When the Saintess Arrives, No King Exist-Chapter 875 - 826: The Battle of Marenpo (Conclusion)

The winter sun at noon cast its faint rays on the snow, while the service soldiers pushed carts, scavenging for usable spoils of war amidst the snow and mud.

As for the remaining Holy Grail Gun Cavalry and the supporting infantry regiment, they continued pursuing the remnants of the Leia people.

Groups of prisoners of war, dejected and forlorn, were escorted under the watchful eyes of the holy guns, advancing towards Haji Castle at the rear.

In such a cold winter day, taking a sip of distilled pine nut liquor was the quickest way to feel alive.

Victor did just that, unscrewing the silver liquor flask he had snatched from the hands of a noble.

The icy liquor slid down his throat, transforming into a fiery heat.

It not only dispelled the cold within, but also numbed the arrow wounds and pain on his body.

"Hahaha——" Victor couldn't help but laugh out loud.

With this battle concluded, they with merely a thousand men held off eight thousand enemy troops, thoroughly exhausting their morale and strength.

With reinforcements joining in now, it was almost effortless to defeat the Leia Army, whose remaining combat power was still considerable.

Just in this battle alone, near Balin Manor at Marenlope, where Victor was stationed, the campsite left behind at least two thousand Leia people.

There were both prisoners and corpses.

As for the five thousand plus who fled, there was no need to worry because, after all, he hadn't contributed the spring cannons to other camps' soldiers.

Victor was even somewhat puzzled; did they not understand the strategy of surrounding on three sides and leaving one open?

The west side was a river, the south was a fortress, the east was enemy troops, they chose to run north, didn't they realize anything?

Shaking his head, Victor was about to drink again when he heard the clerk shouting behind him, "Victor, there's pork stew with fries made at the back; come quickly."

"First, get me a bowl," Victor quickly put away the liquor flask, "Don't let those bastards devour it all."

Victor limped away towards the stove but suddenly halted midway.

He stared blankly in one direction, speechless for some time.

Rubbing his eyes with the back of his hand, Victor feared it was sand obstructing his eyesight or too fatigued making him see wrongly.

But upon repeated verification, he was sure he wasn't mistaken.

Exhausted perhaps, when Victor was supporting himself on his knees walking towards that mound, even his calves were trembling.

Yet he used those trembling calves, almost stumbling, to rush to the mound's edge.

On top of the mound lay a door plank, with a person covered by a white cloth on it, stained with bright blood.

Although the cloth concealed the face, Victor could recognize the hat adorned with multicolored feathers without lifting it.

At that moment, an elite steel arrow was piercing through the hat from front to back.

Only after taking several deep breaths did Victor dare slowly extend his hand to peel away the white cloth.

"I knew it." He didn't need to lift it completely, just looking at those open eyes and dense eyebrows, Victor knew who it was.

"Told you, no battlefield allows you not to wear a helmet, yet you insist on that flashy felt hat."

After swearing a few times, Victor felt something block his nasal cavity, making his voice muffled.

Ultimately, it's a battlefield—who dares say they can retreat unscathed?

"Clearly a victory." Stroking Kolman's hair, Victor sniffed, "Clearly a victory, my brother."

They had known each other since the Gulag era, joining the then Black Hat Army together, from little mud pit to Pavia, from Black Mountain to Cheese Bay.

Each battle fought together.

Others speak of life-saving gratitude; they had saved each other countless times.

To say blood brothers, none would match Victor and Kolman.

"Kolman, Brother Kolman, this might be the first time I'm calling you this.

I'm two years younger than you but always considered you as my elder brother...you...you..."

Midway through speaking, Victor suddenly felt something was amiss. 𝙧𝙚𝙚𝔀𝒆𝓫𝓷𝙤𝓿𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝙤𝓶

The arrow had clearly pierced through the skull, yet his hair bore not a trace of blood.

Then taking a closer look at that mustached donkey face, eyelids suddenly twitched, the mustache twitching along with the corner of his mouth.

"Damn you!" In a flash of anger, Victor kicked Kolman off the mound.

"Ow, ow, the Battle Commander injures the wounded, is anyone going to intervene?!"

"You dare to cry out, get over here!"

"That's enough now, don't mistake me for a good-natured man; if you step over my...ow!"

With arms locked by an enraged Victor, Kolman howled in pain.

However, those surrounding saw the Battle Commander and Deputy Warlord roughhousing, nobody intervened except to laugh.

"What are you pretending for, huh? I really thought you were dead, why cover your face with a white cloth?"

Kolman turned his face, shouting his innocence: "I ran all night last night and just took a nap at noon. The sun is blazing at noon, I can't sleep without covering my face."

"You sleep with your eyes wide open, who are you trying to show?"

"I always sleep with my eyes open."

Victor remained red-faced: "Then what's with your hat?"

"I made my hat a bit taller, the arrow shot over my head, didn't even scratch the skin." Kolman defended himself, "I really didn't do it on purpose."

Victor paused for a moment, then released his grip, allowing Kolman to step out.

Though Kolman spoke lightly, everyone could imagine how dangerous the scene must have been.

Kolman got up from the ground, patted the dust off his body, and punched Victor's shoulder: "His Majesty said we should build a world where everyone has enough to eat and can live well. We haven't even seen this Paradise yet, it'd be a shame to die now."

Victor chuckled lightly, stood up, and dusted off his knees: "Wasted my emotions."

"Oh, I know, Victor, brother, I treat you as my younger brother too... Hey! The Battle Commander is hitting people again, ouch—"

......

Like a zombie, Count Dretta rode on his horse, but he kept muttering to himself.

If you got close, you would hear, "Where did... a thousand... five thousand... Haji Castle... doesn't add up... creating people out of thin air?"

To know, they had calculated meticulously; this wasn't just his attack, but the entire Leia Army's offensive.

His part collapsed, and it was such a disastrous defeat, the chain reaction was unimaginable.

But up to now, he still couldn't understand where the army came from?

Keep in mind, the Mountain Knights of Xia Lvcheng were newly defeated, and many were still infected with disease, Horn could only muster a force of thirty thousand.

Raffel, through complex maneuvering, forced Thousand River Valley to dispatch a large number of troops in all directions for support.

This meant their transportation capabilities should have been greatly occupied, even if reinforcements could be squeezed out, not this many.

After joining with several other defeated armies, it was even more baffling.

Every army said they were impacted by two to three thousand infantry and Holy Grail Cavalry.

From dawn till noon, all four attacking enemy forces were defeated, and it was learned from the captured Defensive Army soldiers — they weren't Black Champions, they were Mountain Knights.

In other words, these people weren't redeployed from the rear, they had always been there.

Count Dretta felt that the crux of the issue was here.

Could it be that they could march in some Spirit Realm, engaging in some inter-dimension navigation?

Or like in "Demon Hunter Tales," some kind of replicant or a kind of blood magic-manufactured ghoul?

Magic, can it really be that powerful?

No, no, the more Dretta thought, the more wrong it felt.

An idea flashed in his mind, and Dretta involuntarily uttered the ancient El Scholar Hakimede's famous saying: "Eureka!"

Even though he still couldn't believe it, this was the closest result resembling the truth.

Their camps should have first equally distributed one or two thousand men.

Then after determining the Leia people's force through scouting on the first day, they quickly redeployed their forces.

Each camp should be composed of 500 to 700 men, including a large number of militia, resisting around six times their number of enemies.

Then a mobile force was extracted that was not inferior in number or combat power to the segmented armies.

Quickly cleared the first segmented army, then redeployed camp troops again to continue clearing the remaining inferior numbers.

Isn't this just an enlarged version of oblique assault with camps?

But the strategy that relies solely on the officers and soldiers' voluntary actions beyond sight is still too demanding on quality.

If Dretta were to command, not to mention who would serve as the camp guard, just uniting this mobile force voluntarily to complete the task would be a challenge.

Unlike the Kingdom Army or the Holy Alliance Army operated under a single leadership, their noble armies were an allied force, assembled from assorted generals pieced together with troops.

"Truly beaten, beaten to..." Dretta looked towards the sun in the sky, "...completely convinced."

When Dretta emerged from his reasoning, he discovered that the marching formation had actually halted.

He lowered his head and was about to ask what was going on, but as his gaze swept over Adan Castle, his throat caught.

High on the walls of Adan Castle, black and red flags were fluttering in the breeze.

The ground around was full of rubble, the walls bearing scorch marks, remnants of spring cannon and plasma crystal bombardments.

After being stunned for seven or eight seconds, Dretta murmured, "Indeed, if five camps can be used, why can't five fortresses be used as well?"