Chapter 437 Tactic
Zaos spent the rest of the day sleeping and then looked for the camp of the Sairus kingdom army. He found them pretty fast since Zaos already knew where to look… still. While they were delayed due to his attack and the fact that he burned down dozens of tents, they were only five kilometers away from the point Zaos had imagined they would be without the attack.
"Drannor is making them pick their pace… the soldiers must be tired, but he isn't planning to use all of them so soon," Zaos rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "He intends to draw the attention of the whole mercenary army and use the ships of Vezar to take the port towns and then attack us from behind. He should know that I have a countermeasure for that, but he is going to do it anyway."
Helen was supposed to be the one who would harass the Sairus kingdom army. At the same time, Zaos took some important commanders, but since he already did that, he decided to help her. Zaos also had to meet with his old friends and see if they discovered anything, but that probably would make him lose a full day… he couldn't do that and lose the chance to delay the war. Just like before, he put the scouts that he found blocking his path to sleep, but before he could attack, he noticed that the number of soldiers awake in the camp was still high… even though it was close to midnight. They were on high alert after last night's attack.
"Even if I attack now… they will stop the flames, and the damage won't spread," Zaos muttered. "Unless… I focus only on destroying a few of the tents by increasing the power of the fire arrows."
Zaos would have to use more mana to do that, and in the end, the damage won't be that high considering the camp as a whole. Was that really worth it? Those three would need more time to prepare for the war, so Zaos needed to do something now.
After thinking for a while, Zaos had an idea. It was a bit risky, but the chances of working were pretty high… even if he fails, Zaos will have the chance to decrease the duration of the war in one way or the other.
Zaos began to move around the camp and then put all the scouts to sleep. Once that was done, he moved to behind the large army. He then began to attack the tents from there without worrying about the fact that he was revealing his location. Dozens of tents began to burn, and the soldiers started to move around to deal with the fire, but then a large force also began to move toward Zaos. The number of horses in the main camp wasn't high, so they were using all the horses they had.
"I don't think that Drannor is among them… did he notice my initial intention?" Zaos pondered.
Drannor truly wanted to have his revenge, but in the end, he wasn't blind. He probably noticed what Zaos was planning… to move him away from where Milliendra was. Considering his actions, Drannor realized that Zaos was truly desperate. Zaos nodded to himself despite that and rode to the support camp that was supposed to be one or two days away from the main one.
In the end, Zaos let the pursuers catch up to him, even though they were heavily armed and armored. He had imagined that the enemies would want to fight up-close, but then he felt the energy that only magic crossbows could emit.
"They have that, huh…" Zaos muttered.
Zaos had planned to solve that without using much mana, but that wasn't possible if the riders had those weapons. Zaos enhanced his legs and then jumped to high in the sky since he couldn't afford to let Moody get wounded. The enemies noticed that and adjusted their arms. Still, they had a hard time aiming since Zaos was twenty meters above ground level, and the darkness of the night didn't help them. They only had a clear sight of him when he was five meters and moved to land above one of their horses, but they still had the chance to fire their crossbows. However, Zaos blocked the most troublesome projectiles with his sword, and the others were repelled thanks to his armor. Only a few of them hit Zaos' skin, but they only caused small wounds due to his high health and resistance to magic.
One of the soldiers opened his eyes widely when Zaos landed a dropkick on him, and before the horse and rider could fall, he had already jumped to attack another one. However, while he was in midair, Zaos used Stone Bullets to knock down several other riders. When he landed on another rider, he kicked him as well instead of using his sword. While Zaos was planning to avoid unnecessary deaths for the sake of Milliendra, he was also planning to use his sword to drain those guys' mana, and he couldn't do that if they died.
While he was so close to their allies, the riders couldn't use their crossbows, so they switched to their spears, but Zaos never gave them the chance to use those. Once he knocked down the third rider and saw the spears being equipped, he just fired Stone Bullets in all directions. One by one, the riders began to fall… Some tried to escape and report what happened, but Zaos had an easy time hitting those that exposed their backs. Thanks to their armor, the riders fell but only suffered light bruises during the fall.
"I have to be fast here… I am just one mile away from their camp," Zaos thought as he began to break the bones of the soldiers with kicks and then drained their mana with his sword.
Drannor should have brought some healers, but even bones couldn't be repaired so fast, even after one's health is full, so Zaos would have to use that tactic whenever possible to delay the war even more…
