Even in the cave, Mirage Haiping could still feel the cold. He wrapped his coat tightly and walked out of his resting place.
There is finally a door here, but outside is a large cave, which is now full of soldiers, some injured and some uninjured.
The soldiers were shivering from the cold and had trouble falling asleep. Many of them were even crowded together. The troops did not have enough cotton-padded clothes to distribute. After all, by the time they remembered that they needed to replenish the cotton-padded clothes, they would not have much time to rush for them.
Coupled with the lack of transportation capacity of the Mirage itself, there were not many cotton-padded clothes rushed to be transported. In order to ensure combat effectiveness, these precious cotton-padded clothes were distributed to elites who could fight. It was difficult for the wounded and second-line troops to obtain them.
"General!" After many days of getting along, the adjutant from the army had become familiar with Mirage Haiping. The other party admired Ming Haiping for staying, so the relationship between the two parties was also very harmonious.
If Mirage Wuyou was here, the two sides might still be at war with each other, but now that Mirage Wuyou is gone and left, only Mirage Haiping is left, which makes the command authority here clear.
"Yes!" Hearing his adjutant's confused greeting, Mirage Haiping made a slight sound. He used the dim light to walk under the light on the wall, and took out a cigarette for himself with the faint light.
He didn't smoke much in the past, but here he learned to smoke. The supply of everything is very tight nowadays, but the materials supplied to Mirage Haiping are still quite abundant.
The commander now even has a little supply of alcohol, which is very rare in the encirclement.
"Why aren't you asleep yet?" The adjutant, who was wearing a cotton coat and looked a little bloated, woke up a lot. He walked to Mage Haiping's side and helped his commander light the cigarette.
The temperature in the mountains itself was low, and it was even colder in the cave, so even though it was only mid-November, the adjutant still wore his cotton-padded jacket.
In fact, there was nothing he could do about it. As the number of wounded increased and the station became more and more crowded, he no longer had his own storage cabinet. It would be troublesome to lose something like a cotton-padded jacket, so I had to wear it on my body.
"Can't sleep!" Haiping replied with a bitter smile.
After a pause, he exhaled a puff of smoke. Mirage Haiping looked at the dark cave ahead and the seemingly invisible shadows on the ground, and asked his adjutant: "Are you leaving?"
"Yes! Let's go." The adjutant actually just fell asleep not long ago. The place where he is sleeping now is in Mirage Haiping's office, but he sleeps next to the table. Mirage Haiping has a bed made of boxes.
Inside the box were some documents that could not be disposed of immediately, as well as some personal belongings of Mirage Haiping. There is also some wine specially provided for him, as well as some cans and other goodies.
The reason why he didn't ask these questions in the room was because he simply wanted to smoke a cigarette and find a bright and spacious place to stand for a while.
The room that belonged to him was really cramped. It was used to store ammunition. After the ammunition was used up, it was moved out to serve as his office.
Despite this, he was satisfied to have a small independent room. After all, the place where he worked was with the wounded.
Every night recently, the mirage army has been engaged in two kinds of operations. One is to break out of the northern encirclement where the orcs are not yet strong, and try to find a way to bring back some food and ammunition and cotton clothes; the other is to launch a counterattack to the west, Sneak attack on the orc camp.
Both battles are brutal and deadly. However, the mirage goblins have no other way to continue fighting.
The cave really can't support that many people. If the excess population is not consumed, all other supplies will be consumed by these people.
Therefore, the mirage army changed from a defensive side to an active offensive side: they had to fight back against the orcs in order to gain more living space.
If they can defeat the orcs by chance, then they can rob some food and clothing from the orc troops, get some ammunition and guns, and even take off the pants and clothes from the corpses to get rid of the cold.
In short, if you win, you can get a lot of supplies, which is equivalent to "hunting" in disguise. It doesn't really matter if they lose the battle. The big deal is that they just lost hundreds of soldiers. At least these dead people don't have to worry about food and clothing.
Driven by this idea, Mirage Haiping would often choose a dark and stormy night to launch a counterattack, allowing hundreds of Mirage soldiers to find a direction to raid and find ways to kill orcs.
He expected to use this method to stick to the main force of the orcs and buy time for the mirage. But gradually, he discovered that his counterattacks could not even reach the orc army's camps in most cases.
The opponent has a lot of flares, and the sentries are also very strict. The mirage army's counterattacks are often discovered in advance, and then they are greeted by only a hail of bullets.
More and more counterattacks ended in failure, and finally Mirage Haiping had to start using lightly wounded or seriously injured people who could move to carry out counterattacks.
It doesn't matter whether he succeeds or fails, he just wants to consume those soldiers who can't fight in disguise. Because only in this way can the remaining soldiers who can fight eat more.
"I don't know if I can succeed this time." Ming Haiping asked knowingly, as if to comfort himself.
In fact, almost everyone knows that it is simply unrealistic to expect the wounded to fight back desperately and bring back abundant food and ammunition.
But everyone can only think this way, otherwise what can we do? The elite combat troops were sent out before, but the result was actually the same.
Under the cover of flares, the MG42 machine gun was like the scythe of death, harvesting the lives of the mirage soldiers. Countless good guys were destroyed on the road to charge, and most of the time they couldn't get anything back.
"I hope they can complete their mission and return safely." The adjutant smiled bitterly and comforted Mirage Haiping with words that even he himself did not believe.
"Ah! Ah!" In the dark distance, a sharp scream suddenly came, and soon a soldier shouted loudly: "Medical soldier! Medical soldier! Someone committed suicide! Someone committed suicide!"
Mirage Haiping was used to it. As long as there was no camp roar, the death of a few people didn't actually seem that terrible.
In such a cramped and dark environment, normal people will soon develop mental problems, let alone those who are seriously injured.
Soon, the Mirage Army medical soldier carrying the medical kit quickly passed by the place where Mirage Haiping was. Perhaps because of the poor sight, the medical soldier did not even stop to stand at attention and salute Mirage Haiping.
Mirage Haiping grabbed the adjutant who wanted to stop the other party's theory, and then continued to smoke and puff under the dim light.
The military doctor carrying an empty medical kit pretended to be there, but soon came back covered in blood. This time he saw Mirage Haiping, standing at attention and bending over. His white armband was covered in blood, as was his face and collar.
"How's it going?" Xu Haiping was a little bit curious, so he asked.
"The opponent's legs were ulcerated and one of his ears was deafened. I couldn't save him." The military doctor immediately lowered his head and replied.
In fact, he didn't finish his words. All the medicines had been used up. Without painkillers, the operation could not continue. Those soldiers who would not die in the first place are now easily eroded by infection, making life miserable and worse than death.
"You have tried your best." Mirage Haiping took out the cigarette case from his pocket, took out one, and handed it to the other party. The other party was flattered and took the cigarette, borrowed a fire from the adjutant, and started smoking together.
Using the light above his head, Xu Haiping looked at the famous watch imported from the Tang Dynasty on his wrist. The time on it showed that it was already past three in the morning. The battle should have started, and this night is destined to not be quiet.
On a distant position, a goblin officer who was blind in one eye waved his arms and shouted loudly to his companions following him: "Rush! For the future of the Mirage Kingdom! For His Majesty the Mirage Emperor!"
"Charge! For His Majesty the Mirage Emperor! Long live His Majesty the Mirage Emperor!" Howling, the goblin soldiers densely rushed towards the defense line of the orc troops. The dark environment prevented the goblins from seeing clearly their surroundings, which greatly increased their courage.
They had no idea how powerful the opponent's machine gun position was, nor did they know that the opponent would soon light up the entire sky.
"Whoosh! Bang!" As the flare took off, everything around him immediately became clear. The attacking goblin troops, seeing the corpses on the ground and the blood on their bodies, instantly lost the desire to continue fighting.
They began to rout, leaving behind the wounded who could barely walk fast. Soon these goblins returned to where they started, and then they counted their number and found that a full two-thirds were missing and had not returned.
"General! News came from the front line that the counterattack failed! 513 of our troops participated in the battle and 116 returned." An officer walked up to Mirage Haiping and reported.
His words stunned the military doctor on the side, and then he began to feel sad: There were so many wounded people, selected before nightfall, and now almost 400 of them were gone!
"At least they are loyal to His Majesty." Mirage Haiping sighed, then threw the cigarette butt at his feet, crushed it with the sole of his shoe, turned and walked towards his office.
The military doctor was not willing to smoke a whole cigarette. He pushed the burning half of the cigarette in his hand against the wall, extinguished the sparks on it, and clamped the half cigarette to his ear.
One day later, almost all the outer defense lines in the central mountainous area were occupied by the attacking orcs. Mirage Haiping only had a position of 4 kilometers in length and width, with a total area of about 16 square kilometers.
