94: Chapter 94 Icethorn's Mad Talk! The Iron Hoof Legion Marches South

The Polaris crushed the last three hundred meters of ice before the armored gates of the Black Rock City-State. The silhouette of the hydraulic expansion frames on both sides of the hull, extended in the twilight, was a full three meters wider than when it had departed.

The guards at the armored gate watched as this war chariot, which had clearly grown a size larger, rushed in. They opened their mouths but couldn't find the words.

The Polaris's heavy tracks ground onto the steel floor of the docking area, its engine still running.

Lu Chen slowed the vehicle to ten kilometers per hour and parked it steadily in an independent berth, with the front facing the direction of the armored gate.

He was ready to charge back out at any moment.

Ice Thorn's voice came through the communicator again.

This time, there was no threat in it at all.

“Fifteen minutes are up! Lin Xiao! Have you made up your mind?”

Ice Thorn's voice was still sharp and cheerful, but his speaking speed was a notch faster than before.

“I'll give you one more minute! Because I'm in a good mood today! I'll gift you an extra sixty seconds!”

The communicator switched to Lin Xiao's frequency.

“City Lord Lin Xiao, I've arrived.”

“I saw. The people in the docking area reported your entry.”

Lin Xiao's voice was kept very low. In the background were the dense footsteps of the command room and the low-voiced reports of staff officers.

“Ice Thorn is waiting for my reply.”

“How do you plan to reply?”

“Tell him to get lost.”

Lu Chen picked up his thermos and took a sip of water.

“Wait a moment.”

“What?”

“Why does he want you to leave?”

The other end of the communicator went quiet for two seconds.

“You noticed?”

“He gave you fifteen minutes to surrender, but his original words were to open the gates and for everyone to come out, weapons on the ground. He said he'd only take things and wouldn't kill anyone.”

Lu Chen placed the thermos back in the cup holder.

“A Raider leader, if his goal was to destroy the Black Rock City-State, wouldn't say he'd only take things and not kill anyone.”

“You mean his purpose isn't to fight a war at all?”

“His purpose is to make you get out of the way.”

The sound of Lin Xiao slamming the table heavily came through the communicator.

“Get out of the way? Why should my city-state of thirty thousand people make way for a Raider?”

Lin Xiao's breathing became heavy for two beats.

“Fine.”

The communicator switched to the public frequency.

Lin Xiao's loud voice rang out across all frequencies.

“Ice Thorn!”

“Yo!” Ice Thorn's voice bounced back from the other side, “Loudmouth Lin Xiao finally spoke! I thought you were so scared you'd shrunken into your turtle shell!”

“You brought a hundred and eighty cannons to my back door. How is that for fighting a war?”

The public frequency went quiet for a beat.

Ice Thorn's laughter squeezed out from his throat.

“Oh? You figured it out?”

“Cut the nonsense. What exactly do you want?”

“I want you to get out of the way.”

Ice Thorn's tone flipped completely. The cheerfulness vanished, replaced by a sharp screech like metal scraping a steel plate.

“I want your Black Rock City-State to leave the Rustwind Wasteland! Leave the Ash Rift Valley! Leave the Pale Shoals! Go south! The further the better!”

“On what grounds?”

“On the grounds of the Iron Hoof Legion.”

Ice Thorn spat out those four words.

All frequencies on the communicator fell silent simultaneously.

Lu Chen's fingers paused for a beat on the steering wheel.

Iron Hoof Legion.

He had seen this name in the archives of the Black Rock City-State.

The most powerful military force on the Northern Ice Field.

They possessed a Lv.5 wonder-class Mobile City, four Lv.4 City-States, and over ten lv.3 fortresses.

“Two years ago!” Ice Thorn's voice split across the frequency, his speaking speed surging to twice that of a normal person, “That madman Iron Crown made a decision!”

“He's heading south!”

“From the Northern Ice Field, through the Roaring Ice Abyss! Into the Central Ice Field!”

“Do you know what kind of place the Roaring Ice Abyss is, Lin Xiao?”

Ice Thorn's breath sprayed against the communicator's microphone, making a hissing sound.

“That's my territory! My Snow Shard Gang's nest! I stayed there for ten years!”

Ice Thorn's voice grew sharper and faster, with no pauses between his words.

“That mad bull Iron Crown brought a Lv.5 crusher and charged through! Four Lv.4s followed behind! Over a dozen Lv.3s lined up! Do you know what that scene was like?”

“My Lv.4 couldn't beat his Lv.5! Two of my Lv.3s were surrounded and hammered by his four Lv.4s!”

“I resisted for six days! Six days!”

Ice Thorn's voice cracked for a moment at its highest point, then pressed back down into that morbid low tone.

“After six days, I ran. I took all my living people and fled south from the Roaring Ice Abyss. I ran to the Ash Rift Valley, to the Pale Shoals, to the Rustwind Wasteland.”

“You think I wanted to come and steal your territory?”

“I was driven here!”

From Lin Xiao's end of the communicator came the sound of staff officers in the command room gasping for air.

Lu Chen sat motionless in the driver's seat.

The Iron Hoof Legion was heading south.

The Snow Shard Gang had been expelled.

Ice Thorn had no intention of expansion; he was fleeing for his life.

This was the root cause of the Snow Shard Gang's abnormal outward expansion over the past six months.

All the blanks marked as 'unknown cause' in the archives were filled today by a madman's roar.

“Lin Xiao! Do you understand now?” Ice Thorn's voice bounced back again, “The Iron Hoof Legion has already occupied the Roaring Ice Abyss! Their vanguard entered the northern edge of the Central Ice Field a month ago!”

“In three months at most, Iron Crown's main force will crush its way into the Rustwind Wasteland!”

“By then, your hundred and twenty cannons will be a pile of toothpicks compared to his Lv.5 wonder-class!”

“I didn't come today with any intention of fighting you! I came to tell you to hurry up and run!”

“And to take what's in your hands while I'm at it!”

Ice Thorn's last sentence again carried that sound of laughter like scraping iron sheets.

Lu Chen switched the communicator back to the private frequency.

“City Lord Lin Xiao.”

“I heard.”

Lin Xiao's voice was three shades heavier.

“Iron Hoof Legion.”

“Is what he said true?”

“I'm not sure. But he has no need to lie at a time like this.”

Lu Chen glanced at the radar screen.

The distance reading between Ice Thorn's Ice Thorn Lv.4 Main City light cluster and the Black Rock City-State's light cluster: twenty-eight kilometers.

It was still slowly shortening.

Speed: five.

He was testing the waters.

“Even if the Iron Hoof Legion really is heading south, that's a matter for three months from now.” Lin Xiao's voice hardened again, “The main problem right now is the madman in front of us.”

“He has a hundred and eighty cannons.”

“I have a hundred and twenty plus the city walls.”

“He also has stealth capabilities and unknown technology.”

“I have you.”

Lu Chen didn't respond to that.

He glanced at his balance.

One thousand and forty points.

Ray Cannon power at 10%, zero shots available, over five hours needed to fully charge.

fragmentation grenades cost fifty points for one round of loading, maximum twenty rounds can be loaded.

Heavy Machine Gun ammunition needs replenishing.

Harpoons need recasting.

“City Lord Lin Xiao, if Ice Thorn really attacks, how long can you hold out?”

“With the walls and a hundred and twenty cannons, in a head-on Lv.4 versus Lv.4 bombardment, I can hold for over two hours.”

“What about the two lv.3 fortresses?”

“If the Lv.3s flank from both wings, my firepower will have to be split.”

“If it's split, you won't last two hours.”

“One hour.”

Lin Xiao paused for a beat.

“If two Lv.3s press in from both wings simultaneously, I have one hour at most.”

“One hour is enough.”

“Enough for what?”

“Enough for me to take out one Lv.3.”

The sound of Lin Xiao slamming the table came from the other side of the communicator.

“You, in a Lv.2, are going to fight a Lv.3?”

“Today I fought forty Lv.2s plus six 105mm cannons.”

“Those were Lv.2s! A Lv.3 is on another level!”

“I know.”

Lu Chen's finger rested next to the red button for the all-weapons linked salvo.

“But my vehicle is also on another level.”

In the distance, the muzzles of the hundred and twenty cannons on the Black Rock City-State's walls lined up into a line of fire in the twilight.

On the other side of the wall, Ice Thorn's Ice Thorn Lv.4 Main City was slowly approaching at five kilometers per hour.

Ice Thorn's voice appeared on the public frequency once more.

“Time's up! Lin Xiao!”

“What is your answer?”

Lin Xiao's loud voice boomed out across the public frequency.

“The answer is: get lost.”

The public frequency went silent for a second.

Ice Thorn's laughter surged up from the bottom of the frequency.

Sharp, cheerful, and morbid to the extreme.

“Good!”

“Then let's fight!”

On the radar screen, the light cluster of Ice Thorn's Ice Thorn Lv.4 Main City began to accelerate.

The speed jumped from five to ten.

Fifteen.

The light clusters of the two lv.3 fortresses moved simultaneously.

One shifted north.

One shifted south.

A pincer movement from the wings.

The hundred and twenty cannons on the walls of the Black Rock City-State fired at once.

The roar of the first salvo was transmitted through the steel frame of The City-State into the docking area, making the steel plates overhead tremble.

The war had begun.