Malin huddled against the wall on the second floor; a Chaos fireball had just visited the window opposite him. Considering there might still be some archer watching, Malin could only reload his firearm whilst lamenting about the extent to which Pamir City had become tainted.
After they entered the eastern district of the city, they actually began to encounter Chaos warriors. The fact that they hadn’t anticipated meeting them cost their side seven dead and eleven wounded just to kill those Chaos warriors. Before they could catch their breath, the Chaotic Believers launched a cluster charge.
Although Lady Manli’s guards had brought over two four-pound cannons with horses, they could not set them up before the close-quarters battle commenced; clearly, they couldn’t just bomb the melee.
So the guards had to carry the two four-pound cannons up to the second floor.
They hadn’t fired many shots before a Chaotic Sorcerer blew one up, sending a man and his mount tumbling. After losing one cannon, the guards were forced to drag the other behind the defensive line.
After Malin finished loading his bullets, he turned to another window and glanced at the Chaos fighters below. He couldn’t help but start missing the synergy of open field tactics, incendiary grenades, and Molotov cocktails.
That’s right, Molotov cocktails.
Malin ran down to the first floor, rummaged through the kitchen of the household, and found some liquor, some rags, and a few ingredients.
After crudely mixing them together, Malin picked a group of Chaotic Believers who burst out from around the corner, brandishing knives and spears and howling as they tried to join the melee. Malin lobbed two bottles of Saduka cocktails at them—this was Pamir City’s high-proof spirit, the label claimed it was a favorite of the Dwarves, with an alcohol content of 87 degrees, hardly different from industrial alcohol.
Truth be told, Malin was appalled when he saw this stuff—do you Dwarves really drink this liquor?
However, when he used the liquor to set that group of Chaos ablaze, Malin still paid his respects to its quality—truly worthy of being called a spirit, and the Half-human Punishers were quite fond of it. They obtained the recipe from Malin and immediately began to scavenge for ingredients.
As they started mass-producing Molotov cocktails, Malin spotted another group of Chaotic Believers. They emerged completely from the opposite side of the street’s alley, looking just like civilians with no armor to speak of, wielding a motley assortment of weapons. Malin spotted kitchen knives, chair legs, bricks, and brooms.
Were these guys really Chaotic Believers?
Harboring such doubts, a flash of light sparked in Malin’s raised right hand.
A fourth-circle Shaping Spell, Lightning Spear.
This was a long-range spell capable of reaching 200 yards, the only one among the first to fifth-circle spells that could hit a target at such a distance. Before the advent of firearms, it was the sniper rifle of the spellcasting world.
Its downside was significant, too—there was no area damage. It only inflicted electrical spell damage within a three-yard radius around the spear’s body, which was lower than the damage if it hit the target directly.
But to kill these pitiful wretches who seemed completely devoid of any combat capability, there was no issue at all.
Malin used maximum enhancement and range enhancement to reinforce the Lightning Spear in his hand. He then threw the Lightning Spear, and the pure white lance cut through the alley, disintegrating its direct contact on the spot. Any Chaos within the area fell to the ground, smoking.
Then, a bullet hit the window; Malin heard Chaos screaming in the street outside—the noise and light effects of the Lightning Spear were too ostentatious; any Chaos who wasn’t blind would be able to see it.
In fact, while Malin was still descending the stairs, Chaos began smashing at the door.
Malin made it downstairs just as Chaos broke through the front door. Facing the swarms of Chaos outside, Malin pressed the detonator in his hand. The directional anti-infantry mine aimed at the door sprayed out a mass of steel balls. It was a good piece of Church ordnance ordered from the workshop, and Malin hadn’t even had a chance to use it yet; thankfully, this device saved the day.
Hundreds of steel balls and shards swept across the entire doorway, knocking all the Chaos to the ground.
Malin flipped over a table and threw a grenade outside the door. The grenade hit a Chaos warrior charging recklessly towards him, exploding on impact. The explosion restored the target it had collided with to its component parts within the next second.
More Chaos charged in recklessly, only to be directly hit by an incendiary grenade thrown by a half-human. About a dozen people screamed and began to scatter in all directions, while Malin was responsible for killing the Chaos that ran towards their side.
Gunshots were heard from the streets, and the Chaotic Believers were retreating. Malin cautiously stuck his head out for a look and saw a squad of soldiers. These fellows didn’t seem to be City Guards but rather like they were from the military.
"Hey, kid, are you from the Church?" someone noticed Malin, also paying attention to the armor he was wearing, and someone immediately greeted him.
"Yes, if you go through this alley, you can flank the Chaos’s rear!" shouted Malin.
Without a second word, the soldiers dove into the alley.
Malin and the half-humans went up to the rooftop and leaped across the gaps between the houses, returning to the chaotic battle zone—Chaos was still swarming with people, and the group had even more Chaos warriors added to it. Perhaps considering the Behelit’s believers ahead of them to be weak and obstructive, several Chaos warriors even started slashing at the believers.
Gentlemen, you can’t even manage to be human, and now you’re being killed by your own elite units. Truly embarrassing.
The half-humans joyfully tossed Molotov cocktails down, setting the densely packed Chaos ablaze. The soldiers who had come up from behind with their firearms further hastened the Chaos’s defeat. Except for the Chaos warriors, who still maintained their fighting strength, they too couldn’t cause much damage without the cover of the believers (or rather, without the cannon fodder to catch the bullets for them).
At that time, Malin and the half-humans went downstairs. Colin stood by the door, and when he saw Malin, he just nodded, "What did you guys throw down just now? I didn’t sense any disturbance from a Spell Formation, but the effect seems to be very good."
"This thing." A half-human threw an unlit incendiary bottle over. Colin caught it, took a look and said, "Sardoka? This stuff?"
"Yeah, mixed with a little material, this stuff can burn quickly and fiercely," Malin said.
"I see. It looks like our corn stock is going to be useful," Colin said, while passing the incendiary bottle in his hand to a dwarf Punisher.
Then, Malin saw the dwarf say thanks, pull out the cloth strip from the bottle, and start guzzling it down.
As expected, he spat it out right after: "What the hell is this?! It’s so sweet! And it tastes weird!" cursed the dwarf.
Malin rolled his eyes.
Colin reached out to pat the dwarf’s head: "Have you lost your mind? I told you to take care of it! It’s an incendiary bottle, not your booze!"
"Why didn’t you say that earlier!" the dwarf retorted.
Malin didn’t know what to say, but one thing was certain.
This thing was probably not going to be mass-produced in the tool workshop.