After having passed through two whole enemy formations, one would think that their enemy to be prepared for their charge attack, right? Well, that was not what was happening here and the reason for that was the utter chaos due to the situation below.
On top of Bacon, Apollo couldn't look down to see the exact progression of the boars rampage. Actually it would require him a blood colder than liquid hydrogen to be able to check the mini-map while riding a giant boar in high speed through enemy formations in a terrain as flat as a mountain. Yes, he was getting better, but he was still far from this level of cold bloodedness, so he couldn't even imagine his plan had actually failed while successfully completing his objective by pure accident at the same time.
Due to the method Hime used to acquire the egg, the boars didn't chase after her as they were too scared fleeing themselves. Their flee was chaotic as they spread to all directions, charging through the forest in panic while having the illusion that the forest was trying to devour them.
It was like a little child being impressed by an horror movie and becoming unable to go to the bathroom. The problem is that in this situation the "bathroom" was the whole forest, so they needed to escape the sooner the better to not be devoured alive by vine tentacles growing from the ground.
In their panic to flee, a dozen or so boars ended up colliding with troops down below, making the Oni's Master's sedan chair fly from their hands and their Master fall on the ground, breaking his arms as a consequence.
These events put the Oni in confusion as they didn't know what to do, after all breaking an arm is far from a fatal wound but this doesn't make it any less painful. Feeling his newly found pain inside his arms, the Oni's Master was torn between continuing the siege and retreating to treat himself, ending up with him being unable to do neither as he suffered in pain on the floor.
Looking over Bacon's mask, Apollo saw a hellish sight on the battlefield ahead. His hand grip grew stronger and sweat started dripping his face, but he didn't avert his sight and stared right in the middle of it.
Up ahead were the Fire Oni who had started their attack just a few minutes ago, transforming the whole mountain coast into a fire sea, using the corpses of the fallen soldiers and weeds as fuel, as they stepped over their bones and ashes proceeding to slice Apollo's soldiers down.
Apollo was not calm enough to count down his losses. Looking at another plant girl being killed right in front of him he felt his anguish grow inside his chest. This was one of the reasons why he didn't went directly to the enemy's main camp, he wanted to lessen their burden as much as he could, while the other motive was simply due to the path being not all that different, with only a few seconds delay between passing through here and bypassing it all.
Because of all the screams and shouts from the fight, the Fire Oni failed to hear the approaching boars until it was almost too late. Seeing the silver masked giant boars a few meters away from them, they didn't panic or tried to run, but instead organized themselves in small groups responsible to slow down the boars any way they could, while everyone else attacked them with all they had.
Bacon noticed their reaction but didn't slow down at all. Swinging her head right and left to make her eyes harder to target, she used her mask as a shield, bashing them to the ground before trampling them all.
Against Bacon and most other boars the Oni's plan ended up in failure as their momentum couldn't be stopped by the strength of just two or three Oni, but even then there were cases of success, resulting in a total of 5 boars being sacrificed in this attack.
Their death opened a hole in the boars wedge formation, allowing more Oni to evade the charge by taking advantage of it. Even so, half the Fire Oni had been trampled and Yuu's troops wouldn't let go of this chance, jumping right over them as soon as the boars had passed.
After having lost their numerical advantage, the battle proceeded in Apollo's favor. While the Fire Oni were excellent warriors, nobody in Apollo's team lacked soldier training as well, allowing them to capitalize on their newly acquired advantage as well as the fact the enemy was now not only focused on them but on the surroundings as well, fearing another charge attack.
Making and adjustment in their route, Apollo's boar cavalry reformed their formation while heading to the enemy's camp. Now that it was on sight, Apollo could notice something had went wrong. He expected the boars to be attacking relentlessly the Oni, but what he saw was no sign of boars at all. They had just passed by, spreading destructions, but none of them dared to stay behind.
The enemy camp saw the masked boars approaching and formed a barricade with the carts and supplies they had. They grabbed their weapons and focused on defending their Master who was still laying on the ground.
Apollo knew this would be a risky move, but if he didn't grab this chance, he would have no chance at all! And just as he started preparing for the collision, something changed in the enemy's camp.
"Eh?"
All of a sudden a light flashed in the bottom of the mountain, followed by all Oni loosing their conscience at once, marking the end of the battle.
-/-
A few minutes ago...
Exiting the cave with an egg in her hands, Hime ran back through the forest, taking the long way to reach the back of the enemies temporary camp.
The last part of her mission should be no less dangerous than the first one, she had to invade the enemy camp and hit their head with this egg.
At first she thought it was like a child's prank, but now, as she felt the weight and resilience of the egg, she was forced to change her mind. While she had no doubt a poisoned arrow would be more effective, this egg was no less of a deadly weapon if hit at the right place with enough power.
As she approached, she already expected to be easily detected by Ector's bracer so she readied herself for a fight, but she was surprised by the lack of reaction from the enemy which meant her movements had yet to be found out.
Seeing the boar unit approaching his camp, Ector didn't feel any danger and efficiently organized all his troops to give a warm reception to them. First he set up a barricade, then a spear wall, and last but not least, every available hand grabbed a bow to shower the iron pigs with arrows before they could reach this place.
"Ready the arrows! Fire on my command!"
Arriving silently at the outskirts of the camp, Hime observed the Oni's movements stealthily, confirming she had truly not been discovered yet. Since she was carrying the egg with both hands, she could hold no weapons, so this was even better to her.
"Ready!"
Step by step, Hime grew closer to her objective. The enemies were all focusing on defending their front, so they left their behind wide open, making it a perfect chance for her to strike, but just as she was a few meters away from her objective she was noticed, making time freeze for a second as the Oni and a single Plant girl stared at each other.
"Set!"
"Enemy assassin!"
"She is holding something in her hand!"
"She is going to throw!"
"Quickly! Protect Master!"
"Sh-What!?"
Hime's hand move just as quick as the Oni's mouth. She was already close enough to her target, so it was now or never! Holding her egg with both hands like doing a "throw-in" in a soccer match, she threw the ball, I mean, egg, on a direct trajectory to Ector's face.
Seeing the huge white egg flying toward his face, he couldn't even lift his arms to defend himself. For the first time since the start of the battle, Ector got a bit startled by a situation going out of his control, and before he could make any kind of answer or further reaction the egg his it's target, downing the already wounded man.
"Gah!!!"