I Created Scientific Magic-Chapter 426 - 414: The Church’s Surprise Attack and the Defeat of the Garrison
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At midnight, in Mist Territory, fifty thousand imperial troops, shielding under the legendary Divine Arts—"Illusion Realm", arrived quietly at the foot of the city.
"It seems these Wizards do have some skills!" Joshua murmured to himself as he gazed at the towering city walls before him.
The last time he had come here, the small border town within the territory only had a low wall less than three meters tall, but now what stood before them was a solid wall reaching up to seven meters.
The Wizards had managed to complete such a miracle with magic in just half a day!
Above the city walls, bonfires blazed fiercely, and one could faintly make out over fifteen hundred guards manning the walls; it appeared they had yet to detect their presence.
The number of guards was much less than Joshua had expected, but considering the heavy casualties among the musketeer squads in the previous battles, with most now likely recovering and receiving treatment, along with those watching over the rest of the city and the musketeers stationed inside, this number wasn't too far off.
A cold smile formed on Joshua's lips—the Wizards probably couldn't have imagined that in just ten hours, the imperial guards had regained their combat strength and were launching a surprise attack overnight.
"Your Highness, Lady Lucia, Lord Judgement Chief, shall we launch the attack now?" Sirid asked respectfully.
A distance of seven hundred meters was the limit; any closer, and they would be detected, even while within the Illusion Realm.
As for the Molten Lava Fire Dragon, Sirid had it stay ten miles away, waiting to fly over at the moment the battle commenced, so as to avoid detection by the Wizards.
Lucia extended her right hand, a boundless divine light gathering in her palm and condensing into a thumb-sized orb before flying directly towards the towering city walls seven hundred meters away.
The soldiers on the walls could only see a bright glow like a firefly, drifting towards them in the dim night, approaching rapidly—the seven hundred meters could be traversed in an instant!
Before they could even shout out, the glimmering light rapidly expanded and then exploded!
Boom... The deafening sound of the explosion echoed through the entire castle; the tall wall crumbled under the force of the blast, the gates were directly blown open, and stones flew in all directions, forming a misty rain of debris.
Dozens of patrolling guards on the walls were thrown to the ground by the blast wave, blood splattered, and screams and wails resounded incessantly...
The moment Lucia made her move, the "Domain—Illusion Realm" instantly shattered, and over ten thousand Griffin Knights cried out "For the glory of our Lord!" as they charged on horses into the breached gates with scimitars and long swords bringing down the city guards one after another.
Perhaps it was their sudden action that left the enemy unprepared, or perhaps their morale had already been crushed in the noon battle and had not yet recovered. With this unobstructed charge, the papal expeditionary force had already breached into the city!
It was all too smooth... A heavy unease surfaced in Joshua's heart; after entering the city, they found a torch placed on every street corner and a considerable number of guards present, yet they encountered no effective resistance.
No rows of musket fire, no cannons, and no Wizards!
The entire city was eerily quiet, with only the terrified shouts of guards fleeing in every direction.
A weirdness that provoked fear in the heart!
"What on earth is going on here?" Sirid was completely baffled and couldn't quite grasp the situation.
Where were their enemies? Where were the Wizards?
Just as everyone was puzzled, a group of bold Griffin Knights captured the leader of the guards and brought him over.
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He was a middle-aged man in his thirties, slightly skinny with somewhat chubby cheeks, who knelt on the ground in fear, incessantly kowtowing and tremblingly said.
"Bishop, I surrender... I surrender! I beg you to forgive my sins, it was all those damned wizards who cast spells on us, forcing us to guard this town for them..."
"Enough!" Joshua interrupted the man's defensive words, coldly inquiring. "Tell me, where are those wizards?"
"They... they left fifteen minutes ago in some sort of flying house." The slim middle-aged man replied, shivering.
"You mean they've already run away?" Joshua frowned slightly, surprised by his own words.
It was not impossible, after all, the Empire and Church's power far surpassed that of the minions of those demons. It was normal for the wizards, having just suffered a defeat and carrying many wounded, to take flight at the sight of danger.
It just so happened that they fled exactly fifteen minutes before their arrival.
Their luck could only be described as awful!
"Do you know in which direction those wizards went?" Lucia suddenly asked.
"Yes... to the north!" the middle-aged man replied hesitantly.
Upon these words, the priests present all showed a look of astonishment because the kingdom was to their west!
If they wanted to withdraw, they should not possibly have flown north!
"What's in the north?" Lucia asked, puzzled.
"It's the oilfields!" Joshua's expression was very solemn. He had some suspicions on this point after searching the memories of those captives earlier.
Because in the wizards' counterattack, the first target ought to have been to reclaim the lost territories of the kingdom, and the previous stagnation of the other two legions within the kingdom's borders would demonstrate this.
The legion they encountered was the only exception, aggressively penetrating into the Empire's territory, and their target was Misrete province, most likely for the oilfields.
"These wizards must have wanted to seize or destroy the Empire's war assets!" Sirid said indignantly.
The importance of the oilfields was self-evident. In the recent years of campaigns against barbarians and the war against demons, they have played a significant role in reducing casualties.
Lucia shook her head, not agreeing with Sirid's speculation.
While the oilfields were useful, compared to the cannons possessed by the wizards, they were insignificantly so.
"It must be that the Wizard Council has found other uses for it," Lucia speculated.
In the last campaign against the kingdom, Evidel's Griffin Knights brought a lot of the oilfields, and most likely it was seized.
Those wizards must have researched the substance and found some secret, which made them so eager to get it, even thinking that it could influence the outcome of the war to some extent, for them to suddenly go in search of the oilfields at such a critical moment...
Read 𝓁at𝙚st chapters at ƒrēenovelkiss.com Only.
(PS: Chapter two around three in the afternoon.)
