George's Conviction

Boom! An artillery shell detonated amid the crowd, blasting several orcs into the air, but Jushan withstood it sheerly through his robust physique and heavy armor. Jagged shrapnel gouged into his flesh, carving hideous wounds, yet they knit shut at visible speed, while the embedded metal fragments became scale-like armor across his body. "Roar—it's no use, Imperials! You can't kill me! You only make me stronger!" Jushan swung his warhammer and roared, not even caring as his foot crushed an orc head that had rolled before him. "Jushan!" "The Imperials' fortress is right ahead! Crush 'em!" Rat-tat-tat-tat— Through the bunker's embrasures, rows of gun muzzles spat fierce tongues of flame. Inside, soldiers fired without ceasing into the surging orcs until their barrels glowed red-hot. Orcs fell in swathes, corpses piling into mounds, yet machine guns could no longer stem the greenskin tide. Reckless of death, they surged forward wave upon wave, driven by a single unshakeable conviction: *I'm gonna fight!* By now, Jushan, charging at the very front, was less than two hundred meters from the bunker. With his immense physique and astonishing regenerative power, shrugging off bullets was as natural to him as eating and drinking, giving the imperial soldiers a massive headache. At this close range, artillery support would soon become unusable. They would have to engage in brutal hand-to-hand combat and drive these orcs back through raw strength. In the eyes of the imperial soldiers, these orcs were utterly dim-witted and feeble; almost every soldier in the bunker had personally felled double-digit numbers of them. But the real problem was their sheer numbers—there was no killing them all. Tens of thousands of orcs charged alongside Jushan alone, a dense green tide threatening to drown the entire battlefield. *Just how fast do these bastards breed?* The question weighed on the mind of every imperial soldier, accompanied by colorful greetings in foul imperial slang directed at the orcs' ancestors across eight generations. Unfortunately, strictly speaking, these green-skinned orcs had no kin whatsoever. Hoisting a rocket launcher onto his shoulder, an ogre aimed at Jushan in the distance and cursed, "You goddamn, foul-tasting greenskin! You sewer maggot, you wall-crack cockroach! I'm gonna blast you into roasted meat!" Whoosh— Traced by white smoke, a rocket shot forward, streaking straight toward the orc chieftain. Yet Jushan did not panic at all. He glanced left and right, and finding nothing handy to grab, he casually snatched an ordinary orc and hurled it out with monstrous force. "Aaargh—!" Amid the orc's screech, the rocket detonated in midair, blowing the unfortunate creature to bits in a spray of blood and scattering severed limbs everywhere like tossed petals. Immediately, another rocket streaked in from afar. Dropping any pretense, Jushan scooped up another unlucky orc and chucked it like a missile. Another blast boomed through the air. After all, finding a handy orc was far easier than finding a handy rock; orcs were endless and everywhere, but rocks were not. The ogre holding the rocket launcher stared in utter disbelief. Stunned for a moment, he spat furiously. "Are you fucking kidding me?!" Jushan watched the midair explosion as well and grumbled, "Blame it on them damn Imperials! Hey you, whatever your name was, you was a good orc! I'll avenge ya!" He pumped his arm and yelled, "Lads, charge with me and avenge our fallen brovas!! Waaagh!" "Boss is right!" "Revenge!" The orcs howled in fury, their charge gaining fierce momentum. However, the orcs who had been crowding around Jushan proved quite sensible, quietly keeping their distance lest they get grabbed and hurled as weapons. In the eyes of the imperial officers and soldiers, the orc assault had neither order nor tactics; it was utter chaos, like a swarm of brainless locusts. But there was no ignoring their sheer numbers. The orcs could plug any gap with their lives; things like coordination and cover were completely irrelevant! At last, after paying the toll of over ten thousand dead and staining the approaches to the bunker crimson, the orcs closed in, finally in position to strike back against the Imperials. Now, less than a hundred meters separated the two sides. Amid the roar of gunfire, Jushan pushed forward using his warhammer as a shield, bellowing triumphantly, "Imperials, you're scared! You're scared of us closin' in!" Under his lead, the force field emanating from the orcs grew ever more intense, steadily enveloping the imperial defense line. Not only did bullets from the machine guns veer off course in unscientific ways, but several heavy guns inside the bunker sputtered and jammed one after another. "Damn it, what's wrong with these machine guns?" "The fuel feed and ignition systems are fine! None of the parts are worn! These are factory-fresh heavy machine guns!" "Cassius above... this defies all logic!" Frantic, the combat engineers disassembled and inspected the weapons again and again, checking the fuel pumps and ignition modules, but found not a single mechanical defect. Such was the idealistic, reality-bending power of the greenskins. They were born engines of war. Born of Gruumsh fused with the Abyss, these green-skinned orcs adapted rapidly to any battlefield, darlings of blood and fire. Boom! As the orcs surged forward, scores of landmines planted before the defense line went off—though only half actually detonated. Plumes of shattered rock and earth erupted skyward, and mangled chunks of orc flesh rained even into the imperial trenches. Jushan raised his warhammer high and bellowed, "Charge! Smash them Imperials flat! Loot everything they got!" "Yeah!" "Waaagh!!" Catching sight of imperial soldiers at last whipped them into a frenzy. Like sharks smelling blood, the orcs swarmed frantically toward the line, eyes bloodshot and crimson, muscles engorged, veins bulging across their skin like tangled roots. These war machines had gone completely mad! In an instant, the psychic force field turned ferocious and wild, washing over the imperial troops. Even veteran half-red dragons who had survived countless battles felt an involuntary shudder. But the imperial officers and soldiers soon displayed their rigorous training. Rapidly establishing interlocking fields of fire, they raised their rifles and pulled their triggers, pouring a hail of bullets into the charging orcs. Meanwhile, ogres and half-red dragon heavy infantry braced behind massive shields at the very front, prepared for the impact of the orc tide. Glaring at the ogre nearby, Jushan snarled, "I remember you! You're the one who shot that thing at me!" As the saying goes, when enemies meet, their eyes blaze. The ogre cursed under his breath, propped his rocket launcher across the heavy shield, aimed at the greenskin, and bellowed, "Kill him! That greenskin has to die!" "Gwahaha, I can see it! You're scared!" "Like hell I am! I fought angels alongside His Majesty Cassius! You think I'd be scared of a worthless green bug like you?!" The ogre squeezed the trigger in fury. Trailing white smoke, a rocket rocketed out at blistering speed, screaming toward the orc. "Waaagh!" Braving the storm of bullets, Jushan vaulted forward. Raising his warhammer with both hands, he roared and leaped over ten meters into the air, narrowly evading the rocket aimed at his head. Plunging from midair, the orc brought his hammer down in a thunderous leaping strike. He roared with unstoppable momentum, his entire body radiating an unimaginable, terrifying force field. In that moment, the collective will of tens of thousands of orcs converged on Jushan, swelling his strength and twisting his features into something monstrous as flames jetted from the back of the hammerhead. The veteran ogre looked up, muttering in disbelief, "He's just... a greenskin..." Boom! An earth-shattering crash echoed across the sky. Jushan's hammer struck down, pulping the ogre's head into a mess of flesh and shattered bone and pounding his body deep into the earth, leaving a massive crater. The Cinder Empire's first battlefield casualty since the start of the war had finally occurred. "Waaagh!" "Smash 'em! Brutal Jushan! Mighty Jushan!!" "So strong! So powerful! We're gonna slaughter all them Imperials just like dat!" "What happened up front?" "Jushan! Boss Jushan killed an Imperial soldier! Word is it was a big tough one!" "Good! Great!" In an instant, tens of thousands of orcs cheered and roared at the top of their lungs, their cries piercing the heavens. Even if their casualty ratio remained one to hundreds of thousands, going from zero to one was a monumental victory worth celebrating for every greenskin. "Boss Jushan, I wanna kill people like you! Chuck me in!" "Chuck you in?" "Yeah! Like how you tossed that poor bastard as a meat shield! Chuck me in too!" "Me too! Toss me too!" Under the fever pitch of the force field, the frontline orcs were utterly crazed, their minds consumed by slaughter and battle. They actually begged Jushan to fling them into the imperial trenches just so they could smack an imperial soldier with a bone club or stone spear. "Right then!" Readily agreeing, Jushan grabbed an orc in each hand, gave a grunt of effort, and easily tossed both into the sky. Flying through the air, the two orcs looked down at the soldiers in the trenches, gripped their crude weapons, and shouted excitedly, "Waaagh! Die! Here we come!" Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! A barrage of gunfire rang out. Under the bewildered gazes of the imperial soldiers, the two crazed orcs were riddled with holes like bloody sieves, plunging headlong from the sky. Jushan scratched his head and muttered, "I fink dat didn't work either." Bang! "Men—these greenskins have grown brazen enough to pull this! This is an insult to the Empire!" First came a gunshot, followed by a familiar voice. The imperial soldiers turned their heads toward the rear to look at the source of the voice. The speaker was a man with brown hair and golden eyes, clad in a crisp, sharp military uniform. His left hand rested on a longsword while his right held a smoking silver pistol. On his epaulets rested four golden five-pointed stars, and pinned to his left breast was an exquisite Dragon Claw Medal—the symbol of an Imperial Count. "It's Division Commander George!" "Cassius above, he came to the front line himself!" "I've heard of him—he fought his way up from the mud. The commander got promoted to division commander after personally slaying a four-winged angel!" "Wait, I heard it was a six-winged angel?" Bang! Bang! Bang! George surveyed his surroundings, raised his pistol again, and fired several shots into the air to command everyone's attention. "Do not let their frenzy intimidate you! They are nothing more than inferior greenskins! Don't you want to rise like me and become noble officers standing tall above the rest? Pick up your blades, your swords, your rifles—for His Majesty Cassius, for the Empire! And for your own glorious future!" His impassioned voice echoed through the trench, stirring everyone's hearts until they felt the scalding dragon blood pulsing through their veins. With Division Commander George personally at the front line—a living symbol of the 'Imperial Dream' who had risen from a mere common soldier—morale soared. "Right! Slaughter these damned greenskins! Purge the vermin plaguing this world!" "For the Empire!" "For His Majesty Cassius!" Battle-hardened veterans through and through, bolstered by the Imperial Will and their faith in Cassius, the soldiers rapidly reorganized and launched a furious counterattack. Boom! Boom! Grenades hurled from the trenches detonated in the green mass, instantly tearing dozens of orcs into blackened, mangled flesh. Immediately following, a dozen machine guns and hundreds of rifles opened fire in unison, weaving an interlocking web of firepower that slaughtered the orcs rushing forward. Under this intense barrage, frontline greenskins fell in droves, and their battle line was pushed back dozens of meters. Now Jushan was fighting alone. To deal with this conspicuously dangerous orc leader, the imperial officers and men pulled out all the stops, with George personally directing a coordinated tactic. Whoosh— With a shrill whistle, a dozen metal spheres were hurled toward the orc from various directions. Jushan roared skyward, thinking these spheres were yet more explosive "eggs," and swung his warhammer wildly. "No use! You can't hurt me! Just wait, we're gonna kill every last one of ya!" Yet to his surprise, the metal spheres burst open in midair, deploying large nets crackling with arcs of lightning. Under the influence of the orc force field, half of the spheres fell dud to the ground, but several electrified nets still converged on him from all directions. "Waaagh!" The orc swung his hammer fiercely, only to become entangled. Woven from the silk of Underdark monstrous spiders, the nets were immensely tough—even Jushan could not tear them apart. He struggled violently, but only wound himself tighter and tighter until he was bound into a bundle. "Discharge," George ordered calmly with a wave of his hand. Instantly, terrifying high-voltage currents surged through the nets into the orc. His skin charred in an instant, grid-like burn marks branding his flesh as Jushan shrieked in agony, enveloped in crackling lightning.