Volume 7 - Chapter 104
We should retreat
The Candra Empire’s expedition force commander Duke Makaros looked at the combat report in his hand. His face that already had skin was completely black because of the dark look on his face and the overcast skies.
The atmosphere in the tent was frozen and everyone was silent, not even daring to let out their breath. They were afraid of catching Duke Makaros’ attention and causing the volcano to explode.
However…..the volcano would explode still whether you wanted it to or not.
After a while, Duke Makaros put down the combat report and narrowed his eyes to look over the other Candra Empire army officers. Seeing them all lower their heads, he let out a snort.
The officers in the tent couldn’t help tremble.
In the Candra Empire’s army, other than the Marshal Duke Campbell Sudman, Duke Makaros was the one with the highest position and prestige.
This time the Candra Empire army had him personally lead this expeditionary force into the Rudson Kingdom, there was no doubt how important this battle was to them.
Now at the first step, the Candra Empire’s army had slammed their heads.
They had divided into six forces that attacked the Rudson Kingdom from six directions, but they had suffered a serious loss in just three days.
The smallest loss was the Saint Regiment who took the fourth front, but they were still ambushed by the Rudson Kingdom army. They had lost four thousand troops and there were ten thousand lightly and heavily injured troops. Out of the thirty thousand troops of the Sacred Regiment, they had lost close to half of their battle power.
The most serious losses were the third front’s Golden Eagle Knight Regiment and the Scarlet Sun Regiment.
The Golden Eagle Knight Regiment had lost ten thousand troops who had either died or were seriously injured, which cut their numbers in half.
The Scarlet Sun Regiment’s losses were a bit lower. They only had seven thousand casualties and not that many heavily injured people, only accounting for around two thousand troops which proved how brutal the battlefield they were on was.
Moreover, in comparison, the losses in terms of troops wasn’t as serious as the loss in equipment for these two regiments.
The Golden Eagle Knight Regiment had lost a total of sixty three large transport Magic Cars and eighty nine of the most important Magic Cannons. The strongest firepower that the Golden Eagle Knight Regiment had been known for had basically been destroyed.
The Scarlet Sun Regiment’s losses were simpler. One hundred of the five hundred large transport Magic Cars that they had were destroyed in the battle and there were two hundred that couldn’t operate anymore because of issues caused by the battle.
This caused the Scarlet Sun Regiment that relied on the large transport Magic Cars to be known as the most mobile regiment to lose their reputation.
The most awful thing was that since the Candra Empire had broken relations with the Frestech Chamber of Commerce, the Frestech Chamber of Commerce had taken back many services for the Candra Empire.
When it came to the large transport Magic Cars, there wasn’t a single Frestech Chamber of Commerce maintenance department in the Candra Empire.
These large transport Magic Cars were all bought from the Frestech Chamber of Commerce and now that they were broken, they couldn’t have the Frestech Chamber of Commerce come fix them, so they could only fix them themselves.
But even if the Candra Empire had some companies study the large transport Magic Cars in secret and they had some success, it was impossible for their technology to match the level of the Frestech Chamber of Commerce.
Moreover, even if they could repair them, the Candra Empire couldn’t find any components to repair them with.
With the current magic machine industry standard of the Candra Empire, they couldn’t make these components themselves.
So like this, the Scarlet Sun Regiment had lost most of their battle power.
Summarizing the battles of the six different fronts, they had sent one hundred and thirty thousand people, but in just a single battle, they had lost forty thousand troops and various different equipment. This was close to losing half their battle power.
This caused the Candra Empire’s army to be shocked.
Even if they didn’t expect this battle to be easy because the Frestech Chamber of Commerce was certain to support the Rudson Kingdom.
They never thought that it would be this difficult. In just the first exchange, the Candra Empire had suffered such a serious loss.
The most important thing was that the Rudson Kingdom’s losses were close to zero!
Because from beginning to end, out of the six armies with a total of one hundred and thirty thousand people, not a single person had had a real clash with the Rudson Kingdom army.
In other words, the Candra Empire army’s side had been passively beaten from beginning to end, not able to find the Rudson Kingdom army at all.
This matter had shocked everyone on the Candra Empire side and even created a bit of alarm.
But this wasn’t what surprised them the most.
The thing that the Candra Empire army cared about the most was with the third army.
The Golden Eagle Knight Regiment and the Scarlet Sun Regiment hadn’t been ambushed and had faced the Rudson Kingdom army on the plains, but they had still suffered such a heavy casualty.
This result meant that the greatest advantage of the Candra Empire army had become useless.
The Rudson Kingdom army didn’t send that many people and could beat the Candra Empire army that was several times bigger, but the Candra Empire army wasn’t able to cause them any losses.
This meant that the battle power of the two sides weren’t on the same level and it didn’t matter how many soldiers there were.
If the Rudson Kingdom could maintain this kind of battle power, the Candra Empire wouldn’t have any hopes of accomplishing anything.
Duke Makaros thought with a dark look for a bit before suddenly turning to look at the Golden Eagle Knight Regiment’s commander Gerald to the left of him.
“Gerald, tell me, what was with the strange looking Magic Car that you encountered?”
Hearing this question, Gerald could clearly see those monsters that he met on the battlefield and he couldn’t help revealing a look of terror.
Even if the battle was three days ago, he could still feel a deep helpless feeling when he thought about it now.
When he first saw the strange looking Magic Cars, Gerald only had a bit of doubt and ordered his Magic Cannons to attack.
But the strange looking Magic Cars used facts to tell him that they weren’t on the same level.
Even with the Golden Eagle Knight Regiment and the Scarlet Sun Regiment firing their personal Magic Bazookas and Magic Cannons at them, the light barrier of those strange looking Magic Cars had easily blocked all their attacks before firing back at them. This was what caused the heavy casualties with the Golden Eagle Knight Regiment and the Scarlet Sun Regiment.
With such a difference in battle power, Gerald even suspected that those fellows from the Frestech Chamber of Commerce were devils from another world!
However, this was just an illusion. The facts were that the Frestech Chamber of Commerce had these terrifying military magic machines that were like devils that no one knew how to defeat.
Hearing Duke Makaros asking him about this matter, Gerald opened his mouth in a daze for a while and he still didn’t know how to describe them after a while.
Seeing Gerald sitting there in a daze, Duke Makaros gave a dissatisfied snort.
“What? Gerald, have you become a fool after being beaten by the Rudson Kingdom’s people? If you’re afraid, then scram back to the empire for me right now, don’t stay here and embarrass yourself!”
Gerald trembled before waking up and quickly shaking his head, “No, no, no, Lord Duke, I wasn’t…..It’s just that when you asked about those strange looking Magic Cars…..I didn’t know how to describe them, but……I really can’t think of way to deal with them.”
“You mean that it’s impossible for us to win if we encounter those things?” Duke Makaros raised a brow and asked this.
Seeing the dark meaning in Duke Makaros’ gaze, Gerald could only give a bitter laugh and a nod.
“Yes, Lord Duke. I feel that if we encounter these things, we really don’t have a way to resist those terrifying things.”
Hearing this response, the other regiment commanders couldn’t help revealing surprised looks.
Although most of the other commanders had fought against the Rudson Kingdom and had also suffered heavy losses, they knew that the Rudson Kingdom had those powerful military magic machines that they were helpless against.
For Gerald to say that they couldn’t resist this “strange looking Magic Car” at all, wasn’t this just too much?
Could it be that this kid Gerald wanted to exaggerate the enemy’s power because of his tragic loss to conceal the fact that the battle was lost because of his own incompetence?
If the Scarlet Sun Regiment’s commander Narolov wasn’t still unconscious and unable to participate in this meeting, would he have said the same thing as Gerald?
Duke Makaros was clearly very unhappy with the response Gerald gave him and after giving a strong snort, he said, “Gerald, based on your words, shouldn’t we retreat immediately? We can’t beat the enemy anyways, right?”
Everyone could hear the taunting tone in his voice. However, after Gerald thought about it for a bit, he gave a strong nod and replied with a serious look, “Yes, Lord Duke. I feel…..that we don’t have the ability to deal with this situation, so it’s a wise choice to retreat right now.”
Duke Makaros was filled with rage as he slapped the table beside him. He pointed at Gerald and scolded, “Gerald, if you hurt the morale of the troops again, do you believe I won’t execute you as per military law?”
Gerald still wanted to say a few things, but another officer beside him pulled at his arm and stopped him.
Seeing that Gerald lowered his head and didn’t say anything else, Duke Makaros gave a cold snort before looking over everyone. He said with a dark look, “We are the Candra Empire’s army. Since we have come on the offensive, if we don’t accomplish anything, we can’t retreat! If anyone else wants to lower the morale of the troops, don’t blame me for showing no mercy!”
All the military officers agreed to this.
“Now we’ll talk about our next plans. Look at this……”
Duke Makaros walked over to a map on the wall of the tent and was about to say something when the tent flap suddenly opened. One of Duke Makaros’ personal guards who was in charge of sending messages rushed in with a look of panic on his face.
Before Duke Makaros could even ask him anything, that personal guard fell onto one knee in front of Duke Makaros and said with a panicked look, “Lord……My lord, we’ve just received news that Severn City has just been attacked by an unknown army……”
Everyone in the tent revealed shocked looks.
Severn City was their logistics depot, which was the foundation of their expeditionary force. Now that Severn City had been ambushed, that meant…..
“What about the supply depot?” Duke Makaros quickly asked.
“The supply depot…..During the ambush…..the depot was completely destroyed……”
When the personal guard gave this answer, the tent fell into complete silence.