South of Hammondale, the village of Werning.

This village of more than 1,000 people is the largest populator in Hammondale outside of the town of Harmonydale, and is populated mostly by local farmers and hunters.

Due to the heavy snow this winter, the entire village of Werning has also been cut off from the road to the outside, and if it weren't for the fact that the villagers exchanged local specialties for enough supplies at the Hammondale Autumn Market before winter came, I am afraid that this winter would have been really difficult to survive.

The snow on the ground was knee-high, and even the strongest hunters in the village would not go out to hunt in such cold weather.

On this night, most of the people slept, and those who did not sleep hid in front of the fireplace at home, talking about the new lord who had not been here for a long time.

This new lord has a lot of surprises for everyone, such as tax cuts, such as the fall of the big-eared bandits.

It can be said that since this lord took office, it has brought only benefits to the villagers, and no harm.

Of course, such a lord has been praised by everyone.

No one noticed that on a road not far from the village, an army was slowly but surely advancing in the direction of the town of Hammondal, in the thick snow of the night.

This army was all draped in thick white cloaks, and even in the daytime, it was difficult to spot the traces of this army if you looked at it from a distance.

Even so, the commander of the army here chose to march in the dark of night.

Not only that, but in order to prevent the metal weapons from reflecting and exposing themselves, the commander even had the soldiers wrap the tips of their spears in white cloth.

Although small in number, the composition of the army was quite complex, ranging from elves with longbows and scimitars, strong dwarves with warhammers, centaur warriors with spears, and elven warriors on white horses with beautiful wings.

The army set out quietly from the forests of Turalea, day and night, in order to cover people's eyes and ears, and prepare to capture Hammondale in one fell swoop before the Erathian Empire could react.

Unlike Her Majesty Queen Catherine, who still wants to maintain peaceful relations between the two sides on the surface, and can only find ways to play tricks in secret, the elven king of the elven kingdom, Palson, has already made up his mind at this time, wanting to take advantage of the fact that Empress Catherine thinks that the roads are not smooth in winter and the elves will not make any moves, and capture Hammondale in one fell swoop, firmly holding this strategic place in her own hands.

What the Blackstone Treaty, what the alliance between the two countries, in the eyes of the Elven King, this is all indifferent, as long as the elves can have a strong force under Hammondalb, except for Dia's necromancer, there will be no force that can directly attack the forests of Tulaone, let alone hit the elves' lair of Eli.

At that time, as long as they concentrate on exterminating or driving away the necromancers who were badly injured in the last war, and recovering the original belonging of Eredia, the elves will be able to keep the enemy out of their homeland and have more than one-third of the rich land of the entire continent of Erathia.

With these advantages, and after a period of recuperation, the Elven King believes that the elves who have grown stronger will definitely be able to regain the right to speak on the continent, instead of being almost reduced to a vassal state of the Human Empire of Erathia as they are now.

For this purpose, the Elven King did not hesitate to go to war with the Erathian Empire.

At this time, the Erathia Empire is no longer the powerful Griffonheart Dynasty it used to be, after a series of wars, it can't even suppress a small country like Titalia, if it weren't for the help of the Elven Kingdom and the Bracada Mage Kingdom in the last war, plus Catherine's sudden return gathered people's hearts, maybe the country would have been destroyed.

But even so, the current empire with a long history is extremely weak, and the main reason is that because of the status of Empress Catherine, there are quite a few nobles in the empire who are very dissatisfied with the return of this woman who has married to another continent to return to power in Erathia, they think that even if the old emperor is no longer there, and he has not left or appointed an heir, then the throne should be elected by the nobles.

Her Majesty the Empress was not willing to let her father's inheritance fall into the hands of these nobles who had already fallen into the hands of pleasure in her eyes, and even if she wanted to give way, she hoped that someone of ability and prestige would take over, not these guys who were greedy for life and afraid of death in the war.

This contradiction is so acute that the Elven King believes that the Erathian Empire will not be able to wage a full-scale war with the Elven Kingdom for one reason or another. This is true even if the elves have taken possession of Hammondal.

In order to increase his certainty, the Elven King even secretly financed the swamp dwellers of Tytaria, helping them to reorganize their armies in order to contain the power of the Erathian Empire.

This approach seems to be quite effective at present, the once independent Titaria Swamp Kingdom is just as unwilling to be a vassal state of the Elasia Empire as the Elven Kingdom, and now the swamp dwellers are calling for independence more and more, which makes Her Majesty the Empress very anxious.

And in order to further achieve the smooth occupation of Hammondal, the Elf King also sent someone to secretly buy the lord of Hammondal, Markham, hoping that he could take refuge in himself, but unfortunately the old fox refused because he did not dare to offend the Empress of the Empire, but after receiving a large amount of wealth from the Elf King, he still played a trick to let Hammondale out.

Unfortunately, the sudden appearance of the big-eared monsters at this time made the elven king, who had already learned from the intelligence that the Big-eared monsters had formed an alliance with the necromancers, worried a lot, and thought that the necromancers also intended to get involved in Hammondal, so for the sake of prudence, he had to suspend the plan to secretly send troops to occupy Hammondal.

At the same time with two countries, the elf king has not reached such an arrogant level.

It wasn't until the winter that the elven king Parson, who had been planning for a long time, finally made up his mind and sent this long-prepared army to capture Harmondale in one fell swoop.

The only surprise in the whole plan was the sudden appearance of the big-eared monsters and the unexpected abilities of the commoner lord arranged by Markham.

The Elven King was curious about the new lord, but only curious.

The Elven King didn't think that his regular army would be defeated like the big-eared monsters in front of this little lord.

The elves are not brainless big-eared monsters, they only know how to punch and rush, and the cooperation of multiple arms and excellent strategies and tactics made the elves shine in the last war, and the world was shocked.

Moreover, the elves are very rich, their equipment is far from being comparable to those big-eared monsters, the weapons and equipment made by the elves are famous all over the continent, not to mention that they have dwarf allies who are better at making weapons and equipment to help.

After the Great War, not all the dwarves went to Baildes, and many chose to stay in the forests of Eli and Turalion.

Whenever a well-equipped elven army appears on the battlefield, it brings terrible nightmares to the enemy.

It's just a small castle, and according to intelligence, there are only a maximum of two hundred newly recruited soldiers, and the only thing to worry about is a master-level fire mage.

Perhaps when the elven army appeared in Hammondal, the little lord would fall to his knees in fright and beg for mercy.

The Elven King had left the little lord behind him at this point, and he was planning how to deal with a possible attack by Erathia after the capture of Hammondal.

Do you want to strike first? In the light of the candlestick, the Elven King's finger moved across the map, eventually stopping at the location marked with Livingste's Fortress.

(Today's first update, please continue to support!) ）