Chapter 432 - 180: Post-war Harvest
Chapter 432: Chapter 180: Post-war Harvest
Once the Centaurs began to scatter in a chaotic rout, victory was all but certain.
Robson ordered the Fengman Knight Order and the Cavalry Team to continue the pursuit, while he led the main army back to provide support.
They had driven off the Beastmen reinforcements, but the Centaurs who had charged out of Julian City had yet to be dealt with.
By the time Robson returned with the main army, the Second Corps was locked in a fierce battle with the Centaur forces, the outcome still undecided.
Of course, this stalemate was only temporary, because at that very moment, another army charged over from the east.
To be precise, it was a column of wagons.
The First Corps had rushed over just in time to catch the tail end of the battle.
When Chief Liete saw the human reinforcements arriving, he knew the fate of his own reinforcements from the north. ’The tide has turned!’ he cried out in his heart. He wanted to retreat, but he had already been targeted by the human Cavalry.
In the ensuing chaos, an arrow from an unknown direction struck him in the eyeball, which burst instantly. As the surrounding human Soldiers rushed in, Chief Liete, his energy depleted, could no longer fight. A dozen spears pierced his body.
The last thing he saw was a group of human Soldiers with a strange fanaticism in their eyes, brandishing their swords over his body as if deciding how to carve him up.
Even in death, Chief Liete could not understand why these humans were so warlike, or why their eyes held such terrifying fanaticism.
After Chief Liete’s death, the entire Centaur army began a true rout.
They shouted that the Chieftain was dead, then scattered to the winds.
However, Robson was prepared. He had no intention of letting these Centaurs escape so easily.
Compared to the trivial experience gained from goblins, high-level creatures like Centaurs yielded experience much faster, especially for high-tier Soldiers.
Soldiers of the First Corps immediately spread out, charging in all directions with their wagons. The returning Third Corps and the other units seemed as if they were just back from a spring outing, their fighting spirit still burning intensely.
In Affleck, the battle merits from Centaurs were far greater than those from goblins. They wouldn’t give up on this wealth that had fallen right into their laps.
...
The battle raged from morning until night. Only then did the armies sent in pursuit of the enemy gradually return to the base of Julian City’s walls.
Inside Julian City, ruins and broken walls were everywhere. Those Centaurs had been ruthless, burning everything before they left and leaving nothing for Robson.
Robson found a secluded spot and opened his Mount & Blade panel.
For the entire day, Robson’s army had been fighting these Centaurs.
Of the nearly twenty thousand Centaurs, more than half had managed to escape, but Robson had intercepted the rest in time.
These Centaurs were nothing like goblins; the experience they provided Robson’s Soldiers was on a completely different level.
As displayed on the Mount & Blade panel, it hadn’t been long since his last wave of Extraordinary Soldiers had been converted, and now a new batch was ready.
This time, however, the main source of new Extraordinary Soldiers was not the First Corps, but the Second Corps.
The Second Corps, along with one Algeria Corps, had held the front line against the majority of the Centaur Warriors from Julian City.
Even after the city gate behind them was blasted apart, they still faced at least five thousand Centaurs, not to mention those who charged out from the gates on the left and right.
The Second Corps also suffered heavy casualties, with the death toll reaching seventy. Over three hundred more were wounded, with injuries ranging from serious to light.
While the number didn’t break three digits, it was actually very high. After all, which of Robson’s three corps—the First, Second, and Third—plus the Cavalry Team wasn’t a veteran unit seasoned in countless battles? These old soldiers might get injured on the battlefield, but the probability of them dying was extremely low.
In the past, seeing these numbers might have made Robson’s heart ache, thinking of how his painstakingly trained Soldiers were lost in an instant.
But now, it was more of a deep sorrow. As the saying goes, a general’s success is built on the bones of ten thousand men. These were all soldiers who had fought their way here alongside him.
Of course, the heavy losses of the Second Corps were rewarded with great gains.
Originally, the Second Corps’ Tier Five rate was eighty percent, the lowest among the first three corps.
Now, that eighty percent had become seventy percent—but this new figure represented their Tier Six rate.
They now had over six hundred Tier Six Soldiers. Their Tier Five rate, meanwhile, had been pushed to one hundred percent, as all remaining Tier Four Soldiers had now been promoted.
There were also over seventy Tier Seven Soldiers, most of them Infantry converted from Frank Border Guards. This filled a gap in Robson’s Extraordinary troop types.
In past battles, enemies were often gunned down by the archers before they could even charge, leaving only the Cavalry to snatch some battle merits from the Frank Shooters.
Now, with this batch of Bronze-tier Extraordinary Infantry, the Extraordinary Army would have a frontline.
The few Algerian Corps that Robson had previously ’procured’ from the kingdom now showed stats several times better than before.
After the battle with the goblins, they had undergone a transformation and become proper Soldiers. Now, after the battle with the Centaurs, they were starting to show the makings of elite troops.
In terms of stats, this meant their Tier Three rate was now around ninety percent, and their Tier Four rate was around forty percent. Of course, their losses were not small either, with five to six hundred Soldiers killed outright—a number Robson had never seen before.
It was safe to say that if the Second Corps hadn’t been holding the line, they probably would have routed long ago.
That’s just how war is. It couldn’t be helped.
...
"Sir!"
Robson snapped out of his thoughts, pulling his focus from the Mount & Blade panel to see Bo Yang standing before him.
Bo Yang’s face was flushed with excitement.
His first truly major battle, one that he had commanded himself, had ended in such a spectacular fashion. Of course he was excited.
Speaking of Bo Yang, what surprised Robson was that the experience Bo Yang gained from commanding the army was also credited to Lord Robson!
According to Robson’s previous calculations, he had only commanded the second half of the battle and should have only received the gains from that part.
However, the Mount & Blade panel had credited him with the full experience from the battle, and Robson had now truly reached the Golden Ninth Tier.
Bo Yang’s own Military Command skill had risen from Proficient to Expert, and his Military Training skill had done the same.
"Sir, so you’re here. We were all looking for you," Bo Yang said with a smile.
"Yes, I know. I’ll be right there," Robson said with a nod.
They were looking for Robson, of course, to discuss the upcoming charge into the Beastman Grassland.
For the Franks, especially the Frankish nobility, the proudest achievement in life was to water one’s horses at Madar Palace.
If they couldn’t make it to Madar Palace, a ride across the Beastman Grassland was an excellent alternative. As they said, you’re no true hero until you’ve ridden the grasslands.