Path of Light.

Chapter 722 723. Prisoner of War Camp Outside the City
In the central square of Padstow City, the gray dwarf prisoners lined up in four long rows and walked out of the portal slowly.

It was noon in Padstow. The dazzling sunlight shone on the central square, making the square like a large oven. The strong sunlight even caused a strong stinging sensation on the skin.

The gray dwarf prisoners were wearing dirty linen shirts. Their beards had not been trimmed properly for almost a week and were almost knotted on their chins. Some of their beards were even stained with blood.

Arriving in a strange environment, the gray dwarf prisoners looked around coldly. Surrounded by a dense forest, the central square looked like a patio.

When the gray dwarf prisoners walk out of the portal, they will stop subconsciously. At this time, the elven guards at the portal will use the short sticks in their hands to poke the dwarves' shoulder blades, urging them to move forward quickly to avoid congestion caused by the portal.

Sometimes the portal is congested, which may cause the gray dwarf prisoners behind to get lost in the unknown space cracks...

Driven by sticks, the gray dwarf prisoners lined up and stood in the extremely hot square.

Soon the sunlight overhead was gradually blocked by the tall trees, and the central square quickly became cooler.

When almost half of the central square was filled with gray dwarf prisoners, a team of half-elf guards came over from the edge of the square. They escorted three thousand gray dwarf prisoners out of the square and walked down along the forest avenue in the city.

The gray dwarf prisoners found that both sides of the road were crowded with half-blood elves watching, and they were all pointing at the dwarf team...

The gray dwarf prisoners did not expect that it would take them half a day to walk out of Padstow from the central square.

The forest roads were full of half-elves, and some of them even threw rotten apples on the street directly into the faces of the gray dwarf prisoners.

Seeing the two fully armed half-elf guards on the street, the gray dwarf prisoners did not dare to make any resistance.

The towering trees on both sides of the street were dotted with tree houses of various styles. The gray dwarf prisoners kept walking like this, and when it was almost dark, they arrived at a clearing in the woods on the outskirts of Padstow.

What kind of forest city is this? Why are there so many elves living there?

The gray dwarf prisoners of war have a new understanding of the elven city...

Some carriages filled with magic herbs were parked on the roadside outside the city. The half-blood elves standing next to the carriages were also staring at the group of gray dwarf prisoners in amazement. They had never expected that so many gray dwarves would come from Padstow City...

Some of the Silver Moon Elf merchants were quite courageous and asked the half-blood elf guards who were escorting these gray dwarf prisoners:
"Sir, are these gray dwarves going to be sent to the Pagisto Plateau to mine?"

"Well, let them help us mine to wash away the crimes they committed in the Queen Eweni Islands."

The half-elf guard captain stopped and spoke to the Silvermoon Elf merchant.

The Silver Moon Elf Merchant shouted in surprise, "Were they sent from the Queen Eweni Islands? Does this mean that the naval battle in the Queen Eweni Islands was won?"

The half-elf guard captain looked at him as if it was a matter of course and stopped talking nonsense with the Silvermoon Elf merchant.

……

There was no place in the city large enough to house these gray dwarf prisoners, so Roy could only temporarily detain them in a clearing in the woods outside the city.

Although the glade was an open area, after a whole night of preparation, the glade was not only surrounded by fishing nets, but the nets were also covered with thorny vines.

This is a hillside, and below the hillside there is a river flowing out of the city of Padstow.

Nearly a thousand elven archers were deployed around the clearing in the forest.

The exhausted and hungry gray dwarf prisoners walked into the clearing in the forest one after another. The half-elves used ropes to separate a number of areas between the trees. There were passages, rest areas, and special areas for fetching water near the river.

The river water is relatively clean, but the river channel is not very wide. There is a waterfall just a hundred meters downstream.

Miss Christine rode a silver Pegasus and stood beside the waterfall. Four silver Pegasus knights followed behind her. Looking at the bustling prisoner-of-war camp from afar, she said to the silver Pegasus knight behind her with some doubt:

"...So, when Captain Roy led eight magic airships to the Queen Ewenni Islands, they happened to encounter the gray dwarf bandits who had assembled a hundred thousand troops to attack the Queen's Islands. As a result, they used magic explosive arrows to burn the gray dwarf bandits' three-masted sailing ship, and then these gray dwarf bandits were defeated?"

The Silver Pegasus Knight quickly explained, "Ahem, actually the War Ancient Tree and the Silver Moon Elf Guards who held on to Queen Island also contributed to this. In addition, there were four Silver Pegasus Knights who blocked the Gray Dwarf bandits in the sky. After the Gray Dwarf bandits were defeated, they chased the fleeing Gray Dwarf fleet for three days and three nights."

Miss Christine lowered her head, stroked the mane of the silver Pegasus, and asked in confusion: "They can't have been flying over the sea for the past three days, how did they get supplies?"

"It was Captain Roy's magic airship that provided the corresponding supplies."

"So, if the legion has a magic airship, its combat effectiveness will be greatly improved?"

"Yes, miss," the Silver Pegasus Knight replied.

Miss Christine did not look at the gray dwarf bandits in the woods again. She reached out and patted the silver Pegasus under her affectionately. The silver Pegasus spread its white wings and flew into the sky above the waterfall.

At this time, the sunset has already set behind the mountain, and the sea of ​​trees in the mountains is dyed a fiery red.

……

The first thing the gray dwarf bandits did was to take a bath in the river.

They were not used to the hot and humid weather in Padstow, but fortunately, the half-elf guards did not lock them up in the clearing in the forest, where they could not do anything. They could go to the river to fetch water or apply for a bath, but they needed a team of gray dwarf prisoners to act in unison.

These gray dwarf prisoners did not dare to run away because there were half-elf archers everywhere.

The gray dwarves even felt that there were some invisible eyes staring at them in the shadows of the surrounding woods. Their sixth sense was always very sharp...

These gray dwarf bandits are very fierce and brutal in battle, but they are also stubborn when they are captured.

A group of gray dwarf robbers came to the stream. The river bank was actually sandy. A group of gray dwarves took off their linen shirts and plunged into the cool river water, feeling the lost strength returning to their bodies.

The first thing they did in the river was to wash their beards. A row of burly gray dwarves sat in the shallow water, washing their beards and chatting in low voices.

"Mushrooms are growing on my feet."

"I thought they would put us in a prison on Palram Island, but I didn't expect to come to a plane full of forests."

"They actually defeated us with a magic airship. The magic airship was originally a magic technology created by us dwarves. We should have brought the magic airship here, so that they would have no advantage at all."

"Why do you think we have never dared to let the magic airship enter the Elf Kingdom?"

"Because those Silver Pegasus Knights happen to be the nemesis of magic airships. They can destroy the floating device by simply throwing their spears at it, and our magic airship will crash directly."

When the gray dwarf bandit leader gave the answer, the group of gray dwarves fell silent.

They rinsed their linen shirts briefly in the river water, wrung out the moisture, and put them back on.

Some gray dwarves have already walked to the shore from the river, and there is not much time to give them a bath, as there are still a large number of gray dwarves waiting behind them.

After the gray dwarves put on their clothes and walked back from the river, they followed the fixed passage surrounded by ropes and came to another open space. The open space here was filled with wooden boxes, and a large number of wooden boxes exuded a rich apple aroma.

The gray dwarves, who had not eaten any food for a day, immediately felt their stomachs rumbling. Under the escort of the half-elf guards, the gray dwarf prisoners lined up in a long line and began to walk in front of the pile of wooden boxes. Each gray dwarf was given two apples.

The gray dwarf bandits actually saw a young human boy among a group of half-elves distributing apples. He was wearing a set of thick leather armor and a magic pattern structure. He took out green apples from a wooden box and distributed them to the gray dwarf prisoners.

A gray dwarf prisoner came to the wooden box and curled his lips when he saw the box full of these green apples.

While Roy was bending down to take the apple, he spoke quickly in Imperial language:

"In the elf world, I can actually see humans. Hey, kid, where is your home?"

Roy heard a string of Imperial language and looked up with a puzzled look on his face, just in time to see a red-bearded gray dwarf looking at him.

The gray dwarf spoke in Elvish again: "Why, you don't understand the Imperial language? ... What about Elvish?"

Roy answered casually: "Elf is OK."

The red-bearded gray dwarf immediately said, "Human boy, where are you from? How come you don't even know the Imperial language?"

His words in Elvish immediately attracted many hostile looks from the people around him, and almost all the half-blood elves were staring at him.

The red-bearded gray dwarf took a step back in fear.

Roy stuffed the green apple in his hand into his hand and said casually:

"I have lived in the elf world since I was a child and I am used to the life here."

Half-blood elves kept bringing baskets of apples and distributing them to the gray dwarf prisoners.

If these gray dwarf prisoners go to the back, they can get a palm-sized salted fish, which is to replenish salt for the gray dwarf bandits. After all, the Partington plane has just entered the hot summer, and the city of Padstow is as hot as a steamer.

After taking a bath and receiving food, the group of gray dwarves were escorted back to the rest area allocated to them.

It was just a clearing in the woods, with no shelter at all. The dwarves could only sit on the ground, but fortunately the ground was not too wet.

The gray dwarf prisoners munched on green apples and talked quietly.

"Hey, they took our beans and gave us these sour rotten apples to eat..."

"Be content, you can think of it this way, at least we can still eat green apples."

"Isn't it good to have a fish? It's better than nothing."

The beans and barley on the three-masted sailing ship were confiscated by the Knights of Silver Pegasus. The Silver Moon Elves planned to use these beans and barley to feed the horses, and would not give them to the gray dwarf prisoners.

The duergar bandit sat in a glade in the woods, eating an apple.

Some gray dwarves found some fungal spores that looked like horse dung eggs under a big tree, and they immediately distributed these horse dung bags.

Some gray dwarves crush these horse dung eggs in their palms and apply them to wounds to prevent inflammation...

"I didn't expect the elves to send us to a different plane. This isn't their style!"

"To be honest, this place isn't as bad as I imagined."

"At least we didn't go hungry or get beaten."

The only thing that was a little uncomfortable was sitting in the woods wearing a linen shirt. There were small flying insects everywhere in the woods. The flying insects could not bite the dwarves' densely hairy parts, but they could leave some marks on their armpits, wrists, ankles, and necks.

It was hot, humid, and covered with slippery moss.

The gray dwarves don't like the smell of that kind of grass and trees.

As the gray dwarf prisoners arrived at the clearing in the forest one after another, the entire hillside was filled with gray dwarf prisoners, densely packed in the darkness.

……

Roy was even a little worried. Once the gray dwarf prisoners found that the half-elf guards were not strong enough, they would suddenly start a riot in the clearing in the forest. Even if they did not fight back and just fled to Padstow Forest, the current 3,000 half-elf guards would not be able to stop them.

Roy was not completely unprepared. The assassination group was currently guarding outside the temporary prisoner-of-war camp here.

Tennyson even hoped that there would be some brave guys among this group of gray dwarf bandits who could escape from the prisoner-of-war camp in the dead of night.

Because there is such an unwritten rule in the Partington plane that any prisoners of war who escape without permission will be killed during the pursuit, no matter if they are Silver Moon Elves or any other race.

Tennyson wanted to implement this rule to the end...

A group of half-elf guards stood on the surrounding trees, holding forest bows in their hands, staring at the gray dwarf prisoners vigilantly.

In fact, the half-elf guards are quite good at archery. An ordinary forest bow plus feather arrows still has a strong killing power against these unarmored gray dwarves.

The glades throughout the forest were littered with gray dwarf prisoners.

Roy checked around the prisoner-of-war camp and found that after eating the two apples and a dried fish in his hand, the gray dwarf prisoners actually calmed down. They huddled together and lay on the forest floor, sleeping soundly without any worries.

It was almost dawn in Padstow when the last group of gray dwarves arrived at the prisoner-of-war camp in the glade.

Roy saw the green apples that the half-blood elves brought from the apple orchard and touched his forehead helplessly.

He was a little afraid to think whether the gray dwarf prisoners would riot after eating green apples for a few days in a row.

But apart from these fruits, there was nothing else in Padstow to fill the stomachs of the gray dwarf prisoners.

After being busy all night, Roy was in the temporary cafeteria in the morning, distributing green apples to the gray dwarf prisoners.

He was not here just to give apples to the gray dwarves. He took advantage of the fact that several gray dwarf prisoners were sitting together chewing sour apples and took an apple with them. Unfortunately, Roy could not understand the language the gray dwarves spoke.

Finally, Roy waited for the red-bearded gray dwarf from last night. When he saw him again in the morning, he had braided his red beard into three beautiful little braids.

Roy picked up two larger apples and threw them to the red-bearded gray dwarf. The red-bearded gray dwarf then asked Roy in Elvish: "Why are you still sharing apples here? Didn't you rest all night? These elves always treat us dwarves and humans as human beings..."

"This job is not bad. Sharing apples is not tiring." Roy responded casually.

"I remember that you failed to capture the Queen Ewenni Islands last time. Why are you planning to attack the Queen Islands again this time? That archipelago is a strategic location, and the elves will never give it up."

The red-bearded gray dwarf was slightly startled when he heard Roy say this. His expression became somewhat helpless. He spread his hands and said to Roy:
"We can't help it! We are just trying to survive..."

(End of this chapter)