VIII

On the evening of June 5, 1666, MDay+65 Gustav (formerly Gistov), an imperial city

The battle for the defense of the Gistov-Kengrad salient entered its fifth day, but the empire was left without a salient near Gistov.

The city named after the emperor is burning. The walls, which had not been fully repaired, collapsed to the ground, the cannons were smashed into scrap metal by Transfiguration, and countless supplies were piled up in the square and turned into a raging fire. Those supplies were supposed to be delivered to the main forces of the Imperial Army south of this place, but now their masters could no longer care about that.

The Imperial Metbysian Legion, which was tasked with guarding the supply lines, was in disarray. The former Fredrarian soldiers who had fought for the Directory were almost immediately crushed, and they joined López in camps, while the stubborn aristocratic officers were divided and several brigade commands were terminated. In the end, the front finally broke back to the city of Gustav, where the corps headquarters was located. The last Imperial company to evacuate the city was at noon on June 5, while the Western Army headquarters moved in at dusk. It took three days for the northerners to take the city, and four hours for the southerners to recapture the city.

The price is of course high. Five days ago, more than 70 Clad self-propelled artillery vehicles under General López had participated in the offensive, but now only thirteen are ready to go. Broken down on the road, fallen into a deep ditch, shot by artillery, destroyed by magic traps...... The invaluable engineering and magical combat power of the Western army had to be dispersed to repair the self-propelled artillery vehicles that were not completely destroyed, so as to ensure that the combat mission of clearing the remnants of the Imperial army abandoned by their own people could be completed on time.

In the chaos of the logistics department, Lieutenant General Clad López and his staff followed the ranks of the eighth regiment into the gates of the city. Except for the first two regiments of the fortified position, the remaining five regiments only rested here and continued to advance, and the lieutenant general himself led the troops who were really ready to take over the city. The three steel monsters that followed the action advanced to the city, and drove directly to the square where the emperor landed on a dragon two months ago. The citizens of the uprising formed a vigilante group, spontaneously surrounding them to "prevent sabotage", chatting about their exploits on the night of Lenny's coup.

López led his staff around the crowd and stopped in front of a broken flag that had been trampled on by many soldiers. He recognized the iron-colored skakaze on it. "It's the Emperor's banner. Has he been to the city?"

"After the interrogation of the captives, he is still here this morning. His chief staff officer, Lieutenant Colonel Al, frowned, bent down to pick up the filthy flag, dusted off it, folded it neatly, and handed it to the staff officer on the side. "I have already told the front-line troops to collect all enemy flags and coats of arms and forward them to the Ministry of Intelligence. It seems that this is missing from the face. ”

"In order to improve the morale of the troops, they have exhausted all means. If we had moved a few more hours, this war might have ended here. ”

"But it's hard for us to catch the emperor. They have dragons, and we can't shoot them down just yet. ”

"Only two or three are real dragons, the rest are pterosaurs. Clad pulled out his pocket watch and glanced at the current time, "If the interspersed troops ahead of us can arrive on time, maybe there is hope...... The Emperor's next landing ground was either in the north or in the east. The troops from the north should be almost there. ”

Robert frowned slightly, and reminded: "Your Excellency, the goal of that operation is very good, but we can't fight on the premise of its success. Moreover, we cannot allow the entire staff to venture to such a high position in order to seize the hope of the Emperor in the slightest. With the exception of the General Reserve, all our troops have reached their limits. ”

"Are you married, Lieutenant Colonel Al?" Clad's sudden remarks stunned Robert, who shook his head as seriously as usual. "Nope. ”

"No wonder. If you have important people involved in the war, you'll be hoping to find a way to end this bloody game quickly. Clad smiled understandingly, "You're the chief staff officer, and it's up to you to decide how you act." If the Emperor's landing ground was to the east, Kengrad might still be able to catch up. Hull and our 10th Division also agreed to rendezvous today. ”

"You can try it. "The lieutenant colonel did not insist this time. He called the staff officer in charge of communications, asked a few words, and made a decision. "They have contacted the staff of the Fort Still. I will immediately ask them to speed up the offensive and organize possible anti-aircraft interceptions. If the Emperor's silver dragon is sighted over there, I will report it to you as soon as possible. ”

"Personally, I think the emperor has a sixty percent chance of being there...... I'll trouble you with that, Lieutenant Colonel Al. Don't worry about bold orders, I'm sure General Eugen will take care of it. The middle-aged general yawned, "I'll go take a nap first." When this is over, you can also rest, and all the troops will be transferred to rest tonight. ”

"No, I intend to hold out until the army of Metbysi is completely routed. The unusually dedicated lieutenant colonel cheered up and shook his head, "I estimate that one day our interspersed troops will be able to completely wipe out their few remaining command posts, and now is not the time to rest." ”

"Then that's an order. Get eight hours of sleep, Lieutenant Colonel Al, and I don't want to rely on a bloodshot chief staff officer. In Lenny, the emperor still has seventy or eighty thousand people waiting for us. ”

“...... All right. Robert reluctantly accepted the order, "I'll rest when I get the orders out of hand." ”

Clad nodded, walked over to the long table of the city council, pulled over a few chairs and made a bed, and fell asleep almost immediately. Robert called a staff officer and asked him to carefully protect the room with silent magic, and then went to find a room to rest and regain his magic. During this time, his order passed through seven formalities and passed into the hands of the Operations Department of the General Staff of the Fort Stillburg Army.

On the morning of June 6, 1666, MDay+66 Kengler, the outskirts of Kengler, Fort Still, the General Staff

The order was sent to the staff of the Fort Stillburg Army, causing an uproar. On the map, Fort Steel's army was organizing a final offensive against the outlying strongholds of Kengrad in order to rescue friendly forces on the southern flank, which were in a bitter battle. The Imperial Fortified Line on the outskirts of Kengal was like a nail embedded between the two Free Armies in the north and south, and they were trying to prevent the Steelburg Army from meeting up with the Fifth Free Division of Klad's General Reserve.

"We believe that now the Emperor and his flying brigade are retreating to the rear. In view of the state of your battle, he will certainly stop near Kengrad, and you are ordered to pay close attention. If you find a silver dragon infested, please immediately concentrate all possible combat power to form an anti-air interception team......"

Naymen Soleton, the combat staff officer of the Fort Stillburg Army, shook his head as he spoke, "Do you want us to be dragon slayers? ”

"Silver Dragon, do you mean the group of things flying over our heads? Assistant Operations Staff Officer Second Lieutenant Jacques Pierre crouched under the cover of shadow magic and pointed to the sky.

Naimon looked up and saw the dazzling wingspans. A silver dragon, and more than a dozen pterosaurs. The flying Grim Reapers, unaware of their magical field headquarters, swept over their heads and headed straight for the besieged Kengler. He casually cursed.

"Oh my God, it's really the Emperor!" Jacques became untimely excited, "Lieutenant, this is the greatest credit in twenty years! Remember why the commander of the artillery of Conti Fox became commander-in-chief? only because he blew up the previous emperor! Use the tactic on the last page of the officer's manual, Lieutenant!"

"What's the name of the one on the last page of the officer's handbook?"

"Saturation Attack!Gather all the spellcasters, divide them into four roles, form several combat teams to support each other, and block the entire airspace......"

"Saturation attack, then the attacking force will have no magic support! This way of distributing magic power will not work, it will be counterattacked by enemy reinforcements!"

Naimon shouted and got up from the bench with bloodshot eyes.

He slammed his head on the corner of a nearby table because he got up too violently. The mountain of files on the table trembled at the impact of the outside, creating an avalanche that buried the poor combat staff officer underneath.

"Did you have a nightmare, Soleton?"

It was a female voice who asked, and he heard that it was the voice of Anne Sefir, a logistics staff officer, so he rubbed his forehead and replied: "No, I just had a dream of making a battle plan." In the dream, the Western Army asked us to devise a plan to break through the frontal line and leave enough magical power to intercept the Emperor's guard......"

"It's not a dream, it was last night that it was ordered. We're here until late at night, and then you and I are on the night shift at the General Staff, and you work in the first half of the night and I'll work in the second half of the night...... You don't even remember?"

"Ah...... It may have been injured just now and lost my memory. Naimon touched the back of his head and got up from the order pile, "What time is it?"

"At eight o'clock, there is still half an hour before the battle order is issued. Anne told a joke in a cold tone, "Since the jurisdiction was assigned to the Western Army, all of us have been overloaded, and it is normal for someone to lose his memory, so that the storyline that cannot be made up can continue to advance...... Then again, Uncle López is really not polite to use someone else's troops. ”

"That's as it should be, after all, we are the weakest point on this front. ”

Naimon stood up on the table, searching for Anne's place. He didn't find her at first glance, but it was only a moment later that he found her behind a mountain of papers, following the sound of writing. The blonde female lieutenant holds a dipping pen in each hand, and writes neatly signed and annotated at a speed that is difficult for the naked eye to keep up with. She didn't look tired on the outside, her blue eyes were still crystal clear, her hair was supple at the back of her neck, and even her hairstyle was not messy. She summoned two cats as pets, and the two cats were diligently dragging them out of the pile of papers and placing them in front of her.

"Annie, you look so good. "Naimon doesn't have to look in a mirror to know how tired she looks.

Anne shrugged, "It's fake, I just added it with illusion." Staying up late is the enemy of beauty, and I don't want you to see what I look like after staying up late. I'll have to count and approve the last of these supply changes in fifteen minutes, and if you don't have a pick-me-up potion, get it in my breast pocket. ”

"No, I got a bottle last night. Naimon began rummaging in his pocket, "What, you have so much to write about?"

"Have you really lost your memory? In yesterday's assault, my three assistant logistics staff officers all lost their combat effectiveness. One was killed, one was missing, and one was blown off and his right hand was sent back. Plus, instead of one bottle of the pick-me-up potion you took last night, you had three bottles, and you'd already drunk them all. Come and get it, quickly. ”

Anne lowered her head, deftly picked up a pale yellow test tube from her breast pocket with her lips like a cat, and winked at him. Her hands didn't stop, and the two cats were quickly changing the papers in front of her. Naimon swallowed, took the refreshing potion from her mouth, drank it all, and felt much better.

"By the way, I had a letter from you late last night, which was sent through the channel of pure gold. Right on the table, the most conspicuous one. ”

"Family letter?" Naimon was stunned.

"Mr. Zart and Sister Vilen gave you a letter from home. It took a lot of thought to get this letter out of the siege of Lenny. ”

Naimon saw the letter at a glance. He pounced hungrily like a traveler in the desert who saw a source of water, and tore open the envelope with swiftness. The letter is not very long, and most of the references in it are just ordinary blessings and daily trivialities, but the love still overflows on the letterhead.

"Xiao Suo...... Lieutenant Soleton now, right?, Sister and I were glad to hear from Anne that you had done a good job in the Fort Stills, and that you had excelled in several battles. Be careful, don't be too heroic in battle, and pay attention to your body. Our side is very good, and the financial difficulties have basically been solved with the care of General López and Chunjin, but some of your juniors are also going to be soldiers, which bothers us a lot.

Recently, the Imperial Army has also attacked the city of Lenny, and we have all gone up to the city wall as volunteers to help defend it. I hadn't seen Imperial soldiers in more than a decade, and they seemed to be a little more capable than before, and the Freire almost lost the outer wall and the fourth wall. Lieutenant Colonel Tedwood, who was in charge of defending the city, was a shrewd and capable general, and he organized several successful counterattacks. Since last week, the Imperial army has not attacked again, and the traffic on the river has resumed, so it seems that Lenny is still safe for now, you don't have to worry about us, you can work hard with peace of mind.

P.S. The nun said that you should decide quickly, if you think that Second Lieutenant Seffir is not bad, order the goods first, and it is not too late to pay after the battle. Or do you still have fantasies about a certain general's daughter? Don't worry, we won't tell them. ”

Naimon saw the last note and hurriedly folded the letter and hid it so that Anne would not see it. "Really, what are these people thinking......"

"What does the letter say?"

"Ah, nothing, it's just ......" Naimon suddenly thought of something serious, "No! they say Lennie's Imperial Army hasn't attacked in a week!"

"Oh, do you mean to say that the Empire has shifted its focus? But they made several attacks in the direction of Fort Still, and it seemed that there were no signs of a massive movement. ”

"I just think...... Are they secretly mobilizing reinforcements to Kengler? Our frontal resistance is not like the resistance of the Kengler Legion, which has less than 10,000 men. ”

Anne thought about it for a moment and shook her head: "No, I think it's because the reinforcements of the Western Army haven't arrived. We can break through a perimeter every day, but every day they can build a new one. The space behind them was too big, and someone had to strike from the south side. The Fifth Division is about to arrive today, and we now have more ammunition, so we will definitely be able to win this time. ”

Naimon asked with interest, "Ammunition is plentiful, why? Because you work hard?"

"No, it's because there are fewer troops to be allocated. Unable to break through for five days in a row, we already had more than 80 companies losing more than half of the dangerous line, and could no longer engage in the attack, so we had to arrange to return to Fort Stille to recuperate. The base of each unit has not decreased, but has increased, compared to the beginning of the battle five days ago, which is why I have stayed up late to adjust the distribution table. The kind of family letters that no one wants to give, it seems that there are a lot of them......"

Naimon fell silent. He was an operational staff officer, and this result ...... At least not a compliment to him.

Anne patted him on the shoulder: "Let's go, the general attack is about to begin." ”

"Halberd division remove cover!"

"Fort Still's division removed cover!!"

"The General Reserve and the General Staff Removal Cover !!"

The Free Army camp emerges from the gloomy cover, and the counter-detection magic set by the command is removed. The sunlight reappeared over the camp, and the people who remained in the tents listened to the orders and ran to their respective defense areas. General Eugen concentrated his last two main regiments for an offensive against the main forces of the Imperial Army in the south, while Colonel Luthor was making a final brief mobilization of the "temporary" priests in this ranks.

"Today's friendly forces on the southern front are coming! This is our last attack today! All our artillery fire will open the way for you! Your battle today will be exchanged for the most dazzling medal in your military career! Follow me and take the ridge guarded by the enemy!"

His powerful voice reverberated through the battlefield with the help of amplification magic, and could be heard by both enemy and friendly forces. To those who stayed in the camp, the sound was deafening.

When the captive First Princess Olya Hugh Cockman heard these words in her tent, she lay on her back on her bed feebly and said sarcastically: "The best thing these statesmen are at is to inspire others to go into battle with flowery words." Have they ever charged in front of the phalanx on horseback, and if we had such knights there, Your Majesty would have let them go back and start over as squires. ”

"Pluto is not like that!" retorted Metie, who lived with her and was actually on a surveillance mission, "didn't you hear him say 'come with me'? and, and he's ......"

"I know. But can he really be on the front line with his stature?" Olya sat up and sneered, "Have you ever seen your Mr. Luthor charge?" Southerner. ”

“...... He's not a coward. I believed in him, and he encouraged me to get out of my meaningless life......" Méty stood up and walked anxiously in the tent. Olya felt like she could see what was going on in the girl's head. "He's calling everyone who can use magic...... I'm going too. ”

Méty changed into civilian clothes and ran straight out of the tent. The two newly changed guards at the door didn't stop her, this task was not on their list. They just whistled, exchanged erotic code words, and chatted about their speculative affair. They have a heartfelt respect for Luthor's solemn and holy appearance and status as a bishop, but this does not affect their speculation about the private life of their immediate superiors.

"Do you think our Lord Bishop would really marry that young lady for the sake of inheriting the whole bank? I wonder if they've ever had that?"

"Rich, powerful, and priestly, this kind of person is not in the same world as us at all. There will be no shortage of women as long as he want......s, right? Women like them, who knows why. Why doesn't anyone like GIs?"

"Haha, that's what I said. Do you dare to say that you didn't think about those nuns and priestesses? Do you have any interest in the female soldiers who spend their days wallowing in the mud like us? The thoughts of those ladies and ladies are not far from you and me. Dare you say you didn't think about the priest in there?"

"How dare you take a prisoner?" "It's definitely a death sentence to be discovered!" "That's exciting, isn't it?"

They kept their voices down, but the conversations reached Oria's ears and made her unusually irritated. As the first princess of the Empire, she knew she shouldn't bother about it. A princess should always be cultivated, proud, and different from everyone else. All the princess has to do is find the right prince and assist him.

"These people don't know who I am, with my upbringing, shouldn't be angry with them, they don't know ......"

But Miss Namrock, a captive who had been a wandering priest in the South for three years, did not think so. This is the South, a free country of evil and depravity. The women here are uneducated, openly walking around the barracks full of smelly men in military uniforms, completely unaware of their vocation as women. They were all terrible, especially Ensign Shalfir, who managed all the logistics, the impulsive, nerveless, swaggering girl, the girl who would charge ahead of the men...... Damn, what kind of education would make a woman like that? will not have any skills to please the opposite sex, only action. Even the lowest-ranking maids wouldn't be like her.

She should not be angry with the soldiers of such a country, no matter how obscene they may say. Olya stood up and lifted the curtain of the tent.

"I'm sorry, both of you. You're talking too loudly. I heard it all. ”

The two soldiers were stunned. They were about to stop her, but they all lowered their heads in shame when they heard this. Olya shook her head angrily.

"How can you have such lust in the name of God? This is depraved!

She didn't know why she was doing it. Why should she be serious with these low-ranking people? She raised her hand in self-abandonment and struck one of the soldiers in the face. With the power of anger against yourself and against those young soldiers, with the power that comes from devout faith.

"Look, you've been beaten up for talking too much...... another soldier's gloating words were stuck in his throat. He saw his companion slap into the tent with a dull thud. Before he could react, an identical slap was slapped on the right side of his face.

"It's like I can't defend myself. Olya muttered angrily to herself, dusting herself off. She took off her dress and high heels, hid her long hair in a military cap, and changed into a soldier's attire. She asked the other soldier who had fainted to remain in a standing position, and recited a prayer promising that he would freeze in fifteen minutes. Then she began to think about what to do next.

Her older brother, Gustav, was nearby. And his silver dragon and his huge army......

Well, not massively. The young staff officer said, "The Imperial Army left behind at Kengele is only a third of the army, less than 10,000 men. They thought that the attack would come from only one direction. ”

It did seem that this was the case, and her brother had only left enough strength here to defend against attacks from one direction. The attacking Free Army would be at least 30,000 people, and the Empire's rule over the capital of the Juloks would collapse at any moment. This is the last chance. Upbringing is useless in this kind of country, she has to work her own and escape.

She knows the true names of all the dragons of the Empire. She could call them to attack here at any time and destroy their headquarters. She can do it.

As long as it is in the right place at the right time, launch this destruction......

"For example, after the attack has begun. She whispered to herself.

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Welcome the majority of book friends to come and read, the latest, fastest, the hottest serialized works are all here!