Chapter 008: Internal Strife

“So, I think it was better to let Tek go just now. In that situation, if Tek had escaped, he would definitely have come back for revenge. If we really killed Tek, the magical beasts would likely send their forces to help him avenge himself. So, regardless of whether we killed Tek or not, it could force the magical beasts and Karu’s group to form an alliance—a situation we definitely don’t want to see,” said Du Fan.
“That’s why I let Tek go, to avoid such a situation as much as possible,” Du Fan added.
Hearing Du Fan’s words, Bashah and Leibao took a deep breath in shock. They had only been focused on keeping Tek captive and hadn’t thought this far ahead. Indeed, if the magical beasts and Karu’s group joined forces, it would be a nightmare for Bashah!
“Third brother, you’re right. We really should have let Tek go just now,” said Bashah.
At that moment, on the battlefield below, the Black Panther Knights were chasing after Karu’s allied forces, having advanced far ahead. The ground was covered with piles of corpses, and blood flowed like rivers.
“Pull back our troops,” Bashah said to Leibao.
Seeing the bodies of his own dwarf族 tribe members everywhere, Bashah couldn’t bear to continue killing anymore.
As Bashah’s order to withdraw was given, the Black Panther Knights, who had gone far ahead, retreated.
After counting the casualties, Bashah’s side lost over two thousand members of the Black Panther Knights. Those who were injured were given water from Moses’s Fountain of Life, and they quickly recovered. Of course, after Moses was besieged and had to use his Fountain of Life, Du Fan made sure to exploit him as much as possible whenever using the water.
As for the dwarf warriors sent by various tribes, over twenty thousand died. Those who were injured were given diluted versions of the Fountain of Life, but even so, their recovery speeds improved significantly.
As for Karu’s allied forces, the death toll reached over eighty thousand!
This wasn’t really surprising—being able to kill so many Black Panther Knights, an eight-decimal death toll wasn’t a bad deal. After all, all the Black Panther Knights were dwarf warriors at level five or above.

After several victories, many dwarf tribes chose to ally with Basha, and the armies assembled by these tribes reached 150,000 strong. However, due to continuous losses, the number of members in the Black Panther Knights had dropped to 20,000. Among them, over 3,000 knights had died or been disabled and forced to retire. Fortunately, out of those 3,000, only about 800 were full-fledged Black Panther Knights; the rest were members of the reserve force. After a night’s rest, a military meeting was held early the next morning to discuss the next steps. The current situation was that the Bilu tribe must have been severely weakened, the Dodge tribe had lost nearly 30,000 members, while the Tata tribe remained intact. The forces that Karu could muster numbered around 150,000. It was decided to lead a large army to attack Gras. Gras was the largest dungeon among the dwarves and once Basha’s territory. More importantly, the Dodge tribe’s lands surrounded Gras City. Before the Dwarf King ascended to the throne, Gras City was a dungeon built by the Dodge tribe, but it could only accommodate about 50,000 people at that time. It was under the Dwarf King’s rule that Gras City was continuously developed, eventually reaching its current scale. Another point to note was that, unlike the dungeons of other tribes where over 95% of the inhabitants were from that tribe, Gras City was home to people from various dwarf tribes. In essence, Gras functioned as the capital of the dwarves, with many other races closely related to the dwarves also living there. Attacking Gras City was, in fact, an attack on the Dodge tribe! On the way to Gras City, they would pass through the Bilu tribe, so the marching route would be from the Black Panther Knights’ base, through the Bilu tribe, to Gras City. This military campaign completely excluded the Tata tribe. Of course, it wasn’t that the Tata tribe was ignored; rather, if the Dodge tribe was defeated, the Tata tribe would be unable to cause any trouble. The issue now was to determine how many troops the Tata tribe would send to support the Dodge tribe during the attack.

According to the conventional thinking of the dwarves, the Tatta tribe should have around thirty thousand warriors. However, the combined skills of the Tatta tribe’s Four Metal Brothers are still quite formidable! After a day of rest, Basha began to mobilize his army and launched an attack on the Dodge tribe. Among the army, three thousand Black Panther Knights were left as a reserve force at the base, while the remaining seventeen thousand Black Panther Knights set off immediately. Following them were two thousand elves archers. A total of one hundred and fifty thousand warriors from various tribes, led by their respective chiefs and accompanied by the archers, formed an alliance of seventeen thousand dwarves and elves that set out toward the Bilu tribe. Along the way, strange things happened—there were many corpses of dwarf warriors scattered along the path. “Upon closer inspection, those corpses belong to the Bilu tribe and the Dodge tribe,” Leibao said to Basha after hearing his subordinates’ reports. Basha, Du Fan, Moses, Naixiu, and three holy-level magicians were all among the elf archers. “How did they die?” Du Fan asked. “Judging from the shape of some of the corpses and their wounds, it seems these dwarves died in a civil war between the two tribes, attacking each other,” Leibao replied. “A civil war!” Hearing this conclusion, Basha became immediately interested. “Indeed. Some of the corpses still retain their posture at the moment of death—such postures indicate that they died from fighting each other,” Leibao said seriously. “It seems the rebel alliance has split internally. This is good news for us, but we still need to investigate further,” Du Fan said. Thus, ahead of the main army, Du Fan, Naixiu, and Moses flew into the air. With their strong domain skills, Du Fan’s flying and lightness techniques, the three of them quickly flew toward the Bilu tribe. Along the way, the corpses of dwarf warriors continued to stretch toward the territory of the Bilu tribe. After flying nearly two hundred miles, what appeared before them was a group of about three thousand dwarf warriors surrounded by another group of over five thousand dwarf warriors. The two sides were engaged in fierce combat. Judging from the appearance of the besieged warriors, they were clearly from the Bilu tribe! And those surrounding the Bilu tribe were obviously dwarf warriors from the Dodge tribe.

“You Doge clan members are all despicable scoundrels!” a man who seemed to be the leader of the Bilu tribe shouted wildly, waving a large axe. “You sent us to deal with Basha! When battle started, you hid behind, then sent us to die! You bunch of despicable scoundrels!” the leader kept shouting.

In the air, the three people witnessing this scene immediately understood that during the battle, the Doge tribe had stayed at the rear of the allied forces, with not many of them participating in the fight. Now, the Bilu tribe warriors were using this as an excuse to blame them.

“You rushed forward eagerly, and now you blame our Doge tribe. Don’t you think that’s shameful?” a dwarf warrior from the Doge tribe retorted to the Bilu man’s words.

“Hmph! We rushed forward—don’t you know you rushed forward with us too?” the Bilu leader snarled.

However, the Doge tribe’s argument made some sense. When Komhan ordered the attack, all the Bilu warriors were driven by revenge, ignoring formation or coordination, charging forward with their weapons. It was very difficult for the Doge tribe to get involved later.

“Chase after you? Chase after you fools?” the Doge tribe members said mockingly.

It wasn’t bad before, but now it got worse. The Bilu tribe was already full of anger, and being mocked by the Doge tribe made them even more furious.

“You Doge clan members are all despicable scoundrels! You made us join forces against the Dwarf King, only for you cowardly bunch to freeze in fear at the sight of the Black Panther Knights and rely solely on us to fight!” Another Bilu warrior couldn’t hold back and started cursing.

Amidst these curses, the two sides continued fighting.

That incident was precisely why the two sides ended up in a chaotic battle.

After retreating in defeat, many Bilu warriors began murmuring about the battle. Soon, many dwarves agreed that the Doge tribe’s lack of effort was the main reason for their defeat!

After identifying this cause, the Bilu tribe began expressing their dissatisfaction toward the Doge family around them.

The Dodge tribe also had strong objections to the Bilu tribe. First, they rushed chaotically at the Basha army, and after losing, they immediately started fleeing in all directions. Such a disorganized group was nothing but a mess; if not for their own incompetence, they would have already dealt with the Basha army long ago, thought the warriors of the Dodge tribe. Thus, the armies of the two tribes, each with their own motives, came together, and soon, over a trivial matter, the warriors on both sides began blaming each other. If only Komhan hadn’t been killed, he could have, relying on the prestige he had accumulated over thousands of years within the Bilu tribe, extinguished these budding tensions between the two tribes. Unfortunately, a figure of such prestige as Komhan had already been killed by Naixiu. Among the remaining people, none had Komhan’s influence, and they were utterly unable to suppress the arguments between the two sides. Moreover, the leaders of the Dodge tribe and the warriors of the Bilu tribe paid no regard to face or dignity.