Under Punk's command, the high-pressure energy ball, brimming with white-blue energy, streaked straight towards the center of the battlefield. Then, in mid-air, the initially gathered energy ball abruptly split into several slender, light-blue ribbons. These little energy ribbons then submerged in the stinking mud in an instant.
Almost all the enemies on the battlefield suddenly felt a surging energy brewing in the mud under their feet, but they still didn't stop their charge and only after strengthening their defences a little, completely disregarded the tyrannical energy that was about to rush out of the ground.
In their hurriedness, neither the enemy warrior nor the enemy mage made any significant effort to create an effective response. After all, in their eyes, an apprentice-level spell was not something to worry about.
But as anyone with a lot of experience would say, the price of underestimating one's enemy, without exception, is always very heavy.
Less than a second after the radiant energy ribbons submerged into the muddy ground, the entire ground started to surge like a sea amongst a storm, one after another huge mud waves rushed toward the enemy formation. Due to the fermentation of decaying plants, the mud had a strong adhesion property, so even under such a huge force, not only did it not shatter into large scattered mud spots, but it behaved just like rolling waves under the ground.
The enemy could not remain stable during such violent ups and downs, and several weaker apprentice-level professionals were thrown high into the air. For a while, the enemy's mages were rendered almost entirely useless as they could not complete any spell; this was undoubtedly a good opportunity for the princess's group to attack.
But "Surging tide" was just an apprentice-level spell after all, although it did have great advantages in terms of range and power, which was more than enough to cover all the enemy's pursuit team within the spell effect. However, in terms of duration, it was not really ideal.
The violent wave of mud surged under the ground for two rounds and then calmed down. However, in this state of guerrilla fighting, this short ending of the surging waves was not a disadvantage but rather an excellent opportunity to conduct a coordinated assault.
Just when the enemy fell on the ground and started to roll uncontrollably, the surging waves slowly stopped. The princess's guards, who had long been restraining their urge to attack, seeing this funny scene, rushed like a bunch of gorillas in heat while roaring loudly. In the enemy team, besides some quick-witted warriors, most of the other combatants were still in a state of bewilderment. They couldn't react even when the bonch of muscular hunks with chicken blood started to behead their comrades. Most of the mages couldn't even create a defensive barrier until a sword already reached their neck.
Seeing that the situation was under control, Punk couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief. Although he had been showing a calm look on the surface, in fact, mentally, he was secretly worried that reinforcements might arrive on the scene; after all, the enemy's pursuers were all professionals and their speed, even when travelling in the foot, could not be underestimated. But fortunately, He had one or two spells that were very appropriate In this battle, so he played the role of a crowd control mage almost perfectly, unlike someone who was standing next to him.
The old mage now seemed very ashamed as he only cast a few small fireballs, and even that actually didn't hit anyone. On the other hand, a younger and less experienced colleague of his, handled the enemies like some circus lions.
Now there were only a few enemy pursuers left. It was a complete victory.
At the same time, Punk also gained a lot of experience in this battle. He had to admit that having some flexible meat shield that could block attacks in front was really beneficial for a mage to use the full extent of their powerful crowd control ability. And the melee class warriors were also best at containing multiple enemies, because if enemy forces were scattered in a large area, then a mage might not be able to support the mana consumption of multiple AoE spells.
Punk, who became fond of this tactic, decided to work on making some alchemy puppets and summoned creatures in the future, or at least pay more attention to knowledge and magic items in that area. But he needed meat shields that didn't have any unstable factors hidden. So, he would rather choose stupid alchemy puppets than those cunning and treacherous contracted summonses.
Now, this battle had also come to an end. Punk was MVP in this battle. So all the soldiers in his group had shown their due respect to this unknown mage. The young princess Nesa had even reached the point where her cheeks would become flushed whenever she looked at Punk. If one was a little experienced with relationship, they would be able to see that the young princess had signs of unrequited love, but it was a pity that the little princess's first love was destined to be disappointing. As the current Punk didn't care about the princess's troublesome thoughts at all, and in his heart, the unnecessary emotions of love were not conducive compared to being strong and gaining knowledge, so he had no interest at all in "based on reproductive instinct" behaviour. Even the respectful attitude of those soldiers was boring and annoying harassment for Punk.
In this battle, although the Princess's Guards could be regarded as the absolute winner on the surface, inevitably, there was still a small number of casualty in the team, which had once again caused a significant reduction in the strength of the group with already a small number of combatants.
The most worrying thing was that this kind of dangerous encounter would most likely happen many times in the future, and as long as such a quick victory was not achieved once, the consequences would be disastrous.
...
Small talks could not alleviate this uneasy atmosphere, and due to time constraints, the soldiers did not even have the time to dig graves for their dead comrades. They always had to keep moving forward under the pursuit of such powerful enemies, even if they had to travel through knee-deep mud.
Punk didn't have any "the fox is sad at the death of a hare" feelings for those soldiers who died. As there was a saying on earth, "The only ones who should kill, are those who are prepared to be killed."
Punk was also a little happy at the bottom of his heart that he didn't choose to go on the road alone; otherwise, if he encountered such a situation, the consequence would have been really undesirable. As for whether this group could pass the Endless swamp! Punk discreetly sifted his peripheral vision and looked at where McNeesey was.
"Well, for this ignorant princess, you have paid almost everything. How long can you persist like this?"