13 (84)

The ground shook. A boulder that looked as if several people had been clumped together was embedded far ahead. Another boulder was floating in the air. Three in total. Looking left and right, around fifteen boulders were either just before being driven into the ground or hanging in the air. One fell behind the boulder that had landed first, and then the other boulders began mercilessly crushing the ground along roughly that same line. But that was all. There was no damage to the troops. Perhaps the horses had been startled, because loud neighing rang out from here and there across the army. After sweeping his gaze over the boulders that had crushed deeply into the ground and sunk inside it, Louis spoke again.

“One more time.”

General Gaion, whose eyes had been focused sharply, immediately gave the order. The sound of bending iron rang out as the improved trebuchets were being loaded. The soldiers, including the officers, let out sounds of admiration at this one-sided attack. The top of the wall was chaos itself. The archers were running about in confusion, and the commander’s face had turned red as if he was issuing additional orders. Louis noticed that he was preparing for close combat.

‘The wall will be smashed soon. They’ll try to defend from inside. I won’t rush. I’ll pressure them slowly.’

“We can’t hold out like this!!”

Redux, the commander of Piatranne and one of Ruderwin’s generals, looked toward the front. His face had turned so red that it would not have been strange if he collapsed from his blood pressure at any moment. The soldier beside him was not in his right mind either. Perhaps because he was anxious, he was biting his lip and shaking his leg. The wall was shaking, and the cracks were gradually worsening. Redux looked toward the front again.

The army stretching endlessly to the horizon was enough to make one bite their tongue. The siege weapon being loaded again in the middle was a type he had never seen before. That beast made of steel had its iron frame bending again, as if it was about to spit fire once more. Redux gritted his teeth. The man calmly looking this way from the very front was undoubtedly Pontina Louis. Even just the number of cavalry and archers showed too great a difference in strength.

“I thought we could hold out for a month……”

“General! Another shot is coming!”

Kooong…! The wall shook as if it were retching, and he bent his body so violently that he nearly lost his balance. He immediately grabbed the brick protruding beside him. The soldier next to him was rolling on the ground. His helmet fell to the floor and rolled in front of Redux. The wall shook continuously. This was the largest impact so far. The wall was tilting diagonally. The crack could no longer endure and vomited out bricks.

The soldiers atop the wall screamed. One squad of archers was falling. The unlucky ones pitched forward, and the lucky ones dangled from the pile of tilted wall bricks. There were also those who screamed as they were crushed because bricks seemed to have pinned them. To the side, soldiers were running toward the intact part of the wall because of the section that was tilting. Two were grabbing a comrade and pulling him up, but the ground was cracked, so all three looked like they might be caught up in it. Redux, who had barely come to his senses, shouted.

“Is close combat ready?”

“It is ready. We will conduct street fighting.”

“The entire enemy army will surely charge! Have all archers on standby keep their arrows nocked!!”

“The archers on the wall are withdrawing, Your Highness. If you entrust the vanguard to me, I will not disappoint you.”

Louis looked to the side. Kaban Ferdinand. The boldness of not even wearing a helmet. His deeply set eyes were shining. Beneath his reddish-brown cloak, he wore light armor, and a long sword hung at his waist. His horse was smaller than Louis’s, but its muscles were so developed that it looked extremely nimble. Since Louis had entrusted the cavalry to him, he was asking permission to enter as the vanguard together with the cavalry.

‘I want to send him in, but this war isn’t simply a matter of giving bone to strike flesh.’

Shortening the number of months and minimizing troop losses. Normally, he would have sent him in, then thrown in infantry for close combat and occupied Piatranne in an instant, but now, even if it took time, he had to proceed thoroughly.

“It is not yet time for you to step forward.”

“Do you have another operation in mind?”

“I do…… General Gaion. Change the ammunition. And advance the siege weapons.”

“When you say advance them……”

“You know it well. The one for turning everything into a sea of fire.”

“Ah…!”

Following the order, the siege weapons were released and moved forward. The plain was full of shattered stones, but it was not completely ruined, so the trebuchets each took their positions. At the same time, all the troops advanced one step. This put them within the range of the enemy’s catapults. Sure enough, several boulders flew toward them. One crushed some soldiers. However, there were notably few. In their urgency, the enemy had fired wildly and already exhausted their stones. Louis paid it no mind and gave the order to attack.

The buildings were burning. The flames had already grown beyond control. The fire was so large that all the buildings at the front of Piatranne were being devastated. Beneath the flames, soldiers were rushing out. Some were engulfed in fire and running forward, some were rolling across the ground, and others were crawling in any way they could to escape. As buildings collapsed, soldiers were trapped and killed along with them. The fixed catapults also caught fire and were burning completely. Below, bodies with flames clinging to them lay scattered without movement. The one fleeing backward in bewilderment was General Redux. His beloved horse had its tail on fire and was rampaging among the soldiers. The archers were fleeing here and there in confusion, but there were still many who were nocking arrows atop buildings that remained intact.

“Everyone!!! Prepare to fire!!! The enemy will soon be upon us!!!”

Louis watched the flames shooting upward with enjoyment.

‘Now I’ll conserve the ammunition.’

There was a limit to the magimetal ammunition he had prepared. He had squeezed the mages dry to prepare the quantity, so he had to advance while using it sparingly. If he used more ammunition than planned, he would have to conduct something close to a close-combat siege at Dgorica, the final point of the quest.

‘I can keep the number of months, but not the troop losses.’

Dgorica was one of the cities famous for defensive warfare. He could lose tens of thousands of troops.

“Horn Bow unit, forward.”

The Horn Bow unit that had been waiting on one side began advancing.

“Attack the area centered on the collapsed wall, and even inside it.”

Over a thousand Horn Bow Archers nocked their arrows at once. The Horn Bow Archers gritted their teeth. Their right arms pulled with all their strength to achieve maximum range. For a moment, their two legs dug long furrows into the soft ground, and when the signal fell, the Horn Bow Archers released their bowstrings at once. Arrows trailing one after another like salmon surged into the sky and crossed over the wall.

The arrows poured down over Ruderwin’s archers. The archers became beehives and collapsed to the ground or fell below. The joints of the buildings were being densely pierced. It looked as if they were being stung by a swarm of bees.

After watching the arrows pass over the wall, Louis looked at Kaban Ferdinand and spoke.

“Lead the infantry and enter close combat.”

“I shall obey your command.”

Street fighting had unfolded. All over the roads, Louis’s army stood in lines and ran forward. Atop a particularly tall building that resembled a spire, one archer was surrounded by several soldiers. He had his hands raised and was being tied up. On the roof below, an archer had been struck by an arrow and was rolling down. At the end of the road, infantry were clashing with infantry. Louis’s infantry were overwhelmingly more numerous. Armed shield soldiers were pushing forward as if applying pressure, and the Ruderwin soldiers caught in a hopeless situation were rushing between them like moths to a flame.

Several had already been cut by blades and rolled on the ground, and piles of corpses stretched between them. Civilians had gathered in the central square. They were holding crudely patched-together spear shafts or farm tools toward Louis’s soldiers as if threatening them, and in front of them, Louis’s soldiers had formed ranks and stopped firmly. Children and women burst into tears from within the civilians. The fire that had attached to the front had already spread long enough to turn the front line into ashes, but the central road had already become black powder, so the flames had stopped. The one passing through that road was Louis. Louis was watching the state of his troop losses while looking around.

On the ground lay the burned corpses of archers, and a burnt pillar that had been poorly joined together finally collapsed. Most of the buildings would not be able to be rebuilt.

‘The point of this operation was to smash the city.’

A city could be reused if it was not destroyed too much. However, to spare his troops, Louis had advanced while thoroughly destroying the buildings first, from the wall to the use of fire attacks.

‘Civilians absolutely must not be killed.’

Louis had instructed the soldiers several times. The population of this place, which would now become his city, had to be treated preciously. Population was national strength.

It was a city occupation bonus. It was an effect granted starting from the full-fledged main quest. Each city had its own unique effect, and upon occupation, that effect was granted to Louis’s army from that point on. Since Siege Attack had become +5, the improved trebuchets’ attack power was 23+5. Naturally, their range also increased slightly.

‘With this, I can easily break through the second target as well.’

The city of Ravno, which lay beyond Piatranne, had sturdier walls than Piatranne and possessed mages. If he could not strengthen his siege weapons here, he would inevitably take a long time to break through the walls protected by mages. If, during that time, he ended up surrounded in the field by Ruderwin’s forces sending reinforcements from all directions, Louis did not think he would lose in that situation, but a loss of troops on the scale of over ten thousand would certainly follow.

Ding. Louis’s information window rang.

‘A granary, huh.’

It was a situation where the existing granary had gone up by one tier. The largest food zones Louis possessed were broadly Pantalist and the city of Pontina. There was nothing to agonize over. In truth, if he considered other houses as well, there would be about two more places, but these cities were the ones where he could exert perfect influence. Louis granted the performance of the Improved Granary to the two places. As if it had been applied, light flashed, and several green points increased. There were places where they increased and places where they did not, but overall, they were increasing.