Chapter 413: Upset

After the spring, the Valois region ushered in frequent rainfall, which was obviously an unfavorable factor for the war, and the marching team was greatly slowed down.

"Hurry up!" There were urging voices everywhere. The imperial army was making intensive deployments. The heavy artillery was stuck in the mud. The packhorses alone were not enough to pull them out of the grooves that were pressed out. Soldiers were needed to pull and push.

There were many inconveniences brought by the rainy season, which made everyone tired, and the musty marching tents and sleeping bags made it difficult to sleep.

In fact, the battles in the past three months, just like the blade will become blunt, the main force of the imperial army has accumulated a lot of fatigue and injuries, but a series of victories provided high morale and covered up various problems. Now, the golden body of victory has been broken.

"Is there no one among you mages who can change this damn weather?" The young officer who was traveling with Richard joked, holding a cigarette in his mouth and handed it to Richard.

Richard declined, and the young officer pointed to his mouth and made a match gesture again.

The sky was still covered with a fine rain curtain. Richard rubbed his hands and lit up his colleague out of thin air. Another arc flashed: "Now your cigarette is not afraid of water."

"Then if I swallow it, it will continue to burn?" In addition to the cold joke, smoke was spewing out of the other party's mouth and nostrils. Richard did not avoid it and let himself be swallowed by the second-hand smoke. He heard the other party continue to say: "Not bad, I am a little reluctant to part with you, Colonel Richard."

"We are in the same division now, so we will act together in the next battle." The military finally got it. They no longer organized the precious magicians together, but changed all the special costumes and let each spellcaster hide in the team.

In the rain, Richard participated in the pre-war mobilization. He was absent-minded and vaguely heard the general on the stage yelling randomly under the blessing of [Amplification].

What the enemy is approaching, what this battle determines the situation of the entire Valois battlefield, must win.

In a trance, he remembered the graduation speech. Just like this time, Richard was absent-minded.

However, the general's words were not empty words. The overwhelming momentum of the Imperial Army not only caused fatigue in the first batch of troops, but also brought a more fatal problem - the main force's defense line was empty. The left and right wings of the Imperial Army and the First and Third Corps of the Kingdom resisted each other. Because they were not the main force and did not receive sufficient supplies, the progress was not as smooth as expected. The southern and northwest coasts of the Kingdom were still in the hands of the Valois.

Now the main force is facing the National Guard, an army of "outsiders" assembled from all over the country, but it has not made a breakthrough. The command did not expect such a situation from the beginning. Behind the main force of the Imperial Army are fragile, poorly built defense lines and thin supply lines, all the way to the capital of the Condi region.

And intelligence shows that the National Guard is still expanding. The original rebels in the south who did not catch up with the defense of the capital have also successfully arrived and formed eight new corps. At least 200,000 armed forces have an overwhelming advantage over the current main force of the Imperial Army.

Then, this battle in the northern part of the Valois region must be won, otherwise it will cause an unimaginable and unacceptable retreat. In order to reverse the numerical advantage, the military gave up the rotation and chose to let the vanguard continue to stand in front and merge with the follow-up troops.

"Place them in front of the first trench and cooperate with the engineers. Hurry up, and hurry up." The front-line commander issued a new thing.

Richard saw a carload of iron products. Their main body was thick iron wire with circles and spikes wrapped around them. It was very difficult to arrange them. The engineers wore thick leather or cotton gloves. Because the thick iron wire was very tight, it was easy to cut their hands when they broke it hard.

Finally, a wire mesh was erected in front of the trench. Richard carefully examined this new thing and found that each section of the wire mesh had a nameplate hanging on it: "Kempson Steel Plant." There was also a factory date and batch number.

I remember Kempson is in Bain. Could it be that the Valois Army could order them after they captured it? For some reason, Richard came up with an absurd idea out of thin air.

Originally, the Imperial Army would only build trenches when attacking cities. Now, in order to protect the front-line camp, the front-line commanders also began to build trenches and defensive fortifications.

Radical officers and soldiers were deeply dissatisfied with such "cowardly behavior". The most resentful ones were the engineers who had to dig mud in the rain. Amidst the cursing, the cautious commander got the nickname "Turtle Richard".

It had nothing to do with Colonel Richard, the accompanying mage. The commander happened to have the same name as him, Lieutenant Colonel Richard Hench, the commander of the Engineer Regiment of the First Division of the New Southern Corps. He was the guy who lived in a tent, read books to him and lit cigarettes for him.

Other commanders did not think that the tortoise behavior was the best solution. They jointly set an active defense plan at the headquarters and had begun to occupy high ground and set up positions.

The rain was getting heavier, and the enemy followed.

The artillery fire announced the start of the war. The artillery of both sides attacked each other. The artillery of the Imperial Army had a longer range, but the artillery of the National Guard seemed to be more mobile and fired more intensively. After confirming that the first line of the Imperial Army was dispersed by artillery fire, the Valois Army decisively launched an attack.

Richard and other officers had already experienced the fearless column charge, so the general chose to strengthen the firepower of the left and right wings and use all the cavalry to disperse the column.

In the pre-war meeting, "Turtle Richard" even slammed the table and shouted "Trenches, use more trenches to stop them!", and was kicked out of the tent on the grounds of disturbing order.

"Send in the cavalry brigade, and the reserve troops are ready."

After receiving the order, the Imperial cavalry began to speed up, trying to rush into the side of the enemy column, but the National Guard infantry began to change their formation. They dispersed, avoiding the artillery and cavalry in front, and quickly approached the Imperial infantry under the bullets from the front.

Richard, the spellcaster, stood on a high point and observed the entire process of the enemy's changes with a telescope. His task was to behead. General Karl's idea was affirmed, and some mages were required to attack the enemy's high-value targets, such as artillery positions and commanders. Of course, the Valois Army now also has mages, and the enemy's key points must also be guarded by spellcasters.

So Richard first observed patiently and looked for the opportunity to attack. Beside him, there was also a hunter from the Bayern Corps. The Bayern Corps was passive and procrastinated, and finally "forced" to procrastinate to the front line when the Imperial Army's vanguard failed. Bayern's army seemed to have a lot of mountain hunters.

The hunters around Richard were also observing, and then took out their guns and set them up. This gun was wrapped in cloth, and Richard couldn't see the appearance of the gun, but he could see from the length of the gun that the Bayern hunters did not use the Empire's standard weapons.

No, it's too distracting. Even on the battlefield today, Richard couldn't concentrate his thoughts. He forced himself to stay awake and finally locked onto a valuable target through the telescope.