Chapter 357
Chapter 357
Iron Emperor — Chapter 357
Chapter 125: Those Gathered Once More
Kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa-kwa!
The wagon wheels screamed as if about to shatter, rolling on.
Rough breaths pumped ceaselessly from the horses' mouths, and the breathing of the riders atop them was just as ragged.
No one was chasing them from behind, yet they rode like madmen. They were the roughly forty thousand troops of Gauri led by Go Jin-cheon, and their destination was the battlefield.
What was unusual was the herd of horses following behind those forty thousand soldiers. Riderless, they looked almost like a herd of wild horses, but a closer look made it easy to tell that was not the case.
Forming the very front rank were the Pukel and Pumas of the Black Armored Ghost Cavalry, their bodies clad in jet-black horse armor. Leading these ferocious breeds, creatures close to monsters, was, ironically, a single horse.
But that horse was no ordinary horse. It was the mightiest warhorse, reigning over them all by sheer strength.
"Prrrrng!"
At the sound of Gangsoe's snort, the speed of the Pukel and Pumas, which had seemed exhausted, rose again. The massive muscles visible between the plates of horse armor were etched with countless scars, like patterns carved into them.
Behind the warhorses of the Black Armored Ghost Cavalry, countless horses ran bearing only empty saddles, carrying no riders.
How long did they ride?
The column of men and horses, which had done nothing but ride endlessly, began to slow. Steam rising in wisps began to come into view ahead. It soon opened into a space large enough for tens of thousands of troops to rest.
"Is that Gowin?"
Go Jin-cheon, riding at the head, smiled faintly when he saw the hundred or so mounted riders coming toward him. The banners they carried mixed the flags of a hawk poised to take flight at any moment with the red Samjoko Flag.
It was the emblem of Gowin's Hawk Corps.
By the time they reached Jin-cheon's front, the entire column's marching speed had dropped considerably.
The hundred approaching riders wheeled their horses to both sides as if to envelop the Gauri main force, which had ridden a great distance, and fell in alongside them. Gowin urged his horse up next to Jin-cheon.
"Salute!"
"It's been a while."
Jin-cheon received Gowin's military salute with a satisfied smile.
Gowin bowed his head, a slightly flustered expression on his face.
"I didn't expect you to arrive so quickly."
"War is waged with money and time."
"Ha, hahaha! Indeed it is."
At Jin-cheon's answer, Gowin burst out laughing and rode forward, volunteering to guide them.
Time and money.
Many other factors decide victory and defeat in war, but these two have shaped not just wars, but history itself.
One of the keys to sustaining a large army is money. With money you feed them, clothe them, and forge spears and swords. Even a common soldier knows the importance of money.
Jin-cheon and the forty thousand troops entered the encampment, where countless barracks had been erected.
Inside that vast camp, fewer than a few thousand people were moving about.
"All units enter your assigned barracks and rest!"
The voices of commanders leading the soldiers rang out from every direction.
Jin-cheon, too, made his way toward a large command tent.
Retreat, then advance.
Make the retreat noisy, but the advance impossible to prepare for even if detected.
That was the core of this war.
Inside the barracks, admiration showed on Gowin's face as he looked at Yeon Hwi-garam. The tactic of retreating and then advancing was nothing extraordinary in itself.
It struck him as the kind of decision Go Jin-cheon could easily make.
But after hearing Hwi-garam explain the overall operation, Gowin's thinking shifted dramatically.
He realized Jin-cheon had chosen this operation not simply because he was Jin-cheon, but because Hwi-garam was there.
The noisy retreat at the heart of this war had been achieved naturally, without any need to deliberately create a commotion.
Because the war situation in the Gauri homeland had naturally drawn everyone's attention. After vanishing completely to the rear, they issued the order to advance again.
Gowin judged it to be sound. As if everything had been prepared from the start, Risel had stockpiled vast quantities of supplies deep in the rear.
But that was not what Gowin marveled at.
It was the orders given to him and the Hawk Corps.
The order was to build barracks for the troops along every route of the main force's advance and arrange for meals to be ready at regular intervals.
On top of that, the task of requisitioning simple packhorses rather than warhorses had also fallen to him.
Simple, but against the enemy called time, it was the best possible method.
After that, Go Jin-cheon and the main force rode on packhorses.
The wagons, too, were pulled by tens of thousands of packhorses and draft animals. Behind them followed the warhorses. Gangsoe led them at the front.
The only times they stopped were to eat and sleep.
There was no need to spend time erecting barracks or preparing meals. Instead, every bit of that time could be devoted to rest and movement.
Of course, part of this was only possible because they were in friendly territory, but even so, no one else had even conceived of such an approach.
The conception itself was different.
A ruthlessly efficient conception was what drove them forward like this.
"It is almost like operating a relay of dispatch riders..."
"What are you doing standing out there? Come in."
"Ah, yes."
Jin-cheon's curt voice reached Gowin's ears as he murmured in admiration. Though they had ridden a great distance and should have been exhausted, Jin-cheon and his subordinate commanders were already seated and spreading out a map.
"What is the state of the war between the empires?"
Jin-cheon went straight to the point, and Gowin began reporting on the previous day's opening battle on the Palancia Plains.
* * *
His two hands resting neatly on his chest, he looked as peaceful as a person asleep. But the complete absence of any rise and fall of the chest — something a living person should have — meant this man was not sleeping; he was dead.
Not only that: though it had been cleaned thoroughly, the wound running from the crown of his head to his groin, and the stitches tightly binding it, made it clear that his body had been split completely in two lengthwise.
"Th-this can't be."
Marquis Millium stared at the gruesome corpse, his voice trembling.
His eyes, which had not even been closed, were fixed wide open, staring at something, and the emotions legible in that stare were resentment, rage, and a sense of bitter injustice.
"Is it truly Hail?"
At Marquis Millium's question, Count Hail Selmier, now a hideous corpse, could give no answer and only kept his silence.
"Hail!"
Intense killing intent burst from Marquis Millium's outcry.
Long before he was called the Divine Sage of the Federal Empire, Marquis Millium had regarded him as a disciple as dear as his own flesh and blood. He was a talent destined one day to surpass his master. And now Count Selmier had gone out to grace the opening battle only to return as a cold corpse.
"Why is there not a single man here who can explain this damnable situation!"
Marquis Millium, who ordinarily never lost his composure, was now, in this moment alone, stained by the monster called rage and radiating killing intent.
"Calm yourself."
"Grrk."
Unable to stand by any longer, Duke Shuo carefully spoke up and calmed him. In this place, Duke Shuo of the Maritime Empire was the only person who could calm him.
Duke Shuo knew full well that under normal circumstances Marquis Millium would never show this side of himself, even if a subordinate general died, if only to preserve the dignity of his empire.
Yet the fact that he raged this openly in front of Duke Shuo spoke to just how deeply Marquis Millium had treasured Count Selmier.
Just as Marquis Millium's fury was barely subsiding, the one who entered the tent was Count Selmier's adjutant, Viscount Philious. But his appearance, too, was far from normal.
"Your Excellency, Marquis..."
As Viscount Philious laboriously began to speak, his right arm was missing, and one of his legs was likewise gone. It seemed he had received magical healing, but he was in no state to come deliver a report.
"What of Count Holman and the other commanders, that you come instead!"
A wounded man should have been treated quietly, but Millium's anger left no room for such consideration.
Under the gaze of the enraged Marquis Millium and the dumbfounded Duke Shuo, Viscount Philious's face contorted as he spoke.
"Cough. Not only C-Count Holman, but all the other commanders were killed in action."
"What?"
At Viscount Philious's labored words, not just Marquis Millium but Duke Shuo's eyes went wide as well.
Had the scouts who went to observe the battlefield not reported that barely half the Holy Empire's forces had survived the retreat?
Tears streamed down Viscount Philious's face as he spoke to the astonished commanders of the two empires.
"Hkkh, what the Holy Empire bastards were aiming for was not victory in battle!"
With those words, Viscount Philious began his report as though each sentence cost him blood.