Volume 3 – The Place Where My Heart Feels At Peace, Chapter 40: Reinforcements
Bao Zhengcheng practically couldn’t believe his own eyes! Were they going to make it past the night just like that? He was suddenly struck with excitement. If they could pass this night, that meant that reinforcements would be nearly here!
In the past two battles, they had managed to cause the allied forces of the dark races to suffer massive losses, especially towards their high-value warriors. Faced with such a weakened force, the expeditionary army only needed to send forth a single regiment to rout them.
“We won!”
“Reinforcements! The reinforcements are almost here!”
Scattered cheering came from every corner of the ruins, and the remaining soldiers came out one after another, and began to congregate as well as restore the command hierarchy. This was necessary for their survival.
Once the soldiers had fully regrouped, Qianye found that less than two hundred of them were still capable of fighting. The camp commandant had long since died, and here and now among the officers, only he was of rank. Qianye hence took on the mantle of command. With Bao Zhengcheng’s help, he regrouped the various combat units, and arranged for their defensive positions, finally having them rest and recuperate and to wait it out.
As time passed second by second, the gray sky began to slowly brighten, and all of the soldiers were filled with hope, anxiously awaiting the sound of gunfire from outside. As the first ray of sunlight fell upon the little town, it was already ten in the morning. But the gloom that had settled on everyone’s hearts got even heavier. The entirety of the outside was completely quiet.
From the camp of the dark races’ allied force would occasionally come some miscellaneous noises, followed by a howling mountain wind, and it made the little town feel even colder and quieter.
Had the humans’ defensive lines really been thoroughly destroyed? Had they destroyed more than their defensive point, just thirty kilometers deeper in, there was a human gathering point, and Earth Castle housed the houses of many soldiers.
Whereas Qianye and Bao Zhengcheng’s hearts were weighed down by another heavy rock—that fake military intelligence. Just who had brought that? Were they from the 131st, or the entire defensive camp?
In the afternoon, on the wasteland, a light jeep was currently rushing towards the station of the 60th Division. The driver was Ye Muwei, and sitting shotgun was Gu Liyu.
Gu Liyu lowered his head to look at the sundial that was fuelled by origin power in his palm, his face impassive. He didn’t say a single word, and yet, it was precisely this that caused Ye Muwei to feel even more nervous, accelerating the jeep.
In front of them, the base of the 60th Division had begun to appear on the horizon.
After showing their IDs, the all-terrain jeep smoothly entered through the front gates. But once they entered the camp, Gu Liyu’s face changed. The entire base was empty, and of the prepared materiel, the armored cars, the tanks, etc. more than half was missing. Worse still, the soldiers had seemingly vanished. This entire campground was only guarded by a single battalion.
Gu Liyu grabbed hold of an officer that was close by, and almost roared into his ear. “What is all this! Where’re the forces! Where have they all gone?”
That particular officer had nearly been suffocated to death, and almost reached for his gun. It was only then that Gu Liyu noticed that he had put too much force into his hands, and rapidly calmed down, stated his ID, and requested to see the highest-ranking officer that was still on base.
An instant later, a colonel came running over to explain the whole story to Gu Liyu.
After hearing him, Gu Liyu spoke with a far milder tone. “So what you’re telling me is, Miss Qiqi used her authority as someone from the Ministry of Military Affairs, and directly moved the entirety of the 60th Division?”
“That’s exactly it, sir.” The colonel’s face was ingratiating, and although his experience and military rank were greater than this young officer, but he didn’t dare to offend anyone from the Ministry of Military Affairs. Readily filling in the details, Miss Qiqi had come in the dead of night, requested for the entirety of the 60th Division to mobilize, and to move out before noon. Among them, the high-level officers and the special forces teams followed Miss Qiqi to leave half an hour earlier.
Gu Liyu had already fully recovered himself at this point, and only dully said, “but I had already given the orders previously, to request for the 60th Division.” To not obey the military laws of the Empire was a major offense for the units.
The colonel continued laughing nervously, and seemed to be on the urge of bowing for forgiveness. “But Miss Qiqi had come personally, and we were completely unable to refuse her.”
Ye Muwei at this point cut in very inappropriately. “What did Miss want to move the 60th Division for?”
Nobody answered.
The colonel’s head was in a muddle, but Gu Liyu knew full well that it was. At this instant, his mind turned towards another thought, saluting the former Jing Hall Madam who had passed away fifteen years, but never ever let the influence and power that she had brought out of the Song family fall into the hands of the Yin. It was still firmly concentrated within the hands of Yin Qiqi.
The sun moved through the sky, and then, as it went behind the edge of an overhead continent, the sky began to gradually darken. As it dimmed, other than just the survivors within the fort, it also cast a shade over the mood of the commander of the allied forces.
Baron Mike was impatiently pacing back and forth in place, and his overflowing anger had no outlets. This whole day, he had not even stopped for even an hour. Although the mutiny had been suppressed for now, the dark clouds were almost going to squeeze the allied forces’ base until it popped, and nobody could say if the next moment was going to explode into even more chaos.
In the middle of the tent, were several werewolf bodies, and one look would tell anyone that they had been drained completely of blood. All of the werewolves were staring daggers at the baron. That black-haired werewolf was even more irate, and he even growled in a low tone.
The black-haired werewolf’s body was covered in wounds, most of them caused by vampire longswords. In the brawl, he alone had suppressed two Blood Esquires, and had almost taken the life of one of them.
Baron Mike’s head hurt, but he knew what he had to say. “I trust that this was definitely not the work of my warriors! Because we would never—”
He instinctively and habitually almost blurted it, that the high and mighty noble vampires would never suck the blood of the dirty werewolves, but as the words reached his mouth, he immediately and alertly swallowed his words. If he had said them, then these violent werewolves would definitely directly pounce him, regardless of how much the difference in power was between the two parties, or they would not have taken this much time to pacify the entirety of the allied forces.
No matter how much Baron Mike hated the werewolves, he still couldn’t go overboard. Not only because they were still fighting against the humans, but even more because further along this path, the werewolves and the vampires both had a Champion rank expert each in charge. Worse still, the werewolves’ overall strength was a shade higher.
As he thought about it, Baron Mike gradually regulated his tone. “I will definitely get to the bottom of this! But first, we need to take Earth Castle.”
“Investigate? Sure, but the time?” The werewolves refused to let the matter go.
Baron Mike forcibly held in his anger. “Once the battle ends I’ll immediately look into it, and will return you a satisfactory reply within a month.”
The werewolves looked at one another, and then slowly nodded.
Baron Mike ordered his men to carry away the bodies of the werewolves, and then, spreading the map, began to plot their next assault.
At this point, a commotion came from outside the tent.
The baron furrowed his eyebrows as he yelled angrily. “What are you all blathering about!?”
His angry roar was infused with origin power, and the sound of his voice swept the camp, causing some of the weaker warriors to be shocked dizzy. The baron was already incomparably frustrated, and directly demonstrated his power, showing off in front of the werewolves.
But from outside the tent came an icily silky voice. “Oh lord baron, is this the way you welcome us?”
When he heard the voice, Mike suddenly chilled, and he cried out involuntarily. “Surrey!”
A tall, thin, middle-aged man walked into the tent, and he gave a small smile. “My dear Mike, it’s nice to see that you still remember my voice.”
His face was pale white, with a meticulously-cut little moustache, and eyes the color of fresh blood, it was clear that he had already moved against someone before he stepped into the tent.
Mike’s pale face turned a little green as he stared Surrey dead in the face. “Lord viscount, I recall that you were assigned to a different area…?”
Surrey’s smile didn’t budge. “I hear that your progress here had been very unsuccessful and you lost quite a number of high level warriors, so I came to see if there was anything I could help with!”
“I am enough to handle it! I’ll not have lord viscount trouble over me!” Mike immediately rejected him.
Surrey stroked his mustache. “Why are you in such a hurry to refuse? Actually, I’m not here of my own accord, but merely as the herald for the princess.”
Mike’s heart immediately began to pound, as he hurriedly asked, “Princess? Which princess?”
Among the vampires, “princess” held a special meaning. Only those who were directly related to the grand princes who were appointed as his successors, or those who had awakened the progenitor’s blood within them, could be termed princes or princesses.
Surrey smiled but didn’t answer, instead choosing to listen to what was going on outside. He walked toward the tent entrance, fixed his expression, and then bowed deeply, presenting a very respectful welcome.
Mike’s eyelids jumped. Someone who could cause Surrey to ingratiate himself thus far, must definitely not be offended. As the highest-in-command here, if he didn’t welcome her, then he would be the next to get punished. Mike couldn’t even be bothered to curse at Surrey who had wasted his time, and immediately rushed out of the tent as he watched a team of vampires walk into the campgrounds.
This team of vampires were all extraordinarily beautiful, wearing dark red-hemmed cloaks and uniforms of deep black that all sported a single blood colored Datura flower.
Looking over, Mike knew that this team of vampires’ strength was extraordinary, and the average member was a Knight level, and besides Surrey, there were even another two Champions!
But what shocked Mike wasn’t that they had great strength, but rather, that Datura flower symbol. That represented an ancient family, and an extraordinary surname, as well as an incomparable strength and influence within the dark world.
That was the symbol of the Monroes, and besides the current Grand Prince Fred Monroe, it was said that another two ancient grand princes slept within their family vaults.
This team’s movements were deceptively slow, and in an instant, they were before Mike. Not even paying attention to Mike, they lightly walked into the military tent. A young girl walked out from among the group, and directly sat on where Mike originally sat.
Mike rushed into the tent, both in shock and fear, as he sneakily took a look at the girl who was sitting there peacefully. Even among the standards of the vampires, she was perfect aside from those black eyes and black hair which rarely appeared on a vampire.
Seeing such unique characteristics, as well as that faintly golden Datura flower, Mike immediately thought of one person, and hurriedly rushed forward to pay his respects. “Princess Nighteye, why has your honored self come here?”
Nighteye spoke lightly. “I heard that the situation here wasn’t too good, so I came to take a look.”
Mike was stunned. “The capture of Earth Castle is indeed a little slow, but one more final attack should be enough. There’s just been a little accident.”
Nighteye suddenly pointed towards the werewolves who were inside the tent. “You, get out!”
The werewolves were stunned, but instantly turned to anger, as they growled. “Or what?”
Nighteye turned to face them directly, as she singled out a single werewolf from among them, and two images began to twist and distort as if being reflected in a rippling pond.
Two werewolves inside the tent suddenly let out long wails, as their body began to emit a dense cacophony of bone-breaking noises. Their bodies had involuntarily turned into wolves, but their bodies were evidently being twisted and changed out of shape, as they tumbled to the ground heavily, unable to get up.
Nighteye then turned slowly towards the other two werewolves. They were shocked out of their skin, and ran straight out of the tent, not even caring for the corpses of their companions.
With a light wave of her hand, Nighteye’s two Monroe guards threw the two wolf corpses outside of the tent.
Only when there were no werewolves within fifty paces of the tent, did Nighteye’s mood finally improve.
Surrey took this time to step forward as he spoke to Mike. “Her Highness’ trip here, is not merely for the sake of something as insignificant as Earth Castle. We will be staying here a night, to help you block off one wave of attacks from the humans.”
“An attack? Which unit? The 55th Division should still be fighting, no? And the 58th is a long way away from here,” Mike asked in a panic. Unless this time the humans still wanted to engage in an air battle, or they couldn’t be thinking of using the airships for transport.
“It’s the 60th Division.”
Mike was instantly bowled over. He didn’t know why the 60th Division would suddenly leave their defense area and move toward here, but the words of Her Highness were never wrong, or why would she even bother wasting her time coming to the sticks?
Although the expeditionary forces’ combat strength was a mixed bad, the combat strength of the forces that were stationed on the border weren’t weak either. Even if Mike wasn’t harmed, an entire division from the expeditionary force could singlehandedly swallow the entirety of his men.
On the wasteland, an innumerable amount of transport vehicles was carrying the men of the 60th Division, driving towards Earth Castle. At the front of this convoy was a single convoy made of light jeeps that had long since left the rest of the convoy behind.
The light jeeps were filled with only rank two or higher Fighters and almost the entirety of the higher command of the 60th Division. The engines of the convoy roared, and their headlights lit up the place into the color of snow, and it looked incomparably arrogant and savage against the dim twilight of the evening, as if they were protesting against the darkness.
In the middle vehicle, Qiqi was busy yawning, staring at the outside in boredom.
At this point, the convoy suddenly stopped. Qiqi furrowed her eyebrows. “Why have we suddenly stopped?”
“Miss, I’m afraid we can’t go any further, you’d best come take a look.”