"It was me! I killed him!"
George’s hand trembled uncontrollably on his rifle, its barrel still radiating a faint heat.
Word had it that this battle had drawn the intense scrutiny of the kingdom's high-ranking lords, even unfolding right under His Majesty’s watchful eyes. Naturally, no one dared to steal this merit.
The hobgoblins and tieflings standing nearby glared at George with looks filled with envy and even jealousy. Their eyes were bloodshot with bitter regret, as if they wanted to swallow the human alive.
"Damn it..."
"It was actually him."
"Lucky bastard. Just you wait."
Yet they could only indulge in such thoughts. Otherwise, the overseer's whip would swiftly remind them what absolute military discipline meant.
After all, this was a count of House Bosque, the supreme commander of the coalition army. A feat of this scale was enough to earn an ennoblement, yet it had been snatched right out from under their noses by a mere human.
"Hahaha... I... I killed him!"
George muttered to himself, visions already surfacing in his mind of a meteoric rise through the ranks, of becoming one of the dragonblood nobility. All the hardships and trials he had endured before were nothing compared to the sweetness of this success.
And as Loren Bosque fell dead before his rifle, that deep-seated inferiority born of his serf origins vanished into thin air.
It seemed those self-important noble lords were nothing special after all.
Even the most powerful Bosque noble in the Northlands was still just flesh and blood incapable of withstanding a bullet, no different from "gray cattle" born into serfdom like himself.
Loren’s death completely broke the Bosque heavy cavalry.
Dense gunfire rattled on all sides. As far as the eye could see, the soldiers of the Kingdom of Cinders advanced, mowing down the enemy like scythes through chives.
The spear-and-shield infantry and crossbowmen behind them were likewise on the verge of total collapse. Kingdom infantry and kobold regiments struck them in a pincer attack from front and rear, while elite skirmishers launched surprise raids from the flanks. The seemingly solid defensive works were riddled full of holes like a sieve, points of breach erupting across the positions as fanatical kingdom soldiers charged everywhere.
Worse still, having lost their supreme commander while flanked from front and back, these elites from the various northern realms could only scatter blindly through the positions like headless flies. Whatever resistance they mustered failed to make even a ripple.
Before long, this stubborn force was encircled in a pocket by the kingdom’s troops and completely annihilated.
Thus ended the Battle of Afton without the slightest hitch, most of the Kingdom of Cinders’ casualties coming from friendly fire.
Not even the kingdom's soldiers took this battle seriously, some even feeling it had ended far too quickly to be satisfying. Likely the only one puffed up with pride and leaping with joy was George, who had struck pure gold.
***
The war marched on, advancing at a startling pace.
Under the decisions of the kingdom’s General Staff and the orders of Marshal Duoluo, the kingdom’s armies split into three spearheads, launching ferocious offensives to the west, east, and south.
They were confident in their ability to crush the opposition even with divided forces, maximizing their military efficiency.
This was tactically contemptuous, yet they possessed the sheer might to back it up.
In recent years, with the infiltration of the "Nocturne" division, the military situation of the northern nations had been laid bare before the kingdom, stripped of all secrets.
The high-ranking staff officers of the kingdom had long since produced various analytical reports, explicitly pointing out that the Northern United Kingdom—with its thousand-year heritage and seemingly massive bulk—was nothing more than a feeble, frail "giant infant" before a kingdom that had undergone a magical industrial revolution. The only opponent warranting slight caution was the martial Principality of Bosque in the south.
And so, the horns of the advance blared in full force.
A combined legion composed primarily of two human reserve infantry divisions, a kobold cannon-fodder brigade, and dozens of wyverns surged west. Across the flat, open expanse of the Barash Great Plain in the eastern Principality of Carter, they tore through the coalition's defensive line of roughly forty thousand men with irresistible momentum.
Like a blade thrust directly into the heart, the rapid, deep-penetrating force formed by infantry and air units swiftly shattered and encircled the antiquated, sprawling coalition army.
Meanwhile, a legion composed primarily of two lizardfolk mixed cavalry-infantry divisions, a goblin cannon-fodder brigade, nearly a hundred wyverns, and an ogre grand cannon battalion drove eastward. Leaning on their absolute firepower advantage, they cleanly smashed open the coalition defenses entrenched along major rivers and treacherous mountain passes.
Immediately afterward, following the battle plan, this legion abandoned all heavy baggage and pushed light into enemy territory. In just a few days, they drove sixty kilometers deep into the Principality of Fano, swiftly reaching the eastern border of Anzeta and setting about pocketing the garrisons in every region.
Even more terrifying, projections of Cassius's speech were broadcast across Anzeta by wyverns, leaving countless northern nobles trembling in fear.
To make matters worse, the "Fireseed" movement led by the players swept across the northern nations in rapid succession, kicking up a furious storm.
These rebel forces possessed extraordinarily stubborn willpower, were commanded by imaginative players, and were equipped with weapon aid from the Kingdom of Cinders. This forced the nobility to dispatch large numbers of private retainers to suppress them, scattering a considerable portion of their strength.
The fall of the northern principalities seemed to be merely a matter of time.
Yet they still clung to one final hope—the Principality of Bosque.
There stood the fearless "Lion of the North," Grand Duke Leo; there stood the Lionheart Knights, who had forged countless glorious achievements; and there gathered reinforcements from across the Feanso Continent, the Material Plane, and even the Outer Planes.
They had gathered the hopes and strength of everyone under the old northern order, hoping to smash the main forces of the Kingdom of Cinders in a single stroke and slay the terrible red dragon that had brought calamity to the Northlands.
The staff officers of the Kingdom of Cinders were naturally well aware of this, and both sides found themselves aligned in intent.
Thus, over a hundred Redscale Conquerors, one hundred and fifty-three Dragon Oath Paladins, a grand artillery brigade formed of over a thousand ogres, over ten thousand elite hobgoblin and tiefling infantry, over a dozen chimeras, twenty armored land drakes, more than six hundred wyverns, nearly thirty thousand dragon-blooded kobolds, and all Starfallen brigades belonging to the kingdom assembled together. Forming the kingdom's massive main army, they advanced grandly toward the south.
They had only one objective—the largest city in the Principality of Bosque, the earliest city established during the historical Scanian Migration, and the nominal capital of the Northern United Kingdom for a thousand years: Stravburg, the "City of the Lion."
***
The army of the Kingdom of Cinders marched forward, the earth trembling beneath their tread, sending birds scattering in panic all around.
Everywhere hung the sound of heavy breathing, the muffled rumble of wheels rolling over snow, and the ponderous footsteps of the land drakes.
Within the marching ranks, Mezrolash turned his head, casting a meaningful glance at the blond youth beside him.
"Andre, we'll soon be facing your father. Do you have any thoughts on that?"
"None," the blond youth answered flatly.
Mezrolash smiled, shaking his head as he murmured, "To tell you the truth, I still don't understand why, after living in Northwind Keep for a time, you chose to commit yourself to the kingdom. You are a descendant of Bosque, the beloved son of Duke Leo."
"..."
Andre fell silent for a long moment before gazing into the distance with a resolute expression.
"For the oath in my heart. There will always be things in this world more important than power."
"Besides, I haven't committed myself to the Kingdom of Cinders."
"After living there these past few years, I see things very clearly. Your kingdom is hardly a good thing. But... at the very least, it's far better than a Northlands rotten to the core, with pus running straight through to the bone."
"Heh."
Mezrolash let out another chuckle and spoke no further. The tiefling leader looked as though he had just heard something rather amusing.
This was a race to the bottom, and the kingdom had undeniably won.
Chapter 311