Universe Infinite Canteen

Aside from the witch who arrived initially, two more witches reached the explosion site, both were hands that Li Wei had left outside the forest from the start.

As for the four witches who fought alongside him, including the middle-aged witch who had just sworn allegiance to him, they all died under the missile attack.

Li Wei felt a moment of regret because these were witches he had carefully selected and cultivated for a long while, some had even followed him for more than a decade, yet his regret also lasted only a moment.

To a knight, witches were inherently expendable.

The key lay in balancing costs and benefits, and this time, Li Wei's gains obviously far exceeded his losses.

Not only did he annihilate the Witch Alliance in one fell swoop, resolving the crisis outside the city, and regaining face for the previous attack on the mine, but his prestige within the Order of Knights also reached its peak.

Moreover, he coincidentally dealt with a group of knights who were close to the Grandmaster Martin, further expanding his faction's influence within the Order of Knights.

As long as the death of the Shrike could be confirmed, Li Wei could leverage his achievements to smoothly replace Martin as the new Grandmaster of the Sacred Order of Knights.

Li Wei was thinking this when, out of the corner of his eye, he suddenly caught sight of a figure that should not have been there.

The Vice Grandmaster of the Sacred Order of Knights also showed a rare look of astonishment on his face.

"Lord Li Wei, are you all right?" Ma Lu came running all the way from the other side of the forest and called out before he reached Li Wei, his tone full of concern.

"Knight... Xi Mu?"

Li Wei was quite surprised, "How come you are here?"

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"Did you forget? I followed your command to search the forest for the whereabouts of those Fallen Witches, and when I saw the smoke and fire over here, I rushed over immediately."

"So, you didn't encounter the attack while you were searching?"

"Attack?" Ma Lu said, "I actually wanted to report this to you. On my way here, I saw many corpses, all our men."

Ma Lu tried to make his voice sound more sorrowful, "They... they all fell victim to those Fallen Witches. I advised you from the start not to split our forces, this was the trap set by the Shrike."

"......"

Li Wei really wanted to say, "Everyone else was poisoned; why are you still perfectly alive?" But clearly, this was not something to be voiced aloud.

As for personally finishing off the job, that was even less likely to happen. Li Wei was a candidate for the Grandmaster of the Order of Knights, and he would not allow himself to be left with such a blatant stain.

Sending someone to their death and killing them by one's own hands were two different things. There was simply no evidence for the former, while leakage of the latter would be far more serious.

Therefore, Li Wei could only hold his nose and say, "I understand, I was indeed negligent this time. Fortunately, I have already killed all the enemies." He paused, and even uncharacteristically added, "It's good that you are unharmed."

Ma Lu acted flattered, and finally showed his true colors.

All the groundwork he had laid before was for this moment.

"It seems you are injured; please rest well. Leave the Energized Plants around here to me."Nôv(el)B\\jnn

At this time, Li Wei also noticed that the three witches he had sent out were engaged in a tough battle, and their main opponent was none other than a large sweet potato riding an eggplant.

The Sweet Potato Knight actually had pretty high combat capabilities, wielding a streetlamp picked up from who knows where as a spear and clutching a homemade vine shield in the other hand.

It truly charged around like a classical knight.

Although its attacks were mainly close combat, the streetlamp spear was 10 meters long, sweeping a large area with each strike, and the large eggplant it rode as a mount also had astonishing mobility.

It could leap out 5 meters at a time, making the area 15 meters in front of it its attack zone. Coupled with an Attack Power of 52, an average witch would basically be finished after being hit twice.

However, using such a long-handled weapon did have drawbacks. A witch under Li Wei's command seized the opportunity and rushed to the angry Sweet Potato Knight, getting half a step away from it.

This was also the blind spot for the streetlamp spear's attack, and she thought she could avoid damage this way.

But unexpectedly, after she got close, the angry Sweet Potato Knight immediately switched its attack method, lifting its vine shield to smash her repeatedly, nearly turning her into mush.

Li Wei also noticed that his witch was in trouble and wondered where the Shrike had found such a powerful Energized Plant. If the Wolf Spider, that is, the female assassin who could lurk in the shadows, had not died, she would have been perfectly suited to deal with the Sweet Potato.

Unfortunately, after a fierce battle, he was somewhat short on manpower.

Yet Li Wei was skeptical about Ma Lu's ability to help. After all, this young man had only graduated from the Squire School less than a month ago and was a complete novice.

Nevertheless, Li Wei soon thought of Ma Lu's excellent performance in the previous few missions and his success in dealing with troublesome Energized Plants, which stirred some hope in him.

Anyway, Li Wei had already changed into his armor, so if things went south, he could always turn tail and run. Having someone forward to delay the Sweet Potato's advance was all to his benefit.

The vice-captain of the Sacred Order of Knights nodded to Ma Lu, "Be careful."

Ma Lu had been waiting for these words and immediately made his pre-battle preparations.

The tactic he opted for was simple — brute force!

After three consecutive rounds of equipment upgrade and the effect of engravings, the strength of his team had qualitatively leaped from the time he had taken over.

Ma Lu adjusted the formation to the fish scale formation.

This was the reward for his Knight Level upgrading to Level 15. The fish scale formation was a defensive enhancement formation that could increase defensive power by 25%, and unlike the Iron Bucket Formation, it did not reduce Attack Power.

Then Ma Lu inserted an Ironwall Banner on the map, giving his team another layer of security.

Of course, Li Wei couldn't see any of these maneuvers. In fact, because Li Wei was present, Ma Lu wasn't showing all his cards and had held back many of his methods.

Afterward, the Bliss Bird also began chanting spells, buffing the team, and then she activated the skill Curse of the Lake Demon attached to the [Lake's Tear Necklace].

It reduced the Angry Sweet Potato Knight's Attack Power from 52 points down to 39 points, and with that, even Yun Que, who had the lowest defensive power and HP in the team, could now withstand at least three attacks from the Angry Sweet Potato Knight.

As the main striker, the Hellhound, bolstered by top-tier equipment, managed to suppress the damage from the Angry Sweet Potato Knight to single digits.

"Go!" With Ma Lu's command,

The purple-haired girl strode forward, eager to rush towards the towering knight before her.