Wortenia Senki Volume 2 Chapter 22

Day 169 after being summoned to another world: (Defensive War 3)

"Listen up! Don't let your guard down! The enemy is five times our numbers; you die if you lose focus even for a moment!"

Under Lione’s order, the Knights began to pull the arrow on their bows.

"Wait on my mark!"

Just like an avalanche, the enemy surged in from the south side where Lione is guarding.

Loud battle cries echoed throughout the battlefield. With the effect of adrenaline, the soldiers charged in fearlessly, thirsting for blood.

It was like a starving pack of wolves attacking without self-control.

Though on a closer look, they are not regular soldiers.

They are the farmers from Duke Gerhardt’s territory that was drafted to become soldiers.

Naturally, they have never received any proper military training, not to mention that, they are only equipped with cheap spears and basic leather armor.

They are not wearing any helmet or shield.

That indicated just how worthless their lives are in the eyes of the n.o.bility.

But right now, they are showing a tremendous battle hunger.

After all, the enemy’s camp is just like a treasure island with a lot of loot up for grab.

The conscript system in this world is quite an unrewarding one.

Not only they have to put their lives on the line for their lords,

There is little to receive in return.

The reason for that can be attributed to the various kinds of tax that exist.

However, despite all of that, there is still some incentive to serve the lord.

In the form of plundering, there is a rule that allow them to claim any battle loot from their enemies to themselves.

They can get some cash from the enemies they have killed, by selling their spears and armor.

To put it simply, It's 'you find it, you keep it' rule.

That kind behavior leads to a more aggressive war.

Rape the women, burn the homes, and steal their wealth.

Captured men are sold as labor slave, and captured women as s.e.x slave.

By wagering their life, there is an opportunity for them to gain significant profits.

That is why, even though the farmers in this world hate the n.o.bles, they were still willing to go to wars.

All for the sake of crushing weaker people to make their own hard life a little easier.

A Knight's equipment is expensive.

They need a full set of armor, a weapon, and a horse.

It can be said that a knight’s pride lies in his weapon.

Of course, it is hard for a farmer to kill a knight.

While there is no fixed way to judge a knight’s fighting capability, generally f a knight who is capable of using magic art is three times stronger than a farmer turned soldier.

Knights are just like a monster in the shape of a man.

However, there are more factors involved in war than just individual ability.

While they might lose a one-on-one fight, that might change when there are more people on one side.

Just like how a flock of ants can eat a giant elephant.

"Listen up! Whatever you get your hands on, it's all yours! We will guarantee that in the name of Duke Gerhardt! Now, Advance!"

"""Uoooooh!"""

In response to the order, the front liners immediately rushed forward.

Right now, in their eyes, Ryouma and the others are a pile of treasure.

They are very confident thanks to the overwhelming difference in number.

They surged forward without hesitation.

Because knowing the fact that they have a much larger army than their enemy made them forget about their fear..

As the farmer-soldiers approached the 5 meter mark from the fence;

"Now! First team, let loose your arrows!"

On Lione’s signal, the defensive Knights released a barrage of arrows toward the enemies.

*HyuHyuHyuHyu*

Following the sounds of the wind, several arrows pierced through the farmer-soldiers’ heads.

""Gyaaaaaaa!!""

"d.a.m.n it! Watch out for the arrows!"

The voices of a farmer-soldier warning about arrows echoed throughout the battlefield.

The moment an arrow pierced their comrades around them, they began to remember the fear they had forgotten.

This ended up slowing down their a.s.sault.

"What are you doing?! Press forward! The enemies are small in numbers! Destroy them in a single push! Don't you want to take all of their treasure?! Their gold!"

The enemy's commander shouted from behind.

Perhaps he has felt that his soldiers’ advancing pace has slowed down.

Once again, a simple human desire known as greed entered the soldiers' minds.

Logically speaking, the n.o.bles should have provided their farmer-soldiers with shields to protect them from the arrows, but they chose not to.

For the n.o.bles in this world, the farmers are their shield.

To put it bluntly, they don't even care how many farmers die.

Farmers are the stepping stones for the n.o.bles to place the victory flag on the enemy’s base.

"Second team! Release!"

Again, under the direction of Lione, the second wave of arrows rained down on the farmers.

"Khu! What are you frightened of?! Their numbers are only a few! They do not have infinite arrows! We still have the advantage over numbers! Advance! Those who managed to reach the fence first will get a bonus bounty! Proceed!"

The enemy commander's aim was clear.

He planned to finish the war by making use of their numerical advantages.

For him, even it takes five farmers to kill one knight, he is still going to win.

On one hand, for Ryouma, he has the upper hand as long as the two sides clash from long distance.

On the other hand, the n.o.ble’s side is seeking a close combat, since they have a large numerical advantage.

Having said that, it was quite a difficult task to avoid a close combat completely.

Although the farmer-soldier army was constantly getting shot by barrages of arrows, they slowly began to close the distance.

They stepped over the dead bodies of their own comrades.

Some even used the body of a fallen as a shield.

Gradually but surely, they kept on moving forward one step at a time while withstanding the rain of arrows that came at them.

"I made it! I'm the first!"  

A soldier finally shouted that he has reached the fence.

It was rare for the n.o.bles to provide such bonus.

But for the farmer, such money would help them ease their life from high taxes.

That's why he tried to make it known by shouting first.

To make sure that the n.o.bles know that he's the first one.

However, the price for that was far too great.

It has costed him his life.

"Third team, come forward!"

Hearing Lione's instruction, the bow users stepped back, and the spear knights began to step forward.

"Push them back!"

On Lione's command, the spears pierced through the gaps of the lower fence.

The spears were aimed at head level.

The man who shouted that he was the first to arrive on the fence got himself pierced by a spear through his right eye.

"Gyaaaaaa!"

The man screamed painfully.

"Retract!"

The spears that were stricken out of the fence were pulled back all at once.

"Puush!"

Numerous spears were protruding out once again between the gap, reaping the foolish farmers' lives.

"Noo! Brother! Lloyd!... d.a.m.n it! You b.a.s.t.a.r.d!"

"Aaargh! My eye!"

"Hiii! I don't want to die! I don't want to die!"

A mix of angry and terrified voices resounded throughout the battlefield.

Some who tried to step forward, and some who wanted to retreat had collided against each other.

This is the result of not knowing a battle formation.

And Lione is not naive enough to miss this opportunity.

The woman who has survived through many battles as a mercenary has a good battle instinct.

"First team and second team! Release the arrows!"

Following her instruction, the spear knights stepped back and the bow users stepped forward.

"Listen up! Shoot them all! Don't hold back!

Following Lione's aggressive order, the arrows released by the Knights rained down toward the farmer-turned-soldiers.

"Khu! This is not looking good. Messenger! I want you to report to Kyle-sama that the enemie’s resistance on the south is too strong; ask for the permission to withdraw! Otherwise, we are going to need some reinforcement!. "

The n.o.ble commander who tried to break through via the South side asked Kyle for the permission to retreat and regroup.

No matter how inexperienced Kyle is, he should know that this would be a wasteful action, since they have already committed so much.

"d.a.m.n it! We have five times more soldiers than the enemy! Why is it so hard to break through?!"

*Klang*

He broke the staff in his hand out of frustration.

----------------------------------------------------------------

"Withdraw you say!? Don't say such stupid thing! We have an overwhelming number! Why should we withdraw?!"

Upon hearing the message from the messenger, Kyle's face turned red in anger.

"B-But..., the resistance on the southern side is very strong, the commander deemed it impossible to capture it immediately..., if he has to continue attacking, he wants more reinforcement."

No matter how much Kyle yelled at him, the messenger did not back down.

He was trying to be faithful toward his duty.

But because of that, Kyle grew even more irritated.

"Don't joke around!"

*Dokang!*

"You b.a.s.t.a.r.d! I have a duty to present this achievement to Gerhardt-sama, do you know that?!"

Kyle shouted furiously at the messenger and hit his head.

Normally he would not do such a thing.

Because having a calm judgment is usually his forte.

However, right now there's no trace of such virtue on him.

In fact, it was not just from the south side, there was also a messenger from the north side that came asking the same thing.

Additionally, Kyle himself who has been attacking the central side couldn’t manage to break through Ryouma's defense either.

Thus he has not much reinforcement to spare.

On the contrary, Kyle himself wants some reinforcement as well.

"There's no reinforcement! Make do with what you have and break through their defence! In the first place how come we can't break through the enemy's defense when we have five times more force than them?! Tell them not to be lazy instead!"

Kyle's words were nothing more than quibbles. However, the messenger couldn’t rebuke him.

If the messenger makes the wrong move here, he could be killed instead.

Right now, Kyle's mind is under sheer madness.

Abusive language kept repeating within Kyle's mind while he was looking at the messenger who was running back in panic.

(d.a.m.n incompetent fellow! Always letting me down!)

The dry moat and fences turned out to be quite strong, effectively slowing down their invasion.

Kyle had annihilated 500 soldiers under Mikhail's command. He thought that his enemy's morale would be low because of that, but surprisingly, there's no sight of such thing in front of him.

And now, the advantages of having more soldiers seem to not have made any difference.

(Why! How come they have such strong fortress..., why can't we breakthrough?!)

Kyle cannot afford to lose this battle by any means.

Now that he had switched sides from the Princess’ to the n.o.bles' faction, he cannot afford to lose.

Rather, he should not have any hard time doing this.

Because he has a lot more soldiers compared to his enemy.

Everyone in the n.o.bles faction will look down on Kyle if he struggles to win.

Even Duke Gerhardt who gave the command to Kyle would end up doubting his ability.

And it would be hard for him to lose the incompetent tag later on.

Failure here would be no different to receiving a death sentence.

(d.a.m.n it all! Each and every one of them! Always getting in my way!)

Kyle does not want to admit that currently, he's struggling.

Rather, he blames all the troops under him, that they’re not putting in enough effort..

Kyle cannot accept the fact that his ability is inferior to the enemy commander. After all, he once had outsmarted them when they annihilated the reconnaissance unit lead by Mikhail.

"I will go to the battlefront myself!"

The officers beside him went pale after hearing Kyle's declaration.

The fact that Kyle, the commanding general, is heading to the front line means the Knights reserved on the back would have to move to the forefront as well.

The soldiers Kyle is leading now are comprised of 2000 knights and 5000 farmer-recruit.

However, the knights under his command are soldiers that cannot be used meaninglessly.

After all, they are a force that Duke Gerhardt secretly arranged to use against suppressing the knight faction later on.

Although Duke Gerhardt hates General Hodram, he has never looked down on the knight's ability.

A knight unit is composed of humans who are capable of using powerful magic arts..

Because Duke Gerhardt himself is capable of using magic arts, he was able to understand this.

That is why Duke Gerhard has been secretly gathering knights from four chivalric order who should have guard the border and the king.

What’s more, he has also been gathering skilled mercenaries, Knights who were exiled from other countries, and Rozeria's knights who had deserted their post.

He incorporated those people and made his own order with a high degree of reward.

And the total force count is 6000.

2000 was lent to Kyle.

Kyle himself know the importance of this Knights.

"Please wait a minute! Isn't this too early for us to move?"

The officers on Kyle's side tried to stop him.

Because originally, they had planned on destroying the enemy in a single stroke after the farmer-soldier had successfully broken through the fences.

"Shut up! It was a naive judgement on my part for expecting the farmers to break through the enemy's line! Though at least, the enemy should be feeling tired as they have been constantly fending off those peasants. Now they should be unable to defend against our Knights' a.s.sault!'

Kyle rejected his adjutant’s advice to wait a little bit more.

He insisted that if they start a.s.saulting the enemies troops with the knight now, they would be able to win.

This clearly reflected his state of desperation.

The words that his adjutant have heard was like receiving a public execution sentence.

But despite all that,  the adjutant also understood his desperation.

That commander's failure is also his adjutant’s failure.

And Duke Gerhardt is not so kind to forgive such incompetent men.

Only being demoted from the current position can be considered as very lucky.

Depending on how big of a loss they sustained, they might end up with a death sentence.

"I understand! But in that case, we should send a messenger to the north and the south unit and order them to a.s.sault the enemy at the same time. If we attack them at the same time, these fences and dry moat won't be much of a problem! "

After the adjutant gave his advice to Kyle, no one said anything else.

"Very well! Fetch me a messenger immediately! We shall finish this before sunset!"

Currently, there is about 30 minutes remaining before sunset.

After sunset, the level of visibility will drop down drastically. Kyle and his army are not prepared to do night battles.

However, if he was able to break through the enemy's defense line, night battles can be done by performing arsons on the enemy's property.

Having finished planning his strategy, Kyle instructed the entire army to perform the a.s.sault attack simultaneously.

This battle ultimately marked the beginning of the decisive war between the princess’ and n.o.ble faction, where neither sides can afford to withdraw.

It is left to be seen which side will emerge victorious.

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