"Alator, that is the name I have chosen for myself!"
The Leader of the Elemental Ten placed his right hand over his heart and bowed slightly. Even though he had turned his back on his ancestors' teachings, his way of greeting was exactly the same.
"So you're saying you want to live without depending on anyone, Alator. You have a point; even though you guys say you protected the orcs, at the same time, because you couldn't fight, you depended on the orcs' protection, didn't you?"
The gaze of the druid warrior, who hadn't broken his cool demeanor since the beginning of the journey, changed. It was so obvious he didn't expect to cross paths with someone who could catch the hidden meaning between his words.
"I want you to know that you are completely right in your thoughts. Rest assured, if I were in your shoes, I would have made the exact same choice!"
Having gotten her answer, Nafız didn't put the young druid warrior on the spot; she continued her speech, and when she finished, she turned to the path and told them what they needed to do. The ten orcs sent by the Orc Military Academy took the point; their weapons were in their hands, and it was clear they would attack at the first trap without giving the others a chance.
"Bookworm, keep a close eye on these brats. They have practically zero battle experience, so they look like easy pickings. I don't want them dying before slaughtering at least a thousand enemies!"
"At your command, master!"
Even though the two orcs seemed to be talking among themselves, as they often did, they were shouting to make their voices heard by the people they wanted to hear them. The ten orc warriors had gotten the message; Nafız was calling them inexperienced, and they started moving with quick steps to prove that wasn't true.
So much so that a gap of more than twenty paces opened up between them and the ones behind; they wanted to prove their worth as soon as possible, but this choice was going to cost them dearly. When the bone pillars descending from the ceiling and rising from the floor simultaneously trapped the ten people, the others were too far away to do a damn thing, and within a few breaths, their line of sight was completely blocked.
"Nafız."
When Alyon split her name into two syllables and dragged out the last letter longer than necessary on top of that, the blood-red-haired orc was forced to turn toward him.
"Yes, Alyon!"
Even though she knew why her friend called her name, she wanted to hear it from his mouth.
"Are you still dead set on not helping?"
"Oh man, do you think I'm doing all this just to play a game to satisfy my own twisted pleasures? Look at them, with just a couple of words from me, they started running like spring lambs to the butcher's knife. When you're left all alone in the region tomorrow, how are you going to deal with these greenhorns?
If they can't handle Hueso's traps, they won't amount to anything more than a burden. Let the brats prove their worth."
While this was going down outside, it was a whole different world inside. The ten orcs, keeping the circle they formed by standing back-to-back intact, were waiting for what was to come. The area created by the merging bone pillars was fifty paces by fifty paces in size, and the orcs were dead center in it.
"Don't panic. The Military Academy trained us for days like this; draw your weapons and wait for my orders!"
There was naturally a leader among the ten people; visibly, there was no difference in rank, but judging by the others listening to him, he must have proven his strength to all of them. Among the orcs, who preserved their savage nature, the strong ruled, and the orders of the one who seized leadership were carried out.
"Mirror Shield, at the ready!"
The ring of the orc warrior, who had countered the attacks coming from the ceiling in Hueso's first trap, enlarged and turned into a shield the size he could carry on his arm. This piece of equipment, capable of both offense and defense at the same time, could come in handy in many ways inside the trap they fell into.
The orcs trapped inside were ready, and they would fight to the bitter end no matter what came, but the ones outside had someone they could learn the details of the trap from. Hueso, who had been settling for merely observing for a while, was startled by a question from someone he didn't expect.
"Could you explain what the trap is?"
The man, who illuminated the damp and dim hollow with the glow of his skin, looked at the red-haired orc before answering, and only started speaking when he got her nod of approval.
"The trap closing in on them from all four sides has a property that will require them to both defend and attack at the same time. Let me put it simply; do you remember the orc's shield in the first trap?"
Everyone nodded in agreement; none of them had the chance of forgetting equipment with that kind of property.
"Well, these bone pillars have the exact same property. They can absorb the enemy's power and reflect it back at them, but of course, they have a certain limit. That is the most crucial point in the trap; will you be able to smash it to pieces, or will it tear you to shreds!"
According to what Hueso said, this was going to be a battle of strategy and endurance, and the ten orcs inside the trap had already started experiencing it.
"Attack, we need to get out of here ASAP!"
Some of the orcs used axes, some swords, and one used a bow. They started the job by attacking the direction they were facing; they figured it was just a wall made of bone, it was impossible for it to stand against the mighty orc blood coursing through their veins.
When it came down to execution, things didn't pan out that way. No matter how hard they hit, the bone pillars responded in kind. If an arrow was shot, it sent a bone arrow; if struck with a sword, it came with a sword-shaped bone, and it countered the descending axes with axes, but there was a major difference: it was responding to almost every strike with ten strikes.
"Leader, the ceiling is coming down!"
As if it wasn't enough for the Bone Pillars to reflect their attacks manifold, when the ceiling started descending, the orcs began attacking harder and faster, but this only served to make things a bit tougher for them. They were still stuck inside a death trap, and their time was steadily running out. If they didn't find a solution soon, they would die either by their own attacks or by being crushed by the mechanism coming down from the ceiling.
"Hueso, even though they only attack the pillars once, they are getting multiple counterattacks. Tell me, where does this trap find the energy to do this!"
Only a few people could address the handsome man, the Sheikh of the Holy Bone Sect, just by his name, and one of them had something she was curious about. Hueso didn't speak; in response, after rolling his eyes in their sockets once, he began looking down at the red-haired orc's feet.
"You sneaky fossil! You thought they wouldn't notice since almost every step of the path is covered with bone fragments, didn't you?"
The porcelain-skinned man opened his mouth wide and smiled, his sparkling teeth dazzling the eyes of those around him.
"These traps are for the Mercenaries, and their energy sensitivity is at least as bad as the ten orcs inside the trap. If it were the druids or someone from the command echelon, they would have felt their energy being stolen in a short time, but your guys haven't figured out what's going on yet!"
The Sheikh of the Holy Bone Sect was using the trap he created with bone pillars for mass destruction. It was easier for a person who possessed quality, but for those fighting with quantity, it turned into a situation where the danger increased by the second.
When the attack coming from the ceiling was only ten meters away from crashing down on their heads, one of the orcs trapped inside, the person who had established himself as the leader to the others, yelled at the top of his lungs.
"Cease your attacks!"
After stopping his comrades, this orc, who finally figured out what was going on, gripped his sword tightly, which he could only lift into the air with two hands. The hilt of the weapon started glowing; as red energy gathered, the veins on his exposed arms bulged as if trying to rip through his skin and burst out.
"Don't do it!"
"Leader, are you trying to get yourself killed!"
Two of his nine subordinates seemed to know what was happening, but their words only pissed the leader off even more.
"When I attack, start running right behind me and do not stop. That is an order!"
No objection rose from anyone, how could they object? These words were perhaps the last order their leader would give.