Chapter 397: Display Our Technological Supremacy. (1)
“Please spare us!”
“We are innocent!”
“We swear loyalty to Fenris!”
The retainers of the Roderick Marquisate turned pale and fell to their knees as the enemy forces surged in.
They had never imagined their castle would be taken. They had been certain that this war, like the previous ones, would end in their victory due to their overwhelming numerical advantage.
But the castle had been seized in the blink of an eye, and the invading forces were upon them before they could even think of fleeing.
Ghislain surveyed them with a dispassionate gaze and spoke nonchalantly.
“Remove them.”
With that single command, the retainers, who managed the Marquisate’s affairs, were all dragged away.
“Argh! The Marquis will never forgive you!”
Though the retainers hurled curses, Ghislain remained indifferent.
The Marquis of Roderick was already moving to kill him anyway.
With Linderstein occupied, the entire administration of the Marquisate was paralyzed. This also meant that the supply lines to the Roderick army currently on campaign were severed.
Ghislain muttered to himself while examining the map.
“Starving soldiers can’t fight properly.”
The surrounding territories had already been looted by Ghislain and his mercenaries. The few regions with remaining resources had also been forced to contribute most of their food supplies.
Now, the Roderick army was left with only the provisions they had carried at the start of their campaign.
Given the size of the army, they must have started with a considerable stockpile. But with the supply lines cut, it was only a matter of time before they would run out of food.
Once the successors and retainers of the Marquisate had been dealt with; a knight approached and reported.
“The enemy has arrived.”
“Good. Let’s show them what real shock and awe looks like.”
Ghislain grinned and ascended the castle walls. Below, a massive army of 40,000 was spread out before the fortress.
“Wow, that’s a lot of them,” he remarked.
There were even more soldiers than he had faced during the Desmond campaign.
Fenris had grown much stronger since then, but taking on such numbers head-on was still risky not that it was necessary.
“Everyone, get ready,” Ghislain ordered.
Knights and soldiers quickly assembled around a hundred medium-sized trebuchets.
Meanwhile, the sight of Linderstein under Fenris’ control left the Roderick army in utter disbelief.
“Our castle was captured? And so quickly?”
“But I thought their army didn’t have siege weapons!”
They had heard reports that the Fenris forces were entirely cavalry, which naturally meant they moved swiftly.
However, no one had imagined that cavalry could haul siege weapons and deploy them at such speed.
The second corps commander of the Roderick army, Count Glasgow, wore a mix of fury, frustration, and bewilderment as he yelled.
“What kind of incompetence allowed the castle to fall already? You fools!”
Though their army of 40,000 moved slowly, he hadn’t been worried. After all, cavalry alone shouldn’t have been able to seize the castle.
Yet, somehow, before their arrival, the castle had already fallen to Fenris. It made no sense.
Despite his shouting, none of the aides could offer a response. They were just as stunned.
Once he calmed himself, Count Glasgow studied the fortress.
“Those things on the walls… Are those trebuchets?”
Massive structures nearly a hundred of them were stationed atop the walls.
Linderstein’s walls were vast and sturdy, providing ample space for siege equipment. But who would bother setting up so many of them?
Moreover, the design seemed odd, as though only the framework had been constructed. They resembled trebuchets but weren’t easily identifiable.
“Judging by the damage of the walls, it seems siege weapons were used,” Glasgow muttered.
Sections of the walls were shattered, and rubble piled up in places where breaches had occurred.
If the Fenris Count and his knights had entered the castle to cause chaos, it would have been difficult for the defenders to hold out.
Still, how those walls had been breached remained a mystery.
“I’ve never heard of siege weapons like that. Is this some sort of trick?”
No matter how he looked at it, the situation was suspicious. Cavalry moving so swiftly with siege weapons seemed impossible.
It had to be some kind of ploy. The bizarre structures on the walls might not even be real trebuchets just a bluff to keep their forces cautious.
An aide approached Count Glasgow and asked, “We don’t have any siege weapons. What should we do?”
The siege weapons had been sent with the first legion to conquer Fenris.
The second legion’s original mission was to move toward the capital. There, they had expected to receive additional food and reinforcements for their clash with the ducal families.
Count Glasgow stroked his beard and spoke decisively.
“We’ll figure out what’s going on once we retake the castle. It doesn’t look like we’ll need siege weapons for that.”
A vast army of forty thousand men. It could sweep through most territories in an instant.
Normally, capturing Linderstein without siege weapons would have been impossible, but weren’t there already breaches scattered throughout its walls?
The gaps had been hastily patched with debris, barely enough to cover the openings, leaving them at a height easily scalable by soldiers.
“Focus on the sections that are already collapsed. The enemy force is only ten thousand strong. A breached fortress is no fortress at all.”
Once this massive army poured into the fortress, they would be able to reclaim it in no time.
Of course, it wouldn’t be easy. Even with parts of the walls collapsed, they hadn’t entirely disappeared.
“The Fenris forces will likely concentrate on defending the breached areas. Those spots will become the fiercest battlegrounds, so deploy the troops in waves to crush them.”
Since the soldiers would be funneled through narrow openings, the advantage of sheer numbers couldn’t be fully utilized right away. However, with a sustained attack, the smaller opposing force would inevitably tire out first.
“Kill the enemy to the best of your ability. Dismount the cavalry and send them in as well. We don’t have much time. Accept the casualties. Securing the supplies takes priority.”
Given the size of their army, Roderick’s forces were consuming provisions at an astonishing rate. They only carried enough food for a few days, and as long as the fortress remained occupied, their supply lines were cut off. Retaking Linderstein as soon as possible was imperative.
One of the strategists cautiously raised a concern.
“Could those things on the walls be new weapons?”
“I’ve never heard of such devices. It’s undoubtedly a ploy to stall us, hoping to force us to waste time figuring out what they are.”
“That’s plausible,” the strategist agreed.
History was filled with instances of strange contraptions being used to bewilder enemies, especially by forces like Fenris that needed to buy time.
Count Glasgow clicked his tongue as he surveyed the fortress walls.
“Tch. Count Fenris is scheming again. But to think he’s already occupied the fortress… As expected of a master. This is going to be troublesome.”
He was curious about how the fortress had been breached but had no time to investigate. The only option now was to push the soldiers forward.
The plan had deviated from the original strategy, meaning casualties would rise, but there was no other choice.
“All troops, advance! The enemy consists solely of cavalry! They have no archers, and their walls are breached! We can get through! Retake the fortress as quickly as possible!”
“Uraaaaaaah!”
At Glasgow’s command, the army of forty thousand surged toward the fortress.
The roar of their battle cry reflected their morale, bolstered by the knowledge that their numbers dwarfed those of the enemy.
As the Roderick army surged forward like a tidal wave, Ghislain, watching from above, casually waved his hand.
“Release.”
At that command, one hundred medium-sized trebuchets unleashed a volley of stones.
Fwoooooosh!
The soldiers charging toward the fortress widened their eyes in shock. These weren’t just siege engines in appearance; they were fully operational trebuchets.
Hundred of stones descended upon them, catching the unsuspecting soldiers completely off guard.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
“Arghhhh!”
“They’re trebuchets! Real trebuchets!”
“And there are a hundred of them!”
Hundreds of soldiers in the vanguard were instantly crushed under the barrage of stones.
Compared to their forty-thousand-strong army, the losses seemed minor, but the problem was that they were entirely unprepared for this attack.
The Roderick forces had never before faced such a concentrated assault from so many trebuchets. Panic spread through their ranks, slowing their advance.
Fenris’ forces seized the moment. Their trebuchets reloaded at an impressive speed.
Fwoooooosh!
Before the Roderick forces could recover, another volley of one hundred stones hurtled toward them.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
“Arghhhh!”
“Don’t stop! Keep running!”
“We need to get closer to avoid the attacks!”
A few knights, regaining their composure, spurred the soldiers forward, urging them to grit their teeth and charge. Meanwhile, the Roderick forces’ command was paralyzed, unable to issue proper orders.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Stone after stone rained down relentlessly. Within moments, thousands of soldiers were killed under the barrage from the one hundred trebuchets.
Even so, the trebuchets weren’t enough to completely stop an army of forty thousand moving all at once.
“We’ve made it! Keep pushing forward! Overwhelm them with numbers!”
Bolstered by the shouts of mid-ranking officers, the soldiers found renewed hope and surged ahead.
Finally, the vanguard reached the range where trebuchets could no longer target them. Since the Fenris forces were all cavalry, they would need to descend from the fortress and defend the breached walls directly.
For the Roderick forces, this was preferable. In melee combat, numbers were the ultimate advantage.
Yet, the Fenris forces on the walls remained unmoving. Ghislain raised his hand again and spoke briefly.
“Next phase.”
The soldiers, clad in full-body Galvaniium armor, retrieved something from their waists.
Clack! Clack! Clack!
Unfolding a device that had been compactly folded into three parts, they revealed bows, Galvaniium folding bows often used by elves and mounted archers.
Every member of the Fenris army drew arrows from the quivers at their sides and nocked them to their strings.
Then, Ghislain’s command echoed clearly.
“Loose!”
Fwoosh!
A rain of ten thousand arrows flew toward the advancing Roderick army.
Thwack-thwack-thwack-thwack!
“Arghhh!”
“They’re archers! They’re firing arrows!”
“What’s going on? They said there were no archers!”
The charging soldiers screamed in terror as they fell helplessly. Just when they thought they’d avoided the trebuchets, now came a hail of arrows.
They had believed the claim that the Fenris forces were entirely cavalry nothing but a lie.
Mounted archers could wield bows, of course, but a force of ten thousand fully-armored mounted archers? Such a thing had never been seen, nor even heard of.
“Dammit! The intel was all wrong! Their archery is too precise!”
Even the knights, charging alongside the infantry, were equally flustered.
These weren’t just stray arrows loosed carelessly.
An enormous number of arrows were fired with perfect precision, all concentrated on a single point.
Distrust in their commanders began to spread like wildfire among the Roderick soldiers.
“They said there were no archers, yet there are trebuchets, and now arrows too!”
Distrust in the Fenris forces grew as well.
“Where did soldiers like this even come from?!”
Their astonishment was understandable.
The Fenris Mobile Corps was a force trained to master every type of weapon.
They were cavalry and archers but could also become infantry, shield-bearers, or spearmen as the situation demanded.
Clad in full-body Galvaniium armor, they were capable of combat prowess on par with knights, even against ordinary soldiers.
Equipped with siege weapons as well, they had become an elite force capable of adapting to any battlefield or environment.
“My Lord, we must issue a retreat order!”
A strategist, who had been frozen in shock, finally snapped out of it and shouted.
The soldiers were being slaughtered without any preparation, and as they approached the enemy, they were cut down in droves.
If this continued, the Roderick army would be annihilated by the end of this battle.
Count Glasgow screamed in panic.
“Retreat! Retreat now!”
Bwooo!
The retreat horn sounded, and the soldiers, in utter chaos, scrambled to withdraw. Even retreating proved no easy task.
Arrows continued to rain down from the walls without respite.
“Fall back! Quickly, get back!”
Shouts echoed everywhere as soldiers fled in disarray. Many continued to die from the unending barrage of arrows as they retreated.
Those at the rear managed to escape relatively easily, but the soldiers who had been in the vanguard were almost entirely wiped out.
The survivors, finally out of range of the trebuchets, collapsed to the ground, panting heavily, unsure of how they had managed to make it back alive.
In the face of this grim reality, Count Glasgow asked in a trembling voice.
“The… casualties?”
The strategists rushed to assess the situation. One of them returned shortly, struggling to speak.
“Approximately… ten thousand casualties, my Lord.”
“…….”
With ten thousand soldiers, one could become a lord whose power none would dare challenge. That was how significant this force was.
And yet, such an enormous number of troops had vanished in a single failed charge.
The Count of Fenris, a master of combat, hadn’t even stepped onto the battlefield. This devastation had been caused solely by the trebuchets and a rain of arrows.
“Ugh….”
Count Glasgow clutched his head in despair. What kind of fool would drive soldiers into enemy siege weapons and archers without any countermeasures? Even if he had sent one hundred thousand men, they would have been annihilated.
And yet, here was such a fool himself.
But Count Glasgow had an excuse.
He had been told the Fenris forces were entirely cavalry. Without that advantage, they couldn’t have traveled so quickly from the north to this location.
Who could have predicted that mounted troops would be adept archers and also carry siege weapons?
“Arghhhh! What kind of monsters are they?!”
It was a situation beyond his comprehension.
To make matters worse, the Fenris forces weren’t even bothering to block the breached walls. Their lack of action was a blatant show of disdain for the Roderick army.
“Arghhhh! Fenris! Count Fenris!”
Count Glasgow raged, tearing at his hair, his eyes bloodshot, before turning to his strategist with a trembling voice.
“What… what do we do now?”
His voice quivered, filled with despair.
No matter how he thought about it, there seemed to be no way to break into that fortress.