When Claudia approached the two generals, Jerista and Martinley, the Blackstone Orcs had not yet arrived.

"Is there anything we can do to boost the morale of the sailors?" Claudia asked, with some concern.

She had no reason not to worry, and on the way to the two generals, Claudia had seen the pre-battle state of the soldiers nearby.

Today, the army participating in the war of the Stormwind Kingdom is mainly composed of three parts, royal knights, sailors, and militia.

Among them, the performance of the royal knights is naturally impeccable, both in strength and will to fight is very strong, but the number of royal knights is too small, there are only four brigades in total, how many orcs can they stop?

As for the militia, it was a headache for Claudia, the militia was not so much a soldier, but a group of farmers with a spear and a breech gun, not even standing in line, not to mention the queue, one by one with a miserable face and white hands and trembling, in Claudia's opinion, these more than 500 militia could not even beat fifty orcs, as long as they reached the stage of white-knuckle warfare, it was estimated that it would not take long to collapse.

Finally, there were the most numerous sailors in the battle today, numbering 1,200 men, but they were only armed with flintlock muskets, bayonets, naval knives, and a small amount of armor, and Claudia did not know what their will would be.

These sailors had asked for money to be paid when they were in Stormwind, and now they had all gathered in twos and threes, and found Claudia passing by them to give a lazy military salute, but there was not much respect in their eyes, more like they were dealing with business.

So at this moment, Claudia is most concerned about the will of the sailors and how much combat effectiveness they can play, which can directly affect the outcome of today's battle.

You must know that although the Stormwind Kingdom has powerful mages, the Blackstone tribe also has warlocks as spellcasters, and mages are more vulnerable after being close after all, and they need front-line troops to be able to withstand in order to exert their strength, so it is not safe to put all your hopes on mages.

"Morale?" General Jereista apparently did not expect Claudia to ask this question, and she immediately corrected it: "With all due respect, Your Majesty, the sailors only lack the equipment and experience to fight in the great armies on land, and they never lack courage. ”

Seeing that General Jeresta said so surely, Claudia couldn't ask again, so she could only nod, and General Jericha continued to explain:

"Your Majesty, in fact, the sea is much more terrible than the land, every time they go to sea, they are equivalent to carrying a shroud on the ship, and they may die at any time from disease, hunger, thirst, pirates, and other ways of death, but they have never been afraid."

As if he knew where Claudia's doubts came from, General Martinley added: "Your Majesty, as far as I know, the military law of the navy is much stricter than that of the army, and the pressure is also greater, so the navy only needs an additional budget for transfer. ”

After listening to General Martinley's addition, Claudia has already understood that since the sailors are under great pressure, the mortality rate is high, and the military law is strict, then they naturally need generous treatment to maintain, otherwise they would have mutinied a long time ago, and they can also rely on capturing booty as a reward when they go out on sea missions in peacetime, and the death rate of such a hard nail as orcs is extremely high and it is estimated that there is no trophy, so it is no wonder that an additional budget is needed.

This is human nature, so Claudia thought about it and said: "In this case, then the order continues, as long as the battle is won today, in addition to the original reward of ten gold coins, I will reward each soldier with ten additional gold coins, and for each additional orc killed, I will be rewarded with additional hardware coins, and all additional rewards will be paid by me personally." ”

General Jereista did not refuse, and bowed his head: "Thank you, Your Majesty." ”

Claudia stressed: "However, there is no need to be cowardly. ”

General Jerysta said in a deep voice: "I understand, anyone who dares to retreat today, including the militia, will be dealt with in accordance with the fourth military regulation of the Naval Code of Conduct. ”

"Well," Claudia nodded, "I'm going to fight on the front line today, and you'll be in charge of commanding the battle, General Laujerista." ”

"Yes!"

After Jerry Star's order was given, the sailors were all jubilant, and the militiamen were a little excited at the high reward at first (one gold coin could make an adult a year's food and clothing not a problem), but when they asked what the so-called Navy's fourth military regulation was, their faces were not good-looking.

Seeing that the fighting atmosphere of the sailors had been mobilized, Claudia was still a little worried in her heart, after all, the total number of human soldiers was only about two thousand, not only was the number less than that of the orcs, but the quality was a little worrying, and this battle was not easy to fight.

"It's not a good battle."

Twenty minutes later, the Blackstone Orcs had arrived, and after witnessing the human army, Red's lieutenant Gasselzog made the same judgment.

"It's just a few humans," said striker Bannock Greataxe disdainfully, "just look at those soldiers, only those knights can fight us, and the rest are just a bunch of miscellaneous soldiers, who can be knocked down as soon as they get close!" ”

"But they still have a dozen mages, and even two of them are archmages!" Before we set out, Lord Nefarian had instructed us not to lose too much, and if the humans were on guard, they could retreat, and there was no need to fight each other to the death. ”

After hearing Nefarian's words, Red Black Hand, the true leader of the Blackstone Orcs, had a look of scruple in his eyes, and snorted coldly: "Hmph, then if we run such a long way, and in the face of such a knight who has no war horse, we don't even fight and flee back in such a gray way, won't we be laughed at by the other clansmen and shame the ancestors?" We are a purebred tribe, and true tribal warriors would never do that! ”

After listening to Red's words, Gasselzog no longer persuaded him, the orcs have a strong martial tradition, they admire warriors the most, and they spurn cowards, and Gasselzog doesn't want to be regarded as a coward by his clansmen.

Bannock Greataxe was visibly impressed by Red's words, and he raised his tomahawk and shouted, "Victory or death!" ”

"Victory, death!" The other orcs raised their weapons and roared in response to Bannock, the roar echoing through the mountain trail.

The humans at the exit of the mountain road also heard the roar of the tribe, at this time the human soldiers have formed several rows of arc queues in a wider place outside the exit of the mountain road, the three rows of human sailors are holding flintlock pistols and waiting for battle, and not far behind them are the royal knights and militiamen, who will be responsible for helping the sailors resist the close impact of the orcs after the battle, this wide and thin line can maximize the firepower advantage of the human musket.

The Blackstone tribe attacked shortly after.

Many of the Blackstone Orcs were veterans of the Second War, and naturally knew how to deal with human mages, and they formed a loose queue, shouting slogans, and rushed towards the human queue in a steady stream.

After the orcs are close enough, take the lead in attacking Gianna and Archmage Merry.

Merry looked at the sky, the sky was suddenly cloudy, the cold wind blew, and countless bowls of ice began to crackle and smash down, if you were hit by such a large ice block at close range, it would be bruised, not to mention that these ice cubes still fell from a high altitude, so even though the orcs dispersed in the queue, there were still nearly thirty orcs who were stoned to death on the spot, and the orcs who were lucky not to die were also frozen by the cold after the ice fell to the ground.

Gianna held up Elunis high, dense purple arcane lightning fell from the sky, reflecting the dim sky purple at the same time, dozens of orcs howled miserably and were blown into powder by arcane lightning, in the face of this scene, Gianna was obviously stunned for a moment, she didn't expect her spell to be increased so much, and Elunis said proudly on the side: "Very good, child, you will get used to it, this is the power of Elunis." ”

In addition to Gianna and Merry, several other mages also cast corresponding spells, and many orcs in the front row were hit, but after all, not all mages have Gianna and Merry's magic power, so many orc infantry wearing armor did not die after being hit, but most of them lost their combat effectiveness.

And more than two dozen orc warlocks on the tribe's side also rushed to the front line under Red's order, and magic such as fire rain, shadow arrows, demon arrows, and sacrifices were cast one after another and thrown towards the human queue.

The human queue also instantly added dozens of dead and wounded sailors, needless to say, the dead were screaming loudly.

After witnessing the tragic condition of the wounded and hearing the screams, many of the militiamen had weakened their legs and stomachs, and even two militiamen had instinctively turned their heads and ran, but the two militiamen were quickly cut down to the ground by the surrounding royal knights, and the military judge loudly announced their disposition:

"According to today's military regulations, deserters will be executed on the spot, and the family will not receive any compensation!"

The militiamen immediately fell silent.

The opposite of the militia was the sailors, who, as General Jeresta had said, were not lacking in courage and possessed the discipline of steel, behaving like machines in the face of their falling companions, one by one carrying their guns to fill the gaps in their comrades' seats, waiting for the officer's next order.

They didn't have to wait long, and finally, the orcs had already stormed fifty meters away from them, and the officer's order sounded: "Shoot!" ”

Boom! Boom! Boom!

After three shots, several orcs who rushed to the front were immediately beaten into a sieve, but the orc forward Bannock was obviously not afraid, he roared loudly: "Rush over, these cowards are afraid of white-knuckle combat!" Shred them! ”

"Tear them apart!"

The orcs responded to the call of the striker, the orcs are not afraid of flintlock pistols, and they are not the first day to deal with humans or black iron dwarves who like to use guns, although the power of the gun is okay, but the accuracy is too poor (the probability of hitting more than 50 meters is less than half), and the rate of fire is too slow (it is good to shoot 3 rounds a minute), and it is useless to deal with a large number of creatures (such as undead and elemental creatures), so in the eyes of the orcs, this weapon is very troublesome to produce, maintain and use, far less convenient than the axe.

In fact, once the black iron dwarf gets close to the orcs, he also decisively throws the gun and pulls out the hammer, and the human is also plugged into a bayonet to turn into a spear melee combat, and the final outcome often depends on the white-knuckle battle.

Amid the battle cries of the orcs, although the ranks of the orcs had decreased a lot in the charge, the distance between the human soldiers and the orcs was getting closer and closer.

White-knuckle combat, on the verge of breaking out.