Gou is a dark elf in Warhammer

Ares did not respond to Dakos, not because he did not want to speak, but because his throat felt like it was blocked by something.

He raised the binoculars slowly, as if confirming that he really wanted to see, and once he saw... there would be no going back.

After glancing at it, he put down the binoculars and turned to look at Dakos. There was no anger or questioning in his gaze, only a complex sense of confirmation, like finally fitting a piece of the puzzle into the last empty space.

"Yes, you... contributed to it?"

There are no stories or anecdotes about aiding and abetting evil in Elven culture; there is no such word or story.

But this didn't stop Darkus from guessing what Aris wanted to ask and offering a similar answer.

After the Second Battle of Gorgrond, Darkus told Aris: "Don't come to Nagarus again. If you come again, it won't be the same as this time."

Those words were a reminder, but also a threat.

But who is Aris?

He is the King of Shadows!
A man who has lurked in the shadows for thousands of years, who has made it as natural as breathing to remain undetected, a man even Malekith had to admit that if you really wanted to hide, he might not be able to find you.

So he came again.

But he didn't cause any sabotage, assassination, or do anything that would raise suspicion; he simply went into hiding. (Chapters 721, 845-847, not elaborated here)
However, by then Duluqi had entered a new era. Aris underestimated the terrifying power of Duluqi's new social system and the already well-established household registration system. Every ID card had a unique number, and every number corresponded to a living person, and everyone was caught in an invisible net.

If you suddenly disappear from this net, the net will sound an alarm.

If you suddenly appear from this net, the net will become alert.

Therefore, he was quickly noticed.

But Dakos and Malekith did nothing to him, because Dakos believed that Aris, who had gone undercover, could personally experience everything about the new era of Duruci, thereby breaking the existing impression and paving the way for the future.

It's not about persuasion, it's about demonstration.

Let me show you, you see, we are not the kind of people you think we are now.

Now, the result is in line with Dakous's expectations.

Malekith, on the other hand, simply didn't know how to face Aris.

After lying low, Aris settled in Krakarond and lived the same life as an ordinary worker. During that time, he learned to operate machine tools. His fingers found a peculiar rhythm on the lathe's rollers, and his eyes captured a kind of order that was blurred by speed but still existed amidst the flying metal shavings.

He became an excellent lathe operator, so excellent that the workshop director signed his name on the performance evaluation form more than once.

Some of the parts for these cannons came from that period, from the factory where Aris worked.

Those parts, after passing through his hands, transformed from rough steel billets into smooth finished products, were stamped with a certificate of conformity by the quality inspector, packed into boxes, transported away, and assembled into everything he was seeing now.

He didn't know that the parts he was driving were from a cannon; he only knew that the lines on the blueprints were very complex, the tolerances were very small, and the scrap rate for defective products was very high.

He didn't know what he was creating.

But he knows now!
"gun?"

In the distance, Ellesander asked the same question.

Unfortunately, Rahil could not provide the answers that Darkus had given to Aris. All Rahil could do was watch.

Watching the Trucians lift the tarpaulin.

Watching the Durucis rotate the cannon 180 degrees, the action didn't seem like operating a weapon, but more like turning the knob on a precision instrument.

As the Durucis loosened the latches securing the seat, a click sounded as the latches popped open, releasing the seat from its folded state.

As the Durucis flipped the seat around the axis downwards, flattening it against the ground, the seat landed on the grass with a dull thud, as if something heavy had finally found its footing.

Watching the officers take the aiming device out of the box and equip it to the left side of the gun barrel, he could clearly see through the binoculars that the box was made of wood and lined with foam, with the aiming device embedded inside, like a piece of jewelry waiting to be worn.

Everything was done in just three minutes.

And then no more.

Upon arriving here, they had completed their preparations to open fire.

Rahil opened his mouth as if to say something, but then closed it again. He had seen many new things in Lorthorn, but every time he thought that was all, something new would emerge from under the next tarpaulin.

According to the normal procedure, one step was missing: the two main frames, namely the gun legs, were not lowered and locked down.

Unlike other cannons that require two extended legs for mounting and the triangular support like the D30, this cannon does not need to extend its legs. It only needs to place the shovel-shaped spade on the ground at the moment of deployment and landing. If the ground is too hard, a spade pit needs to be dug with tools to ensure that the spade is firmly embedded and prevents it from slipping during recoil when firing.

Yes, it has a kind of otherworldly beauty, like M119 or L119.

Rahil didn't know these names, but from the gun's clean lines, compact layout, and shape without any unnecessary protrusions, he sensed a mature design quality that was different from any long-range weapon he had ever seen before.

This is because of Duruci's tactics and assessments.

This cannon was built a long time ago and was called a "secret weapon" by Dakous, but it was not mass-produced.

Within Duruch's organization, only a small number of generals and high-ranking officers knew of the existence of this secret weapon.

The purpose was to boost the generals' confidence and tell them that there was actually a backup plan.

After all, technological advancement is the most effective way to improve combat effectiveness, and it's much faster than any kind of training.

A typical example is machine guns and barbed wire against cavalry, or firearms against cold weapons in the mature period.

In the assessment, the appearance of artillery on Ausuan signified that Duruci had strategically fallen behind and the offensive was faltering. It indicated that they were desperate and had reached the point where even the workers needed to be mobilized and brought to Ausuan.

At that point, who cares about this or that anymore?

Thus, this cannon was designed.

Two horses are enough to pull it, and four horses are enough for rapid maneuvering.

The main features are lightweight, flexible, rapid deployment, and quick deployment and evacuation.

The downsides are poor range and insufficient power, but that depends on what you're comparing it to.

It's important to know that Asur is not equipped with artillery.

As long as it can be deployed and the shells fired, hitting the hundred-man squads and the Asur army camp, then this cannon is sufficient.

As a result, only the shells were produced; the propellant charges were neither designed nor produced.

Rahil was unaware of this background, but from the soldiers' practiced, composed movements, as if they were performing a routine task, he gleaned one thing: this wasn't the first time they had done this.

They've done this process countless times: pulling off the tarpaulin, rotating the gun barrel, loosening the clips, flipping down the base, and installing the sight. They've done it so many times that they don't need to think about it, they don't need to give commands, and everyone knows exactly where to put their hands.

After the artillery completed its firing preparations, the soldiers ran in an orderly fashion to a position fifty meters behind the cannon. That fifty meters wasn't just drawn randomly; it was calculated precisely. The round trip—from the rear to the gun position and back—was timed exactly to match the cannon's rate of fire.

As a red signal flare rose on the hillside, the wooden crate containing artillery shells was opened.

Then, the "dog walk" began.

The soldiers held the 105mm shells in their arms as if they were holding a sleeping baby. The shells were bronze-colored, smooth, and had sharp tips that gleamed coldly in the sunlight.

The first soldier returned to the artillery position, his steps quick. Five seconds later, the second soldier began to move. Five seconds apart, one after another, like a string of moving beads strung on the same line.

Since there was no need for a propellant charge, one only needed to stuff the shell into the breech. However, there was an extra safety measure. The Black Knight sat next to the officer, who was seated on the left breech. The Black Knight bent down, took the fuse from the box at his feet, and handed it to the officer.

The fuse was bronze-colored, with a sharp tip and a threaded back. The black knight held it between his fingers as if it were a delicate key used to open some kind of ancient lock.

The officer then inserts the fuse into the front of the shell, tightens it, confirms, and clicks it into place. Only after all this is done does the soldier load the shell into the breech and pull the breechblock.

The sound of the breech closing was muffled and heavy, as if something had been locked up.

Although there is one more step, it is still very fast.

Soon, one of the cannons fired.

A short, solid sound, like a giant iron hammer striking a thick anvil, rang out. A burst of orange-red flame shot from the muzzle, lasting less than half a second before being swallowed by the smoke.

The gun barrel jerked backward, but only slightly. The base and spade absorbed the recoil, leaving only a slight upward bounce of the barrel before it returned to its original position.

Then came the second gate, and the third gate.

Within five seconds, all eighty artillery pieces deployed on the other side of the riverbank completed their first firing.

In most cases, the human eye cannot directly capture the complete flight path of a large-caliber artillery shell. This is mainly due to the shell's extremely high speed, small size, and the physiological limitations of the human eye. However, under certain special conditions, there is a very low probability of seeing a brief, blurry point of light or trajectory.

However, there were no humans in the entire scene, only elves with excellent eyesight. Their eyes captured a fleeting moment, a moment so brief as to be barely visible, but their brains received it.

It was a dark, blurry point of light with a thin trail, flying from the opposite bank of the river, tracing a low, almost straight arc, before landing in the center of the position and disappearing below the ground.

Then, most of the people present changed their expressions.

The shell struck the empty position, and the ground jolted the moment it hit.

It felt as if something inside its belly had suddenly kicked, causing the entire area to bounce upwards for a moment. Then the soil was hurled up, like a gray-black flower, composed of mud, gravel, charred grass roots, and still-burning debris, surging upwards.

The flower bloomed in a fraction of a second and withered in a fraction of a second, torn apart by the wind and pulled back to the ground by gravity, making a sparse, muffled sound as it fell, like raindrops hitting the surrounding earth.

Rahil abruptly turned to look at Elisander.

At that moment, he was suffocating. It felt as if an invisible hand was forcing his chest open from the inside. His ribs were expanding, his lungs were bulging, but no air could get in. It was as if someone was choking him, not too hard, not too hard, just enough for him to breathe, but not enough for him to speak.

His face was pale, so pale that his lips were bluish and there was no color in the sides of his nose.

Ellenson's expression and complexion were exactly the same as his; it was as if the two of them had been pricked by the same needle and reacted in the same second.

Alessand's eyes were wide open, so wide that Rahil could clearly see the blood vessels on the surface of his eyeballs spreading outward from the edges of his pupils, like some kind of growing, tiny, red roots. His mouth was slightly open, his teeth were clenched together, and his lips were trembling slightly, but he couldn't speak.

Quirrell's already red eyes turned even redder at this moment. The redness spread from the whites of his eyes to the corners, and from the corners to his eyelids, making his entire eye look as if it were being soaked in a translucent, dark red liquid. It was as if, at any moment, blood would seep from his eye sockets, trickle down his cheeks, and drip onto his crumpled robe.

Then his expression turned to grief, the kind of grief one feels when losing a loved one, a grief that feels like the body has been cleaved in two, a grief where even breathing becomes a burden, a silent grief without tears. It was as if the shells had not struck an empty battlefield, but rather he himself.

One by one, smash his bones, crush his flesh, and pulverize all his fantasies that Caledo could stand up again.

Soon, a second volley of shells hit the position.

This time, the ground did not jump.

It wasn't that it didn't bounce; it was that it didn't have time to bounce before the next one came. The interval between the shells' impact points was too short, so short that the soil kicked up by the previous shell hadn't even fallen back to the ground before the next one exploded.

The sound of the explosion changed from a thud to a boom, and then from a boom to a continuous, uninterrupted rumble, like the deep, persistent roar of a huge, high-speed machine.

The roar came from the ground, from the soles of our feet, from our knees, from our lumbar spine, from our hearts, causing everyone's body to tremble slightly.

Ares turned his head stiffly, so slowly that Dakos could almost hear the faint, sandpaper-like sound of his cervical spine rubbing together.

His face was expressionless; his eyebrows didn't move, his lips didn't move, and his eyes didn't move. It was as if he had suppressed all his emotions into some deep place, a place where even he himself couldn't find the entrance.

He tried to look at Darkus with a blank expression, but the horror in his eyes betrayed him.

He thought, he thought, he thought...

Now, all those assumptions have been shattered one by one by the sound of those shells hitting the ground.

Having completed his preparations, Fenafen stood stiffly on the riverbank, his body as still as a bronze statue cast into the water. His hands hung at his sides, his fingers slightly curled, as if he were about to grasp something but then forgot to. His gaze fell on the battlefield across the river, shrouded in smoke and dust, but his focus was elsewhere; his brain was processing information he hadn't yet fully processed.

The Asur naval commanders and sea helmets beside him were in no better shape. Some were muttering something to themselves, some were repeatedly and unconsciously stroking their sword hilts, some had their mouths open and forgot to close them, and some had their eyes closed, unable to look.

Due to the terrain, the generals and soldiers on the other side of the riverbank had a clear view of the artillery bombardment of their positions. The shells flew out of the cannons with a muffled roar, as if coming from the depths of the earth, and landed on the positions several kilometers away, kicking up dirt higher than the trees. The sound of the explosions traveled back slower than the shells, so they saw the dirt fly up first, and then heard the sound.

A gasp escaped their lips; the sound wasn't loud, but it was synchronized, as if tens of thousands of people had been stabbed simultaneously in the same second. Someone cried out, but the cry was brief, swallowed by the explosion almost immediately.

When the third volley of shells hit the position, Malekith vanished from the spot.

One second he was standing there, arms crossed, watching the distant field being plowed by shells, his expression calm as if he were watching a performance that had nothing to do with him and whose outcome he already knew; the next second, his spot was empty, with only two shallow indentations in the grass from his boots.

Estrel and Marist exchanged a glance, both filled with shock, upon sensing Malekith's disappearance.

Meanwhile, the nobles of Asur on the hillside were a diverse group of people.

Some people covered their mouths, afraid of making a sound; some clenched their fists, their nails digging into their palms; some stood there, motionless, as if nailed to the spot by something; some slowly, gently, as if reluctantly, sat down on the grass, supporting themselves with their hands, heads down, not looking at anyone.

Someone started speaking, but the sounds were meaningless and empty; it was just lips moving and vocal cords vibrating, as if something was trying to escape from the body but couldn't find a suitable outlet.

Some people started to cry. Tears welled up in their eyes and streamed down their cheeks. They were silent and expressionless, just standing there letting the tears flow.

Some people started vomiting, not because they were sick, but because their bodies couldn't withstand the shockwaves of the explosions—not physical shockwaves, but psychological ones. Those shockwaves passed through their ears, their eyes, their skin, and crashed directly into their internal organs, churning their stomachs.

Some people squatted on the ground, holding their heads in their hands, their shoulders heaving violently; others stood with their eyes wide open, but their pupils were dilated, as if they weren't seeing anything at all.

Someone's lips were moving rapidly, as if chanting some scripture, but no sound could be heard. Someone's hands were repeatedly drawing symbols on their chest, which were prayer gestures, but the gestures were wrong; they were not Aisha's, not Asuyan's, not those of any known deity.

No one said: This is impossible.

Because everyone present knew that they had just witnessed something that was possible.

Nobody said: This is nothing special.

Because the moment they saw the shells hit the ground, they already knew that it wasn't just a possibility, it wasn't a maybe, it was already over.

From that moment on, from the moment the turbulent soil hadn't yet settled and the next round of shells was already flying down the road, everything was over.

Those military formations, those city walls, those castles, those defenses they considered insurmountable, those glories and prides they wrote on parchment scrolls, carved on stone tablets, and embroidered on banners—all have come to an end.

It wasn't defeated, it was surpassed.

They weren't defeated, they were eliminated.

The fourth round of shells has arrived.

But no one noticed anymore, because the smoke of the third round of fighting had not yet dissipated, because the dust of the second round was still floating in the air, and because the sounds of the first round were still echoing across the plains.

Also, because they no longer want to watch it.

But they still watched, watching that position that was repeatedly torn apart, crushed, and crushed, watching the shells fall again and again, explode again and again, and devour everything they no longer recognized—everything that had turned from soil into fragments, from fragments into dust, that had once been grass, soil, and stone.

Soon, the fifth volley of shells arrived. (End of Chapter)