Four Split Personalities

Game Time PM14:47

Hodir Mountain Pass, eastern side path

With bated breath and full concentration, Da’erwen frantically sprinted ahead, carefully listening to the increasingly distinct roars not far away. Anxiously, he opened the friends list, found the name that was pinned to the very top, took a deep breath, and gritted his teeth as he typed: "Hei Fan boss, this is the Heavy Armor Interception Brigade, we will reach the designated position in about three minutes."

Two seconds later

"Three minutes? Why so soon?"

Motan’s message popped up quickly, his tone seemingly puzzled.

Da’erwen swallowed hard, about to offer a token explanation when he saw the second message from the other party quickly follow up.

"Forget it, position yourselves according to plan as swiftly as possible and try not to draw the mutants’ attention. Notify me immediately if there’s an issue, have all the Priests in the squad snatch every moment to restore their strength, follow the second set of procedures for enemy defense, and remember to keep the Death Dust constant."

"Got it!"

Da’erwen breathed a sigh of relief, truly grateful that Commander hadn’t delved too deeply into this matter, visibly relaxing.

"Oh, by the way, if you’re lucky enough to survive this battle, go and help out at Luna’s for a few days."

"Uh, boss, what is this..."

"I’ll have Feather Song keep an eye on you, that’s all for now, we’ll be in touch if something comes up."

Thus, the just moments ago radiant Da’erwen visibly deflated again.

...

Meanwhile

In front of the Third Contact Zone

"Magicians, be careful not to use Corrosion Magic, just smash forward with direct spells like Evil Fire and energy bursts, they don’t need to get uglier. Third echelon, head up and replace the guys in front, be careful not to let too many mutants through, close in a bit from both flanks, you’re expanding the enemy’s effective attack area." Standing on a makeshift Earth Element platform, Motan scrutinized the entire battlefield: "Feather Song..."

"I’m here."

The female assassin, gripping two long daggers, swiftly decapitated the head in front of her, stepped on the body that hadn’t yet fallen, leaped high, took a feint step in mid-air, and lightly landed beside Motan, asking indifferently, "What’s up?"

Despite being covered in dried blood and half her face stained dark red, the emotionless female assassin remained apathetic, not even frowning as she casually flicked flesh debris from her daggers.

[She’s really overdoing the act...]

Impressed, Motan glanced at Feather Song and then commanded in a deep voice, "Head back, bring over the Clergy with leftover energy from the first and second combat sequences, then pick out a group to form a strike team with strong endurance, ready to welcome the Knight Order’s arrival and prepare for the evacuation."

The girl’s eyes flashed with surprise, but she didn’t say much. She just nodded lightly and said, "Understood."

Then, with a cool move, she re-sheathed the two daggers and quickly ran toward the encampment not far behind them. Motan felt that, barring any mishaps, the girl would probably complete his orders within two minutes, even if she took a moment to dry heave in a deserted place during the process; the timing wouldn’t be off by much.

Up until now, the mutants’ numbers had been reduced to below seven thousand, and the coalition forces had also paid with over two hundred lives. If the battle continues at this pace, when the remaining thousand or so people from the three combat sequences were completely spent, the Mutant Group would likely be left with very few monsters...

But that "if" did not exist. First of all, the coalition forces were sustaining increasing casualties by the minute, and the first support squads on both sides of the mountain wall had almost exhausted all their resources. Although the mutants’ numbers had been greatly reduced, their offensive showed no sign of slowing. Continuing to hold out would mean the constantly supplemented monsters could break the defense line at any time.

Secondly, the Third Contact Zone was the coalition’s last stand on Hodir Pass. Beyond this point, the terrain would abruptly open up, doubling the mutants’ combat space within a kilometer, fully unleashing their numerical advantage. If that stage were reached, the battle would be completely untenable, leaving the coalition with no room to retreat. Even stacking corpses might be necessary to block these monsters here; otherwise, an inevitable encirclement was incoming. If surrounded by these beings, not even an Intermediate Professional at their peak could escape with their body intact.

As for the third and most crucial point, Motan never intended to wipe out these mutants by exhausting all human resources. It was important to note that this was merely the third phase of the Requiem Plan. Apart from the ten thousand-plus monsters led this way by Yu Chen, an equal number of mutants were still entrenched outside the Twin Cities. No matter how powerful Cordova and Xia Lian were, they couldn’t exterminate all those creatures. In fact, according to the latest news received half an hour ago, the duo holding the long bridge was starting to falter; Cordova, as a Rune Creation, was still managing, but Xia Lian, who had been struggling since dawn without the use of any Divine Power, was in a precarious state, relying purely on physical strength up to this point.

In summary, the stalemate had lasted long enough...