Am I really hallucinating?

Chapter 438 Before the Siege
In any case, having Rabbi's help was no different from "this game is in the bag" in the eyes of Grealley and others.

However, the rabbi was not under anyone's command; she did whatever she pleased on her own. After meeting with the Ghrali branch, she left.

Grealley and his team did not bask in this joy, but continued to diligently carry out their assigned tasks.

Weapons, puppets, personnel deployment, plan confirmation...

Even with all these preparations, they were still weak compared to the garrison soldiers of Scalova and the army of the Durazon family outside.

What Mechanical Heart wants to do is not to directly confront both sides, but to seize every opportunity to profit from the situation.

When the rabbi returned to his temporary lodgings, he noticed the commotion downstairs and went downstairs. He saw Mrs. Arele sitting alone in a rocking chair in the living room, staring blankly at the burning fireplace.

The old housekeeping doll named Nuomi, standing nearby, gave Phoebe a greeting.

Mrs. Ereshkigal.

"Oh, Miss Phoebe, did I disturb you?"

Rabbi shook his head: "Why aren't you asleep at this hour?"

“Middleia hasn’t returned yet.” Mrs. Arele said with a worried look. “Although this isn’t the first time, I still have to wait for him. It’s not safe outside right now. He’s being chased by those soldiers. I’m very worried about him.”

"..." Rabbi looked at Mrs. Ereshkigal and vaguely thought of his grandfather.

“Even if he’s so useless and argues with you all the time, squandering your retirement savings, would you still be willing to wait for him until late at night?” she said.

“He has his difficulties,” Mrs. Arele said kindly, turning to look at Rabbi. “I’m not saying this because a mother is biased towards her child, but because I can see it.”

The rabbi blinked.

“He can’t lie, and faking anger isn’t easy for him. It’s like he’s just joking with me. He also knows his act is clumsy, so he started drinking heavily in front of me later, which made it much more real.”

The old man seemed somewhat gratified as he recalled his child's behavior.

“He’s a good kid. If he’s going to do something that requires him to pretend to hurt me, then I think he’s already prepared and thought it through.”

"I'll just wait for him here until he comes back safely."

The rabbi said, "After he succeeds, he will come back to apologize to you and share his joy."

"Yes, of course..." Mrs. Eresh squinted her eyes, her voice gradually weakening, and she unknowingly fell asleep.

For older people, getting through this long is already exhausting.

Rabbi turned around and went back upstairs, where he saw Carrot sitting obediently in the corner of the room.

The room wasn't big, and the radish looked very crowded in the corner.

“Beep…”

“You’re right. Whether it’s external invasion or internal chaos, war is still a very painful thing,” the rabbi said.

She slowly walked over to Radish's side and sat down, leaning against Radish's hard, cold body, but she felt very comfortable.

“Beep…”

"Yes, I miss Grandpa."

The room fell silent, and Rabbi fell asleep in Carrot's arms.

Zheng Fan stood silently by the window, the light from the streetlamp outside casting a soft glow inside. Luo Bo stared at Rabbi's sleeping face for a long time before looking up at Zheng Fan.

“Beep…”

"Hmm," Zheng responded, without saying anything more.

……

It was another early morning, and Xinmu City began its oppressive day. The sky was overcast, the air was humid, and rain seemed imminent.

Seemingly sensing some kind of impending trouble, even the usually lazy soldiers became tense today, no longer swaggering around on patrol. Hurried footsteps echoed back and forth, some men, some women.

Armed vehicles crowd the streets, drawing attention while simultaneously drawing people away.

Sensing something was amiss, pedestrians dared not linger outside and began to hide in their homes.

By noon, the city had become quiet, and there was still little sign of the sun coming out.

Melloni was the garrison commander of Scalovar in New Mou. At this moment, he was in a military camp in New Mou, looking at the map with a furrowed brow.

"Those traitorous bastards of Durason, when White Clothes was around they shamelessly fawned over him, but now that White Clothes isn't around they immediately turn their attention to Kabala." He grinned and cursed as he looked at Durason's deployment outside the city, which he had already scouted out.

Durason has annexed several surrounding areas centered on Durin County and is a powerful force in the current Scallovarian civil war.

As a long-established military family, despite being located on the frontier, they possess a strong and well-equipped army, boasting substantial armed forces. If they were to retake Xinmou City, their power would undoubtedly expand further, making them unparalleled in their influence.

To this end, Durasong also made many deployments for Xinmu City, and took advantage of the slowdown in the fighting on other fronts to gather a considerable force outside Xinmu City.

The number of people and military dolls was significantly different from that of Xinmu City.

This city is most likely to be indefensible.

But even if we can't hold it, we have to.

While Meloni was fretting, in the allied camp outside the city, the commander of the Durazon army, Kep Durazon, once again assessed the disparity in strength between the two sides, but his emotions remained unreadable.

"The capture of Xinmu City is a fait accompli, but even with our current strength, we cannot forget that there are many forces that can rival us. Kabala City itself is a formidable fortress, not to mention the Props family to the east, the Sandtooth Legion to the southwest, the Lilon Union to the north, and Rosie Red to the northeast..."

"In this battle, we are not only aiming for victory, but for a great victory. We want to take Xinmu City with the least possible force, so as to preserve as much strength as possible for the subsequent battles."

The Durazon family, which produced many capable individuals who could become powerful warlords, was not one to be complacent about the victory in a small battle; he was considering a broader scope.

At this moment, an official received a message from a scout and stepped forward to report to Kep in a low voice.

After listening, Kep pondered for a moment and gently shook his head.

"The Mechanical Heart is making some moves in the city? What are they planning to do? Do they have detailed plans?" He asked, but got no results.

Back at the deployment map, Kep felt inexplicably that something was off about the Mechanical Heart.

But I can't quite put my finger on what's wrong.

Most factions now view the Mechanical Heart as a group of naive idealists.

Moreover, some of their ideas seriously threaten the interests of the ruling class, including these aristocratic warlords. They are fundamentally opposed to the vast majority of the current powers.

Extremely stupid.

Unfortunately, many unarmed people from the lower classes were deceived by such exaggerated ideas and devoted themselves to the so-called ideal cause without hesitation.

Kemp is very puzzling.

Although he had read the articles written by the leader of the Mechanical Heart Party, Grealley, some of the content either enlightened him or made him feel cold. If he hadn't been sitting right there, he would have actually been somewhat infected by the emotions.

Great.

Although their current power is weak, if these idealistic lunatics are left unchecked, they might actually cause some big trouble one day.

"Pay more attention to them." He didn't underestimate these people.

Of course, although he did not underestimate them, he could not imagine that these people's intention was to take over Xinmou City and reap the benefits.

"Sir, the Third and Fourth Mobile Puppet Units have arrived." At this moment, an officer entered the military camp to report.

Cape's attention immediately shifted: "Alright, alright, take a short rest, and launch the attack as planned in half an hour."

(End of this chapter)