Steel, gunpowder, and spellcasters

Chapter 174 Planning and Change

What is hard to obtain but easy to lose is time; what arrives without delay is opportunity.

The question is no longer whether Winters wants to fight, but that the fighter jets are right in front of him and he cannot let them go.

Just like when you see a red and round button, you will instinctively press it;

When a wild beast sees the throat of a living creature, it instinctively wants to bite.

The barbarian army came out in full force, leaving behind tents, supplies, and spare horses.

Their weakness was thus exposed to Winters. Veneta, Palatour... all those things were forgotten. At this moment, Lieutenant Montagne was filled with excitement.

One by one, the bright spots below the hillside disappeared as the remaining Hede people extinguished their campfires.

Taking advantage of the last embers of the fire, Winters quickly memorized the layout of the camp.

He estimated that there were at least a thousand more Hedren in the camp, twice the number of his own men, and this battle needed to be carefully planned.

……

Outside Camp Heard, the officers of the Jesska Battalion were in high spirits.

Inside the Paratau camp, General Seckler was furious.

"One-Eyed Jessica! How dare he! He ruined my plans!" Sackler's forehead veins bulged, and his chest heaved violently. "Who gave him the audacity to abandon his post! If Northbridge is lost, I'll gouge out his other eye too! I'll personally shoot him!"

The others remained silent, so Colonel László had no choice but to step forward and ease the tension: "So, do you want his eyes, or do you want to shoot him?"

Sackler rarely swore, but he did: "I'll fucking dig first and then collapse!"

“The battle was too dangerous when the first wave of messengers was sent. Jesse must have only sent troops in a moment of desperation. Since he hasn’t arrived yet, it means he encountered the messengers behind him and had to retreat…” László advised.

“It’s also possible that the entire army was wiped out, and that the barbarians under Hed took advantage of the situation to seize the North Bridge,” Sackler said coldly.

Even László was at a loss for words.

Sackler rubbed his forehead to calm himself down for a moment, and when he spoke again, he had regained his dignified and composed demeanor: "It's too late to say anything now. We need to strike Alpard ahead of time."

"Ahead of schedule?" some people asked, puzzled.

Sackler was adamant: "Ahead of time! Bring paper and pen!"

The guards offered him paper and pen, and the brigadier used a stone as a desk to scribble a few words on the parchment.

He couldn't even wait for the sealing wax to heat up; he directly took off his graduation ring from the Army Academy and used it as a clasp and a token.

“Select a few brave and reliable messengers to cross the river and deliver the letter to General Alpard.” Seckler handed the letter to Laszlo and said to the other battalion commanders, “You all go back and prepare yourselves; the barbarians Hed will be here soon.”

The officer on duty rang the alarm bell with all his might, startling the Paratist soldiers who were resting with their weapons in hand.

From the moment they left the camp, the soldiers never rested—assembling, marching, fighting, digging trenches, building walls, and felling trees. They had barely taken a nap before they were back in action.

Three messengers rode to the riverbank, the letter packed in two sealed, waterproof containers.

Messengers traveling by land were seen leaving but never returning, clearly having been intercepted and killed by the Harts. Swimming to the south bank was the only safe route.

Before the pontoon bridge was even built, the short messenger in the lead stripped off his clothes, removed his saddle, and strode into the rapids, clutching his horse's neck.

Although the river was not frozen, it was bitterly cold. The warhorse only took a few steps into the river before neighing and struggling, refusing to go any further.

Upon seeing this, Andrei, who was building a pontoon bridge, threw the cable to the other party.

The man grabbed the rope, and the militiamen on the other side pulled him across. When he got ashore, his lips were already blue, and the militiamen next to him quickly took off their clothes to wipe his body.

The second messenger went down into the river, but when he reached the middle, he suddenly cramped up, and the rope slipped from his grasp. In the blink of an eye, this Paratist was swept away by the rapids and disappeared into the dark waves.

The third messenger gritted his teeth and went into the water, and thankfully no further accidents occurred.

"Give them two horses!" Andrei roared from across the river.

The short man at the head bowed gratefully, and Andrei took off his helmet to return the gesture.

Two messengers leaped onto their saddles and, without waiting for the militia to deliver their clothes to the other side, galloped off towards the main camp.

On the hillside opposite the camp, more and more of Hart's cavalrymen, carrying torches, gathered, and one fiery python after another approached from afar.

Gradually, the Hed people began to shout in unintelligible language. The shouts contained rhythm, clearly some kind of poetry or scripture.

An invisible wave of sound crashed against the small camp from all directions, as if a vast army was hidden behind the cover of night.

Lieutenant Varga leaped onto the breastwork and shouted to his men, "Never be afraid of infidels! The Lord will protect us and bring us victory!"

He began reciting scriptures, and more and more soldiers followed him, with several clergymen accompanying the army also beginning to guide him.

The two waves of sound collided, and for a moment neither could suppress the other.

Lieutenant Roy wasn't in the mood for the theological debate, so he went to Lieutenant Colonel Robert and said, "Why do I think the barbarians are even more formidable than they were during the day?"

“There are more than during the day.” Lieutenant Colonel Robert looked worried. “I’m just worried… this isn’t all…”

"What should we do then, sir?"

“What do we do? We do what the general tells us to do.” Robert patted the lieutenant on the shoulder: “As for now, get your musketeers ready.”

The temporary camp of the Sackler tribe was shaped like a six-pointed star, and attacking any of the walls would result in crossfire.

Each of the six battalions was stationed at a corner, with the battalion closest to the riverbank also serving as the reserve. As the strongest battalion, Robert's battalion was responsible for defending the north corner, which faced the enemy directly.

On the distant hillside, the Heds began to extinguish their torches. Lieutenant Colonel Robert's heart tightened; this was a harbinger of an attack.

Inside the Palatul camp, the command to "extinguish the lights" echoed repeatedly.

The battlefield quickly turned into complete darkness, and nothing could be seen clearly.

Brigadier General Sackler, who was observing the enemy, slammed his fist against the wall. The second wave of attacks came much earlier than he had expected.

Hart's army was a mixed bag, with each faction outwardly united but inwardly divided.

When things are going well, everyone is eager to take the lead and everyone is brave, but once the attack is thwarted, it is not easy to rebuild morale.

Sackler had assumed the enemy would launch a second attack the next day.

But his plans were completely disrupted the moment the militiamen of the Jessica brigade floated down from upstream on their rafts.

"Jeska! You bastard!" Sackler was so angry his teeth itched. "And all that effort I put to get you back!"

……

At this very moment, in a ravine five kilometers southwest of the Sackler tribe, the culprit who disrupted the grand plan was still gleefully preparing to raid the camp.

Winters was completely unaware of the brigadier general's anger, but even if he had known, he wouldn't have cared—that's the kind of boldness that outsiders have.

He collected the remaining water and food from his two hundred-man squads and then distributed them equally among them.

"Gentlemen! I know you are all very hungry, and I am very hungry too!" Winters stood on a large rock, surrounded by his men.

“But this is all we have to eat.” He held up a piece of dry bread no bigger than a finger joint—that was all there was to give each person: “I can’t feed all of you with five pieces of bread.”

The crowd fell silent; the militiamen had no idea what the lieutenant wanted to say.

“Although we have no food,” Winters said, pointing eastward and laughing, “the camp ahead has everything! Hand-pulled mutton, fragrant and tender, better than anything with just salt! Mare’s milk wine, drink as much as you want, it won’t get you drunk! Roasted whole lamb, the skin is roasted to a crispy golden brown, but one bite and your mouth is full of juicy goodness!”

"The taste, the feeling... tsk tsk tsk." Winters gently shook his head and exclaimed, "It's absolutely divine!"

The audience's Adam's apples bobbed, and their saliva was almost uncontrollably secreted.

In reality, Winters had never drunk mare's milk wine, nor eaten mutton, and he didn't even know if roast whole lamb was a dish. All his descriptions came from Mitchell's roast whole pig.

"If you don't like meat, there's yogurt, cheese, milk crisps, milk cakes... all served in gold and silver vessels, inlaid with pearls and gems. The barbarian chieftain Yasin has a large gold mine with ten thousand slaves to mine it. But his taste is terrible; he only knows how to pile up materials, and the gold cups and plates are all incredibly heavy."

Pre-war mobilization had completely entered the stage of unleashing imagination.

Fortunately, it was too dark for anyone to see Winters blushing, and no one argued with him: "Each of you can take one home as a souvenir!" "I have a lot of kids, can I take two, sir!" someone suddenly raised their hand to interrupt.

"Alright! If you can carry them, you can have two. No, two for each of you!" Winters continued to boast shamelessly, "But you can only take two, because the rest are mine!"

The crowd chuckled softly.

"Gentlemen! Food! Drink! Silver! Gold! It's all there!" Winters quickly stopped the charade just as everyone was getting excited.

He slammed the small piece of dry ration on the ground: "Who the hell wants to eat this stuff? Let's go drink and eat meat!"

The militiamen also threw their rations on the ground, their eyes shining brightly.

"Listen carefully to this!" Winters' tone suddenly changed, becoming menacing. He held up a wooden stick: "Without my order, anyone who dares to remove their bridle first, or whose bridle is lost during the post-battle inventory, will be executed without mercy! The spoils of war will be distributed equally. Anyone who dares to hoard or fight for spoils during the battle will be hanged!"

When the usually mild-mannered Lieutenant Montagne disappeared, Ish in the ranks felt a chill run down his spine.

He couldn't see the lieutenant's figure in the darkness, but he could sense that what was hidden behind the night was not the lieutenant, but Blood Wolf.

"Dai Xianmei!" The voice rang out again from the darkness.

Ish quickly took out his gag—which was a wooden stick—and bit into it.

There were hemp ropes at both ends of the stick, and Ish held the ends of the ropes and tied them into knots behind the back of his head.

He suddenly remembered something, hurriedly untied the slipknot, and then tightly tied it into a knot.

"Gentlemen! After we've dealt with those barbarians ahead," Winters said, looking around at the crowd, "let us feast!"

"Let's go!" He waved his hand and gripped the wooden stick tightly.

Under the cover of night, two squads of a hundred spearmen quietly crawled out of the ravine and made their way towards the Hed camp on the hillside ahead.

The other four hundred-man teams of the brigade lay in ambush in the ravine, waiting for the agreed signal.

The two hundred-man squads marched in columns, with each soldier holding onto the belt of the one in front, because many of them were night-blind.

Winters was at the forefront. When he estimated that there were still about two hundred meters to go, he took out his copper rod, activated the light spell slightly, and shook it above his head a few times.

The dark green light was not very noticeable at night, but the militiamen behind could see it clearly.

The column stretched into a line, and everyone slowed their pace and bent their bodies even lower.

When they were about fifty meters away, the militiamen with good eyesight could already see the Hud people moving around in the camp.

The main force lay prone on the ground, waiting for orders, while Winters led the little hunter forward.

Winters had also changed into a full set of lamellar armor, wearing a Herd helmet, and his face was smeared with grime. Apart from his slightly sleazy trotting posture, he really did look like a Herd man from a distance.

The lamellar armor made a slight "rustling" sound when he walked, but fortunately it went unnoticed.

The outermost ring of the Hed's camp was made of wagons, somewhat resembling a wagon formation.

However, the Heds' wagons were all two-wheeled, and Winters, who was escorting the supply convoy, noticed that they were all single-wheeled.

Behind the wagons were tents, but there were no trenches, breastworks, or fences.

Stepping into the simple tents, Winters immediately adopted a strutting posture, as if he were coming home.

Bell followed the lieutenant nervously, constantly swallowing hard and glancing back at the road they had come from.

Winters patted Bell on the shoulder in a casual manner, signaling the little hunter not to be nervous.

At this moment, Winters missed the old pirate Gold, who was a master of bluffing.

The two proceeded without hindrance until they reached the inner circle of the camp, where a clear view suddenly appeared.

Before me were countless horses, some chewing, some resting, hundreds and thousands of them, all silent and still—the Herd people's skill in taming horses was truly terrifying.

Winters was momentarily stunned.

This is the layout of the Heard camp: the wagons are on the outermost side, and the tents enclose the horses.

The Hud people would take their horses out of the camp to forage during the day, and if there were enemies nearby, they would bring them back into the camp at night; otherwise, they could stay outside at night.

"[Herd] Hey! What are you doing?" A Herd man approached, his tone extremely annoyed: "[Herd] No touching horses in the night camp, do you have a death wish?"

Winters raised his hand and killed the Hedman with a flying arrow. Now that he had reached this point, he no longer needed to hide.

Hearing the sound, the horses all raised their heads to look at Winters.

Their ears fluttered, their eyes blinked, and they looked tiny and adorable, their eyes filled with kindness and peace.

Before him was a pony with a white star on its forehead. Winters reached out and scratched the pony's forehead, and the pony obediently allowed himself to be stroked.

"I'm sorry," Winters apologized silently, then crushed the porcelain bottle in his hand, letting out a short, low growl: "Woohoo!"

A combination of spells is activated: vaporization, wind manipulation, and amplification.

A low growl amplified by magic exploded in the center of Hed's camp, instantly vaporizing the liquid in the bottle and swirling it towards the horses under the influence of the Wind Riding spell.

Winters felt dizzy and nearly fainted on the spot.

The spotted pony was terrified and ran away.

All the Herdmars went mad, losing all their docility, fleeing into the distance, smashing, trampling, and destroying everything in their path.

This is a full-fledged version of "Frightened Beast"—Winters now has an unlimited supply of wild beast dung.

Watching thousands of horses scatter and flee, Winters felt an indescribable sense of accomplishment: this might be the most astonishing "frightening the beasts" ever achieved.

Horses are actually very timid.

Once startled beyond a certain threshold, a horse will enter a state of extreme agitation, and even the most docile horse will become extremely aggressive.

Winters awakens Hedmar's instinctive fear of wild beasts, and all subsequent training is suppressed by the urge to escape.

All they want to do now is run, run for their lives.

This emotion is contagious; even horses that are not startled will blindly follow the startled one.

Tents in the camp were overturned one after another, and the terrified and desperate cries of the Hed people came from all directions: "[Hed] The horses are frightened! Run! The horses are frightened!"

A startled horse can be considered troublesome;
A hundred frightened horses would be terrifying;
What about the thousand horses?
What about 10,000 horses?
At this moment, no one was more desperate than the Hud people in the camp.

Bell pulled out a dozen or so porcelain bottles and clumsily splashed the contents around him.

Wen Tesla turned and ran, yelling at the silly boy, "The runaway horse is coming!"

Some horses broke through the wagon formation and escaped from the camp, while others, like headless flies, rushed back.

The militiamen outside could hear everything that was happening inside the camp.

Ish jumped up and shouted, "Woo woo woo!"

"Woo woo woo!" Two hundred-man squads charged toward Hed's camp with shouts.

[Note: They wanted to shout for battle, but with gags in their mouths, they could only make "whooshing" sounds.]
More militiamen climbed out of the ravine and rushed toward Hart's camp.

I owe you one chapter (covers face)

I sincerely thank all the readers for reading this story, and for voting, giving monthly tickets, tipping, subscribing, commenting, and leaving messages.

It may sound like I'm just indulging myself, but it's you all who have encouraged me to keep writing. Thank you all.
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(End of this chapter)