Industrial Revolution of the Mage Lords

Chapter 675 First Victory on the Ice Plains
Click——

The crisp sound of the magic machine gun emptying its magazine rang out, and Benny kicked open the ammunition box placed beside him... only to find it was already empty.

He instinctively turned his head and saw the young soldier who had been covering him was dragging a heavy ammunition box back.

"Very good! Continue loading, I'll replace the spare barrel!"

"Yes, sir!"

"After changing the ammunition belts, the remaining ammunition was sent to the next room; their ammunition also seems to be..."

In the brief moment between Benny's orders, he suddenly realized that another firing position to his left had been silent for a while. He turned his head sharply and looked over... only to find that the two men who had been shouting and firing just a short while ago had now rolled into the trench.

One of them had a sharp shard of crystal spike embedded diagonally in his abdomen, and blood was gushing from the wound as he convulsed. The other person had half of his body blown apart from his shoulder blade, seemingly caused by being directly hit by the red lightning.

The horrific scene filled Benny with an indescribable grief and indignation. After a moment of stunned silence, he roared at the top of his lungs, "There's still one alive! Where are the medical emergency team? Get them here now!"

Several medics carrying a stretcher happened to pass by. They looked down at him for a moment, then shook their heads and gave him a silent apologetic look.

The meaning is very clear... the internal organs have been punctured and there has been excessive blood loss; there is no hope of recovery.

……

Fortunately, targeted bombing covering the left flank of the defense line began soon.

Heavy artillery roared from the rear artillery positions, and dozens of shells flew in with a piercing whistle, crashing into the enemy ranks like meteors falling to earth, cutting their relentless assault lines in half.

The sudden burst of light from the explosion illuminated the entire ice field, revealing the twisted figures of the Lizardmen blasted into pieces, as well as the horrific scene of the Conch Beast collapsing with a deafening roar.

The alternating firing of explosive and solid bullets quickly achieved an absolute suppressive effect on the enemy. The jet worms dragged to the front of the battle had little defensive capability. Although rifle shots were unlikely to kill them in one shot, artillery and aerial bombs could tear their soft bodies apart instantly.

After the airship force retreated to the same level as the defensive line, more than ten high-level battle mages also left their air vehicles and directly entered the more intense battlefield below. Together with the newly arrived special forces bloodline warriors, they nimbly moved along the long line of more than a thousand meters to reinforce the weak areas.

Benny, who thought he was incredibly lucky, was caught off guard by a red light attack from a winged being. In his haste to dodge, he rolled over and crashed headfirst into a hard ammunition box in the trench, causing blood to gush from his forehead and instantly losing half of his sight.

He only received a communication from the rear when he was being dragged into the ice fortress bunker by soldiers for bandaging.

"The enemies who infiltrated the camp command post and the area near the artillery positions have all been eliminated! A new wave of reinforcements from the Ice Sea Base has just arrived. Soldiers on the front lines, please prepare for rotation!"

Turning to look at the unfamiliar recruit who had been following him since the start of the battle, Benny hissed as he clutched his forehead and asked, "Which battalion are you from? What's your name?"

The recruit, clutching his leg lacerated by shards of crystal, trembled for a moment before honestly replying, "Sir... I... I'm a maintenance soldier... I received orders to come to the front lines before the attack, to repair the machine gun winches for the 5th Battalion on the left flank... but they were all... all killed... that's why..."

Benny grabbed his collar and found that there was indeed only a silver wheat ear pattern embroidered on the left chest, representing new recruits. She looked him over with some surprise. "Goodness, you're this brave on your first time on the battlefield... Aren't you afraid of dying?" "Yes... But if the defenses collapse and the enemy breaks into our camp, aren't we still doomed? It's better to just fight them!"

Benny burst into laughter upon hearing this, unable to help but recall the earnest advice that Captain Newman had given him... On the battlefield, soldiers who are afraid of death will sometimes die faster than those who fight bravely!

After the reinforcements arrived, the firepower along the entire front intensified, and more airships were deployed from the rear, bringing the Lizardmen's charge to a standstill. After several rounds of precise heavy artillery salvos, a vacuum zone representing death was cleared in front of the three flanks of the defensive line, with large numbers of mutilated alien corpses lying on the ice.

It was the darkest hour before dawn when the enemy's night raiding army finally began to break down. As the winged ones retreated first, the demon lizardmen soldiers on the ground also began to waver and then retreated like a tide... Those of their kind who charged ahead were abandoned by them in the shattered ice tunnels.

What awaited them were special forces soldiers leaping out of the trenches and relentlessly pursuing them, as well as the merciless mobbing by high-level mages patrolling the low sky.

……

When Vaughn returned to command post with Duff and Wayne, Chief Dawson had also returned from the artillery position and was gathered with a group of frontline staff, gesturing and pointing at the sand table map.

Upon seeing the commander-in-chief arrive, the staff officers quickly turned and saluted, "Commander!"

Vaughn nodded to the chief, then looked around and asked with a serious expression, "What's the current situation?"

"The front line has completely repelled the attacking enemy, and the airship force is currently cooperating with the special forces on the ground to pursue them."

"Don't go too deep. Be careful that the lizardmen don't suddenly turn around and bite you back... Make them retreat as soon as possible."

Duff rubbed his hands together, saying bitterly, "Shouldn't we have taken advantage of their crushing defeat and retreat to advance directly towards Floating Island Number Two? I bet... they have very few troops left on the floating island right now!"

Vaughn shook his head and said slowly, "Of course we have to fight... but not now. We have confirmed that there are traces of the enemy at the No. 17 estuary. They must have a brand new floating island fortress hidden there. We will probably have to fight on two fronts."

Once the enemy launches its operation, its target will definitely be the Ice Sea Base located to the flank and rear of the early warning line. If we were to commit all our forces to the already exhausted and crumbling No. 2 floating island at this time, we would fall into the enemy's trap of "luring the tiger away from the mountain".

At that moment, the logistics officer also hurriedly walked in, holding a report.

"Commander, according to the statistics from the battlefield cleanup and reports from the rear, more than 300 of our soldiers were killed or killed in tonight's attack, and nearly 800 were wounded... Of the wounded, more than 200 were directly incapacitated."

The atmosphere in the command post immediately plummeted. The logistics officer, looking at Vaughn's gloomy face, took a deep breath and added, "This is just the initial statistic from the battlefield after the battle just ended... The field medical unit at the Ice Sea Base says the actual casualties are probably even more pessimistic. After all, many seriously wounded are still in the rescue stage."

A sudden night attack caught Vaughn, the battlefield commander, and his senior officers well-prepared, but they did not anticipate that the enemy would launch a full-scale attack and inflict such heavy casualties on them.

The deaths of three hundred soldiers... were no different from the destruction of an entire battalion headquarters. This battle was the greatest loss and setback the Northern Army had ever suffered since its founding.

It was at this moment that everyone truly realized... this battle of fate concerning the survival and reproduction of the two races had finally slowly revealed its absolutely cruel true nature!
(End of this chapter)