Chapter 229 Pulling Down The Shields

Chapter 229 Pulling Down The Shields
The freezing rain pounded against the thick, black iron of the tower shields, a relentless drumming that drowned out the gasps of the dying thugs bleeding in the alleys.

Fifty heavy infantrymen formed an absolute, unbroken wall of steel across the narrow street. Behind them, Captain Ma sat on his armored warhorse, his massive executioner’s sword resting on his shoulder. He looked down at us with the bored, arrogant confidence of a man who had never lost a battle in the slums.

"Advance," Ma ordered, his deep voice carrying effortlessly over the storm.

The shield wall moved. It was a terrifying, mechanical crawl. The men stepped in perfect unison, their heavy, iron-shod boots sinking deep into the thick, sewage-filled mud. From the gaps between the massive paveses, thirty long, barbed pikes thrust forward, creating an impenetrable forest of deadly iron.

I didn't have a single drop of Qi in my hollow core. I couldn't shatter their shields with kinetic energy, and I couldn't outrun them.

But I had something else. I had a fully healed, baseline body operating at absolute peak physical condition, and a mind forged in the darkest pits of assassination. I knew exactly how heavy armor worked. It made men feel invincible, but it blinded them, exhausted them, and in knee-deep mud, it turned them into anchors.

"Stay close to my back," I told Jin-Woo, not turning my head. "Do not waste your Qi on their shields. Hit the joints when they fall."

Jin-Woo’s breathing was ragged, but he stepped up behind my right shoulder, his straight sword held in a low, ready guard. "Break the line, Mu-Kang."

I charged.

I didn't run at the center of the wall. I sprinted toward the narrow gap between the left flank of the shield wall and the decaying brick face of a brothel.

"Pikes!" a lieutenant shouted from behind the shields.

Six barbed spearheads thrust forward, aiming directly for my chest.

I didn't try to block them. Two feet before the steel could pierce my tunic, I dropped to the ground. The mud was slick, thick, and frictionless. I slid underneath the thrusting pikes, the razor-sharp barbs passing inches above my face.

Before the infantrymen could retract their weapons, I lashed out with my right arm. The heavy iron chain wrapped entirely around the thick wooden ankle of the closest heavy shield.

I didn't pull back. I rolled my body weight away from the wall, using my legs to press against the brick building for leverage, and yanked the chain with every ounce of my newly restored strength.

The infantryman holding the shield was wearing sixty pounds of black steel plate. His boots were buried deep in the sucking mud. When I pulled the base of his shield outward, his center of gravity completely collapsed.

He pitched forward with a muffled shout, his massive shield slamming face-down into the muck.

The unbroken wall was breached. A four-foot gap opened in their flawless defense.

"Now!" I roared.

Baek Jin-Woo didn't hesitate. He surged into the gap like a floodwater finding a crack in a dam. He didn't swing at their breastplates. He dropped to one knee and drove the heavy brass pommel of his sword directly into the unprotected back of the falling man’s knee joint.

The joint popped. The man screamed, completely immobilized in the mud.

The men to his right desperately tried to turn their heavy tower shields to plug the gap, but they were too slow. The mud sucked at their boots, fighting their every movement.

I scrambled to my feet, diving directly into the absolute center of their chaotic formation.

It was a meat grinder of close-quarters leverage. I grabbed the shaft of a thrusting pike, pulled myself forward, and drove my elbow directly into the thin chainmail protecting the man’s armpit. His arm went entirely numb, dropping the weapon.

I spun on my heel, sweeping the legs of a second man. As he fell heavily backward, his steel armor collided with the man behind him, sending them both tumbling into the filth.

We were a nightmare moving through their ranks.

Jin-Woo and I fought with a terrifying, unspoken synchronization. Every time a heavy broadsword swung toward my blind spot, Jin-Woo’s blade was there to parry it, deflecting the strike with a sharp scrape of steel. Every time a pikeman tried to surround Jin-Woo, my iron chain lashed out, binding their weapons or shattering their kneecaps.

I could feel the absolute trust radiating from the Orthodox swordsman. He knew the horrifying truth of my past. He knew I had poisoned five hundred innocent people. But he also knew I was currently breaking my own knuckles against steel plate to ensure I didn't take a single life tonight.

I gripped a man's helmet by the visor, twisting his head violently to the side to disorient him, then drove my knee into his stomach. He collapsed, gasping for air.

\[System Notice: Hostile incapacitated without lethal intent.\]
\[Karma Generated: +15.\]

I ignored the flashing blue text in my peripheral vision. I moved to the next target.

The heavy infantry was completely unraveling. Their long pikes were useless at such close range, and their heavy armor was causing them to exhaust themselves simply trying to stand up in the slick mud. They were falling over each other, a chaotic, thrashing mass of black iron.

"Useless dogs!" Captain Ma roared from the rear of the formation.

He didn't wait for his men to recover. He spurred his massive armored warhorse forward, charging directly through his own broken ranks. Men scrambled out of the way as the beast trampled the mud, heading straight for Jin-Woo.

Ma raised his massive, two-handed executioner’s sword high above his head, preparing to cleave Jin-Woo entirely in half.

Jin-Woo raised his blade, his deep blue Qi flickering weakly, bracing for an impact that would surely shatter his exhausted arms.

"Jin-Woo, drop!" I shouted.

Jin-Woo instantly threw himself flat into the mud.