"Very good, continue to suppress the artillery fire! Before reinforcements arrive, we must block the dozen or so iron cans at the bottom. ”

"Yes!"

Not far behind the steam tank, in a camp surrounded by several military tents, a local nobleman of Great Britain with a fine cigar looked at the map, analyzed the information transmitted by the observer, and made a decision.

"Just give that prisoner as a gift to the lieutenant colonel. ”

The general's face was full of arrogance, although arrogant, but this did not mean that he was stupid. Therefore, after losing a tank, he quickly adjusted his strategy and formed an advance force of 20 people in the empire, all of which were blocked into a long and narrow trough.

Sitting opposite the general was Lieutenant Colonel Berriman, who had fled back from Sukkaran. Although it is said that the defeated army is a general, after all, it is a rare magician, so Berriman has not been punished too severely. However, his description of the Imperial Mechs, and his request for the King to evacuate the fleet at sea and not to be an enemy of the Empire, was dismissed by most as alarmist and nonsense.

Later, Berriman was demoted in disguise and thrown to Norman, who they considered the least likely to be invaded, as an advisor to the Imperial Mech, in the name of assisting the Norman coastal defense line against the Empire's sneak attack. Although he was defeated, he was the only person in Great Britain who had seen the Imperial mech.

But in fact, during the year in Norman, the local garrison top brass did not involve him in the normal defense of the defensive line. It was only to accompany the local nobles on some nominal patrols, but in fact it was a marginal task for sightseeing and hunting.

This time, it can be said that the two sides were able to collide with each other.

As a nobleman, George Catroux was one of the few powerful figures in the Norman region, and he was also a rather avant-garde guy, and it was precisely because of this forward-thinking that he was not very popular in the army. The night before, George had a whimsical idea of how tanks would fight at night and how to fight in groups. So after thinking that the garrison borrowed ten steam tanks, he took Berriman with him to experiment with his whims.

It was nightfall, and they had just made a short stop on the spot on the route that the advance troops had to take because of an abnormality in the power boiler of one of the tanks.

As the advance team of the Imperial Army, it is also the first time to see such a super-large iron guy as a steam tank. As a result, as soon as the two sides fought, the advance team lost four people, and the opponent's tank, which could not move because it lost power, was destroyed on the spot by the advance team.

After paying the price of two "barbarians" again, and the support aircraft in charge of communications was knocked out of the antenna, the crowd was compressed into a low valley.

The narrow valley pass made the opposing tanks dare not attack head-on, and at the same time, the armor-piercing ability of the tank artillery also made it impossible for the advance team to break through the blockade and retreat.

(Did you overestimate the combat power of those mechs, or did you say that the combat power of those guys regressed?) Or did you only have those monster-like combat power.) ）

Faced with George's humor, Burriman could only smile bitterly. He had been thinking about this question for several hours, starting in the middle of the night and continuing until dawn. For him, who had seen the war with his own eyes, he preferred to lean towards the last one. Moreover, he had a vague sense that the demon-like creature would soon be met again.

"How is it possible? A special type of airframe on the other side is advancing at a very high speed. ”

Outside the camp, the soldiers who had just received the feedback from the flag translated the message to the staff officers on the side, and the staff officers felt that it was like an April Fool's joke. Even though that message had been repeatedly confirmed, they still couldn't believe it.

By the time this message reached George's ears, the artillerymen sitting on the tank were already able to visualize the figure of the single lancers.

"Looks like you have the guts! Tell the artillerymen to shoot him down for me!"

Almost as soon as the herald walked out of the tent, another herald ran in.

The artillery strikers have captured the enemy's plane, and the number of targets is one. ”

"So what are you waiting for, destroy him for me!"

"But ......"

The herald's next words were a bit resigned, and he didn't dare to say them out loud. Because, even if he saw that kind of thing, he couldn't believe his eyes.

"Say it out loud. ”

"Yes! The opponent is too fast for the artillery to catch the target. ”

Hearing this, Berriman didn't bother to ask the Marquis of George Catroux for advice, and immediately got up and rushed out.

"—What is the state of the enemy?"

When Burriman, who was standing on the side of the tank, asked loudly, he already knew in his mind that this time it was definitely not an ordinary soldier of the Empire. At the same time, my mind is racing fast about how to deal with such a situation.

"Huh?"

In order to prevent the artillerymen from bursting their eardrums by the loud sound of artillery, they did not hear what Burriman was shouting because they were wearing protective earplugs.

"What's going on now?"

"The opponent's speed is too fast, and our artillery can only play a role in containment. ”

"Help me up!"

Burriman slapped the soldier in charge of the guard next to him. And with the help of soldiers, climbed into a three-meter-high tank.

The telescope that took over the observation hand met Burriman's line of sight with a silver-gray figure rushing towards him at high speed. Soon he discovered that the color was not painted like that by the other party, but that its original color was silver-gray, which was the color of the monster when it left the factory. At the same time, the so-called artillery fire diversion effect of artillery is actually minimal.

"Inform its tanks to conduct cross-fire in echelons. ”

The captain, who was in charge of controlling the artillery, looked at him suspiciously.

"Do as I say!"

"Yes!"

After the frequency and method of the artillery's attacks changed, the silver figure was noticeably slower. After confirming this, Burriman bent down and shouted to the herald standing under the tank, "Inform the Marquis, be ready to retreat!"

(Why is this so?) An enemy of this speed can sneak into the vicinity of our tank position and carry out a surprise attack. But why is he so swaggering?)

Approaching secretly and launching a surprise attack is the right tactic that these people have always used. It is precisely because of this that after arriving in Norman, Berriman will continue to ask the local garrison to introduce dwarven tanks, and he believes that only this kind of mobile turret, which is extremely strong in defense, will have a chance to confront the Imperial mechs. Sadly, however, the local garrison was the same as the British Empire's higher-ups, and was not optimistic about Burriman's idea. In the end, only a few nobles paid for about forty tanks out of novelty, and most of them were used as façade decorations.