216: Chapter 214 Ragu's Attack, Deployment of the Defense Line

Zhang Mu wanted to lead the team in training, so he stayed in Moza Village.

To prevent Joey and the hidden accomplices from noticing anything unusual, he didn't just take out a puppet and use the Transformation Technique to turn it into his likeness and return to the City Lord's Mansion.

He also moved the training base into the "World," while stationing an army in Moza Village to continue practicing with ordinary weapons; the two armies rotated every three days.

This ensured the progress of mastering magic-conducting weapons wasn't delayed while also deceiving the enemy.

During this time, Mihe went to the Silent Forest alone.

With the Swift Travel Technique, he set off in the morning and had already returned to the village by evening.

The magical beasts have begun migrating south—this was the news he brought back.

Zhang Mu understood clearly that this meant the Kingdom army would attack soon.

According to Soren's speculation and the common knowledge of warfare on the Saul Continent, even when marching through a forest, the main legion would have no fewer than fifty thousand Soldiers.

And the High-tier Professionals leading the charge would include at least five Magisters.

It wasn't that the Kingdom didn't have even higher-level individuals.

It was just that they had their own enemies and couldn't afford not to leave any forces to guard their borders.

To be honest, Zhang Mu highly suspected that the Kingdom chose to act this year not only because the City Lord was turned by Joey, but also likely because Teacher Potter's whereabouts were unknown.

After becoming the Lord of Gur City, he used his power to inquire about news from the upper echelons of Lake.

The King was in poor health, yet he had been slow to finalize the heir to the throne.

The Senior Sister with the highest hopes, First Prince Andre, and the slightly less prestigious Second Prince, Third Prince, and Fourth Princess were competing with increasing blatancy and intensity; the Kingdom's political situation was turbulent.

In this situation, neighboring countries were watching like tigers, and internally, two Grand Dukes who rose to power at the same time as the King seemed intent on causing some trouble.

The City Lords of various cities within the Kingdom who had strength were already accumulating power.

Those with basically no chance were cleverly sitting on the fence, using their sensitive facial skin to feel the wind—waiting to see which way it blew harder before immediately leaning that way.

Zhang Mu estimated that the previous Lord of Gur City, who died in the mouth of a violent bear, had agreed to cooperate with Joey for this very reason.

Once things fell into chaos, the royal family would be completely unable to look after Gur City.

"Senior Sister, Teacher..." Sorting through the intelligence gathered over the past few months, Zhang Mu's brow furrowed.

"Zhang Mu, who is your teacher?"

Since they were talking in Mihe's small hut with no outsiders, he addressed him by his original name.

"Hmm? What's wrong?" Zhang Mu looked over.

"Just curious." Mihe smiled. "I think having a student like you, your teacher must be very proud."

Proud...

"Teacher..."

Recalling the night they parted in the small town, Zhang Mu shook his head inexplicably: "My teacher probably only has worries for me."

"Wh—"

"Alright." Interrupting him, Zhang Mu said, "What's important now is the enemy that's about to arrive."

"Zhang Mu, magic-conducting weapons are very powerful.

Although we are far outnumbered by the enemy, our combat power is absolutely overwhelming."

"It's not the ordinary army I'm worried about."

Tapping his finger on the table: "The trouble is the High-tier Professionals.

Five, at least five Magisters, with a high probability of two or more being Magisters."

We must hold them back to have any hope of victory."

On our side, the only combatants of the same level are Mihe and Zhang Mu.

Two against five—no matter how you look at it, it's a losing battle.

However, Mihe smiled: "As long as we do our best, there will be no regrets."

Zhang Mu was stunned for a moment.

After a while, he also laughed: "Yes."

"Then we..."

"Set off!"

"By your command." Mihe stood up and performed a proper knight's salute. "Lord City Lord!"

The principle that speed is of the essence in war was something not only Zhang Mu understood; the Kingdom certainly knew it as well.

In the Silent Forest within Gur City's territory, all magical beasts, whether high or low tier, have begun to move; the Kingdom would never waste time and would surely set their army in motion immediately.

At this moment, they are likely already on their way.

They have two ways to march.

First, use a The World to carry the army and reach Gur City as quickly as possible.

This is unlikely.

A large-capacity The World is something the Lagu Kingdom does not yet have the capability to possess.

Not just to acquire, but to "possess."

Therefore, it is quite clear and almost certain that the Kingdom will take the conventional approach—the main force will cross the Silent Forest on foot, while a small group of High-tier Professionals and elite troops will arrive ahead of time via flying transport.

Zhang Mu did not intend to intercept this wave of enemies.

If the entire First Army Corps were deployed to ambush them, there would be a chance of achieving some results.

But there would certainly be those who escaped, and the cost would be heavy casualties; furthermore, the enemy's follow-up forces would realize that we were using magic-conducting weapons different from ordinary firearms.

All things considered, it wasn't worth it.

Zhang Mu wasn't willing to risk exposing the firearms just for a few High-tier Professionals.

The main force was the strategic objective.

If the main force were annihilated, even if he gave up Gur City, the Kingdom would no longer have the ability to occupy it and continue their advance.

To that end, he could only allow them to cross the defense line.

Once they noticed something was wrong and returned to investigate, Zhang Mu would take Mihe to block them, buying time for the First Army Corps to completely wipe out the enemy forces.

The situation was very unfavorable for Zhang Mu; after all, he was using the strength of a single city to resist a nation. If even one Magister escaped, the strategic goal would be impossible to achieve.

Furthermore, before that, he had to ensure that the elite vanguard responsible for reconnaissance would not discover the ambushing First Army Corps.

Normally, this would be a very difficult task.

Magisters were not blind, and there were at least five of them.

Fortunately, the Saul Continent had "Worlds," artifacts that could be called bugs in warfare.

When Zhang Mu announced the order to "set out," all the Soldiers of the First Army Corps, except for those staying in Moza Village to deceive Joey and the others, began their departure.

An army of eight thousand marching would usually be like a dark cloud pressing down on a city, or at least kicking up a lot of dust, but the only ones walking on the road were three people—Zhang Mu, Mihe, and Domit.

The Soldiers were still inside the The World practicing with magic-conducting weapons.

Moza Village was not very far from the Silent Forest; it was about a ten-day journey on foot for an ordinary person, and about three days for High-tier Professionals.

But they had Mihe.

Setting off in the evening, they reached the edge of the Silent Forest just after midnight.

They had to watch the Kingdom's movements, as their elite vanguard could fly overhead at any time, so the three of them did not enter Zhang Mu's The World to rest.

Mihe was fast on his feet, so he was tasked with keeping watch on the route the enemy was most likely to take.

Zhang Mu and Domit stayed a bit further away to prevent being detected by a Magister's Mental Energy.

With nothing to do, Zhang Mu found a tree to lean against, a blade of grass in his mouth, looking up at the starry sky and going over the plan in his mind repeatedly to ensure there were no flaws.

Domit was a bit annoying, standing next to him like a statue with his hand on the hilt of the longsword at his waist.

"What are you standing here for?"

"I am your personal guard, Mr. Zhang Mu."

"Have you ever seen a guard weaker than the person they're protecting?"

"Uh, at least I can help you drive away the annoying mosquitoes."

As he spoke, he drew his longsword and slashed horizontally in front of him.

It had to be admitted that Domit, a High-level Knight, had exquisite swordsmanship; with this one strike, at least twenty mosquitoes were sliced apart!

Zhang Mu took a deep breath: "Do you know that I just promoted to Magister two days ago?"

"Oh! I heard Mr. Mi He say so." Domit straightened his back a bit. "Should I call it a miracle, or praise you as expected of Mr. Zhang Mu, in just half a year from..."

"Do you know that a Magister's Mental Energy undergoes a qualitative change?"

"I know."

"What, do you think that my Mental Energy as a Magister can't even block mosquitoes?"

"Uh, I'll go check over there."

Domit scratched his head and turned to walk into the forest.

...

Mihe had been out scouting for three days.

Zhang Mu went from lying down to sitting up, then stood up, looking toward the forest where Mihe had left.

Could something have happened?

He felt a bit worried, but then he thought it was unlikely.

Although the Lord of Gur City's character wasn't great, his strength was definitely beyond question.

With his Solar Storm, he was a top-tier existence even among Magisters.

If he hadn't died and had obtained the resources in the "World," he might have already promoted to Saint Magician by now.

Mihe had escaped from such a City Lord dozens of times; the Kingdom wouldn't have the skill to catch him.

Even though he said that and the reasoning was sound, with no sign of him returning, Zhang Mu's expression inevitably turned solemn.

Just like that, a week passed.

On the morning of the eighth day, Mihe still hadn't returned.

Zhang Mu couldn't wait any longer and prepared to go find him.

However, before he could even lift his foot, a small black dot suddenly appeared in the distant sky, gradually growing larger.

As it got closer, he could see clearly that what was flying over was a strange-looking magical beast.

Flying rapidly at high altitude, it had no wings. It was massive, appearing to be the size of a 300-seat passenger plane, with a flat oval body, no limbs, and a thin tail behind it.

Its skin was like a dolphin's, looking extremely smooth.

At this moment, because Zhang Mu was looking up from the ground, he could only see its milky-white belly.

The belly was also clean, with no visible eyes or other organs for gathering environmental information.

After watching for a while, Zhang Mu felt that this thing was a bit like a manta ray from Earth.

Of course, manta rays can't fly, but it could.

"A fifth-tier Sky Magical Beast native to the Kingdom; its flight speed is average, but it excels in payload capacity, has a gentle temperament, and is easy to tame," said Domit, running out from the woods.

"What is it called?"

"I don't know."

Useless piece of trash, what good are you.

Cursing inwardly, he waved his hand to signal him to get back into the forest so as not to be discovered by the Kingdom's magicians.

Zhang Mu had no fluctuations of mana or Mental Energy, so there was no need to worry; he casually hid under a lush tree, squinting his eyes as he observed the enemy.

The opponents seemed to be in the middle of the magical beast's back; due to the angle, he couldn't see anything.

Domit said it didn't fly fast, but that was relative to other Sky Magical Beasts.

In his field of vision, it went from a small black dot on the horizon to blocking the sun overhead in only about five minutes.

Unable to see the number of enemies, Zhang Mu smacked his lips and lowered his head.

The magical beast seemed more like it was "drifting" over his head than flying, heading toward Gur City and soon becoming a small black dot on the horizon again.

Just as Zhang Mu was considering whether to immediately deploy the First Army Corps or go find Mihe first, the man returned on his own.

Under the Swift Travel Technique, Mihe appeared before him suddenly, as if he had blinked into existence.

"Mr. Mi He." Domit, running over, breathed a sigh of relief. "If you hadn't come back soon, Mr. Zhang Mu was going to go look for you."

Mihe ignored him and said at a very fast pace, "The situation is different from what we estimated."

After their previous discussions, they thought the Kingdom's fast-moving vanguard and the main force would be far apart.

By letting the vanguard pass, they would have plenty of time to deploy the defense line.

But not long after Mihe saw the Sky Magical Beast, he discovered traces of the Kingdom's main army in the woods about five kilometers away.

According to his guess, the Kingdom didn't trust Joey.

Or rather, they maintained an instinctive vigilance and did not fully trust the intelligence that "magical beasts migrate south in the summer."

To prevent the magical beasts from not leaving or turning back and causing heavy casualties to the army.

The vanguard had been controlling its speed, staying five kilometers ahead of the main force and using its high-altitude visibility to scout the movements of the magical beasts.

Only upon reaching the edge of the Silent Forest did they head toward Gur City at full speed.

This was also why Mihe had only just rushed back; he didn't dare release magic under the enemy's nose.

The surging mana would very likely be captured by Mental Energy; Mihe could have escaped, but it would have been impossible to ambush the Kingdom again.

"In other words, the Kingdom's main force is only five kilometers away from us?"

"At the edge of the forest, the vanguard began to accelerate their flight, and the distance widened a bit; I estimate it's twenty kilometers."

"Then what are we just standing here for?!"

Zhang Mu raised his hand to open the light gate of the The World; upon receiving the order, Soldiers wearing jungle camouflage combat uniforms filed out of the gate, carrying rifles.

The gate wasn't very large, only wide enough for five people to pass through side by side.

Fortunately, the marching training of the eight thousand men had been effective, and no chaos occurred to waste time.

But it still took a full twenty minutes for all of them to pass through and finish lining up in the clearing.

Despite the urgency, Zhang Mu still had to give a pre-battle speech.

Scanning the army in front of him that had quite a flavor of home from left to right, looking at the various young faces, he had much he wanted to say and could say.

But in the end, he had only one sentence: "I need you to give your lives for me."

"Dedicate loyalty, bravery, glory, and sacrifice to Marshal Zhang Mu!"

For the rank structure of the First Army Corps, Zhang Mu partially drew inspiration from the military of Earth.

The highest commander was himself—rank of Marshal.

From high to low: General—Legion Commander, currently held by Domit for the First Army Corps.

Following that were Lieutenant General and Major General.

The subdivisions for field officers, company officers, non-commissioned officers, and Soldiers were equivalent.

Hearing the shouts that startled the birds into flight, Zhang Mu knew he didn't need to say more: "Domit, set up the defense line as practiced.

We will stop the Kingdom's army at the edge of the forest and never let them take a single step further!"

"Yes!"

Domit, already in uniform, placed his right hand over his left chest and bowed in a knight's salute.

After the salute, he turned and began to issue orders.

Due to the number of personnel, the First Army Corps's organization was not at full strength.

Zhang Mu adopted the "three-three system," where one brigade commanded three regiments, one regiment commanded three battalions, and so on.

A full-strength brigade had 4,500 men; currently, the First Army Corps had less than two brigades.

Therefore, as the Legion Commander, Domit gave orders directly to the Brigade Commanders standing at the front of the ranks.

"The entire Second Brigade will enter the forest and find suitable ambush locations on their own.

The commander of the First Brigade will lead his unit to dig trenches at the exit and be ready to support the Second Brigade at any time!"

"Yes!"

The Soldiers, under the command of their respective officers, ran toward their target locations in an orderly fashion.

The training during this period included not only combat skills for ordinary Soldiers but also focused training on the military capabilities of the officers.

The materials were all found by Zhang Mu; Domit learned them first and then taught them down the line.

Domit knew better than Zhang Mu how well the officers had learned, so he was very comfortable letting the officers decide on the ambush spots themselves.

With the Soldiers already on their way, he didn't stay idle either, leading his assistants to set up a Command Post in a safe area.

Zhang Mu and Mihe exchanged a glance, then turned and rushed toward Gur City.

War was on the verge of breaking out.