The next day, after returning to the cage mountain command post on the Seagull, Iron Axe walked into the office of the General Staff as soon as possible.

"How's this trip?" said Edith was sitting at the mahogany table, sipping her tea.

Obviously, everyone is busy these days, and it is common to work until the early hours of the morning, but she still maintains a delicate image, as if she is born with more energy and time than others, and this ability is admired even by an iron axe.

"Morale is available. He replied briefly.

"Then we can move on to the next step. Northland Pearl smiled slightly, "By the way, just last night, the defenders of Fine Sand City also withdrew from the defensive area. ”

"Then only Sunken Pond Bay remains......" Iron Axe looked at the large map on the wall.

"I suggest that they evacuate as soon as possible and send a force to meet them, without having to wait for a breach in the defensive line to act. ”

Iron Axe nodded, agreeing with the judgment. It is likely that there are more than 50,000 devils gathered from west to east now, and this number will not be a problem to encircle the entire Shenchi Bay, and once the large armies converge, it may be difficult for the First Army to find a suitable time to retreat.

Since their strategic goal was not on one city or one place in the first place, it was naturally a natural decision to abandon Shenchi Bay early in order to preserve the army.

Ever since the enemy launched a massive attack, the evacuation has not stopped, and the residents and merchants who had kept the city running were the first to be transferred out of the city, followed by the families and nobles who had joined Roland. At this moment, the city is nothing more than a huge empty shell, and the defenders can move immediately if the order is given.

"I ...... I don't understand......" Agatha, who was looking through the latest war report on the sidelines, suddenly muttered.

"Is something wrong?" Iron Axe walked up to her.

"The discrepancy between the number of casualties and the statistics of the enemy destroyed...... That's 30 times as much, how is that done?"Since all four cities have had their share of the past week, and the reports have been sent in batches, they need to be manually aggregated. In order to prevent miscalculations, she double-checked the arithmetic formula in her hand several times, and the answers she got remained unchanged.

According to the results of statistics, the four cities have suffered more than 1,500 casualties in the battle so far, but the number of enemies destroyed is as high as 50,000, which can be described as incredible.

If it was in the era of the Federation, Agatha would not hesitate to think that this was a deliberate fraud and a lie about military exploits, but she had fought with the First Army many times, and it was unlikely that such a problem would arise under the system of multi-party checking. Even if you throw away an error of one or two percent, it will not change its essence.

You must know that when the First Army was in the northern expedition to the fertile plains, it faced only 20,000 devilish troops! At that time, they relied on the railway that stretched for hundreds of kilometers and built one fortress after another, and it took nearly a year before they won the battle of Tachira.

And this time the strategy of the General Staff was just to keep retreating, and in eight days it achieved twice as much as the Fertile Plains?

Despite her confidence in humanity today, she was shocked by the results.

Agatha thought that this big battle would be fought very hard.

"I see," Edith chuckled after reading the Ice Witch's stats, "and to be honest, this plan has worked a little bit better than I expected. However, this is not all due to the First Army, the cooperation of the devil is also very important, and it is likely that the ambush left Hekzod with a lot of injuries, so that he no longer has the energy to control the details of the front line. ”

"Is that the only reason?" said Agatha incredulously.

"I know you're wondering what," Edith said, waving her hand, "It looks like we've only managed to get back with a few retreats, and the battle plan can be summed up in a single sentence, but it's not like that. You often stayed in the rear during the Confederation period, and it was normal not to understand it - in short, only the current First Army could carry out this tactic. ”

"Nor will the First Army on the expedition to the ruins of Tachira?"

"At least it won't be better than it is now. "Retreat and rout are often separated by a piece of paper, and it is extremely difficult to maintain order under tremendous pressure, let alone evacuate in an orderly manner." In the case of those aristocratic armies, I am afraid that scattering in a hurry is already the best performance. If it weren't for the fact that the First Army had been tested by the night raids in Tachira, and for the strength with which the previous evacuation squads had executed orders, I would not have dared to risk putting this plan into practice. ”

"The usefulness of the new weapons is also evident - at least in the streets of the city, they can rely on the fire of general-purpose machine guns and field guns to counter the enemy without the support of fortress artillery. The biggest advantage of firearms is distance, once the whole army can move, always hold the advantage in hand, it is only natural to achieve this result. ”

Edith paused, "But it's also true that we've lost our perimeter defense, so that's the key to the whole plan." Once the devil takes the four cities, he will definitely start planning the next round of attacks, and Cage Mountain is both a barrier and a raw material source for the sun's radiance, so it is impossible to use the land for people method forever. The enemy's strength must be further reduced before they recover. ”

"Red Mist......" Agatha whispered.

"That's right, these four cities are already outside the Red Mist Zone, and the devil's dependence on supply lines is bound to increase significantly, and it is very possible that the blood line will reappear. And the current front spans almost the entire wolf's heart, and I don't think they can take care of everything. ”

"Before the Mist Tower was built, all the devil could rely on was fortress-shaped freaks and human transportation equivalent to small obelisks. Iron Axe added, "Previously their attacks from the flanks all started with the Freaks, but according to Lightning and Maisie's observations, they are not as protective of the Freaks as they used to be after losing a large number of madness. In addition, during the attack on the four cities, the supply lines of the main force of the Devil's front were all hidden in the Red Mist Zone, but then it would be exposed to the eyes of the First Army. ”

"The problem is that it means we need to be proactive. Agatha hesitated, "The fortress-type freaks can move autonomously, and they are not very afraid of the strafing of the Sky Knights, so the only way to destroy them is to send ground troops. But we can see the enemy, and the enemy can see us, and even if the protection of the freak beasts decreases, they can send reinforcements on an ad hoc basis - and we will probably lose the distance advantage if we count the distance and back trips. If the devil catches you up......"

In an undisguised encounter, even if the First Army can repel the devil, it will inevitably suffer heavy losses of its own.

"So speed is everything," Edith said, raising the corners of her mouth, "just complete the counterattack before the enemy can react." ”

But how can this be done? Agatha set her sights on the map, trying to find a shortcut from Cage Mountain to the Four Cities. There are many roads between the two places, including former trade roads and hard roads that were later built to speed up the evacuation. They are scattered all over the four cities and the cage mountain, like a spider's web.

However, these roads do not have the ability to shorten the distance. Not to mention that the First Army did not have cavalry troops at all, even if there were a large number of horses, it was not to be said whether they could catch up with the fortress-type freak beasts. What's more, the light rider can carry limited firepower, which is not suitable for dealing with those huge monsters.

"Not now, of course," Pearl of the Northland seemed to see her puzzled, "there is still a key element missing from this plan, and all the conditions will be in place when it is in place." But according to the plan, you'll be able to see it soon. ”