Chapter 293 The War Is Coming

Haland Territory has been developing for more than ten years. This year, it has a fiscal deficit for the first time, with the amount of 37,000 gold coins, accounting for 8.6% of fiscal revenue.

In the past few years, the fiscal surplus of Harland Territory added up to about 100,000 gold coins. The fiscal deficit of 37,000 gold coins is not particularly serious. The gold coins saved in the treasury can make up for the deficit.

After the financial meeting, the Goddess’ Birthday Festival soon arrived.

The Goddess’ Birthday Festival is the final festival of the Grant Kingdom. Although most of the nobles are believers of the God of Kingship and Order, the influence of the Kingship Church in the Grant Kingdom is not as deep as that of the Dawn Church.

During the Goddess’ Birthday Festival, Harland Territory will have a ten-day holiday.

Even the heavily guarded factories and scientific research institutes, except for those who need to be on duty, all return home to celebrate the festival with their families.

During the Goddess’ Birthday Festival, the shops in Harland Territory are also particularly prosperous, and craftsmen will sell various small commodities on the street.

Because of the harsh environment in the northern border, residents in this area don't like to save much. Both high-income people and ordinary people have a carpe diem style.

This national characteristic is actually not very conducive to capital accumulation.

But changing the social atmosphere and changing people's concepts is not an easy task.

Although Richard has prestige in the Harland Territory, he can only unite people's hearts and assimilate people from different ethnic groups into the Harland Territory. The comprehensive reshaping of the nationality of the Harland Territory can only be handed over to the next generation.

Shortly after the Goddess's Birthday Festival, six primary schools in the Harland Territory have begun to recruit people.

This year, Richard once again lowered the tuition fees, reducing the annual tuition fees for primary schools to two silver coins and fifteen copper coins, and required schools to provide free breakfast. Although these breakfasts only have goat milk and whole wheat black bread, they can also reduce the burden on children from ordinary families.

With the reduction of tuition fees, the scale of free people has increased significantly. This year, more than 1,600 children have enrolled. On average, each school has recruited six or seven classes of students.

After the Goddess' Birthday, Wendy went to Nolan in person and exchanged three hundred magic crystals with the Grant Mage Association for a crystal ball for testing qualifications.

More than a dozen magicians in the Harland Territory were dispatched to test the qualifications of the 1,600 new children, and found fourteen students with magic qualifications, and one with medium qualifications.

These students with magic qualifications received special attention from their teachers. After they began to practice meditation, they would join the Harland Mage Association and supplement nutrients for the Mage Association.

In February, the soldiers of the Harland Territory began to mobilize in an all-round way and entered emergency alert.

The magic balloon troops and the Lion Cavalry began to take off and scout the northern area of ​​the Eagle Mountains to find the whereabouts of the orcs.

The Scouting Cavalry Brigade will also send elites to cooperate with the actions of the aerial reconnaissance force.

After years of development, the Harland Territory is now equipped with three magic balloon squadrons, each squadron is equipped with eight balloon groups, plus the balloon groups trained by the headquarters, more than thirty balloon groups can take off and fight.

After four years of training, the Lion Duck Cavalry has trained seven Lion Duck Knights. The Lion Duck eggs seized that year have also been successfully hatched. In addition, the Lion Duck population has expanded in recent years, and the number of young Lion Ducks has exceeded ten.

When the next orc invasion comes, there should be two Lion Duck teams available.

Because there are third-level archers in the magic hot air balloon team to restrain the harpy, the air reconnaissance force of the Harland Territory can already compete with the air reconnaissance force of an orc legion.

However, the situation in the northern border area where the enemy is strong and we are weak has not changed. In order to avoid stimulating the orcs to fight desperately, Richard ordered to reduce the intensity of air reconnaissance and still focus on ground reconnaissance.

The reason why the orcs can take the initiative in the battle with humans is that in addition to the advantage of large numbers and military strength, the overwhelming advantage of reconnaissance force is also an important reason.

Once the orcs realize that Harland Territory has cultivated a large number of air reconnaissance forces, they will inevitably concentrate their forces to defeat Harland Territory.

Although Harland Territory has developed rapidly in recent years, it is not comparable to the huge Orc Empire.

Let the Grant family take the lead. Even if the sky falls, there will be tall people to support it.

Through frequent reconnaissance, the orc army gradually exposed to Richard's eyes.

This time, the orcs really drew a large army and rushed to Harland Territory. According to the estimation of the scouts, there are already three legions of orcs in the northern area of ​​Harland Territory, with more than 100,000 troops.

This powerful force cannot be countered by Harland Territory alone.

In order to ensure the authenticity of the intelligence, Harland Territory lost four magic hot air balloons, and more than dozens of scout cavalry were killed or missing. Even the Lion Duck Cavalry was injured. Two people were injured, and one Lion Duck was too seriously injured and may not be able to fly in the future.

After scouting the main marching route of the orcs, Richard immediately wrote a letter for help to the main legion in the rear.

Because the reconnaissance force is in a weak position, the strategy of the Grant Kingdom has always been to divide the troops to guard, consume the power of the orcs, and then wait for the orcs to withdraw.

Such a strategy is very passive. Every time the orcs invade, the northern border region suffers heavy losses.

However, the reconnaissance force is not as good as the orcs, and any active attack is unilaterally transparent to the orc army.

If you rashly leave the solid castle and the defense line that has been built for many years, you will inevitably suffer heavy losses.

Years of war experience have also proved this point. A few years ago, the Grizzlies Legion fell into the orcs' strategy of besieging and attacking the reinforcements, and almost the entire army was destroyed.

The Mad Lion Legion also rushed to fight against the main force of the orcs because it could not detect them, and fell into the trap of the orcs and suffered heavy losses.

After receiving the letter of help from the Harland Territory, the commander of the Northern Legion, Raber, did not rush to send troops. He first sent a main brigade and a thousand auxiliary soldiers into the Pratos Fortress Group to guard this important mountain road together with the hundreds of soldiers left in the territory by Baron Sharp.

Then he ordered the noble coalition forces of Black River and Roman counties to enter the Harland Territory with a total of 4,000 soldiers.

Although the first batch of reinforcements was only 4,000 people, Richard was still very happy and sent 4,000 noble coalition forces to the North Boundary Fortress of Salt Lake County.

Salt Lake County is located between the two counties of Harland Territory. Once this county is lost, the east and west counties of Harland Territory will be separated. At that time, the head and tail cannot take care of each other and it is easy to be divided and surrounded by the orcs.

The geographical location of Salt Lake County is very important. It is a key point of the defense of Harland Territory. However, due to the limitation of the number of soldiers, the garrison in this area is only 4,000.

Among the 4,000 garrisons, the main force has two battalions with 3,000 people, and the auxiliary soldiers and local security forces are close to 1,000.

Despite the defense of 4,000 soldiers, it is still a weak point of the defense line. This area is equivalent to the eggs of Harland Territory. Once it is pinched by the orcs, it is easy to fall into a passive position.

Before the outbreak of the war, Richard originally planned to draw soldiers to strengthen the defense of Salt Lake County. Now the 4,000 people sent by the noble coalition of the two counties can just strengthen this direction. With these 4,000 reinforcements, the garrison of Salt Lake County has 8,000 people.

With 8,000 people guarding Salt Lake County, the orcs can only pose a threat unless they dispatch legion-level forces.

The remaining troops can be held by Richard as the general reserve.

In order to unify the command, Richard appointed Viscount Romon as the garrison commander of Salt Lake County and Jennings, the captain of the sixth battalion, as the deputy commander.

The Harland Territory is now divided into two counties with a total area of ​​56,000 square kilometers. From east to west, it needs to defend a front line of about 400 kilometers.

This 400-kilometer defense line has four defense focuses.

The westernmost is the Pratos Fortress Group. Because the Northern Legion has sent reinforcements, the Harland Territory does not need to send reinforcements for the time being.

According to aerial reconnaissance, there are about half a legion of orcs in the northern part of the Pratos defense line.

The area east of Pratos is the core of the Harland Territory. From Sophia Castle, William Castle to the military station castle and the swamp basin are all the focus of the Harland Territory.

In this direction, the Harland Territory has stationed a large army. The swamp basin not only has a battalion stationed, but also half a mage regiment, and the military station castle also has a battalion stationed.

William Castle is the headquarters of the Harland Territory, with three infantry battalions, a Warcraft cavalry battalion, half a scout battalion, and a magic hot air balloon squadron, which concentrates the main force of 7,000 troops.

The garrisons of the three castles add up to more than 10,000. If the war is urgent, the auxiliary troops, public security, intelligence and other second-line combat personnel can be mobilized to dispatch 15,000 troops.

However, the second-line forces such as auxiliary troops, public security, and intelligence can only fight the city defense war, not the field battle, and defeat the orcs head-on.

To the east of the military station fort passage is Salt Lake County. This area has received support from the nobles of the two counties of Geda Province, and the garrison has a total of 8,000 people.

The easternmost is Grota River County. The county garrison is divided into three castles, with a total of four infantry battalions, five reconnaissance cavalry squadrons, and a magic hot air balloon squadron, with a main force of about 7,000 people.

If fighting a city defense war, 2,000 auxiliary troops can be dispatched to cooperate in the battle.

The garrisons of the four areas add up to a total of 35,000 soldiers, but the only one with strong combat effectiveness and a head-on confrontation with the orcs is the 20,000 regular troops of the Harland Territory.

Through reconnaissance, the orc army rushing to the Harland Territory exceeded three legions, with a total of about 100,000 orc armies.

The first to fight against the Harland Territory were the orcs of Grota River County.

Canyon Castle is located in the northernmost part of Grota River County. This castle is located in the east of the Eagle Mountains, only 180 kilometers away from the lair of the legendary green dragon.

There are occasional sub-dragon activities near the castle. In order to avoid irritating the legendary green dragon, the demon hunting team of Harland Territory basically does not operate in this area.

During the period of controlling Grota River County, the Harland Territory and the legendary green dragon lived in peace and no conflicts broke out.

The location of Canyon Castle is easy to defend and difficult to attack. Camps were built on the ridges on both sides of the north, which can support each other with the castle on the front of the canyon. This castle is completely a military fortress. There are almost no people nearby except the garrison.

"Attention, the orcs are coming up, light the wolf smoke quickly, string the bows and crossbows, and help each other wear armor. We only have about ten minutes."

The fortifications in the north of Canyon Castle extend about thirty miles to the north. Brick sentry towers are built every ten miles, and the sentry towers can light the wolf smoke at any time.

The sentry tower was built on the ridge, with a very good view, and could monitor the enemy from a long distance. The surrounding trees were also cut down, and a trench was built in the rear, through which people could quickly go down the mountain.

A small-scale military station was built at the foot of the mountain, with more than a dozen war horses stored in the military station, which could quickly allow the defenders to retreat to the back.

Extending northward along the Canyon Fort, more than 20 sentry towers of various sizes were built in the north of several valleys.

These sentry towers were stationed with dozens of scouts according to the terrain, and only a few soldiers were stationed in the fewest. The total number of scout cavalry stationed in the sentry towers exceeded 300 regular troops.

It was precisely relying on these front-line scouts that the enemy situation in the north of the Canyon Fort could be understood.

Since the discovery of the harpy, the Canyon Fort defenders began to mobilize in full and were ready to enter a state of war at any time.

On the third day after the appearance of the harpy, the orc army appeared in the north of the military station fort.

The orc vanguard battalion waved a mess of weapons and issued a majestic shout. The orc captain was quite barbaric. He may have relied on his experience three years ago and did not conduct a careful investigation before rashly launching a siege.

This orc battalion had a total of about two thousand soldiers, and the two thousand orcs were divided into seven or eight races. They rushed up in a mess and began to attack the defense line established by the Canyon Fort defenders.

The valley in front of the Canyon Fort was only one hundred meters wide, and the two thousand orcs immediately became chaotic when they rushed in.

The soldiers on the walls of the Canyon Fort seized the opportunity and kept shooting crossbows with their crossbows.

The arrows were like locusts, constantly shooting through the shields and leather armor of the orcs, and for a while, there were shrill screams in the canyon. The mob in the orc army had begun to disintegrate.

Seeing that the situation was unfavorable, the orc captain immediately dispatched elite troops, and the snake-bodied heavy infantry quickly joined the battle, trying to climb the city wall and break through the defense line in one fell swoop.

As a result, the defenders had already set a trap, and when the snake-bodied people appeared on the battlefield, they immediately threw dozens of alchemical bombs.

After the smoke, the bed crossbows had already been shot out from the city wall, and the officers also used enchanted crossbows to aim at the snake-bodied people. In an instant, the snake-bodied people had lost more than half.

Seeing that the snake-bodied people were about to be wiped out, the orc captain hurriedly urged the eagle-bodied people to launch a surprise attack and cooperate with the snake-bodied people in the battle.

As a result, two hot air balloons rose inside the castle.

There were third-level archers on the hot air balloons, and they were also equipped with explosive arrows. The eagle-bodied people were not careful for a while, and three of them were hit by the explosive arrows and exploded into pieces in the air.

Seeing this scene, the eagle-bodied people were so scared that they didn't dare to move forward.

Without the cooperation of the eagle-bodied people to disrupt the battle line, the snake-bodied people were quickly surrounded and annihilated by the defenders.

The main force suffered heavy losses, and the orcs could not bear the casualties and wanted to withdraw from the front line.

Seeing the orcs retreat, the catapults on the city wall fired one after another. The shooting table had been marked in advance in this area, and countless stone bullets fell into the retreating orcs. The defenders in the camps on both sides also shot arrows from high places. The orc brigade was besieged on three sides and could not hold out for too long, and was soon wiped out.