Emperor of Steel

“Ugh! These men need to be killed right away!”

Lenuk was furious at the current turn of events.

After he ended up getting caught in a surprise attack, he kept on suffering from drawbacks because of the enemy’s special forces for five consecutive days.

The enemy cut off the roads and ended up stopping the monster march, blasted down the cliff, rolled down the mountain rocks onto them.

They even had the audacity to leave behind a mocking article like this one.

80 kilometers to Verange. Here are the shortcuts to those sluggish nerds who are wandering around the mountains.

Blast!

The sign which was struck in front of a forked road was smashed by Lenuk.

When he saw the scene, the subordinate who was behind Lenuk, tried to stop him.

“Be patient, Elder Lenuk! If we do something wrong, we might be shot by the enemy men!”

“Shut up! You think I would die because of a wooden flying stick?!”

Lenuk, an 8th circle warlock, wasn’t afraid of arrows, but his subordinates were.

The enemy, regardless of day and night, persistently aimed at only the warlocks.

During the march ahead, it seemed common for arrows to fly in, and the fire arrows would sometimes aim for the barracks created for rest in the night.

Some of the warlocks who picked up roadside herbs died after having them, and few fell into a trap created by them.

If the number of warlocks decreased like that, controlling the monsters would turn very difficult.

In fact, the large army of over 100,000 was reduced to 90,000 and more than dead ones, the monsters which fled were huge in number.

They were fortunate if the monsters just ran away.

Violent ogres and orcs attacked the monsters around them as soon as the brainwashing got released.

Anyway, when the sniping of the enemy turned frequent, Lenuk organized a pursuit unit to wipe out the enemy’s special forces.

But there wasn’t much of a good news.

It happened only a few times when the special troops of the enemy hurried away like rats, or sometimes they would lead the warlocks into a trap they dug and the chase would end right away.

“This won’t do! I will go ahead directly and take down those sneaking bastards…!”

“Please be calm! If the squadron elder itself leaves, more monsters will end up leaving.”

“Then do you expect me to keep hiding like this until we get past the mountain?! Watching the monsters like a nanny?”

Right now, most of the warlocks were hiding themselves in between the monsters or using an invisibility magic.

Some even disguised themselves with monster skin like Orcs.

“… this can’t be helped.”

“There is no other right way now.”

At the words of his subordinate, Lenuk broke the staff which was in his hand.

But that didn’t mean that he completely agreed with the subordinates’ words.

“Ah, such useless ones around me… hurry up and continue marching!”

The monsters who had paused for a while, began to march at Lenuk’s order.

However, they didn’t take the shortcut which the Symphonia men had informed them about.

Even if they looked into the information given by my spies, they knew that the shortcut was clearly the right path, because it was a lot narrower and more difficult than the other one.

‘If we enter that one and end up falling into a trap those men have dug, everyone else will turn disheartened.’

With that Lenuk, ended up taking the path which he thought was the safest.

Without realizing that the shortcut was really the safe path.

“The enemy is coming our way!”

At the scout’s report, Marquis Rogers looked at the defense he had built which would block the path.

Along with the barriers which were installed as the obstacle points for the enemies, dwarves wrapped several layers of newly invented barbed wire.

The barbed wire was like a thorny bush of twisted wires, and even if the Gigant was safe, it was effective enough to deter humans or small to medium-sized monsters.

Behind the barrier and the barbed wires were several small pits, which had a pointed stake in the center.

Which was also meant to stop the marching monsters.

‘Even if they break through that, there are Gigants.’

Knight class Gigants of Gaius, pressed tightly together to block the road.

The warrior class ones placed behind the Gaius were supposed to give them strength, to keep them from getting pushed. Stones and spears were placed to the rear.

“Gigants have been placed in the rear for artillery right?”

“Yes, the old Gigants which were put away from active duty was placed in charge of transporting the artillery equipment.”

The area where the current line of defense was deployed was quite large for a mountain path.

In the past, the procession at the top of the mountain was left vacant for camping, and Marquis Rogers planned to stop the monsters in that place.

With the same intention, he wanted to build a fort over there.

However, they didn’t have the time or resources to do it.

So what they devised was to use the artillery units.

Rogers deployed the artillery in the rear and ordered them to move away after firing three shots.

It was because if they decided to stay in one place, they could be damaged by the enemy magic or attacked by the monsters.

And of course, there was no way that the soldiers would be able to move the cannons so quickly, so the transport of the artillery was entrusted to the used Gigants.

“I don’t know if they can hold it well. No matter how much we try holding them back with the Gigants and attack with cannons, the monsters are around 100,000 in number…”

“We need to endure it. If we can hold it off here, they will try to find a detour.”

There were two more roads going down the mountain, and similarly sized defense units were already deployed there.

If anyone of the three defense units were broken, the monsters would step foot directly into Symphonia.

If that happened, the people and soldiers would end up being in trouble.

“What about the engineers’ units deployed in the areas?”

“The work isn’t going on time, it will take another five more days for completion.”

According to the information given by the one in charge, the operation was modified in the middle, and the work wasn’t going smooth as there were too many obstacles in the basins which were selected for attack.

“That will be too late, tell them to finish it in three days.”

“Okay.”

If he and the other defense troops run out of power, they could surely hold on for 5 days with their skills.

But Rogers didn’t like the idea of using his men in the west any longer.

There was no guarantee that the only enemies coming towards them were the monster legion or the Grenada Navy.

“If I was the enemy, I would prepare for an internal revolt of some kind… What does the Chief Commander think?”

Before the war, Luke once asked Rogers for personal talks.

Rogers agreed with Luke’s assessment.

Enemies from the east were impossible to invade, as the Holy Empire was located there, and the Baroque was too busy fighting with the Volga Republic, so they didn’t have to care about it.

Therefore, it could be said that a domestic rebellion of unrest would be created to shake the Symphonia Kingdom.

The Minister of Intelligence had already selected some leading rebellion candidates. Some nobles, radical republicans, and such.

Of course, there were all just possible candidates, and they held back to see whether they will work with Symphonia or move with the enemy and cause war.

“The enemy Vanguard has appeared!”

The guards placed on the mountain peak yelled.

Weeik!

Rogers jumped onto his Gigant, Orion.

He stood on its shoulder and looked at the approaching enemies.

Trolls and Ogres and all kinds of large monsters were coming towards them in rows.

It seemed like monsters of hell were coming towards them.

“They are finally coming, let’s try and see how this goes!”

With his fists clenched, Rogers boarded into his Orion.