Seeing that he had been isolated, Wang Zhifan did not care much. He then headed toward the courtyard's exit—a closed wooden gate—planning to check the situation outside first.
But before he had taken two steps, the wooden gate some distance away was pushed open from outside. An elderly, stoop-backed man in blue cloth robes entered, with a grizzled goatee hanging from his chin.
The old man's face was clearly filled with sorrow. As soon as he entered, he bent his already hunched body deeply, nearly prostrating himself on the ground, then raised his head and shouted to the players in the courtyard:
"Brave warriors! The Blood Wolf Bandits are almost at the stockade! This old man begs you to lend us a hand and help Peaceful Stockade wipe out these evildoers!"
"Please rise, sir. We will certainly help."
Wang Zhifan, who was closest to the old man who was obviously a dungeon NPC, immediately stepped forward and spoke to him.
He had long learned while browsing the Player Forum that NPCs might appear in dungeons, so he was not at all surprised that this old man had come to invite them into battle.
"Then I must trouble you, brave warriors! Please make your preparations and hurry to the stockade gate to meet the enemy. The able-bodied men of Peaceful Stockade have already formed up. With your assistance, we will surely eliminate those lawless bandits!"
"Alright, sir. Take us there now."
After hearing the NPC out, Wang Zhifan did not waste any time. He directly asked to go to the battlefield, since he was already fully armed and ready to fight at any moment.
"Please follow me, brave warrior!"
The old NPC swept his gaze over Wang Zhifan before him, then glanced at the other two groups in the courtyard—the three led by the man in the overcoat and the woman in black. Seeing that they were all walking over, he answered Wang Zhifan and turned to lead the way.
Following him through the wooden gate leading out of the courtyard, Wang Zhifan arrived in a place resembling an ancient village of the Xia Kingdom. On both sides of the gravel road beneath his feet stood ancient brick houses with black-tiled roofs, none more than two stories high, along with several structures resembling mills and granaries. Beyond all those buildings stood a ring of tall wooden palisades, and at the end of the gravel road was the palisade's only exit: a massive stockade gate built from thick logs.
The main gate was tightly shut. In an open area inside it, around a hundred able-bodied villagers had already assembled, holding sickles or hoes. Above the gate, several people dressed like hunters with bows on their backs were watching the situation outside.
Looks like we'll be fighting defensively. I'll hide behind the palisade first, then.
After arriving near the main gate with the old NPC, Wang Zhifan quickly chose his starting position. He crouched behind a section of palisade neither too close nor too far from the gate, waiting for the incoming bandits. He intended to fire Fine Tier bullets from his Fine Tier pistol through the gaps in the fence at the enemies outside, which would keep him relatively safe.
Once Wang Zhifan was in position, he quickly noticed that the other teammates who had followed over had each made their own choices.
The man in the overcoat carrying a sniper rifle quickly asked the old NPC for a ladder. He climbed onto a rooftop more than two hundred meters from the main gate, roughly the one closest to the center of the village. Then he braced his sniper rifle against the black roof tiles, lay flat, and peered through the scope, waiting to pick off the approaching enemies from afar.
The young man in the suit, also a gunner but armed with a rifle, did not retreat as far as the man in the overcoat. He hid directly on a rooftop relatively close to the main gate, ready at any time to provide long-range fire support to the able-bodied villagers below.
The long-haired woman in black, who carried a pistol like Wang Zhifan, made a similar choice. She hid behind the palisade on the other side of the main gate, also intending to fire through the gaps in the fence.
As for the only melee player besides Wang Zhifan, the Assassin wearing the smiling mask, Wang Zhifan only saw him arrive near the main gate before he suddenly disappeared. He was probably already in a state of Invisibility.
There are around a hundred villagers with sickles and hoes for pure melee, several archers for close-range firepower, the long-haired woman and me with pistols, the suited guy on the nearby roof with a rifle for mid-range firepower, the overcoat guy with the sniper rifle for long-range firepower, plus an Assassin for sneak attacks. Wouldn't this lineup crush a dungeon with an ancient setting like this?
Although he had not yet seen the enemy, Wang Zhifan, hiding behind the palisade near the main gate, was already quite confident. He knew very well how terrifying modern firepower would be against ancient bandits like these. As long as there were not thousands or tens of thousands of them, their current setup could handle the fight.
Speak of the devil, and the devil appeared. Just as Wang Zhifan was considering this, he suddenly heard a burst of hoofbeats from the sloping dirt road outside the main gate. Then five burly men on horseback emerged from below and charged up rapidly, followed by nearly two hundred running bandits.
Good... only around two hundred bandits in total. This shouldn't be too hard.
Hiding behind the palisade near the main gate, Wang Zhifan observed the enemies approaching outside the stockade while making his judgment.
"Loose the arrows!"
Then he heard the stoop-backed old NPC, who had been observing the situation behind the main gate, suddenly give the order for the several archers crouching atop the gate with drawn bows to fire together.
These archers, who might have been hunters, were fairly skilled. At the old man's command, the arrows on their bows flew toward the five mounted bandits closest to the gate and most conspicuous, especially the bald, scar-faced bandit in the center, who received the attention of half the arrows.
However, to Wang Zhifan's surprise, the bandit leaders facing the incoming arrows did not retreat. Instead, they all urged their horses to accelerate toward the main gate! In particular, the four mounted bandits flanking the bald, scar-faced man in the center suddenly leaped high from their saddles, crossing more than twenty meters as if running through the air. They directly evaded the arrows and charged before the hunters shooting from atop the main gate! "Fuck! How can those mounted bandits jump that far?! Do they know martial arts?!"
Wang Zhifan's expression immediately turned grim. He had thought their group would easily crush the bandits outside with technological weapons, but it turned out these were not the kind of bandits found in the ancient Xia Kingdom of the real world. They apparently knew martial arts as well!
Before you continue