The Duke’s Eldest Son Escaped to the Military (134)
Translator: ChubbyCheeks
46 West’s Frontlines in Crisis (2)
Iron’s Special Mobile Unit was finally about to move after a short training.
They were the only unit that was specialized and allowed to move outside of the Northeast’s jurisdiction.
Everyone was looking forward to their performance after hearing the news that they would be moving despite their troops consisting mostly of rookies. This could mostly be attributed to Iron’s huge contributions in the Great Northern War with just rookies under his command.
However, they were all still very worried.
[ The Western Frontlines’ Collapse. ]
All of the people were aware of this fact after reading the article in the newspaper.
With the release of this news, the Northern Army urgently began to gather troops and dispatch reinforcements. Even the Northern Territorial Lords moved and added some of their forces.
If the West had been breached, then the North would also be affected. That was why they were trying to send support. The Northeast would also send support and had decided to send Iron’s Special Mobile Unit first.
However, no news came from the other regions.
The reason for their silence was revealed later on and was mainly because they were also having a hard time on their own. The South was facing their own crisis while the East was still busy dealing with their own problems.
“They came from the Center?”
“This doesn’t even make sense?”
“What is the Center doing?”
The people of the Empire were furious. They were angry that the Center’s shit all flocked to the regions whose armies were already having difficulties and made their fronts collapse. But even if the masses demanded their explanations, the Central officers maintained their silence. They kept their mouths shut even after countless people flocked to the government office. As this fact became known, newspapers began reporting about a huge secret that the public was not aware of.
“It seems like they can’t explain.”
Iron smirked as he folded the newspaper neatly and placed it beside him.
Vwoong~ vwoong~
Accompanied by the sound of the airship’s mana stone, they finally finished their preparations and had begun heading to the West. They had prepared a huge airship to fly and move a brigade-level unit. The Drake Unit had also finished their preparations perfectly.
“You will turn 20 once you reach the Western frontlines… what a shame.”
Cardro spoke bitterly.
Just like he said, Iron was about to turn 20. Cardro, Ariel and Carl were all turning 20 soon too.
“It seems like we’ll arrive at the Western front exactly when my age changes.”
Everyone smiled bitterly when they saw Iron speaking bitterly too.
“Hoo… To be honest, my age changing to 20 doesn’t mean much. It doesn’t really matter, what’s important is information about our enemies.”
Everyone nodded heavily at Iron’s words.
‘Death Corps.’
Iron had asked for information from Command. The problem was the fact that the information kept on changing.
When he heard that an undead unit had appeared, he thought that this battlefield would be a bit easier than the others. However, new information came in. It seemed like the beings that they thought to be simple zombies actually sucked people’s blood while being able to use illusion techniques.
‘Then, vampires?’
But they weren’t those too.
He heard that they could also spit out poison and reattach their cut off limbs over and over again, just like a zombie. And if they drank blood, they would also be able to regenerate their cut off limbs. These bastards seemed to have the combined advantages of the undead and the vampires.
‘Then, are they chimeras?’
This thought flashed in his head. However, it was hard to conclude that they were chimeras especially when there were no traces of their bodies being combined together, the chimera’s major characteristic, nor did they have any time limit from the side-effects of joining different bodies together.
Since they still did not know where these bastards came from or what kind of beings they are, it had now become a huge problem.
“I’m having a headache.”
He had no choice but to move carefully since he had never experienced this in his previous life.
‘I’ve fought with a lot of undead but… if they are just similar to them then it doesn’t make sense for the West to struggle this much when fighting against them.’
The undead had appeared countless times in the Empire’s history so their characteristics were already described in detail. The armies were also fully armed with their basic information. The same was true for vampires. Vampires had vastly different powers depending on their blood. Generally, pure blooded vampires were stronger than those that weren’t of pure blood. And even though they had different attributes, their weaknesses were basically the same.
However, for them to be pushed back like this meant that the weaknesses that they were already aware of were not working properly.
“We found monsters one hour away from us.”
“Their size?”
Iron hurriedly got up from his seat and walked forward after hearing the sudden report.
“Amazing.”
“Is it the new monsters?”
“I don’t think so?”
The officer in charge of the airship hurriedly showed the mana ball to Iron. The reflection on the mana ball was truly only showing monsters. The problem was that they were urgently moving somewhere. It looked similar to a monster wave.
“They’re running away. Towards the North?”
“That seems to be the case.”
Iron looked at the mana ball seriously. Everyone looking at the mana ball were aware that there should be something more powerful that made these monsters run away.
‘The bastards harassing the Center?’
Dark clouds suddenly flocked from afar as black fog began to spread from the ground.
Iron stood up from his seat when he saw the green light shining from within the black fog.
“Go and get ready for battle.”
“Yes, sir!”
The officers immediately moved hurriedly after hearing Iron’s command.
Iron continued to look at the mana ball. He soon saw strange beings appearing from inside the black fog to catch the escaping monsters.
“Undead? No.”
Seeing their movements, one would simply conclude that they were the undead. But they were also using magic.
What was more shocking was the fact that it weren’t just the liches or the skeleton mages who used magic, all of these strange beings inside the black fog could use magic albeit only at a crude level. They were also able to restore their bodies that got cut off from the monsters’ counterattack by sucking the monsters’ blood. In other words, they had little to no chance of dying unless their cores were completely destroyed.
In addition, it seemed like they were able to revive some of the monsters since they had the undead’s characteristics. And by using that special characteristic, they were able to continuously raise their troops.
Just like what Iron had expected, they seemed to have both the characteristics of the vampires and the undead.
“Will holy power work?”
Both of the characteristics that he was able to personally identify were weak to holy power. The problem was that the Central Army was probably aware of it. But the fact that the unknown corps were able to breach their line and come all the way here meant that using holy power was not effective.
Therefore, he needed to have more accurate information before he could make his own judgement.
“Should I go and check it out personally?”
Iron muttered to himself as he approached the door of the airship.
“Open it.”
“Yes? But we’re too high…”
“It doesn’t matter. Open it.”
The soldier hurriedly opened the door at Iron’s orders. Then, Iron free-falled from the airship.
“Owl!”
― Hooooot!
Two Moons appeared at Iron’s call. It quickly picked him up as they began to glide slowly.
Thump!
His heart began to thump wildly the moment he jumped off the airship and approached the unknown corps. At the same time, his stigmata ached and emitted light as it immediately released his holy power. It was as if it saw something that shouldn’t exist as it expressed strong dissatisfaction through every fiber of his being towards these unknown beings.
The same was true for Two Moons, a divine beast.
― Hooooot!
Two Moons’ eagerness to slaughter and extinguish them immediately rang in his head.
“Hold on. I have to check something.”
Iron appeased Two Moons who was just about ready to sweep them away immediately and released his holy power immediately.
The black fog was immediately purified as the sanctuary that appeared in the North plenty of times had been created here as well. Because of that, the beings hiding in the black fog appeared one after the other.
The beings were all covered with black energy while their eyes emitted green light.
“So, you’re resisting?”
He thought that they would have already been purified and turned to dust with his holy power but it seemed like they still survived. The only thing that disappeared was the black fog. This meant that holy power did not work on them.
“Hmm… Is it because of the flow of the holy power?”
Iron mumbled to himself as he released a stronger holy power.
Then, some of the bastards on the outskirts finally reacted.
Iron frowned after seeing that some of the weaker ones had broken down after the black fog surrounding their bodies had suddenly disappeared.
Holy power does work.
However, it had no overwhelming advantage on them unlike on the undead or the vampires.
“Resistance to holy power…”
Some of them tried to spit poison at them but Two Moons was able to move sleekly to avoid them.
Their magic wasn’t that high-leveled but that did not matter. Thankfully, the vampire’s charm magic wasn’t being expressed due to the sanctuary. At the very least, he was certain that holy power was working against those.
“Let’s first grab some and experiment on them…”
Iron mumbled to himself as he went to the ship’s captain and ordered them to fire at them.
Not long after, bombs and artillery began to rain down from the airship as the surrounding area was devastated. At the same time, Cardro’s aerial assault unit also began to attack them. The Drake Unit flew out to protect the airship as some of them landed and let off the troops one after the other.
But maybe it was because it was their first actual battle? Everyone was moving creakily and made small mistakes one after the other.
Iron summoned his divine beasts to cover for their mistakes.
Iron’s divine beasts’ overwhelming strength drew enough attention from their opponents. In addition, Iron himself went down and cut the monsters personally so the troops were given enough time to reorganize themselves and go into their formation.
The sound of the bombs exploding resonated in the area.
Bang! Bang!
“Tch!”
Iron clicked his tongue as he looked at his faltering troops.
Even though they did not train for long, he thought that they would probably be a bit composed since they received intense training from him. But all he could do was sigh as he watched the unit leaders fail to unite together. The knights, the rangers, the aerial units and the rest of the troops were all busy taking care of themselves.
They might be a brigade-level unit but they weren’t very large in an army’s point of view. It would be extremely difficult for their unit to play a big role in this battlefield if they couldn’t even unite and fight as one.
“There are more than one or two things that needed to be corrected but…”
Iron sighed as he swung his sword.
They needed to annihilate the enemies in front of them first.
When the divine beasts and Iron’s sanctuary had weakened their enemies, the troops were finally able to perform well despite this being their first actual battle as a brigade.
The knights went into formation and broke the enemies’ defense line.
The rangers gradually reduced the number of their enemies by killing the escaping enemies one by one.
The aerial assault unit appeared in the rear and prevented the enemies from concentrating in one place.
Everyone fought the enemies by dutifully following their roles.
Their enemies could regenerate even if their limbs or torso were cut off but they still failed to endure and withstand the power of the sanctuary and eventually died.
“If it weren’t for the sanctuary, things would have been tricky.”
Ariel mumbled to herself as she blew off the head of the enemy who had tried to do a surprise attack on her.
The same opinion ran through the heads of the other leaders.
Their regeneration was significantly slowed down thanks to the extreme power of the sanctuary and eventually caused their deaths. However, compared to the undead and the vampires, they felt a strong and powerful vitality in these new monsters until the very end.
“What the hell are these bastards…”
Cardro muttered to himself and frowned as he split the body of the monster in front of him once again.
Everyone felt flustered as they made sure to thoroughly kill the enemy.
Their charm magic was crude and the dark magic that they used was weak enough that the soldiers could beat them. Even the poison that they spit out from time to time was also at a level that the soldiers and their shields could endure.
This was only possible since they had been weakened by the sanctuary.
― Uwoooooo!
“Is it near the heart? They’re also on the joints. I believe these black beads are the cause but… Seeing traces of forced surgeries… it’s weird.”
Iron found out the cause of their regenerative powers after catching one of the monsters and chopping up its body. The monster remained alive despite being chopped up roughly but immediately collapsed and died when he smashed the black bead on its head.
“Maybe I’ll understand if I catch more of them?”
Iron suddenly spoke to the bastards that surrounded him.
Although they were dressed like other men and aristocrats, they were all emitting black energy. Perhaps it was their power that caused that black fog. But their power still fell short in front of Iron.
Just like any other apostle, the enormous holy power emanating from his stigmata was able to quickly purify the black energy from their bodies.
― Apostle… apostle!
― Let’s die together!
Knowing that their full strength would not work, all of them rushed forward from all sides.
Bang!
The commanders self-destructed and caused an explosion of blood. But maybe it was because his body was denying the power in their blood? Most of them were easily purified while the rest were greatly weakened from the power of the explosion that they weren’t able to penetrate through his steel mana.
“What a pity.”
Iron looked at the commanders that exploded in blood with regret. However, Iron did not dwell on them. After all, there were still many unknown beings that had not yet died.
Iron’s lips curled up into a grin at the thought of finishing this battle quickly and experimenting on them.
‘Knowledge is power.’
That was the foundation that allowed him to survive until the end of his previous life. And to gain that, Iron immediately gave his orders.
“Don’t kill all of them. Capture them! We need to find out their weaknesses.”
The troops, who were about to wipe out the enemy, began to capture their enemies one by one at Iron’s orders.
Once the commanders had disappeared, the weaker ones were easily captured by the troops.
Iron smiled brightly once all of the battles were over.
Although they showed their inexperience, they were still able to win the war without any losses. Even though they fought in a battle where they had the overwhelming advantage, it was still meaningful since there were no deaths in their ranks.
So, to celebrate his brigade’s first victory, he ordered his men to set up a temporary camp and told them to take a break.
While the troops were celebrating their victory, Iron went ahead and found the ones that they had captured and left alive.
“Hoo… Is it my time to have some fun now?”
Iron smiled as he pulled a knife out.
“Shall we start with the heart? I wonder how weak you can get once I take out the core in your heart… I’m very curious.”
***
