Chapter 305 - 65: War Preparations
Chapter 305: Chapter 65: War Preparations
"Fall in! Fall in!"
"Assemble! All members of the First Regiment! You have five minutes!"
Messengers scurrying back and forth quickly roused the entire First Regiment’s camp.
Hans was, once again, the last to wake up. To his shame, he was beaten awake.
"Who is it?! Captain... what are you doing? That actually hurt..." Hans rubbed his head, his voice tinged with grievance.
"We’re assembling, and there are only three minutes left. An officer personally gave the order just now, so you’d better figure it out." Captain Jason, at a loss for words, unceremoniously threw Hans’s inner armor at him.
"How are you always this slow?"
"I don’t know... Ever since we took down those Gnolls, my head has been fuzzy.
Hey... Wait for me! You’re really not waiting!"
Seeing his teammates all bolt out the door, Hans scrambled to put on his inner armor and military boots. He then scooped up his heavy armor, weighing dozens of pounds, and chased after his squad.
By the time Hans arrived at the assembly point, he was fully clad in his armor.
The entire First Regiment had already finished assembling. To Hans’s surprise, the Second Regiment beside them was just as quick.
Thanks to the long-standing rivalry between the two regiments, both sides wanted to show their best, and an impromptu competition had broken out.
After the horns sounded, the entire camp quickly came to life. Cavalry wove through the ranks, and the newly delivered Magic Crystal Cannons rushed toward their designated positions.
"First Regiment! Is the First Regiment in position?"
"Where is the Fifth Squad of the First Regiment?!"
"Almost there, sir!"
Regardless of the regiment, all had now completed their initial assembly.
Hans followed his unit to the location specified by the regimental commander. As everyone bustled about, a long cry suddenly echoed from the sky.
"It’s the Lord’s magical beast!"
"What magical beast?! That’s a phoenix! A Divine Beast!"
"The Divine Beast! Look, the phoenix is chasing those big birds."
In the sky, Huang Na was spewing flames, chasing down the Thunderhawks. From time to time, a Thunderhawk would plummet from the heavens.
The other Thunderhawks seemed to lose their will to fight and began to flee eastward.
Huang Na was in her youth as a phoenix. A proud creature, she even circled once in the sky in a show of vanity.
"We won! Our phoenix won!"
"Obviously! How could those few mangy birds even compare to our Lord’s Divine Beast!"
"The Lord must be favored by the Lord of Dawn. I’m one of the Lord’s veterans; we never used to have this many people..."
"The Lord is victorious in every battle. He must be blessed by the gods..."
Seeing Huang Na defeat the Beastmen’s Thunderhawks, the entire army erupted in cheers. This manifested as a two-point morale boost for all regiments.
Most of the soldiers under Robson were common folk. Especially after Orgrim’s betrayal, Robson had begun to promote talent from within his own army.
Most were worldly-wise Free People. Due to the military system Robson had established, along with various benefits and the influence of the Mount & Blade system, everyone already held a kind of inexplicable reverence for him.
Now, with Huang Na’s appearance, she was immediately revered as a Divine Beast, and people even began to associate Robson with the divine.
But this was understandable. Even a major figure like Oscillate was astonished by the speed of Robson’s growth.
To Robson’s soldiers, wasn’t this a gift from the gods?
Hans looked to the sky, gazing at the phoenix. He suddenly remembered his shield. He took it out and looked, and sure enough, the emblem on it matched the phoenix in the sky perfectly.
"Captain, look. Our shields... don’t they look like that phoenix..."
"That’s the family crest... The Lord possesses a phoenix. A phoenix... The Lord must truly be favored by the gods." As Hans was looking confused, Jack stepped forward and said.
....
"Your Highness! Your Highness! This is bad! The enemy has a strange creature that drove all our Thunderhawks back! We lost two of them!"
Just as Prince Odoruo and Elder Linton were arranging affairs before setting out, a scout from the front returned to the Beastman Camp to report.
Hearing this news, the Beastman officers all turned to look at Prince Odoruo.
’How did we lose two of them?’ Prince Odoruo’s heart ached when he heard the news.
Prince Odoruo had gone to great lengths to acquire these Thunderhawks.
He had brought them out this time specifically to block the enemy’s phoenix, but he hadn’t expected to not only fail but also lose two in the process.
"I already knew. It must be that phoenix.
Do not worry. I sent out the Thunderhawks precisely to entangle that phoenix and prevent it from acting later," Prince Odoruo said calmly.
He had no choice. He had to swallow his anger and frustration. With a great battle imminent, he, the commander-in-chief, had to act as if everything was going according to plan.
Sure enough, hearing Prince Odoruo’s words, the Beastman officers all breathed a sigh of relief.
"Is my Personal Guard Team ready?" Prince Odoruo asked the adjutant beside him.
The Thunderhawks’ failure to stop the enemy was within Prince Odoruo’s expectations; they were just a speculative move. The only thing that surprised him was that two had died.
Things had already come to this. Even if the Thunderhawks were dead, the plan had to proceed.
"They are ready, Your Highness," the adjutant replied with a nod.
"Teacher, we can go now." Upon hearing the reply, Prince Odoruo mounted his Warg Mount—an ordinary Warg Mount, aside from the markings on its forehead.
Linton nodded and mounted his elk. A Gnoll paired with an elk was an incredibly strange combination, yet at this moment, it seemed perfectly fitting.
"Your Highness, must you really go in person? The humans from Ancient Dumu Town are rushing toward us. Their main force is expected to arrive here tonight.
If something unexpected were to happen..."
"There will be no unexpected incidents! Thanatos, there will be no unexpected incidents!"
The one who had spoken was Thanatos, the deputy commander of Prince Odoruo’s personal guard, who had been assigned to face the enemy head-on this time. Prince Odoruo had cut him off mid-sentence.
"Honestly, who wants to take such risks? You know this, Castro’s older brother saved my life, and Tec gave his all for me.
Now, they need me, their Prince. Imagine the scene: my great banner appears on the battlefield. What will they say?
’Oh! Heavens! It’s the banner of His Highness the Prince!’ right? I must go. This war cannot be won without me." Seeing the atmosphere suddenly turn solemn, Prince Odoruo spoke his true feelings, though he framed it as a joke.
Given the current state of the war, only Prince Odoruo’s personal intervention stood a chance of turning the tide.
The routed Beastman forces on the other side of the mountain had all been crushed by that human army on Wayne Moutain. If it were just one unit, it would be one thing, but it was all of them.
In a situation like this, only Prince Odoruo’s royal banner could save their collapsing morale.
Seeing Prince Odoruo’s determined expression, Thanatos could say no more and sighed.
"As you command, Your Highness.
I can only guarantee that if any humans appear on our path of return, it will be over my dead body..." Thanatos said, his tone earnest and his words resolute.
Prince Odoruo narrowed his eyes at Thanatos. Even his battle aura, which was nearing the Gold rank, couldn’t hide the wrinkles on Thanatos’s face. He was part of the political legacy left to Prince Odoruo by his mother.
Linton, Thanatos... they were old now. There had been many others, but most of them had already died for him, for Odoruo, in one way or another.
Linton should have died as well, but the Beast Emperor personally intervened to save him.
"We will all return alive. Perhaps I will once again be able to watch Soria ride on the grasslands, under the white clouds and soaring goshawks.
They all say that a Beastman goes to the battlefield twice in his life. Thanatos, this is our final battle. We will all return alive..." Prince Odoruo lamented.
Soria was Prince Odoruo’s daughter. The Prince was now nearly fifty years old. If he couldn’t break through to the Gold rank in his lifetime, this southern campaign of the Beastmen would be his final war.
"You will definitely see it. Soria, I mean."
....
After watching Prince Odoruo and Elder Linton depart, Thanatos turned to look at the Beastman Corps behind him.
This was basically the last sizable Beastman Corps on the eastern front. The others were just groups of a few hundred or a few dozen goblins or Kobolds.
Thanatos drew his sword.
"Move out!"