The plainly dressed Wizard Reed stepped onto the muddy ground and walked into the rebel tent, looking around confusedly and sadly.
This place was originally filled with elite warriors equipped with iron armor and swords, with powerful and sharp eyes like blades. But almost all of these warriors were lost in yesterday's battle, leaving only a few leaders headed by Lance.
"Your Excellency Lance." The middle-aged man saluted slightly to the general in the center of the camp. Although his clothes were shabby, he looked like a homeless man from Beyeland, but he carried a mysterious and fearsome extraordinary aura in his movements.
"Mr. Reed," Lance said hello with a bandage on his body and nodded with a somewhat dejected expression, "The camp in the north was broken, you know? What happened yesterday."
"Mosmok was also killed by the formation. The officer in charge was a knight named Griffith." Mr. Reed spread his hands, "I saw the soldiers who escaped from there."
"Griffith?" As soon as he finished speaking, a voice sounded from the corner of the tent, and everyone present got out of the way. Lanthanis, who had fought against Griffith, sat on a box and lazily wiped his long sword: "I fought against him before, and he was a thorn in his feet. Mosmok has that sophisticated set. With the blessing of armor, why can’t I defeat him?”
Lance glanced at the Juggernaut, then looked away and asked Wizard Reed:
"Your mentor should be satisfied, right? We killed an extraordinary wizard, but we also wasted precious time in this muddy area and paid the lives of so many heroes. If we continue to delay, the army will be in danger."
"This," Wizard Reed sighed, "according to the plan, we need to capture one or two descendants of the great nobles and hand them over to my mentor, so that he can give us more blessings and information."
"A blessing like Steel Rod Ferro and Wall?" Fanfan Holland, who was also in the camp, shouted dissatisfied, "It's useless at all. He can't go three rounds against the noble's lackey."
Another wizard, Daruno, was now in the same camp as Reed and immediately said:
"They should be grateful and satisfied to be promoted from a bandit to an extraordinary person, without being crazy or mutated, and experiencing power they have never had before.
"If it hadn't been for our Lord's arrangement, the army would not have had the chance to pass through the obstruction of the noble coalition, and you would still be eating grass in the mountains.
"Now, we have rushed into the core area of Verona, which is almost defenseless. We have seized countless supplies, property and weapons. Hundreds of heroes join us every day, and the army is becoming more and more famous. All of this is thanks to our mentor. Given.”
Wizard Reed raised his right hand and stopped Wizard Daruno from speaking further before others started to make a fuss:
"According to intelligence, Count Sindra, one of the main nobles of Verona, has organized an army composed of knights, city defense troops and garrison troops. They are coming from the north and will join the battlefield soon. Your Excellency Lance You must be ready to lead the army to attack, right?"
"You mean, it looks like this?" Lance pointed to his injuries. "Lancenis, can you lead three thousand infantry to defeat the enemy in the north? I will stay here to organize the new heroes."
"No problem!" Lancenis sat on the box and waved to everyone.
"Wait a minute," Wizard Reed said, "I think Lord Lanthanis should attack Baron Bet's castle with all his strength and exchange those noble young masters and ladies for more support."
Lance shook his head: "This is not easy. Just now, more than a hundred city defense troops and militiamen, led by a knight, attacked the checkpoint near the ferry and killed dozens of people. I just sent more than two hundred soldiers Go there and cut off the ferry.
"The officers and soldiers who attacked there were the forces that broke through the North Camp. They used waterways to attack us everywhere. If we just sit back and do nothing, a gap will be opened in the eastern siege of Beit Manor."
"It's just a checkpoint, what does it matter?" Wizard Reed asked with a displeased face.
Lance narrowed his eyes and glanced at Mr. Reed, his ferocious gaze more like that of a beast than a human being. Reed, who was stared at by this gaze, couldn't help but tremble.
Lance quickly looked away and explained in a calm tone:
"It's not a checkpoint issue.
"The North Camp and the river bank checkpoints have been severely damaged. If we don't take action, this army will open more gaps and even cause the major battalions to collapse."
As he spoke, he raised his hands and clenched his fists: "The army is a whole, and it looks fierce. In fact, it is just like a little girl. If it is slightly stimulated, the whole body will suddenly twitch without warning.
"Although our army has a large number, the heroes come from all over the country and have not been properly trained, and the orders among the units are not unified. Once the battles are unfavorable in a row, the whole army will be at risk of disintegration, just like the Beiying.
"We can't capture the baron's castle, and it doesn't matter if we can't capture the hostages. This war has dealt a heavy blow to the nobles and their lackeys, and strengthened the momentum and strength of the rebels. We can retreat to the mountainous areas where the nobles are weak, where and The other rebel armies gathered together to accumulate strength and wait for the opportunity."
"No, no, we can't retreat!" Wizard Reed's teeth made a creaking sound, and he said again like a wild dog staring at his prey, "Can't Lord Lanthanis go to the castle once? Come here with extraordinary dignity, The heirs of the nobles there must be no match."
Lancenis shrugged his shoulders in boredom, showing no interest in such a plan at all: "Tsk, do you think I'm stupid for not knowing about conflicting attributes? Sir Lance can snipe and kill an extraordinary wizard, how can the little bastards in the castle Can't you use magic to trap me?
"I'm not a lawbreaker. If I fall into a trap, everything will be over.
"You go ahead! I'll cooperate."
Lance, who was wearing heavy armor, chuckled, opened his mouth full of jagged teeth and said:
"The noble Lord's reinforcements will soon be surrounded from all sides. According to me, the families of those young people are far away in Beyeland. The purpose of using them as bait to attract the officers and soldiers to fight with us has been achieved. There is no need to continue taking risks.
"We need to gather more troops;
“We have a group of veterans of the Verona Auxiliary Legion joining us who have a deep grudge.
"Although the North Camp is under attack, the location of the South Camp is more important. If we hold it there, we will have a way out to gallop across the Verona Plains full of farms. I will go there to defend and reorganize the army.
"Lancenis, you take some veterans and three thousand heroes to defeat the reinforcements coming from the north.
"As for this camp and Baron Bate's castle, don't worry, Mr. Reed, I will leave this west camp and the nearby 1,200 troops, plus the 500 people left in the north camp, to you. You and Wizard Daruno can use your discretion. I will send people to support you when I organize the new army."
…
Lance ignored the fierce opposition of the wizards, left the rebels' west camp, and took a group of soldiers to the south camp by the Vero River.
This camp is located on the hillside of a small hill. It was originally a position used to confront Commander Maglius. After the opponent was washed away by the flood, it became a peninsula guarding land routes and rivers.
When Lance arrived at the camp, the more than two thousand soldiers gathered here were in a mess, with neither martial law nor fighting.
"What are you doing? Why are you all gathering together to watch?" Lance yelled, hitting the soldiers he encountered with the back of his knife.
"Sir, three ships of soldiers from the nobles passed by here not long ago and attacked a northern outpost. They killed dozens of brothers and left."
"I know that, what else?"
"Another group of people took two boats and set up two trebuchets on the other side of the river!" A leader reported to Lance.
Are they going to bombard us from this far away? ! Lance was surprised at first, but when he thought about it carefully, the range was impossible to cover the rebel camp from the other side of the river, so there was no threat at all.
However, Lance still said cautiously: "Send a few ships over and kill them."
"People have been arranged to go, but they also ran away," the leader responded. "Before you arrived, they fired several rounds at us, and the fireballs were thrown on the nearby hills."
"oh?"
Lance hurriedly looked up to the top of the mountain nearby. To the east of Nanying, there was a hilltop with bursts of smoke and fire. That hilltop is still quite far away from South Camp, and it is very difficult to get up and down. The army cannot camp there, and the fire will not spread to the camp.
"When did this happen?" Lance asked.
"An hour ago, that's when we heard about the attack on the outpost."
Stupid noble lackey...Lance was relieved. The trebuchets on the other side also stopped firing at this time. It seemed that the officers and soldiers on the opposite side also realized that the distance was not enough and had given up this stupid plan.
If you want to bombard the camp with firepower, you must transport the trebuchet across the river and set it up on the bank. But what if it’s shipped over? With the rebels' superior strength, they could be dealt with with a single charge.
Maybe the government army will send elite soldiers to cover the trebuchet when it reaches the river bank. That would be better. The second-level squad leader who killed Mosmok should come.
Lance felt relieved and called the leaders over, asking them to gather the newly joined heroes to prepare for inspection and training.
Suddenly, he seemed to see some shadow moving on the top of the mountain not far away. The trees on the top of the mountain that had just been ignited have been burned, leaving black marks.
In the remaining thick smoke, something huge seemed to flash past.
An ominous premonition flashed through Lance's heart, and he immediately shouted: "Take someone to the top of the mountain to have a look! Immediately!"
The strong wind blew away the smoke from the top of the mountain, and two trebuchets suddenly appeared above the bandits' heads.
Before Lance could give the order, a trebuchet had already thrown a burning fireball towards the place.
"Bombardment!"
"hidden!"
The fireball dragged a long trail of thick smoke across the dark sky, hit a tent, and opened a wall of fire in the camp. Splashing debris and flames ignited nearby houses and rebels, and screams broke out one after another.
"Quick! Go kill those trebuchets!" Lance shouted. Before he finished speaking, the second fireball had already risen into the sky.
…
"Okay, so shameless!" Senamon praised sincerely as he looked down at the chaotic rebel camp and the rolling fireballs in the distance.
While Griffith launched the offensive, a small number of engineer squadrons were already preparing to attack the rebel southern camp in accordance with his plan. However, they did not attack directly. Instead, according to the instructions, they first bombarded the woods and shrubs on the top of the nearby mountains, burning a small open space. While the rebels focused their attention on fighting in the north and trebuchets on the shore, Sennamon led The soldiers secretly climbed up to the top of the burning mountain, completed the deployment of two light trebuchets, and then threw incendiary bombs at the rebels at the bottom of the mountain.
The hilltop used as an artillery position was still some distance from the south camp, but due to the height difference, the trebuchet's range was also increased.
In just ten minutes, continuous fireballs turned the rebel camp upside down. The place where they camped was not large to maintain the terrain, and the newly collected recruits and supplies were crowded together, so the fireballs were almost perfect.
However, the engineers could not bring much kerosene and stone bombs, and the materials and mechanical structure of the trebuchet could not support long-term shooting. After a quarter of an hour of shooting, it looked like it was going to be unsustainable.
The engineer poured oil on the trebuchet, lit a fire, and slid down quickly along the rope tied to the boulder.
"Go get them!"
Lance's face had been burned black, and his two thousand troops were in chaos in the burning camp. Many new heroes simply took advantage of the chaos to rob.
They managed to extract more than a hundred people, and the Extraordinary Mad Dog Matt led a hundred axemen to outflank them along the river bank.
Mad Dog Matt saw those shameless engineering soldiers coming down the mountain from a distance, and thought that he must intercept them by the river.
Two flat-bottomed boats have been parked on the side of the hill near the river bank. The engineering soldiers descended from the mountain in a hurry and were hurriedly escaping to the boats.
"Kill all the nobles' lackeys!" Mad Dog Matt raised his arms and shouted, and all his men rushed towards him howling with red eyes.
Suddenly, a warrior wearing heavy armor and holding a halberd jumped out of the boat and attacked the rushing rebels alone.
"kill him!"
Mad Dog Matt barked wildly. Before he finished speaking, the halberdier had already killed three people in a row. He held a terrifying weapon and roared in the wind, breaking swords and breaking shields along the way. He was injured when he was brushed and died when he was touched.
Most of the rebel swordsmen and axemen were not wearing armor, and they were killed with a single halberd before the weapons in their hands could reach the enemy.
"You lackeys, stop being so arrogant!" Mad Dog Matt saw his men being massacred and was furious. He jumped over with two scimitars in his hand.
His figure was agile, and some mysterious power suddenly activated, elongating his hands and feet, and he actually took on the posture of a mantis-like monster, moving forward and back in an extremely strange way.
"Monster Path Sequence 8 'Alien'?" The Halberdier killed two more people and asked Matt coldly.
"Exactly!" Matt's two scimitars were connected to his hands, slashing like shadows.
"Bang!"
The halberd and the long knife intersected, making a clear trill.
Mad Dog Matt kicked the ground with his inhuman legs, jumped up like an insect, and swept the halberdier's chest with his blade like a phantom.
Amidst the sparks, the breastplate did not move at all. Instead, the halberd spun like a windmill, and the heavy iron ball smashed down head on.
"Pong!"
There was just a muffled sound, and all the swordsmen and axemen present saw their leader's brain burst and he stumbled to the ground. The halberd flipped between his arms and stabbed down towards his face.
…
"Master Griffith is truly incomparable. He is indeed Miss Larmore's favorite..."
"Shut up." Griffith shouted coldly.
The engineer sergeant Senamon who led the team hurriedly covered his mouth and quickly changed his compliments, "We have never had such a hearty bombardment. How many enemies did we destroy in the rebel camp? Eight hundred?"
"I think it's at least a thousand and a half!" shouted the soldier on the side. "It's so exciting to see them scurrying around with their heads in their hands! When can we do it again?"
Griffith ignored them and stared at the river in the distance. The shelling just now was so effective that it lasted longer than originally planned, but the danger also increased exponentially.
He stared at the bend in the river mouth, where the rebel pursuers should appear. Although flat-bottomed boats are highly adaptable, they are also extremely slow. The enemy can catch up quickly as long as they drive a light boat.
Fortunately, until they passed the mouth of the river, the rebel camp was busy putting out fires and no pursuers were sent out.
After three consecutive attacks, the rebel organization has fallen into chaos.
…
When Griffith returned to Yambol Town, more people and supplies had gathered here.
The town officials who were lazy and indifferent last night became particularly diligent, arranging meals and supplies before and after running. Fiona is supervising them, and the locals actually listen to her.
The girl was also very happy to see Griffith return victorious, and immediately explained to him the reason.
It turned out that when she broke through, Sonia asked everyone to sign a letter of authorization for her, requesting help from Beyeland on behalf of everyone trapped.
After Fiona contacted Old Town, although she did not immediately receive the support of powerful supernatural beings and troops, all nearby forces were told to accept her command and dispatch.
Count Chalon, who was unable to come to the scene, made severe threats through various channels, and then made many promises, finally swaying the Verona forces in this area.
Local officials are reorganizing land transportation to the ferry crossing of Boulogne, which is lined with villages and estates. With limited ships and the river covered with debris and trees, if a large army wanted to launch an attack, it could only reach the east bank by land, and then cross the river to Boulogne Ferry.
In addition, they actually collected a regular regiment squadron and gathered 50 soldiers from five squads.
They were part of the empty First Legion of Verona. They were originally going to obey orders from Commander Maglius, but they were too slow to catch up. After the flash flood broke out, the higher-level units of these reinforcements were either swept away by the flood or blocked elsewhere, so that these troops could not find their commanders.
The inexperienced officials did not even find an officer in charge of Fiona. They directly led the noisy soldiers over and gathered them in the square in front of the town council to listen to the girl's orders.
Fortunately, Griffith arrived in time. When he first saw these five squads of legionnaires, he immediately frowned and immediately understood why they fell behind.
These people were well-equipped with mail armor, throwing spears, swords and shields, but their mental temperament was completely different from the legionnaires Griffith was familiar with. They stood crookedly in the square like a group of hooligans.
They are the local legion of Verona, replicas of the Eagle Banner of Bijerland in various regions, managed and adjusted by the local nobles according to their habits.
Fiona saw these soldiers from a distance and always felt that something was wrong. But when she thought that these people could rescue Lana and the others, her mood brightened. She tried to calm down, thought about what she was going to say next, and walked to the high platform in the center of the square. A bewildered Paxiu followed her.
Griffith watched her walk toward the Legionnaires, like a little rabbit bounding to give a lecture to a pack of big bad wolves. He hurriedly grabbed Fiona and pulled her back into the lounge.
Fiona was startled when she realized that Griffith was holding her back and glared at him angrily.
"Fiona, have you taken any lessons in army formation and combat?"
"No, that's a second grade course." The girl answered honestly.
"Do you have any previous experience in commanding combat operations?"
"No~"
"Then leave it to me," Griffith pounded his breastplate, "Go to the town government and Old Town officials, ask them for more soldiers, and send me all the Old Town defense troops. Take a guard with you when you go."
The lessons and missions prepared for young nobles like Sonia and Fiona are completely different from those of Shutoral. Commanding battles and training soldiers do not require the hard work of high-ranking nobles. What they need to care about is the recruitment, organization, equipment and tactical research and development, and supply policies of the army. They are the decision-makers of military affairs. Offices, parliaments, and balls are their battlefields.
It is naturally the job of Shutoral and the lower nobles and officers to personally fight in battle, enforce military laws, and solve the needs of the rude soldiers.
