novelraw Chapter 198: Is the Dog-Eat-Dog Situation Really Coming?
Chapter 198: Is the Dog-Eat-Dog Situation Really Coming?
Chapter 198: Is the Dog-Eat-Dog Situation Really Coming?"Promotion conditions met, Profession Ranger (lv4) promoted—Current Profession Ranger (lv5)"
"Received profession attribute bonuses: Strength+1, Agility+4, Constitution+1!"
"Promotion conditions met, Profession Assassin (lv4) promoted—Current Profession Assassin (lv5)"
"Received profession attribute bonuses: Strength+1, Agility+4, Constitution+1!"
After his Agility attribute reached the requirements for level 5, Lin Mo's Assassin and Ranger professions completed their promotions together, granting him a total of 12 additional attribute points.
In this battle, Lin Mo had already lost count of how many times his attributes had increased...
Moreover, as each profession's level increased, the benefits of having multiple professions were becoming increasingly apparent. Even without considering versatility, Lin Mo's main attributes for any single profession now significantly exceeded those of other Professionals at the same level.
After all, when other professions promoted, they also gained corresponding attribute bonuses.
For example, the recent promotions of Ranger and Assassin together provided him with two points of Strength and two points of Constitution.
It didn't seem like much, but when accumulated across multiple professions, it became quite substantial.At the rear of the battlefield, the goblin army had completely entered a withdrawal state... Their appearance could almost be described as a panicked flight.
While those goblins could still retreat, the ones that had penetrated deep into the battlefield near the front lines weren't having such an easy time leaving.
The guards and adventurers who were still in relatively good condition pursued the victory, continuously harvesting the heads of these goblins.
Commander Joel was also excited at this point, loudly commanding: "Brothers, charge! Silverstream City isn't a place they can come and go as they please! Since they dared to attack, let them leave their lives behind!"
Lin Mo followed the main force in pursuit for some time, completely eliminating the portion of goblins that couldn't retreat in time.
They had almost chased to the midpoint of the battlefield. Reaching here, Commander Joel finally began to calm down. The goblin side had likely chosen to abandon the attack mainly because they couldn't achieve a breakthrough after prolonged fighting, suffered heavy losses, and because the undead creatures had withdrawn.
But this didn't mean the goblin side had lost their threat. In fact, even including the several thousand to ten thousand goblins they had just killed during the pursuit, the total goblins they had eliminated in the battle only accounted for about one-sixth or one-seventh of the enemy's total numbers.
There were limits to beating a drowning dog. If pushed too hard, a cornered dog would jump over the wall, which wouldn't benefit anyone.
Withdraw the troops...
This battle had lasted from nightfall until almost dawn. Both the guards and adventurers were completely exhausted. They left some personnel who were still in good condition to continue guarding the defensive lines and prevent a goblin counterattack, while the remaining people quickly withdrew to safe areas to rest.
More independent adventurers like Lin Mo didn't need to stay at the defensive lines at all. They directly returned to the city with Ellie and Finnie.
This battle had lasted too long, and they had faced many opponents, including some powerful ones. Lin Mo had fought until he was nearly at his wit's end and needed proper rest. ṛά𝐍ó𝐁ÊŞ
They first brought the still-unconscious Finnie to the City Lord's Mansion. Sherfilia took Finnie to her room, settled her in, carefully changed her into pajamas, and covered her with blankets before following Lin Mo back to the manor.
Due to the special circumstances, Lena was still working overtime at the Adventurers' Association and hadn't returned. Sherfilia quickly prepared some breakfast, the three ate something, and then each returned to their rooms to rest.
Lin Mo was so tired he couldn't even be bothered to take a bath. He directly cast "Cleansing Flow" on himself, then dried off using fire element, and went straight to bed.
He fell asleep almost as soon as he touched the bed...
That sleep lasted straight until late morning.
When Lin Mo opened his eyes, the sunlight was strong but wasn't shining into the room. He turned his head to look—the curtains he had forgotten to close before sleeping had been drawn shut at some point.
Turning his head to scan the room, the dim space was empty, with no sign of a certain petite figure.
"Strange..."
Lin Mo scratched his head somewhat puzzled. He had clearly felt like someone was watching him just moments before.
Could she be hiding? That didn't seem likely though.
Sherfilia had never deliberately hidden her presence from him before.
Although with her level and strength, if she wanted to do so, Lin Mo indeed wouldn't be able to detect her.
Shaking his head, Lin Mo got up from bed, then froze again.
He had been so exhausted earlier that he had clearly fallen asleep directly without changing clothes, but now he was wearing pajamas.
This felt like having a magical housekeeping spirit...
A faint smile curved at the corner of Lin Mo's mouth. He could now be certain that his earlier feeling wasn't just his imagination.
But he didn't intend to expose her, directly leaving the room.
In a dark corner of the room, Sherfilia crouched half-standing, hugging her knees with both hands, staring at the ground in a daze for a long time.
Why had she suddenly hidden?
Even she herself wasn't quite clear. It seemed she was somewhat afraid that he would discover her staring at him when he woke up.
Why did she have such thoughts? If this were before, she would have stared back at him expressionlessly until he awkwardly looked away first.
But now, she was experiencing a very subtle feeling.
This emotion was hard to describe, quite strange, and made her heart feel itchy...
Was this what Young Mistress Finnie had previously called experiencing feelings?
Sherfilia remembered the strange things Young Mistress Finnie had often said to her some time ago. Back then, she hadn't really understood, simply being a qualified listener.
Who would have thought that as time passed, it would now be her turn.
Ellie was still sound asleep and hadn't gotten up yet. Lin Mo went to check her room, decided not to disturb her, and turned to leave.
When he went downstairs to the living room, he saw Sherfilia wearing a new maid outfit, sitting elegantly on the sofa drinking tea.
Seeing Lin Mo come downstairs, she stood up and walked over to him, slightly bowing: "Master, did you sleep well?"
She didn't seem suspicious at all, her expression as cool as usual. If Lin Mo hadn't become sufficiently familiar with her, this attitude could almost be mistaken for reluctance.
But in reality, this was actually quite good attitude for Sherfilia. Apart from still being somewhat unaccustomed to the new form of address, her tone could almost be described as quite compliant.
"Quite well. Let's go, shall we head to the City Lord's Mansion?"
Although they had repelled one wave of the goblin army's attack, this didn't mean the goblin siege incident had simply ended. Lin Mo wasn't clear about the current specific situation and needed to go to the City Lord's Mansion to find out.
It would also be a good opportunity to check on Finnie's condition.
This girl always disregarded her own physical condition in such situations, repeatedly pushing her spirit to near-collapse until she fell unconscious.
Ultimately, it was because her Spirit attribute wasn't high enough to bear the mental load from using magic.
Lin Mo had often been troubled by this issue before too, but recently, as his Spirit attribute gradually increased, he didn't experience such situations as often.
The two didn't bother with eating and went directly to the City Lord's Mansion.
They weren't the only ones at the City Lord's Mansion—there were also some city officers and the two adventurer groups that had come to support earlier.
City Lord Behira had specially arranged a banquet to thank them for their assistance.
The banquet was quite grand and very lively, which made Lin Mo somewhat puzzled.
Was it really appropriate to celebrate so extravagantly just for repelling one wave of goblin attack?
Holding this doubt, Lin Mo came to City Lord Behira's study and knocked on the door.
"Come in."
City Lord Behira's voice sounded from inside. Lin Mo pushed the door open and entered. The City Lord was, as usual, working at her desk, but the expression on her face was clearly much more relaxed.
"You're here?"
Looking up and seeing Lin Mo, City Lord Behira's expression immediately became more amiable. She smiled and nodded: "Have a seat."
Lin Mo sat on the nearby sofa, and City Lord Behira also stood up, sitting opposite him.
Miss Melissa suddenly appeared from somewhere and poured hot tea for them.
"Thank you."
Since she was Sherfilia's mother, Lin Mo nodded and expressed thanks.
Melissa smiled: "No need to be so polite with me, Young Master."
"That child Sherfilia... has she been causing you any trouble recently?"
"No, she's been quite good..."
Under Melissa's gaze, Lin Mo instinctively felt somewhat nervous. After all, speaking of which, this person was actually similar to City Lord Behira—both could be considered his mothers-in-law?
"That child has had a cool personality since childhood, doesn't like to talk... please be understanding."
Melissa slightly bowed as she spoke.
Lin Mo could only respond awkwardly. Although his strength had improved tremendously compared to when he first crossed over, and he was now quite a notable figure in Silverstream City—even becoming the City Lord's prospective son-in-law—his mindset was still difficult to change quickly. At the very least, he still found it hard to put on those so-called aristocratic airs.
Lin Mo also didn't like putting on such airs. For him, normal communication was sufficient.
Of course, he did enjoy Sherfilia's "Master" form of address.
Who wouldn't love hearing a beautiful young girl call them "Master"?
Especially with Sherfilia's cool expression and calm tone—if she could add a bit of a disdainful expression...
But now, she was experiencing a very subtle feeling.
"You came here to ask about the situation outside the city, right?"
City Lord Behira took a sip of hot tea from her cup. Seeing Lin Mo nod, she continued: "No need to worry about that. According to intelligence scouts, the goblin army is still continuing to move in a direction away from Silverstream City."
"Oh?"
This surprised Lin Mo somewhat. The goblin army wasn't some small squad of dozens or hundreds—with that scale of hundreds of thousands of personnel, it was almost impossible to hide their movements or perform deceptive maneuvers.
This meant those goblins truly had no intention of continuing to attack Silverstream City.
After one failed attack, they just gave up?
Were goblins really that lacking in resilience and patience?
No wonder they were already celebrating here.
Lin Mo slightly frowned, pondering these matters. In his view, according to common sense, a goblin army of this scale, once formed, shouldn't disband so easily.
But they were indeed moving away from Silverstream City. Unless...
Lin Mo suddenly thought of something: "They're not... heading toward Lania City, are they?"
City Lord Behira smiled and nodded: "Judging from their current movement route, that's highly likely."
There was such a thing?
The dog-eat-dog situation was really happening.
But according to their ongoing investigations, the goblins had been cooperating with Lania City all along. Why would they suddenly turn against them? This change in attitude was really quite rapid.
"However, we also have bad news on our side."
City Lord Behira slightly frowned: "After preliminary battlefield cleanup and statistical work, we discovered that many corpses of fallen soldiers were secretly transported away by goblins during the chaos of battle."
Hearing this, Lin Mo immediately realized what this meant: "Similar situations have occurred before... In the end, it's the necromancer hiding in the shadows who benefits."
"Other towns haven't reported their situations yet, but it's probably the same everywhere... And some individual towns might have suffered relatively severe damage. Fortunately, for safety considerations, all village residents had been evacuated to towns beforehand, otherwise who knows how many corpses would have been stolen..."
"But precisely because of this, those villages suffered very serious damage. The reconstruction work will require a long time..."
City Lord Behira said these words, but she didn't actually look particularly troubled. After all, compared to the threat of the goblin army pressing at their borders, although these tasks were somewhat troublesome, they could be gradually resolved over time, so they didn't really count as major problems.
City Lord Behira then looked up at Lin Mo and changed the subject: "If the goblin army's target is truly Lania City, what do you think we should do?"
Asking me?
Lin Mo was momentarily stunned, then thought briefly: "For now, we should definitely hold our position and observe the specific situation..."
After all, he wasn't familiar with Lania City's specific circumstances, and it was still uncertain whether the goblins were truly going to attack Lania City.
"Hmm."
City Lord Behira nodded: "Before the situation over there becomes clear, it's best to hold our position."
But if everything becomes settled and it's confirmed that the goblins have completely broken with Lania City or the Lawrence Family, they couldn't just stand by and watch the people of Lania City suffer.
After all, most of the guilt originated from the Lawrence Family's arrogance and greed. The residents of Lania City and nearby towns were mostly innocent.
Of course, by that time, what they would need to do wouldn't just be providing support, but also settling accounts with the Lawrence Family!