"We will definitely lose this battle!"

Inside the towers of the Ebolden wall, Loren Turin opened the entire pre-war meeting with these words.

The words fell, and the entire war room fell silent.

For a full minute, there was not even a single person in front of the map table, and the atmosphere was embarrassing.

The two mercenary captains did not dare to speak, the commander of the city defense and the commander of the Imperial legion looked at each other, Isaac was completely unaware of what was happening, and Count Eckert and the archon of Corona were expressionless and the other remained smiling.

Gently "snap!" A slap, Lu Sien slapped directly on his face, and the corners of his mouth twitched.

With this kind of rhetoric as the final mobilization before the war, Lord Loren is absolutely unprecedented.

Thankfully, this was the final pre-war meeting, and Master Corona had stopped all the free nobles from attending by virtue of his position as consul.

Otherwise, if the people outside hear their commander's remarks, they will still be willing to stay and defend the city, and there will be ghosts!

Of course, he's Lord Loren, Loren Turin—the guy who can believe the nonsense of a deserter, go into the glacial wastes alone in search of the Dragon King, and finally succeed, so it's no surprise that he did anything.

"Don't get me wrong, this is by no means to say that we can't hold back the enemy's troops—of course, in some sense—or that we can't hold the city of Eboden... Well, it's impossible to hold on, and it's not for everyone to be prepared to retreat, although you do need to be prepared to retreat......"

"Get to the point. Looking at Loren, who was getting darker and darker, Count Eckert hurriedly stood up to ease the atmosphere for him: "I thought... Everyone here should know what you're thinking. ”

"Anyway...... The way we fight the enemy must not be limited to conventional siege warfare, relying on unfortified walls and clearing the wilderness and killing a large number of enemies to carry out passive defense, and such a battle will not have good results. ”

Loren had to explain: "We need to turn the passive into the active, lure the enemy to attack the direction we want them to attack, so as to achieve the goal of holding the city of Eberden." ”

Looking at the still confused expressions of everyone present, the black-haired wizard had to sigh.

"To be more specific, we need to take advantage of the weak but equally complex defense system of Eberden City to lure the enemy to deliberately attack it, so as to delay their seizure of the city. ”

"We are not trying to turn Ebolden into a flesh mill, but to let them take Ebolden little by little, lure the enemy to besiege the nodes that we have deliberately used as bait, so as to reduce the pressure on the entire front, and give the bait to the enemy before they are about to inflict heavy casualties on us, or simply destroy it!"

"It's like the prince who saves the princess in the legend, every volume has to go through a difficulty, we are the villains who set up difficulties for the prince, all we have to do is delay the time that the prince takes in each level, and it is better for him to meet the princess, both of whom are already hunched over and dying!"

The commander of the city defense army had a surprised expression, and Corona's eyes lit up.

Only the Empire's legion commander frowned: "So, it's not that Eboden will definitely fall, but that you are ready to abandon Eboden?"

As the words fell, everyone's eyes turned directly to the black-haired wizard with a calm face.

Even the Legion Commander was stunned by his own answer.

Is there any commander in the world who has been planning how to make the city fall since before the battle even begins?

Only Isaac remained stunned, as if anxiously waiting for something.

"Yes, it's not right. ”

Facing everyone's gaze, the black-haired wizard shook his head, leaned forward unconsciously, and pressed the map on the table: "First of all, thank you for finally understanding my plan, and secondly... You seem to have forgotten the most important thing. ”

"What is the purpose of this battle?"

In front of the map table, all faces were stunned.

So Master Corona stood up and revealed the answer: "It is to delay the enemy as long as possible, and buy time for the empire to gather troops and supplies." ”

"Exactly. Loren snapped his fingers and sighed softly: "We only have less than 30,000 troops, and if we spread it evenly over the entire Eberden city defense, it can only barely be enough." ”

In other words, once the enemy launches a full-scale offensive, what seems to be a fairly adequate force will soon be stretched thin, and once a battle for an important fortification or fortress is reached, the battle with the enemy is ironclad. ”

"I don't know if I'll be able to hold Ebolden as much as I can in this tragic way, but even if I do... How many of these 30,000 people will survive?"

The expressions of the two mercenary captains became solemn.

"But this is a matter of imperial honor, and it is a great shame to abandon the city in front of the enemy!" The commander of the legion frowned: "You are a Byrin, I always thought that Byrin people were brave enough to sacrifice for honor and dignity......"

"If you lose the city, you can still find a way to get it back... It's a big deal to die together, and build a new one later, and when the man dies, what do you rely on to fight the next battle?" Loren stared at him coldly, interrupting:

"And you seem to have misunderstood the difference between sacrifice and death - for the sake of victory, the Byrnes will not resist sacrifice, but to waste the life that could have continued to fight, that is called deliberately seeking death. ”

"I think... The Duke was right. The Silver Blood, who had been silent just now, finally spoke: "The Silver Blood Mercenary Group agrees with the Duke's point of view, and is willing to continue to serve the Duke and the Empire after this battle. ”

The "Black Blade" next to him also nodded, twitching his throat silently.

The corps commander finally stopped talking.

"Tell us about your specific plans. Corona glanced at Isaac, who was almost impatient next to him, and smiled without losing any time:

"If you want to lure the enemy, you have to have a specific goal. ”

The black-haired wizard nodded, groped his right index finger on the Ebolden map, and stopped at the castle on the other side of the Gem River: "This fortress is our first bait. ”

The solemn voice made everyone's expressions become serious.

"Once the Azores fleet approached, the first problem they had to face was the iron chain directly in front of the coastline, which would have to break through one of the two fortifications in order to break the blockade. ”

"I have arranged a large number of temporary fortifications around the circular fortress at the harbor and turned it into our battlefield, in order to lure the enemy to turn his main attack to this lonely castle on the other side of the river. ”

Loren quietly hooked the corners of his mouth: "As long as the castle does not fall for a day, the enemy's fleet will not be able to talk about the Gem River, and even the seaport of Eberden will not be able to get close, so they will definitely come." ”

"The next battle will become a battle for the castle, once it is confined here, the width of the battlefield and the size of the castle itself will make the scale of the battle have to be reduced, the enemy will not stop the offensive in the ring fortress in order to capture her, so that we can take care of one or the other, but the real battlefield is still here in the castle. ”

"What's next?" the commander of the city defense army began to be a little curious: "In the end, the enemy will definitely take the castle at all costs." ”

"That's right, so we'll have to time it and abandon the city and retreat. Loren had an expression of "finally enlightened" and smiled: "You must destroy all the city's defense weapons and baggage, but not too much, otherwise the enemy will not be fooled." ”

"The castle has fallen, and the enemy army has finally been able to launch an attack on all fronts – but they still have to face the ring fortress of the harbor, the towers at our feet, and the walls of Eboden. ”

"They can still attack from one direction, and the width and depth of the battlefield still determine the strength that the enemy can put into it, and it is still very limited - so what will they do at such a time?"

Lusen's eyes lit up: "They attack the sluice?!"

"Quite possibly!"

Loren gave him a thumbs up: "There are two possibilities - the first is to attack from the castle to the inner city wall, and directly attack the inner wall, which is not good for us, so we must destroy the passage first and lock the sluices." ”

"The second is to use the momentum of the current, and then put a few warships on chains and drag them downstream to the sea to destroy the sluices; this possibility is also very high. ”

The black-haired wizard's fingers moved away from the castle and moved up the channel of the Gem River: "And what we have to do is to get ahead of them and block the entrance to the sea from the upstream down—not all of them, as long as the enemy's warships can't get in." ”

"Destroyed houses, scuttled battleships, domestic garbage ... Anything goes, as long as you can block the port of the Gem River within a month, you will be considered a victory!"

Then they will understand that they have been fooled, and then they will realize that they have wasted most of their months in such meaningless things. Taking a deep breath, the smiling Loren closed his eyes:

"And then they'll find out... Winter is coming. ”

"The sea is about to start to freeze. ”

"The first reinforcements and supplies of the Empire have also arrived at Ebolden, and the city is no longer a fragile port that can be easily captured, but a powerful military fortress with tens of thousands of troops stationed. ”

"They will launch an unprecedented assault, sacrifice and attrition with three to one, five to one, and even ten to one or even more troops to capture Ebolden, and exchange the sea of corpses and blood for the port of Ebolden!"

"We, on the other hand, have plenty of supplies to deal with them, and when the walls are breached, we will retreat into the inner city, using the fortress as a stronghold, and the underground passages as a network of contacts to delay the enemy's time to take the city, and inflict a great deal of casualties on them;"

"Until the onset of winter, with the assistance of the Imperial Army, withdraw from the city, leaving the Azoreans with a ruined and frozen port for three months, and wait until the next spring to ...... this enemy, who had been hungry for a winter."

"Decisive battle!"

Loud words echoed in front of the map table.

The black-haired wizard opened his eyes and stared at the map of Ebolden in front of him.

"How do you lure the enemy into taking the bait?"

In front of the quiet map table, only the legion commander said coldly: "This is the key to the whole plan, right?"

"That's right, whether the first step can be successful or not can be said to be the most important thing. Loren nodded, and said calmly: "So I will trouble the thousand legionnaires under your command to be stationed in the castle." ”

"In this way, you can make the enemy realize the importance of this place, but you can also mistakenly think that there are contradictions within the defenders - when the battle is tight and the enemy begins to attack, two mercenary groups will come to your aid, so that they can further convince their judgment. ”

"As for how to fight the Azorean elves...... the black-haired wizard sighed with a smile, and turned his gaze to Isaac next to him, who was already on the verge of killing himself with his gaze: "It's up to our genius wizard Isaac Grantham to report on his latest discoveries!"

The words fell, and everyone's eyes turned to a certain "genius".

"You made me wait so long, you did it on purpose, right?!"

Glaring viciously, Isaac, with an exaggerated expression, pushed Loren aside and stood in front of the map table, coughing twice, then straightening his back:

"Gentlemen, after six hours of careful study, I have gone through all the records of Ebolden's foreign trade and dealings, and have found a great deal of information about the Azorean elves. ”

"That's right, it's not the first time in the history of Ebolden that we've had a history with this race, though it's almost always a one-sided ......."

"Six hours?"

Silver Blood frowned, his expression in disbelief: "I don't know how many 'records' there are, but six hours... You're all done?"

"Yes, after all these years, I can roughly understand your thoughts, and it is indeed impossible to read one thousand and sixty-two books, five hundred and seventy-six thousand six hundred and sixty-six pages, and four hundred and forty-four million four hundred and forty-four thousand one hundred and fifty-four words in six hours in the eyes of mortals. ”

"But I can, because I'm a genius... In just one day, the genius who has read all the books in the library of the Royal Wizarding Academy of the Empire. ”

At the map table, everyone's expressions were even more stunned than before.

Only Loren, Lusen and Corona are still used to it.

"If there are any other questions, I'll continue if not. Isaac, who pretended to be plain, was so proud that his tail was almost cocked: "According to my careful search, I found some important information about the Azorean elf army. ”

"For example... They are accustomed to wearing light armor to fight, and the weapons they use are mainly long knives and spears, and rarely wear shields or armor-piercing weapons. ”

"Oh, and most importantly - the Azorean elves have a very special tradition of blowing a flute-like 'trumpet' before the war begins, announcing the beginning of the war to the enemy. ”

"The sound of this horn is said to be very similar to the sound of an eagle chirping......

At this moment, a faint eagle whistle came from the direction of the port of Ebolden;

Everyone was stunned.

Isaac, stunned, looked at everyone, nodded silently, and pointed out the window:

"Hmm... That's it. ”(https:)

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