"Boom!" Another projectile exploded not far away. Black smoke and fire flashed, and a few small sparks hung on the surrounding bushes …
"Colonel, let's move back a little. It's too dangerous here."
The adjutant, Lieutenant Wydlake, urged his horse forward a few steps and stood in front of Colonel Derwick, turning around to advise him.
Colonel Drivick was unmoved. He continued to observe the enemy firing points on the hill with his binoculars. "Have the new infantry field cannons arrived yet?"
"I've already applied for it. They said they would be here in half an hour," Lieutenant Wydlake replied.
"Have Brigade 11 keep up the pressure on the enemy. Take cover and don't let them throw their grenades at us.
When the cannons arrive, we'll coordinate with them and take down this hill in one fell swoop. "Colonel Drivick pointed at the hill where the enemy was still throwing grenades.
After a while, three new infantry field cannons were dragged over by six pack horses. After reporting to Colonel Drivick, the artillery platoon leader ordered his men to quickly set up the cannons and aimed at the Nasrian hilltop.
The process of capturing the hilltop was very simple. The three new cannons only fired three rounds each and overturned the seven grenade throwers deployed on the hilltop.
The enemy defending the hilltop turned and ran in panic. The soldiers of Brigade 11 could only shoot at the backs of the fleeing enemies.
This was yet another Nasrian garrison that had overestimated themselves. They were a small battalion of 800 men, and they had left more than a hundred corpses and wounded on the battlefield …
"Colonel, we found this in the position …" Captain Wesley of the Eleventh Brigade came before Colonel Derwick and handed him a black leather briefcase.
This black leather briefcase should have been left behind by the Battalion Commander of the local garrison. Escaping with his life was more important, so he couldn't care less about these worldly possessions.
It was filled with official notices and the daily administrative documents of the garrison, but Colonel Drivick's gaze was focused on one of them.
"Lieutenant Wedrake, find a few of the wounded and interrogate them. Is this true?" Colonel Drivick ordered.
Soon, the black briefcase and the prisoner's interrogation report were delivered to Claude.
"Prince Vedario is gathering his forces in Turaveli and preparing to launch a counterattack on the capital to save his father and family …" Claude scratched his head. "Who is this prince?
What's the situation with the 18th standing corps? "
Mason Hughes, who stood beside Claude, was already prepared. He quickly found the information Claude needed from a stack of documents on the table. "General, Prince Vedario is the seventh son of Nasri VII. He's 23 this year and his birth mother is Lady Bormanna.
Nasri VII had one queen and two concubines. Princess Pormanna was the most favored by Nasri VII, so her son, Prince Vedario, was also the most favored of all of Nasri VII's children.
"It's said that Prince Vedario has been very smart since he was born. It's a pity that he was born too late. Otherwise, he would have been the first in line to the throne.
"This time, he was appointed as the overseer of Nasrian's 18th standing corps to go to our kingdom, so he wasn't in the capital. Fortunately, he didn't fall into General Berklin's hands.
"As for the 18th standing corps, it's a new corps that Nasrian just formed. It's equivalent to our kingdom's second-line corps."
Claude understood now. The 18th Corps was probably a new corps prepared to head to Nasri as reinforcements. Now that Nasri's capital city had been taken over by Thundercrash, Vedalio immediately halted the reinforcements to Nasri and regrouped his forces for a counterattack.
In the end, his summon was sent to the local garrison camp, and that garrison camp happened to be run into by Colonel Derrick's 7th Regiment ….
"Turaveli …" Claude looked up at the map of Nasrian.
The capital of Tukurasmu, Turaveli, was three prefectures away from the royal capital of Polyvisia. The plains were only one prefecture away from Claude's current location.
"Order General Dyavid to lead Line 5 and Line 6 to Tukurasmu Prefecture. Line 7 and Line 8, stay close to me. Independent battalions stand guard on both sides. We'll go and defeat the 18th standing corps first," Claude ordered.
Claude gave the order to change the itinerary and not to meet up with Berklin's First Division in the capital of Polivisia.
They were in enemy territory now and couldn't allow the enemy to gather their forces. Even if they were just a bunch of nobodies, they would still be a force to be reckoned with.
The more people there were, the more courageous they would be. It would be better to launch an attack when the enemy was gathered. The earlier they defeated them, the earlier they could finish things off. That way, the capital wouldn't be surrounded by the local armed forces.
Sometimes, the plan was good, but the reality was out of everyone's expectations.
Claude had wanted to fight Prince Vedario's 18th standing corps in Tukurasmu Prefecture, but when he arrived at Turaveli, he saw the lightning flag of Thundercrash fluttering above the city. Dyavid was there with his men to welcome him.
"They're too weak. We only fired two rounds of cannons and launched a light cavalry assault. The enemy collapsed and turned to run, leaving their backs to us," Dyavid complained.
He didn't expect that the enemy's standing corps and the local garrisons would have more than a hundred thousand men against his two regiments of more than ten thousand men.
He only wanted to launch a feint attack to see what other trump cards the enemy had up their sleeves.
In the end, the enemy was bombarded by two rounds of cannons and turned to run when they saw the horde of light cavalry charging at them.
Naturally, Dyavid's feint attack turned into a decisive charge.
"We killed tens of thousands of them and captured more than 50,000 captives. The 18th standing corps can be disbanded.
It's a pity that the prince ran the fastest and we didn't manage to catch him, "Dyavid said gleefully," The problem now is what we should do with the captives.
Dyavid said proudly, "The problem is, what should we do with all these captives? We can't kill them all, but it's not appropriate to let them all go. As long as we have weapons, they'll become our enemies once they're recruited …"
"I want some peace and quiet."
Claude felt that he should reflect on whether he was becoming more cowardly the more battles he fought. In that case, Dyavid might as well have recklessly taken the initiative.
Even ten thousand men dared to charge at an enemy ten times their size.
He had wanted to have a big battle, but two of Dyavid's regiments had crushed the enemy's army of over a hundred thousand.
Claude felt that he had overestimated the enemy and underestimated his own forces.
Now that he thought about it, Thundercrash, equipped with the new cannons and rifles, was many times stronger than the musketeers of this era.
Two corps of 200 cannons fired twice, which was equivalent to 4,800 cannons exploding in the midst of the enemy. Ten thousand light cavalry would charge at them. The garrison forces and second-line corps had only three months of training and had never seen something like that before. Would they just wait for death if they didn't run?
In the end, one of them led the others to flee. It was only natural for the entire army to turn and run.
"Has the city been cleaned up?" Claude asked.
"Not yet. We've only taken control of the gates. Everyone else is busy capturing and watching over the captives," Dyavid answered honestly.
Claude nodded. "Same rules. Search the properties of the nobles and officials. Kill anyone who resists.
As for the captives, they were to be selected from among them to form a captive camp and handed over to the logistics department of the division. These captives were to be in charge of transporting supplies and escorting rations. They were to be placed under the command of a platoon. If one escaped, the entire platoon would be executed.
The rest of the soldiers will be given a cut on their left thighs. We'll bandage their wounds and give them some rations before letting them go home.
Remember to tell them that if we catch them again and they have a scar on their left thigh, we'll cut off their right thumbs, unless they don't fire at us and become our enemy. "
"Boss, I don't understand. Why do we have to make it so complicated?"
Dyavid scratched his head in confusion. "I understand cutting the captives' thighs to prevent them from becoming our enemy, but why do we have to bandage their wounds?
I say we should just cut off their thumbs. That way, they won't be able to hold their guns anymore. "
Claude slapped the back of Dyavid's head. "Just do as I say. Are you stupid? Cut off the thumbs of so many captives? Do you know how many families will hate us for turning their families into cripples?
"Help them bandage their wounds. That way, they'll be more than willing to let you cut them. We don't have to send our own soldiers to do it. We can even let the captives bandage their wounds for us. We don't have to waste any effort on them.
That way, they won't have to worry about being conscripted again. That way, they'll be thankful to us.
"Tell them that we'll cut off their thumbs the next time we catch them unless they don't fire at us. If they don't become our enemy, they'll only think about running away when they face us on the battlefield again.
Think about it. What will happen if they run away? It'll be just like what you did this time. If one of them leads a group, then a group leads all of them. The enemies will all turn and run, and we'll have an easy time. "
Three months of recuperation after a cut was to prevent the captives from becoming soldiers again after a short period of training.
Their ammunition would arrive three months later. By then, no matter how many enemies there were, they would only be cannon fodder and nothing to worry about.
Of course, that was only one layer of insurance. The other layer of insurance was the captive camp. The soldiers could be released, but the officers couldn't.
Without the officers, no one would be able to stop the soldiers from running away. No matter how many people they gathered, they would only end up as a motley crew.
"Go do what you need to do. We can only stay here for two days. We'll leave in two days," Claude said.
We'll split our forces into two groups. Your 2nd Folk will have two men in each group sweep through the 14 prefectures from here to the royal capital. Crush all resistance and deal with the captives as I say. Understood? "
"Hehe, understood, Boss. I'll go do what I need to do," Dyavid said as he slipped away.
Claude just remembered that Nasri had suffered a great deal of damage to their kingdom.
Ever since the start of the Debt War, they'd been ground to the ground by Aueras. Four standing corps invaded the kingdom, only to be met by Reddragon and two royal guard divisions. Only one and a half corps managed to make it back, losing a hundred and fifty to sixty thousand men.
The royal guard even managed to invade their borders, giving the eastern countries an excuse to join forces to invade Aueras.
Nasri suffered heavy losses once more in the border prefectures, losing a hundred thousand men.
Later on, during the battle on the Ibinister Plains, the first line of defense, they lost another hundred thousand men and horses.
Monolith's great victory in Ambrize caused the Nasri army to abandon their armor and flee for their lives. Less than one and a half corps was left.
All in all, Nasri had lost at least four hundred thousand men since the start of the war.
Aueras had suffered more than a million casualties in the five years of war in the Eastern Region, and that was already a huge blow to their foundation.
Nasri, on the other hand, only had a population of sixteen million. Losing more than four hundred thousand men and at least seven corps in less than two years was a huge blow to the kingdom.
Naturally, it also had a lot to do with the widespread use of grenades on the battlefield.
That was especially true in defensive battles where grenades were thrown at each other, resulting in heavy casualties.
Had it not been for the fact that Aueras were on the verge of collapse, Nasri wouldn't have persevered like that. They would have continued to conscript their troops and rely on Shiks to send their corps to the frontlines.
Now that Dyavid led two corps to defeat the newly formed 18th Corps, all that was left in Nasri were two newly-formed corps that were said to be waiting for Shiksan reinforcements.
That meant that Nasri had lost seven corps in the invasion of Aueras, the 18th Corps and the Nasri Royal Guard Corps that Berklin had annihilated during his raid on Polivisia Capital. It could be said that Nasri had lost nine corps in total.
Now, there were only three standing corps in Aueras and two newly formed corps waiting for Shiks' reinforcements. The three corps in Aueras wouldn't be able to make it back in half a month, and it wasn't even certain if they'd even make it back.
As for the two newly formed corps, they wouldn't pose much of a threat to Claude's Thundercrash unless Shiks reinforcements arrived.
So, Claude could easily clear out Nasri's garrisons in the various prefectures and reduce Nasri's combat potential. There was no need for him to gather his troops and head to Polivisia cautiously.
Even though Nasri had always been Aueras's mortal enemy, a dog without teeth wouldn't be much of a threat. What Claude needed to do was to pull out all the teeth Nasri had left.
Two days later, the four light cavalry divisions of 2nd Division set out in all directions, sweeping through the prefectures of the Nasrian Kingdom.
As Claude expected, none of the garrisons could withstand Thundercrash's ambush and all the towns fell.
However, 2nd Folk didn't occupy any of the towns. They followed Claude's orders to capture the officers and release the soldiers after cutting their left thighs. The nobles and officials in the towns were searched for their belongings. After that was done, they moved on to the next place.
However, the division Claude was in was getting more and more overstaffed. More and more carriages and captives were added to the caravan, so much so that it attracted the attention of quite a few people.
Bang! Bang! Bang! The sound of gunfire could be heard in the distance, followed by the sound of the new rifles.
Not long after, a messenger came to report the situation. "General, the scouting party was ambushed by the enemy. One died and three were injured. The enemy left more than 20 corpses in our counterattack and fled. According to our investigation, they should be a resistance force formed by the local prefectures. The scale of the ambush should be around a hundred people."
It wasn't the first time something like this had happened. Due to the confiscation of the properties of the nobles and officials in the conquered towns, the local prefectures of Nasri started to form their own resistance forces.
It was as if they were facing a civil war. The resistance forces didn't dare to target the four light cavalry regiments of 2nd Folk. Instead, they set their sights on Claude's large logistics unit.
Not only was he picking on the soft persimmon, but he also wanted to make some money from this place.
It was a pity that the resistance forces didn't understand the essence of guerrilla warfare. Claude sighed and decided to use his trump card. After all, the resistance forces were too disgusting. They would circle around him like mosquitoes and suck his blood whenever he wasn't paying attention.
Claude decided to kill the resistance forces so that they wouldn't be an eyesore in front of him.
"Mason, Hughes, tell Bloweyk that his Wolffang Brigade can be mobilized.
I don't want to hear any more news about the resistance forces plotting against us. He can do whatever he wants. As long as it's a resistance force, don't let it go, "Claude ordered.
The rest of the journey was an unforgettable one for the transport team and the captives they were escorting.
Corpses hung from the trees on both sides of the road from time to time. All of them had the words "Death to Resistance" written on them in fresh blood.
It was obvious that this was the work of the Wolf Fang Brigade.
Claude didn't hear any more news about the resistance forces until they reached the capital of Polyvicia.
Using Wolffang Brigade to deal with the resistance forces was like killing a chicken with a butcher's knife.
But it did make things a little quieter. The only thing that worried Claude was his younger brother, Bloweyk. Adele's death made him even more bloodthirsty. He became even crazier on the battlefield and didn't care about his own life.
Perhaps after this war was over, he could return to the Overseas Dominion, go to his sister Anna's ranch, and spend some time with his twin sons and daughters. That way, he would be able to reduce the hostility in his heart …
Berklin held a welcoming ceremony in Polyvicia to welcome Claude and 2nd Folk. He even ordered 1st Folk to send out a battalion each to hold a small military parade for Claude to inspect.
This was a blatant attempt to show off his achievements and humiliate Nasri. The way he saw it, the Eastern Alliance had held a military parade after taking over the royal capital anyway, so he had to do the same thing.
On the 6th of May, year 6000 of the Sacred Light Calendar, Claude led 2nd Folk through 16 prefectures of Nasri and finally met up with 1st Folk in the capital of Polyvicia.