Alien world

Chapter 1885, Section 518: A Cunning Plan
What he saw with his own eyes was even more shocking than the magical images. This single bombardment had reduced at least hundreds of thousands of ratmen to ashes—but that wasn't what pained him, nor was it the thousands of pounds of oil worth thousands of gold nars that had been thrown down. It was that after eliminating so many ratmen, not even a single rat ear could be recovered.

Evelyn initially didn't understand this mentality, but Annan used shopping as an analogy: I can accept a product worth 100 gold nars, but I would be in agony if I forgot to use the coupon that reduces the price by 50 silver coins.

Evelyn understood instantly and also felt a pang of regret.

"My army is in position. Let's join forces and take Old Val."

Marshal Galgin did not answer, but instead asked him, "Do you still have a lot of that kind of kerosene?"

Annan shook his head at first, then realized that Grand Marshal Galkin couldn't see him, and said, "The amount of those just now will require my alchemy workshop to operate for three days."

"You can't help."

Grand Marshal Galkin was as indifferent as a heartless john, saying, "Give me all my oil and take your men to guard the Greymount Mountains."

Annan remained silent, only ordering the reconnaissance airship to drop the "essential version of the Northern Great Wall defense battle" overboard.

"You can not."

Marshal Galkin reiterated his stance, and Annan, skeptical, was silenced by a single sentence from Galkin.

"Whether the plan succeeds or fails, the losses will be devastating. Even I will die here. Can you accept the complete annihilation of your carefully trained soldiers?"

Annan was indeed frightened: "The situation hasn't gotten to that point yet..."

After all, they were not the main battlefield, and taking Old Val would not affect the overall situation. In the end, it still depended on the Imperial Army.

Marshal Galkin shook his head. After all, Annan was not a warrior and lacked the courage to burn his bridges.

But perhaps it was this concern for casualty figures that led him to invent those amazing weapons?
Annan didn't have the courage to go all in, but he didn't want to back down either, so he compromised and said, "Tell me your plan first. Some things may be difficult for you, but I have a way to get around them."

Marshal Galkin did not refuse.

He said the ratmen didn't actually care much about Old Vale.

His plan was to make it seem like he absolutely had to take Old Vale, so the ratmen would think Old Vale was important and lure all the nearby gray rats there, then wipe them all out in one fell swoop.

Similar to the Empire's strategy, or rather, this is a common method for dealing with the Skaven.

You should know that there are endless slave rats. You may think you have killed a ratman, but you have only killed half of it. Two complete rat carcasses are enough for a young rat to eat until it grows to adulthood.

With their astonishing energy efficiency and voracious appetite, it's no wonder that ancient wizards speculated that the ratmen were man-made war creatures.

Grand Marshal Galkin's plan was half successful; a large number of gray rats had gathered in Old Val, ready to defend it to the death.

"Although I don't know where you got this information from, you may have been misled... They are not in Old Val Town."

Grand Marshal Galkin's calm voice echoed from within the Leaf of Another World: "What do you know?"

Annan deliberately coughed: "Cough..."

"Everyone around me is one of our own."

Annan then truthfully replied, "My men followed a fleeing gray rat to its nest, where there were several gray rats, and possibly more."

"It's impossible for the ratmen to gather in large numbers in Old Vale. I even suspect they might be plotting something while hiding outside..."

Perhaps they've set a huge trap in Oldval. The exhausted Kingdom army will storm Oldval, only to find themselves caught in a ratman's trap. Hmm... smells like Stunn ratmen.

"Then let's turn the tables and attack Old Val."

Annan responded with a question. "The gray-haired rats are gathering in Old Val town. Let's take advantage of this and wipe them all out, using your kerosene."

Annan understood and couldn't find fault with it.

If the gray rats want to lure the Kingdom's army over, they need to use themselves as bait. The Kingdom's army can easily eat the bait and ignore the trap.

"How about increasing the intensity a bit more? If you send the Kingdom Army closer to the Gray Mountain Range, they will definitely think you are going to retreat, and they will increase their efforts to draw your attention back."

"Do as you say."

After Annan and Grand Marshal Galkin, one big and one small fox, finalized their plan, Annan instructed Grand Marshal Galkin to burn the Leaf of Another World in his hand before leaving—the elves must not be aware of its existence.

The behemoth in the air turned, and the Kingdom's army soon followed suit, heading towards the Gray Mountain Range.

When the news reached the ears of the Gray Rat commander, he immediately and anxiously positioned his main force between the Kingdom's army and the Gray Mountain Range—which immediately exposed the fact that Old Val Town was indeed a trap.

Despite the resistance, the Kingdom Army remained unmoved and determined to join forces with Annam.

……

Old Ware town.

The building, which was originally the Imperial Military Council Hall, is now occupied by gray rats, who sit awkwardly in the stone chairs, whispering to each other.

"Black Rock, didn't you swear that the plan could fool humans? They've escaped!" one of the gray rats questioned.

"What does Stunn's plan have to do with me? Didn't you agree to it too?" the gray-haired rat known as Blackrock retorted.

The council chamber was filled with screams of shirking responsibility.

As Annan said, after learning that the Kingdom's army's objective was Old Val, the ratmen turned the town into a trap—they dug deep underground, waiting for the humans to arrive so they could pretend to retreat and then trap everyone.

Suddenly, the human creature changed direction and stopped coming!

Everything can be attributed to the sudden appearance of reinforcements from the south.

Some gray rats are clamoring that if humans don't come here, they'll just eat them.

Some of the gray rats cursed Tokin in their vile rat-human language, saying that even human things couldn't stop him—anyway, it wasn't here.

While the gray-haired rats were chaotically discussing countermeasures in Old Vale, Annan's behemoth returned to the Trapezoidal Mountains.

The defensive fortifications were already taking shape, and those protruding rocky hills that would have hindered the rolling stones and shells had been forcibly flattened.

If it weren't for the fear of the magic-suppressing domain, they could have occupied all the nearby mountains and then let the rat swarm experience a tough battle.

The first thing Annam did upon returning was to send rangers to the north to "meet" the Kingdom's army, making the ratmen believe that they were really going to reunite.

Hellfire, unable to move quickly, continued to guard the Trapezoid Mountain, constantly reinforcing the area.

At dusk, the soldiers lit a huge bonfire in the clearing on the mountaintop. Everyone sat around the fire, singing folk songs from their hometown along with a chorus organized by Commissar Frank.

"We ran along the ridges of the fields our father had planted, from dawn till dusk, until the wheat fields bent low—"

A tremendous chorus echoed across the mountaintop, and the firelight illuminated the faces of the stationed soldiers.

(End of this chapter)