All for Naught

"Watch out!"

Seeing the two enormous trolls charge straight at the two archers in the company, the dwarves nearby immediately shouted.

"Quick, stop them!"

Thorin Oakenshield roared.

Monsters of such massive size had thick hides and incredibly tough defenses.

With the company's strength, only Morgan and Kili could hurt the monsters with their bows.

Thorin Oakenshield had realized that from the start.

Morgan had just proved it by shooting dead the slightly smaller troll.

Now the two monsters clearly knew that the archers were the greatest threat.

They were trying to kill Morgan and Kili first.

At a time like this, Thorin Oakenshield naturally had to protect the two archers above all else.

Only by protecting the two archers

would they have any chance of defeating the monsters.

"Quick, stop them!"

Thorin Oakenshield roared as he charged forward.

More than a dozen dwarves swarmed in.

They couldn't kill the two trolls outright, but several short swords, axes, and hammers stabbing and smashing into their lower bodies would still hurt.

The wounded trolls roared and swung their huge hands, slapping at the dwarves beneath them like fleas.

On Kili's side, Menbo was being swarmed by dwarves. The troll suddenly felt a stab of pain and couldn't help stopping to swat at them.

Kili fired an arrow, then immediately turned and moved away.

Meanwhile, on Morgan's side,

Kuibo was likewise being kept busy by the dwarves.

Quickly enraged by them, Kuibo swung the thick tree trunk in his hands and smashed it at the dwarves.

The dwarves leaped and darted about, managing to evade the troll's attacks.

Only the surrounding trees, ground, flowers, and earth were completely churned up.

Morgan remained where he was.

Calmly watching the enormous troll nearby, he drew another arrow from the quiver on his back.

With Morgan's current skill in Archery, shooting two arrows at once was already something he could do quite well. He could even shoot three at once, but his accuracy would be considerably lower.

The massive troll before him looked like an enormous living target.

But that wasn't really the case. Although the troll was huge, its thick hide meant that even arrows striking its head, a relatively vulnerable spot, did very little damage.

And arrows hitting other parts of its body were even less effective.

Morgan and Kili had already demonstrated as much.

The trolls could still leap about even with their heads full of arrows. Shooting them anywhere else would only waste arrows, with no effect to speak of.

By now, everyone knew that the eyes were a troll's only weakness.

But even on a troll's enormous body, its eyes were only so big.

It was like how Morgan had a high chance of hitting an orc in the head with his bow. But if he had to aim specifically for an orc's eyes to kill it,

the difficulty would immediately shoot up.

What's more, the two giant trolls before him seemed to have realized they needed to protect their eyes.

Morgan didn't dare get overconfident. Shooting one arrow at a time would naturally give him a better chance of hitting his mark.

"Whoosh."

His breathing quickly steadied. He focused all his attention on a single point, calming his mind.

Morgan drew his bow and carefully aimed at the enormous troll nearby, doing his best to find the perfect opening.

"Bang!"

"Bang!"

"Damn it, you little dwarves! When I catch you, I'll eat you alive! I'll roast you and eat you, or boil you into thick soup!"

Kuibo shouted furiously. The thick tree trunk in his hands was like a toy as he swung it wildly, flinging grass, branches, and mud everywhere.

"You'll have to catch us first!"

"You stupid lump!"

"You're too slow. You'll never catch us. All you can do is let us make fools of you."

"Come on, catch me! If you do, I'll let you eat me!"

"Haha!"

The dwarves darted nimbly around Kuibo, jumping about and taunting him without restraint.

Kuibo grew even angrier. "Damn it! You damn dwarves, squirrels, rats!"

"Hey, big guy, look at this! Come catch me!"

Bofur, wearing a leather cap and holding a short hammer, stood behind the troll. He stuck out his rear, slapped it with his hand, and loudly provoked the troll in front of him.

Kuibo's eyes shifted, but he didn't turn around. He acted as if he hadn't heard Bofur's taunts.

Still gripping the tree trunk, he continued chasing and smashing at Gloin.

Just as Bofur thought his taunting had failed to get the troll's attention and started to relax a little,

Kuibo suddenly dropped the tree trunk and whipped around, charging at Bofur behind him.

"Watch out!"

"Bofur, look out!"

The dwarves nearby immediately shouted.

Seeing the enormous troll suddenly lunge at him, Bofur's expression changed. He immediately tried to run.

But Kuibo had moved without warning.

The enormous troll covered more than a dozen meters with that single lunge, then reached out with his long arm.

Bofur was caught in his grasp, utterly helpless to resist.

"Bofur, look out!"

"Bofur!"

"Let go of Bofur!"

Seeing Bofur caught, the dwarves nearby immediately charged in.

They attacked the troll with all their might, swinging their weapons.

But now that the troll had finally caught a dwarf, he only waved his free hand to drive off the others, making no attempt to strike back.

"Heh heh, finally got you!"

Kuibo bared a mouthful of crooked, yellow-black fangs, widened his cloudy eyes, and stared at the little dwarf in his hand with a hideous grin.

"Now!"

A little farther away, Morgan had been aiming at the troll with his bow drawn for some time. He saw the troll standing still, its expression intent, eyes wide open.

The fingers holding his arrow suddenly released.

"Whoosh!"

The arrow shot forth with a sharp whistle, tearing through the air.

The next second,

"Roar!"

A piercing scream rang out across the entire forest battlefield.

At that moment, everyone's attention, including that of the other troll, was drawn to the scream and focused on the troll who had let it out.

Then they all saw Kuibo fling Bofur from his grasp.

His body trembling, the troll hurriedly reached into one bleeding eye socket, desperately clawing at something.

The others didn't have to wait long.

Soon, the troll pulled a blood-soaked arrow from his eye socket. Something white and bloody still hung from its sharp tip.

After pulling the arrow from his eye, the troll's massive body trembled even harder.

He barely managed to raise the bloodied arrow to his other, undamaged eye, seemingly trying to make out what it was.

But his enormous body could no longer stay upright, and he toppled to the ground.

"Bang!"

The troll, four meters tall, crashed to the ground.

The earth shook.

The last troll, the largest of them all, finally felt afraid.

He immediately turned and ran.

Morgan was just about to shout for someone to stop the troll

when he saw the dwarves who had been blocking the way immediately move aside to let it pass.

Morgan couldn't help cursing in frustration. "Fuck!"