Riches and Bitches: I have a gate to an isekai and leveling-up system!

Chapter 157: The fleeting moment

"Arise!"

There were only a few meters left for us to cross.

If I were to be with just a small unit, I would try to cross them undetected, getting the most out of the surprise attack.

But not now. Now with close to five hundred souls with me. Right now, coordination was of much greater value than just those few seconds of advantage.

Following my word, everyone dropped their simple, mud-covered cloaks and straightened up.

Step.

The feet drowning in the muddy ground surrounding the camp.

'Were they trying to add water to it?' I momentarily thought. 'Is that why Loraz stopped so hard?'

Another step. Just a few more.

With the time seemingly slowing down, I struggled to pull my foot out of the mud. Overcoming its pull proved to be far harder on the last stretch. Maybe because contrary to my crawl before, right now I actually wanted to move as quickly as possible?

Finally, the third step. Eyeballing it, only five more.

A few celestials and divines passed by, leaving me behind.

'Shit!'

My thoughts exploded as I made another, fourth step.

'If they mounted any resistance…'

Two more steps.

Only two more left and my foot would find the solid ground.

More and more forest protectors rushed past me, ignoring the core order of the attack. And it was for them to let me lead the sneak attack so I could dismantle any possible resistance with just one or two discharges from my neu-shottie.

'Maybe showing off this gun was the right move, after all?'

Showcasing the power of my weapon was something I considered… But worried about alerting the enemy with the noise, I decided not to.

And right now, I have to pay the price.

"FIRE!"

Someone within the camp shouted, proving the defenders weren't as gullible as I hoped they would be.

Was that owl celestial feeding me fake intel? Or maybe it was all a set-up, a trap for my surprise attack that the humans have seen through? Who knows, maybe it was just the wit of a local leader with uncommon foresight.

What mattered, was that in a single volley, four of my men fell down to the ground.

All the shields they've raised since dropping the disguise shattered, leaving their bodies free from the hostile acupuncture. And between all the arrows, bolts, and spells unleashed right in their face, even the celestial and divine bodies had to give.

'Just one last step…!'

Finally, I reached the solid ground and climbed just a little bit higher, getting a proper look above the faltering first line of my men for the very first time.

Desperate to prevent further losses right on impact, I shoved two celestials out of the way and reached out with the dark muzzle of my gun…

Only to be met with a small group of maybe twenty, or thirty people.

People were too busy standing in place, their faces tense as more and more celestials reached the camp's border.

For but a second, I caught the look of the enemy leader. A man of chin-long, brown hair, perfectly blue eyes, and an ill-kept beard. He donned a simple, leather armor with only some occasional specks of proper, metal protection.

For one, fleeting second, we stared each other in the eye, both already aware of what was going to happen next.

And yet…

Even though this man knew he had nothing to stop a horde of powerful monsters from the forest with just the bunch he managed to gather… I saw no fear in that man's eyes.

And until the very last moment, he didn't falter.

Overcoming his shock, the man stood his ground, even going as far as to clash a few times with the divines at the front before falling prey to a strike from outside his field of vision.

The resistance broke in a single second as if it never appeared in the first place.

Even though I didn't shoot, the gun suddenly started to burn my hand.

More and more celestials passed by the frozen me, soon making it impossible for me to even see the mangled and soon trampled corpse of the brave human and an equally as brave squad of soldiers he managed to rally.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, experiencing the moral drawback of claiming lives for the very first time in this world… Or rather, in general.

'Pity,' I thought, shaking my head and allowing the flow of the crowd to carry me onwards, all the way to the agreed-on spot where the horde of celestials and divines swiftly split into two major groups.

"Onwards! To Loraz!" the nominal leader of the sneak attack brought a plundered sword high above his head before leading pretty much half of the troops away, to where the humans actually gathered. As for the rest…

"Let's hunt!" someone shouted high in the air, pouring the last drop that spilled over the chalice and causing the cohesion within the second half of the unit to break.

All at once, everyone rushed away, all of them in different directions.

Some jumped to set the camp's outer layer on fire. Others sprinted away to destroy any and all supplies they could find. Another group hurried towards the camp's center, eager to kill everything there.

And all of them, shared only two goals.

First, to sweep through the entire camp and annihilate all the stragglers, and second, to gather on the other half of the original unit once they would complete the first task.

A simple set of just two, logical orders.

Remove all the threats to our rear and join in with the rest.

Not expecting any sort of discipline or cooperation from the celestials and divines, in fact happy just with them putting their conflict on hold, that was the furthest I could hope to direct them around.

Anything more complicated, and there would be a huge chance things would get messy.

Boom! Boom!

Two nearby explosions of the condensation charges calmed down the last of my doubts, prompting me to push through with the second and relatively easiest part of the plan.

"Round them all up!"