She was certain there was nothing wrong with the location and time she had set, so why had they appeared here?
Had the Akasha System made a teleportation error? Could something like that really happen?
She carefully observed the two armies locked in battle. Judging by their clothing and weapons, this should have been the era of the Qin Dynasty.
No, this was the Warring States period, before Qin Shi Huang had unified the realm.
So which battle of the Warring States period was this battlefield before them?
"Something's wrong!"
"Hm? What's wrong, Sister?"
"The banners are wrong. There were no banners like these during the Warring States period!"
Among the soldiers fighting before them, the banners carried by the larger force did not match any Warring States military banner Brunhilde knew of.
"Han!"
Brunhilde murmured the word.
She now knew where the army with the greater number of soldiers had come from.
They were not in the Warring States period, but during the Qin Dynasty. No, that was not right. The Qin Dynasty had already collapsed by now.
They were currently in the era of the Chu-Han Contention, standing in the midst of a battlefield where both sides were slaughtering one another.
The sounds of killing, roaring, clashing weapons, and hooves pounding the ground all intertwined.
One side clearly had more men, and their equipment was roughly equal to that of their enemy, yet they were being pushed back.
The larger force was the army of the King of Han, while the smaller force belonged to the Hegemon King.
Every soldier in the Hegemon King's army was extraordinarily fierce. Their bloodthirsty disregard for death terrified the Han Army.
If their weapons were knocked away, they used their fists.
If their hands were cut off, they still had feet to kick with, teeth to bite with, and heads to ram with.
As long as their lives had not ended, they would throw every last ounce of strength into killing their enemies.
It was precisely this savage behavior that had the King of Han's army on the back foot.
It could be said that for every soldier of the Hegemon King they killed, the King of Han's side had to pay the price of at least ten soldiers.
However, the difference in numbers between the two sides was simply too great.
No matter how brave and skilled the Hegemon King's soldiers were, they could not withstand the flood-like tide of the enemy army.
From the looks of it, the Hegemon King's side had fewer than a thousand soldiers, while the King of Han's army had a full fifty thousand. The gap was far too wide.
Against such human-wave tactics, the Hegemon King's soldiers had nearly reached their limits. At this rate, their annihilation was only a matter of time.
So this was a unit that had fallen behind the main force and encountered an encirclement by the King of Han's army?
No, this was probably the final stage of the Chu-Han Contention, the period when the Western Chu Hegemon King, Xiang Yu, was approaching his end.
Then where was this legendary Hegemon King?
Following the direction in which the encircling ring around the fewer than one thousand cavalrymen kept shrinking, Brunhilde sensed a ferocious, murderous aura radiating from there.
Suddenly, the Xiang army, which had been tightening its encirclement, took the initiative to open a gap. A figure radiating immense pressure stepped out.
From afar, he looked like a burly, bearded man, but upon closer inspection, he was strikingly handsome.
He was the Western Chu Hegemon King—Xiang Yu.
Clad in armor and holding the Tyrant of a Hundred Weapons—a halberd—in one hand, he walked forward several dozen steps with his eyes still closed. The Han Army surrounding this section retreated more than a hundred steps in fear.
Every one of them looked at him with terror in their eyes, cold sweat pouring down their faces.
"Attack!"
"What are you afraid of? There are only this many of them left!"
"Whoever kills Xiang Yu will be granted a marquisate!!!"
The promise of being granted a marquisate instantly made the terrified Han soldiers' eyes flicker. Each of them was filled with desire, swallowing unconsciously.
The Western Chu Hegemon King before them had become like an exquisite feast, tempting them until saliva kept forming in their mouths.
As the saying went, great rewards brought forth brave men, much less a temptation like being granted noble rank and high office.
"Kill!"
"Kill!"
One after another, they raised their bloodstained blades and charged.
Yet faced with this charge, the Xiang army showed no intention of rushing forward to protect him. They remained where they stood. Were they planning to abandon their king?
Of course not. The reason they did not step forward was because they had received an order.
Yet Brunhilde was certain that the Hegemon King had not issued any command.
It was an unspoken understanding. A glance alone was enough for them to understand their king's intent.
Although the Xiang soldiers were utterly exhausted, their gazes remained sharp and steadfast. They believed their king was invincible. They firmly believed he would not be defeated and would lead them out of the encirclement.
The charging soldiers were already right before them, viciously bringing down their weapons.
At that moment, his closed eyes snapped open, revealing Double Pupils.
In that instant, the ferocious aura he released seemed to steal the courage from the soldiers charging at him, causing every one of them to freeze in place.
At the same time, the Hegemon King held his halberd level, twisted his waist halfway back, and drew the halberd's tip farther and farther behind him.
The next instant, like a bowstring drawn to its limit snapping back, terrifying force tore through the air with an explosive roar as the halberd swept viciously across the enemy troops before him.
At that moment, every soldier struck within the halberd's reach was cut cleanly in two at the waist.
No, even soldiers some distance beyond the halberd's reach were severed at the waist. Those farther away were not cut in half, but their abdomens were sliced open with neat wounds.
Then came screams so agonizing they seemed to tear apart hearts and lungs, echoing across the entire battlefield.
Even Brunhilde was stunned by the sight.
It was not caused by any miraculous power. It was purely because the swing had been so violent that the air was compressed at extreme speed, forming cutting currents like sword qi.
Moreover, such a swing should logically have produced powerful gusts of wind, yet the reality was the opposite. The surroundings were strangely calm.
That was because this Hegemon King had condensed all the force of his swing into the halberd's tip, creating air cuts as thin as paper.
"M-Monster!"
"I-I don't want any marquisate or high office! I want to live!"
"We can't win!"
That bloody strike that swept through the army instantly shattered the courage of the Han soldiers who had witnessed it, and they began to flee in panic.
Faced with such chaos, the Han Army had no choice but to temporarily abandon the encirclement, withdraw first, and reorganize their morale before continuing the pursuit.
At that moment, a piercing whistle sounded. It was a spear thrown by the Hegemon King. After piercing through more than a dozen men in succession, it shot a major Han general straight off his horse.
Seeing this, Brunhilde's eyes flickered.
Wasn't the man before her also a suitable candidate?
The Qin Dynasty Black Armored Army's Strange Intrusion
For a peerless warrior as brave as this, Brunhilde had initially already had someone in mind.
It was Lu Bu Fengxian, the famed general of the late Eastern Han Dynasty and one of the warlords of the Han's final years. In her eyes, he was the strongest man that land had produced from the Warring States period to the modern era.
Therefore, even before attending the gods' council, Brunhilde had already selected several candidates in advance, and Lu Bu Fengxian was one of them.
He was an extremely famous historical figure throughout the world. Numerous works had been created based on his deeds—novels, games, anime, and more—and in all of them, he was unquestionably portrayed as the strongest.
Naturally, Brunhilde had investigated such a renowned figure. After reviewing his history, she had been deeply shocked. His reputation was well deserved.
Barring any surprises, he could be said to have been one of her certain picks among the thirteen.
He would serve as humanity's vanguard, and she had placed great hopes on him—hopes that he would secure humanity's first victory and slap the gods hard across the face.
However, after seeing the Western Chu Hegemon King before her, Brunhilde realized she had been wrong. She should not have let preconceived notions convince her that, simply because he was more famous worldwide, he was the strongest hero of that Eastern land.
The Xiang Yu before her, the man who had played a crucial role in ending the Qin Dynasty, radiated an aura far more intense than Lu Bu's.
Based on his display of military strength alone, he did not seem inferior to Lu Bu in the slightest.
And in terms of status, Lu Bu could not compare to him either.
Xiang Yu bore the mighty title of Hegemon King and was the leader of the feudal lords. By comparison, Lu Bu's highest position had merely been that of the ruler of Xuzhou. He was in no way comparable to a ruler of the realm.
In military talent, Xiang Yu was also beyond Lu Bu's comparison.
Historically, Lu Bu had not fought any truly renowned campaigns. Perhaps that was because he pursued personal military strength alone, but when it came to truly commanding armies in war, Lu Bu's ability was indeed lacking.
As for Xiang Yu, take the Battle of Julu. Xiang Yu led tens of thousands of Chu soldiers, Breaking the Cauldrons and Sinking the Boats as they fought four hundred thousand Qin troops. While the armies of the other feudal lords cowered and refused to advance, he was the first to launch a fierce assault against the Qin army. Fighting one against ten, their battle cries shook the heavens as they crushed the Qin forces.
In the end, he committed an outrageously cruel act, burying alive more than two hundred thousand surrendered soldiers of the Qin Dynasty overnight.
Then there was the Battle of Pengcheng during the Chu-Han Contention. Under the resolute and decisive command of the Western Chu Hegemon King, Xiang Yu, the Chu army used just thirty thousand men to rout more than five hundred thousand Han troops within half a day, annihilating the main force of King of Han Liu Bang.
Beyond those two almost unbelievable battles, there had been many other battles, large and small, and he had won far more than he had lost.
As for political talent, neither of them had any.
It was precisely because of his poor political ability and excessive brutality, his fondness for massacring cities and slaughtering surrendered soldiers, that he ultimately found himself abandoned by all.
Such a generation's Hegemon King finally met his end at Wujiang—too ashamed to face the elders of Jiangdong, he cut his own throat and died.
The battle in which the two Valkyrie sisters now stood should have been the Battle of Gaixia.
This was the period when the glorious life of the Western Chu Hegemon King, Xiang Yu, was approaching its curtain call.
Though he had fallen into such dire straits, the Hegemon King was still the Hegemon King. With fewer than a thousand cavalrymen, he fought against an army of more than a hundred thousand, ultimately frightening them into temporarily fleeing and leaving behind a devastated battlefield.
As far as the eye could see, the corpses covering the battlefield were almost all Han soldiers. Brunhilde estimated that there had been nearly ten thousand casualties.
On the Hegemon King's side, however, there had been only a little over one hundred cavalry casualties.
On average, that was practically one man against a hundred. It was an unbelievable record.
Thus, Brunhilde no longer doubted the authenticity of the accounts describing the Battle of Julu and the Battle of Pengcheng.
"S-So this is Hegemon King Xiang Yu?"
The dazed voice did not belong to Brunhilde, but to her younger sister, Lantigreese, who stood beside her.
Her face was filled with shock, yet she also seemed slightly captivated by that domineering figure.
After driving back the Han Army, Xiang Yu and his more than eight hundred cavalrymen did not spur their horses and flee. Instead, they moved at an unhurried pace.
Before long, the reorganized Han Army once more sent five thousand elite cavalry vanguards in pursuit.
In the blink of an eye, blades flashed again, and corpses fell into pools of blood.
Before long, the five thousand elite cavalry had lost nearly half their number and quickly withdrew, allowing the tens of thousands of infantry who had already arrived to join the encirclement.
Much like before, the Han Army was frightened back once again. No, rather than being scared into retreat this time, it was more like they withdrew voluntarily before their courage could break.
Brunhilde saw through it. The commander intended to use attrition tactics and had no plans to force a decisive battle in one go. Otherwise, the more brutally Xiang Yu's side slaughtered, the deeper the psychological shadow cast over the Han Army would become.
So they launched wave after wave of attacks, giving Xiang Yu and his men almost no time to rest and exhausting them through battle. In the end, they would be wiped out once their strength failed.
And so they were steadily driven toward a riverbank, the very place where the Hegemon King had historically met his end.
When they reached the riverbank, the Hegemon King suddenly twisted the weapon in his hand and drove it straight into the ground, leaving it standing upright. Then, a point on the halberd began to flash with light.
The constantly flashing light somehow resembled a signal beacon or positioning indicator.
What was going on? Brunhilde was confused.
Suddenly, the air around where the halberd stood began to distort.
No, it was space itself that was distorting, twisting the halberd into fragments.
Then a burst of white light flashed without warning.
"Sister...!"
Lantigreese could not help crying out in disbelief, her eyes widened as she stared at the anomaly before them.
After the flash of white light, a strange door appeared out of thin air.
Before you continue