
The orcs outside, exhausted from battle, saw the gate swing open—and burst with joy.
“Are these cowards surrendering? Aivendeldan is ours!”
“Hah! They can’t withstand our onslaught!”
“Wait… what’s that?”
Then came horror.
Though the gate stood open, it wasn’t a surrendering army they saw—no, it was the Dwarf Heavy Cavalry, waiting, eager, and ready.
At the front, the dwarf king—covered in a metal mask, towering and powerful—stood like a war drum calling to battle.
“All troops!”
“Charge!”
The earth trembled. Dust and smoke roared into the sky.
From the gate burst a tide of steel—armored goats thundering forward, their iron hooves crushing the fragile bodies of orcs beneath them.
The dwarven cavalry swung their war hammers and iron rods, smashing orc heads with effortless precision, harvesting life like wheat.
“By the name of the High Mountain Kingdom—Aivendeldan will never fall!”
At the front, Aid raised his hammer with one arm. His goat leaped skyward, soaring several meters.
Crack!
The head of a Hill Giant exploded like a rotten fruit—boiling blood, meat fragments, and bone shards sprayed in all directions. The corpse collapsed with a roar.
Using the momentum, Aid slammed his hammer into the ground. The weapon, blessed by Molradin, flared with a fiery light.
Boom!
The hammer sank deep into the earth, cracking the ground in a spiderweb pattern. Charring marks spread outward. Flames erupted from the crater and fissures, instantly reducing the orcs beneath to ash.
Smoke, stench, and the smell of scorched metal filled the air.
Aid swung the hammer again—crushing hundreds of orcs in a single strike.
“By Molradin’s name! Dwarves will never be slaves!”
As he spoke, a massive rock—hundreds of tons—materialized mid-air. With a single downward swing, the hammer drove it into the ground.
Boom!
The earth split open. Debris flew in all directions. The shockwave shook the ground for a hundred meters.
The entire orc unit—over two hundred strong—was buried beneath the rubble, reduced to a mangled, indistinguishable pulp.
One blow. Hundreds dead.
But Aid didn’t stop.
He broke from the cavalry line, charging alone into the heart of the orc army.
Where he passed, dust and debris raged. Any who dared approach were crushed to pieces by his blood-stained hammer.
In mere moments, nearly ten thousand orcs—surrounding the wall—were slaughtered. No orc dared come near.
This was the king, the legendary “Lord of the Highlands,” the “Master of the Furnace”—Aid Klein.
A warrior of legend, wielding the Pillar of Stone Hammer, said to have been forged by Molradin himself, clad in the ancient armor of the dwarf royal family.
Centuries ago, it was this very king who had single-handedly blocked the Divine Offspring of Sacred Fedran—forcing the old emperor to abandon his dream of enslaving the dwarves.
Now, history was repeating.
“Molradin above… Father God, bless us through this trial,” Aid whispered, gripping his hammer tightly, staring at the restless orcs.
Something stirred in his gut. A dark premonition.
This time, the orcs were truly going all out. They had the will to conquer Aivendeldan—no turning back.
The Frenzied Blood of Gwush had been awakened. It surged through their veins, fueling endless ambition.
And Mongke, the Severed Trunk—“Eye of Gwush”—was no different.
Standing atop the hill, he raised his dual-headed axe. His single eye burned red with bloodlust.
“Traps. Cavalry. None of it shall stop the orc warrior’s advance! No fear shall bind us!”
A orc does not claim what is his until he seizes it. Until then, he is a coward, unworthy of presence. The mud-shak kingdom of Gwush will never welcome such filth!
Remember—never stop your march until Aivendeldan is yours!
Red light flickered in Mongke’s eye. His veins stood out like roots beneath the skin, knotted and taut.
“Aaaaarrrrgh!”
A long, earth-shaking roar split the air.
From behind the hill, a black dire wolf—bigger than a small mountain—leaped over the ridge, landing before the orc vanguard.
The mightiest beast of the Crimson Blood Tribe—the “Black Hill,” as the strength-worshipping orcs called it. It had killed seven orc trainers, refusing to let anyone ride it—except Mongke, who had wrestled it bare-handed.
Mongke leapt onto its back, roaring at the sky.
“Charge!”
“For Gwush!”
The orc wolf cavalry responded to the call. Their dire wolves raised their heads, howling in unison—eerie, terrifying.
Clutching spears and battle axes, riding hungry, blood-lit eyes blazing, the wolf cavalry charged across the battlefield—launching a full-scale assault.
Aid raised his hammer once more, gathering the Heavy Cavalry. His voice thundered across the field.
“By Molradin’s name—dwarves will never be slaves!”
“Dwarves will never be slaves!”
The earth trembled. Armored goats galloped across the ground, the dwarf cavalry advancing like a wall of steel—meeting the orc wolf cavalry head-on.
(End of Chapter)
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