Max’s ring shone as he took three arrows in his hand. At the same time, his opponent took a round shield and began charging at him, a red essence bursting out from its body.

  ‘Aura too?!’ Max was dismayed. ‘Ngh, to think I let a powerful high orc get this close to me!’

  Inwardly kicking himself for being inattentive, Max shot an arrow as his thoughts kicked into gear. The orc, tilting its shield up, easily deflected the headshot attempt.

  ‘This is actually pretty bad.’

  After missing his shot on the demon before, Max lost the boost from [Successive Speed], so his arrows had returned to normal velocity. Now, he only had his own abilities to fall back on.

  “You! The blood-haired archer! You killed my brother!! Prepare to die!!”

  Max loosed two more arrows, targeting the orc’s outer extremities, but with swift and precise shield movements, it managed to deflect both. As the gap between them closed, it realised there would no longer be time for this sort of reactive blocking and smartly tucked its face behind the shield.

  “Blood-haired? My hair is pink!” Max raised his aim.

  Shik!

  Right on cue, the orc lowered its shield to peek at Max and took an arrow directly to the eye.

  “GUAAAH!!!” The orc clutched its face and screamed in pain. Reaching Max’s location, it swung out blindly with the shield.

  Rolling under the attack, Max traded places with the orc. No longer cornered by the broken wall, he wasted no time bolting the other direction along the battlements, not missing an opportunity to shoot at the orc’s exposed nape as he ran.

  Tk!

  ‘W-what?’ To Max’s shock, the arrow only penetrated a thumb’s width deep. ‘Oh, no, no, no, the aura is endurance-type?!’

  As if the super-tough skin of a high orc wasn’t enough of a challenge to get through, this guy was also a BOSS monster with an aura ability increasing physical damage resistance! It really was too much.

  The high orc spun around and Max saw that it was actually foaming at the mouth in rage.

  “You... YOU SLIMY BASTAARD!! I HOPE YOU CHOKE ON YOUR OWN DISHONOUR!!!”

  “Well that’s a new one.”

  Max took double arrows and tried a multi-shot, aimed at its head and feet simultaneously.

  Thck!

  The orc blocked the headshot but had a toe shot cleanly off.

  ‘As expected, it’s not smart enough to block and dodge at the same time.’

  “GRAGGHHHH!!!”

  Although Max had accumulated some damage, the situation was still dire. The orc came back to its senses and charged at him with renewed fury. Firing off more shots, Max tried tipping over a lit brazier to spread fire between them, but, as the fire had no time to build, the orc simply ran through it unfazed.

  ‘Guh, these shots are barely piercing at all... If it weren’t for that damn assassin earlier; I was less than a minute away from buying armour-piercing arrows.’ Max mentally complained between shots.

  An arrow ripped through the orc’s ankle, making it stumble. “I will rip your eyes out and shove them down your throat, and then cut your stomach open and feed them to you again.”

  “Well that’s just unnecessary.”

  Despite his playful words and sangfroid expression, Max’s mind was spinning in overdrive.

  ‘Gaining on me… Seven, no, six seconds. I don’t think I can finish it off in time; not when it has such a strong aura ability. Then, what if I…’

  After the stunt Max had just pulled, the orc committed to protecting its face and was extremely reluctant to peek out from behind its shield. Noting this, Max quietly switched direction, instead running toward the orc.

  “It’s absolutely necessary for scum like y– Uh?” The orc peered out from behind its shield to find empty battlements. Before it could realise why, Max manoeuvred around its destroyed eye and delivered a heavy kick to the ribs, sending it reeling into the palisade.

  “Argh! YOU F*CKING SWINE!!” Losing its shield, the orc tumbled over the side, barely managing to grab hold of a stake to avoid falling.

  Max appeared over the stake and fired an arrow into its remaining eye. “Die already!”

  SHIK.

  Aura dissipating, the orc limply let go and dropped to the ground, but not before throwing a parting gift with its spare arm.

  Dink.

  A lone stick of dynamite arced over the palisade and landed directly into a fire brazier.

  “NO!” Max lunged at the brazier and threw it over the side, but the fuse had already been lit.

  BOOOMMMM!!!!

  With a deafening crack, the dynamite detonated on the side of the wall. Max’s feet were violently ripped from the battlements as a shockwave slammed him skyward.

  Fwack!

  Narrowly managing to shield his face in time, Max was buffeted by splintered wood, with the largest piece striking him in the chest and sending him spinning. His ears rang as debris zipped past, the battlefield blurring beneath him. Expecting a painful crash to the ground, he braced for impact but instead found himself landing on top of a thatched roof. Unfortunately, the roof was steeply inclined and quickly betrayed him. Using a large portion of his impact energy, Max was sent rolling down the roof and smashing against the side of an adjacent building, accompanied by an unhealthy-sounding bodily crack.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  “...Ow.”

  “Wait, I’m alive?”

  Max’s screen pulsed red, indicating he was close to death. Attempting bring up his status, he realised his arm was broken, so he used the other arm to do it.

  [Abnormal Status: Minor internal bleeding (chest), major hearing loss, tinnitus]

  [Condition: Fractured ribs (7, 8, 9, 10), bruising (chest, left shoulder, left arm, left leg), broken arm (left), dislocated shoulder (left), muscle damage (left leg), tremors (left leg)]

  “Hm, no wonder I’m in excruciating pain.” Max sat up and tested how well his limbs could move. “Should I turn the pain setting down? ...No, I deserve this. I didn’t even bring a health potion, after all.”

  Looking around, he had a surprisingly good view of the battlefield from here, positioned slightly uphill from most of the fighting. Unfortunately, it seemed like he’d landed behind enemy lines; it was unlikely that he would be able to reach a healer from here before bleeding out.

  Max observed the wall in the distance, where a new hole had appeared near the top.

  “Wow, I flew really far.”

  Searching for possible survival options, his gaze drifted onto white and violet colours.

  “Eh, they’re still fighting?”

  Max was amazed. In most cases, swordfights were anticlimactic events which only lasted a few seconds, but Virtus had been fighting this demon for well over a minute – this indicated that both combatants were highly skilled. Although small injuries could be seen on both of them, it seemed like Virtus was winning.

  “I wonder...”

  Max took out his bow, which he’d stowed away in his inventory amidst the explosion. Thankfully, it seemed undamaged.

  Before he was ambushed by the high orc, he developed a theory about this demon which he really wanted to test out – preferably before bleeding to death. With a majestic flash of his ring, an arrow appeared in his broken hand.

  “...”

  After moving the ring to his other hand, Max took the arrow and nocked it. Then, taking the bow and placing it under his shoe, he pushed away with his foot to draw the bowstring.

  “Hahaha, I haven’t done this in a while.”

  Adjusting his footing slightly, Max grinned as he observed the demon in the distance. “Alright, now to test my theory...”

  Aiming the bow with his foot, he pointed toward the demon in the distance. Almost immediately, the demon turned and inspected him.

  “Oh yeah, that’s a bingo; perception-type aura for sure.”

  Max’s eyes twinkled. Although there were a few different types of aura in HoL, none of them were perception-related, which meant only one thing...

  ‘New content!’

  “Given how it sensed Lemonade approaching earlier, it probably has proximity detection, too.”

  An enemy like this would be fearsome in group combat, being able to sense attacks in all directions. If Virtus wasn’t here, the army losses would be unimaginable. The thing was a force of nature.

  “Hm? It keeps looking over here though... am I that scary?”

  Even while fighting Virtus, the demon’s eyes flicked to Max every other second, as if he was particularly wary of the moribund cripple.

  “Ehh? Oh!” Max realised what was going on. “He thinks I still have the missile arrows!”

  The demon believed a supersonic, nearly impossible-to-dodge arrow would come flying at him at any moment and was completely on-edge as a result. Of course, no such arrow would come since he’d lost the bonus... but the demon had no way of knowing that.

  “Kekeke, oh noo~ better pay attention, I could shoot at any moment!” Max dangled his foot around in loops, manipulating his aim to zone in and out of the demon’s threat detection.

  Just as the Demon turned to glare at him with an angry expression, its eyes widened in alarm. Dodging a fraction of a second too late, it let out a pained roar as a violet hand went soaring into the air.

  “Woah... that worked?!”

  In Max’s mind, he was just uselessly trolling. He didn’t expect the demon to actually lose focus from something so stupid. This felt like he’d just bullied a kid with ADHD or something.

  Virtus closed in on the offensive, applying pressure to the maimed demon. After losing its composure, the demon began to devolve into panic, retreating a step with every exchange and using its long arm length to maintain distance. This only lasted a few seconds before Virtus shifted his sword grip, wrapping his gauntlet around the midsection of his blade in a half-swording stance. Moving aggressively, he lunged forward and shoved the demon’s sword aside, not giving the demon any time to react as he closed the gap and hammered his boot into its chestplate.

  Bang!

  The demon was sent hurtling some distance. The impact of metal-on-metal was probably really loud. This was what Max believed. In actuality, he had no idea, because he was completely deaf after that explosion from before.

  The demon fell over backward and desperately crawled away from Virtus, who approached in large strides. It seemed like this demon had never experienced fear before.

  ‘...Hm?’

  Max noticed a flying creature racing toward the two. ‘Imp!’

  Not bothering to ask questions, Max shifted his aim and released an arrow. Although rare, imps were one of the most hated enemies in HoL; they were capable of fast air manoeuvres which emboldened them to scout, harass, and attack enemies as they pleased, whilst flying around the battlefield acting as though they were invincible.

  Of course, it was this exact arrogance that made them Max’s favourite species to fight. Also, because they flew away quite fast, shooting them on sight had become almost a knee-jerk reaction for him.

  Woosh!

  The arrow sailed past the imp, barely missing its wing.

  “What? I missed again?!”

  Max was aghast. He’d practiced this type of shot thousands of times – using one arm and one leg to aim. He should be able to easily hit a shot at thirty metres, even with shoes on like he had now.

  ‘Knee jerk... no, my knees actually jerked in reaction?’

  Putting his thoughts aside temporarily, he hastily prepared another arrow. The imp was already retreating in fear, abandoning its ally.

  “Noo, get back here!”

  Max loosed the shot, but this one was even more inaccurate, pathing off-course by several metres.

  “Nooooo!”

  Immensely disappointed, Max brought back his system panel:

  [Abnormal Status: Minor internal bleeding (chest), major hearing loss, tinnitus, hemorrhagic shock]

  “Haemorrhagic shock? What kind of dumb status effect is that? As if all the other injuries weren’t enough, now I have haemorrhoids which give me internal bodily earthquake?” Max grumbled. “Seriously, could you not have waited five more seconds before doing that?”

  Greatly disappointed, Max could only take consolation in watching Virtus successfully decapitate the demon, finishing it off. After doing so, Virtus’s eyes searched the area before locking onto Max.

  Seeing the poor state he was in, Virtus came running over and called out to him, “◇?????????”

  “Sorry, I’m currently deaf in both ears.” Max smiled wryly.

  “◇h.” Virtus nodded in understanding. Taking off his gauntlet, he tapped a concealed ring to summon a red potion into his hand, tossing it over to Max.

  ‘Oh? He was also a walking dispensary!’ Max gratefully accepted and downed the potion. “Ah, thank you, you saved me.”

  “Of course. But how did you get over here, weren’t you up on the wall?” Virtus questioned him.

  “My hearing came back quick... Yes, I was on the wall, but I was blown away by the enemy, so I ended up here.”

  Virtus narrowed his eyes. “Blown away? Then, you were busy admiring the enemy rather than fighting?”

  “…?” Max felt confused by Virtus’s sudden change in demeanor. “Oh, blown– no, I mean I was actually blown away, like, by an explosion.”

  Virtus showed visible confusion.

  “That's why I was deaf; I landed up there.” Max pointed to a sunken area of thatch rooftop.

  “Oh... Well, regardless... Erm, now that you’ve recovered, assist me with clearing out the rest of the orcs.”

  “Yes sir!”