Soul of Searing Steel

Sunny day, the beginning of summer, the beginning of a new dawn.

At the border of the horizon of the northwest plains, there was a faint glow slowly rising under the stars. It then released endless heat of heat across the world. At the same time when the light began to shine, it had also brought up a flash of light across the entire land.

It was not the light of magic or the flame of Combat Aura. Instead, it was some sort of refractive light.

That was the reflected light of heavy armor.

Upon the vast plains that seemed to be a boundless land, the earth was trembling. There were five large-scale legions marching forward slowly. They were equipped with five different styles of armor, with soldiers of each legion equipped with armor of the same style. Meanwhile, the five legions were carrying five flags with five different insignias on each of the flags. They were lined in five different formations, with each legion as one formation that represented one different army force. However, they were all moving in the same direction.

That was the direction where the sun rises. The land where all swords will intersect.

That was where the Orc Palace would be.

As some orc nomads, they had obtained the knowledge to advance their civilization to another whole new level from the hands of human beings. Since five hundred years ago, they had no longer used stone arrows, bone spears, and wooden shields. They were exploiting the plains, mining the ores, forging armor blades and armors, building towns and fortresses between plains and valleys, reclaiming farmlands, and grazing herds. If they were not to do so, they would not be able to withstand the increasing strength of humanity. Instead, they could continue to invade the borderlands each year, and plunder people and resources.

The Orc Palace was a huge fortress city towering on the backbone of the plains known as the Highlands of Tartaros. It was located on a highland where walls were made of limestone surrounding it. The walls were enchanted with the magic-resistance attribute. It served as the main city, also the sacred land of the orcs. It also served as the residential area of the orc's royal families. It was the city blessed by the orcs and the God of War, known as the Blessed City.

But now, this so-called Blessed City was surrounded by dead bodies and flooded with blood. The red blood of humans and the green blood of orcs were mixed together and dried up. The clotted black blood was formed in such a way. The traces of the black blood had permeated the gray walls. Even the most ruthless person would be shocked to see such a scene.

The Orc Palace was currently surrounded by the large army of the Empire for more than a month now. Both sides had held up against each other for quite a long time. They also performed several tragic siege battles against the city of the orcs. However, because the walls were too tough and the defense of the city was too strict, even if they could defeat all of the orc armies, the undefeated Empire would still suffer a setback along with a great deal of losses.

Since the battle back at the Thomas Grand Canyon had started back during the autumn of last year, up to the current battle at the Tartaros Highland, the remaining strength of the orcs had been completely annihilated. Aand the development of towns, villages, farmlands and all the development of civilization in the past 500 years has been scorched and reduced to dust by the humans. Currently, the isolated city was the only remaining city of the orcs, waiting for its inevitable fall.

And at that time.

On the other side of the horizon, a flash of light appeared.

The glazed armor reflected the light, appearing like a sparkling surface of a lake under the sunlight. Five new legions had arrived at the location, ready to unleash the fury of men upon what remained in the city.

"This is…"

One of the generals that was besieging the city noticed that. Even though he was tired as f*ck, he still struggled to lift up the binoculars and looked into the distant. After that, he could not help but to get shocked by what he saw, "The five flags…"

"Did they come as well?!"

Black Raven, Red Mist, White Horse, Vault of Heaven and Golden Radiance.

After suppressing the Dark Tide by the internal region of the Empire Kingdom, the five armies, under the direct command of the Emperor, had arrived at the final battlefield with the orcs.

Among the sound of armor clashing into each other, they orderly exchanged positions with the forces that were already on the battlefield and assumed the responsibility as the assault forces on the frontline. Next, they would take turns and use the lives on their side to wipe out all the surviving forces of the orcs until they could break into the city and annihilate everything that was left.

No mercy. No prisoner. Not even one living being will be spared.

Meanwhile, at the Orc Palace, lines of orc shamans that were wearing accessories made of bones and totems went up to the city walls. The number was only nearly a thousand. They looked down on the human army that had them surrounded at the moment.

That was a total of hundreds of thousands of humans down there. Even if they were merely great in number, that number was also a huge number that even the entire remaining orcs could not afford to endure. That scene had struck a sense of death and sorrow into the gazes of the Orc Shamans. They remained silent, making the surroundings a little quiet than expected.

The wind blew through the corpses between the two armed forces and brought a scent of rusty blood.

They stretched their skinny hands and took hold of their totems, or the items that were invested by spirits of the souls.

That was a completely different spell from the spell of the human wizards. It was another way of exploring the world that was different from magic. The shamans gained their power by igniting the Flames of their own souls and communicating with the Will of all things in the world. Now, one by one the totems of different materials began to appear along with a dense presence. The runes were beginning to flow around the totems. The power of elements was beginning to gather around, followed by mysterious lights emanating from each of the totems.

That was the most elite high-order shaman legion of the orcs. All of the great shamans that belong to the God of War were among them. Their ancestors used the orc's first generation of great violence to kill all the races on the plains and exterminated the centaurs' first legion that the centaurs ever had, wiping them out of their existence.

The raging winds of the great plains blew through the clouds and dispersed the clouds from the sky. In between the heaven and earth, there was a fierce roar. An old orc shaman that doesn't seem too skinny compared to the other orc shaman, wearing numerous gemstones all over its body, took a step forward. It was holding a gigantic bone scepter. There were no pupils in both of its eyes; not even the whites in its eye sockets. There were only hot glowing white lights in the center of each of its eye sockets.

The Great Orc Shaman, known as the highest priest of the God of War, gazed at the enemies in front of him. Looking at the despairing military forces of mankind, it knew that the end of the pride of the plains and the withering of the sons of God were neigh. It was inevitable.

The rows of orc shamans took a step forward along with their elder. Even though it would be merely a pointless struggle, they would still want to kill one more human as long as they were still breathing.

That was the only thought that all of the orcs had on their minds.

The orcs were beings of war. Their bodies were burning with the power of slaughter and destruction. The sons of God would never surrender, they would never give up resisting. Even after their city was surrounded for long, they would want to take the fight to their enemies.

Remaining in silence while watching the shamans and priests around them, these were all its descendants, its students. The great shaman did not flash its eyes at all. It lifted up the bone scepter in its hands and placed it up right at the very top of its head. The skull on the scepter was the skull of a centaur. That skull was known to the skull of the last blood of a royal family of a centaur. It was gleaming with the radiance of blood.

The orc's path to conquer everything would never stop. It was either exterminating the other races or get exterminated by them. That would be something easy to understand.

"Blood sacrifice for the ancestor." Its dry, low voice echoed over the wall.

"The soul returns to the earth." The same sound that seemed to dry up because of hunger and thirst echoed again.

Numerous totems burst out with blinding radiances at the same particular moment. Senses of presences were unleashed one wave after another. Power from the ancient, the heaven and earth, and from all things in this world was unleashed.

One hundred and twenty-nine years ago, there was a major hurricane that destroyed an entire city.

Three hundred and fifty-five years ago, a large earthquake had destroyed an entire army.

Seven hundred seventy-four years ago, falling stars from the heaven had almost exterminated the Orcs, hitting hard on the backbone plain of the Tartaros.

The power of all catastrophe had reappeared. After that, concepts were extracted and condensed into a dark beam of light. Numerous light beams crossed the sky and its border one beam after another, forming a long line of parabolic segments, leaving residues of images in the field of vision. Containing the power to destroy everything, the beam went straight toward the legions of the humans.

Shamans were beings that call upon the power of the past and the world. Through the spirits of heaven and earth, they could recreate all the phenomena that had appeared in this world.

And that, would be their final strike back.