“No, but I’m going to use every chance I have to defeat the sect and Balium. Especially when we have a chance to mislead our enemies.”
Nero didn’t understand what his friend was talking about at first, and then he smiled as bloodthirstily as Hadjar.
“It’s definitely a great plan, buddy. If our enemies are afraid of a thousand ‘bears’, what will they feel when they see hundreds of thousands?”
“Then it’s settled.” Hadjar nodded and turned to the recruits. “I hope you won’t come to regret your decision. Or I mine…”
Everyone turned around and returned to the camp, only now there were two hundred thousand more of them.
Chapter 95
Two more days went by, filled with everyday concerns. Despite the fact that Hadjar was trying to delegate some of his responsibilities, some issues still required his personal involvement, like, for example, the need for two hundred thousand tents. Fortunately, his army didn’t currently lack those.
They had about a million tents left. The army had a surplus of them after being decimated in the battle at the ridge. So, the recruits were actually quite pleased with their new accommodations.
The Lidus Army initially treated the newcomers with suspicion, but there was no denying that they could run a tight ship. No fights or arguments broke out. Besides that, the soldiers who’d joined them in order to take revenge on ‘The Black Gates’ were too tired from their ‘bear’ training to pay attention to the suspicious glances of the other soldiers.
Hadjar hadn’t trained in the last few days, both because it was forbidden due to his wounds, and because there was no time—he always had to solve some issue or another, and he found that he was doing far more paperwork than he’d ever thought possible.
Things continued on like this until a bodyguard entered his tent.
“My General.” He saluted. “The delegation from headquarters has arrived.”
“Thank you,” Hadjar replied, acknowledging the news. “You’re free to go.”
The bodyguard nodded and left the tent.
Hadjar looked at the sleeping Azrea. She still hadn’t grown, and Hadjar couldn’t understand why. Maybe he should’ve fed her the core of the Ancient Tigress, but such a power would have overwhelmed even Hadjar, let alone the little kitten.
“No rest for the wicked.” Hadjar smiled, stroking the purring ball of fur.
Getting to his feet, he left the tent once again, ready to face the newest challenges in his life.
However, he soon found that, this time, the problem couldn’t be solved with a swift swing of his sword.
The news that officials from headquarters had arrived at the camp quickly spread among the soldiers. Therefore, by the time Hadjar reached the so-called ‘entrance’ to the camp, almost all of his army, led by their commanders, had already gathered there.
It was as if they were cheering for their General as he made his way toward two carriages drawn by a set of harnessed stallions.
Oh, demons. Selling off even one of these horses would let us buy enough food to last us two seasons.
As he came closer, Hadjar couldn’t take his eyes off the beautiful, majestic stallions. Each of them was twice the size of an ordinary horse. Their legs were as broad as a young tree’s trunk, and their manes were as thick as the grass on the steppes.
Analyzing object...
Object
Mount
Class
Steppe Trotter
Level of cultivation
Alpha
The animals were definitely at the Alpha Stage and were clearly incredibly expensive. Several officials stepped down from the carts, which resembled coaches more than anything else.
Hadjar noticed two familiar faces among them: the fat investigator and the bitch who had offered him the opportunity to sell the medal (that he’d never seen) to supply his squad with everything it needed.
The delegation consisted of nine people, including a pompous young man in white armor and a matching white cloak. So far, he had done nothing but constantly complain that the local dirt would stain his pristine clothes.
It was funny and shameful at the same time. Hadjar certainly felt most ashamed for the inappropriate young man.
“Officer?” The head of the delegation came forward. It was another older official with a lot of gold on his body and brocade in his clothes. Hadjar’s army could’ve bought all the gunpowder they needed after selling off his clothes.
“Hadjar. I’m Hadjar.”
“Are you really?” The young man in white snorted.
No one in the delegation stopped him or made any comments. Moreover, the bitch and the fat man were fawning over the young man as if he were the Crown Prince himself.
“I’m Earl Areen Norr,” the old man introduced himself. “I am the authorized representative of the Generals.”
“Hello, Earl,” Hadjar replied politely.
The Earl bowed his head and looked behind Hadjar. He saw several hundred thousand warriors in full armor and carrying weapons, every one of them looking as if they were going to be fighting at any moment.
“Call off your soldiers, Officer,” the Earl ordered.
Hadjar tried to hold back. How dare this bureaucratic dog order him about? Hadjar was not a holy man, and he wouldn’t claim that he was never prideful. But this indignation wasn’t caused by his pride.
He would have obeyed if he’d sensed strength and honor in the man. However, only greed and a clear lust for power could be felt from Areen.
“Warriors!” the General thundered.
Hundreds of thousands of soldiers immediately punched their chests.
“Continue practicing your attack formation!”
A shield wall instantly appeared behind Hadjar. The creaking of bows and the neighing of horses could be heard.
“What are you doing, peasant?” the young man in white screamed.
“Silence your dog, Earl.”
“Wha-a-a-t? I-”
The young man, as well as the fat investigator standing nearby (and looking extremely pale now), fell back in the dirt. Hadjar hadn’t even looked in his direction. He’d merely put his hand on the handle of his sword.
That had been enough to make the whole delegation start suffocating. They’d felt the spirit of death itself caressing their throats.
They didn’t see a man standing before them, but rather, a dangerous beast, ready to savage them. They shouldn’t have laughed at the songs about the ‘Bear General’ which they had heard on the way to this gods-forsaken backwater.
“I think I ordered you to call off the soldiers,” the Earl repeated, trying to calm down. “My orders are the same as the Generals’ own!”
“I would’ve done so, Mister Clerk, but my soldiers are practicing their attack formation. They started the exercise before you arrived, and they’ll continue it long after your departure.”
The Earl wanted to come closer to the impudent commoner, but he wasn’t able to take another step. It seemed to him like it wasn’t a tall man standing in front of him, but a huge, impregnable mountain. A mountain that would crush him just as easily as it would an ant.
“This is the order of the Generals!” He shouted so that the soldiers could hear him. “Viscount Seliam has been appointed the General of this army!”
Areen pointed his finger at the youth in white armor. He had tried to get up from the ground, but his feet kept slipping on the soft mud.
An oppressive silence descended on the camp, but the sound of metal being struck by metal and the cries of disgruntled soldiers soon shattered it.
“General Hadjar!”
Almost a million voices thundered, “General Hadjar!”
“General Hadj...”
The thunderous roar died away as quickly as it had appeared as Hadjar lowered his fist, and the clearing was quiet once again.
“Give me the medallion, Officer.” The Earl stretched out his hand and became even paler. “Give it back or I’ll charge you
with treason.”
Hadjar never even considered taking the amulet off.
“Well, Mr. Official, you haven’t even asked me what the current state of the army is.”
“The medallion, Officer!”
“Why don’t you ask me about our provisions and uniforms, about whether we need help, and whether it’s necessary to send us more carts?”
“The Kingdom is in a serious economic crisis, Officer.” The Earl’s golden ornaments shook as he spoke, and all his precious stones sparkled in the sunlight. Each decoration would have cost the same as tens of thousands of sets of armor for the soldiers. “We’re broke. But that shouldn’t concern you. Now give me the MEDALLION!”
Areen screamed the last word in a high, shrill voice, but Hadjar didn’t even touch the ribbons of his amulet.
“I know the laws, Earl. If I have the support of all the army’s commanders, I can call out a representative of the staff and demand a fight. The winner gets the amulet.”
The Earl frowned. How could this commoner know of the old laws?
“Commanders, I need to remind you that your salary depends …”
“To hell with our salary!” Helion shouted.
“Where are our arrows and gunpowder, you bloody pig?” Lian screamed.
“We support our General!” Tuur added.
“Stupid hillbillies,” the Earl said in a whisper so that only Hadjar could hear him. “You’re their leader. I’ll destroy you here. Give me the medallion or you’ll starve to death!”
“You bark loudly, mutt,” Hadjar growled. “But can you bite?”
“Sir Seliam!” The Earl, feeling both impotent rage and fear, turned toward the young man who had finally managed to stand up again. “Kill this hillbilly!”
“Say goodbye, you stinking soldier.” The boy, who had possibly never even shaved, couldn’t even get his blade out of its scabbard on the first try.
The blade was as luxurious as any other ornament, with a golden hilt adorned with dozens of precious stones. A skillful emerald ligature formed the pattern of a dragon, and a tiger adorned the blade.
Seliam swung it, but the army behind Hadjar once again started making noise, confident in their general’s victory.
Hadjar, who’d been standing only a few yards away from the young man a second ago, came closer. He grabbed the blade with his bare hand.
Seliam, grunting, tried to pull the blade out of Hadjar’s iron grip, but he couldn’t even break the skin, let alone pull back his weapon.
“Get your dirty hands off me!”
“As you wish, Your Excellency…”
Hadjar clenched his fist and the blade broke with a loud crunch. Rivulets of blood ran down Hadjar’s hand, and they fell on a piece of the blade that had plunged into the ground at his feet.
Seliam was still holding the rest of the broken sword in his hands when a ferocious beast grabbed him by the throat. The beast easily lifted him off the ground using only one hand.
The young man looked into those bottomless blue eyes and didn’t see even a drop of humanity in them. He also didn’t hear anything ‘human’ in the growl that erupted from the mouth of the beast.
The soldiers also took up Hadjar’s belligerent cry, and soon after, their cry was replaced by booming waves of laughter.
A fragrant, yellow stream was staining the young man’s boots.
Hadjar wrinkled his nose and then threw Sir Seliam away.
“Leave,” he said quietly.
“Do you even know who you’ve dared attack, asshole!” the Earl yelled. “He’s the son of one of the Generals’ first officials.”
“I said… get out of here.”
“I’ll…”
“Warriors!” Hadjar raised his clenched fist toward the sky.
The soldiers stopped laughing. Still holding their shield wall formation, they put their spears forward, then took a step toward the pompous idiots with a loud “Heh!”
Their General once again had his hand on the hilt of his sword. “I never repeat myself more than once.”
“You’ll regret this.” The officials, pushing each other and frantically picking up their clothes, tried to get back into the carts.
“I’ll tell my father,” Seliam howled while hurrying to his own transport.
Chapter 96
Damn it. Primus didn’t even realize that he was allowing a cancer to fester in the Kingdom. Balium had once made the same mistake, and now two hundred thousand of their soldiers were fighting for their enemy’s army.
Primus wasn’t stupid or naïve. However, he never paid any attention to the common folk. He knew how to be manipulative, and he knew how to fight, but he did it all at the highest level, not trying to understand what was happening with the poorer parts of his country—sometimes even forgetting about them altogether.
The only question was: when would the first major uprising begin?
Most likely, it would happen once the war between the two empires escalated, and the Legion’s presence at the mine lessened. And where would all the pain and anger of the slaves be directed then? Taking into account that it had been their own country and not foreign invaders that had made them slaves; their own Kingdom, which was supposed to protect and defend them…
There would be so much blood that all the previous conflicts with the nomads and their neighboring kingdoms would look like child’s play in comparison. There was no war worse than a civil war.
“They didn’t help us,” Hadjar noticed, adding another mark to the scroll.
“You’re right. But at least they didn’t interfere, and now… the demons only know!”
“We must, therefore, leave this place and move forward as soon as possible.”
“Where do we go?” Nero stabbed the map with his dagger. “To the steppes? The Eastern Army has been sitting there for three years. Their General is a real asshole. He won’t even give us a bag of rotten rice, it’s pointless to go to him for help.”
“We won’t go to the steppes, then,” Hadjar said with a nod.
“Are you suggesting we go back to Spring Town? You’ve just offended the son of a big shot, let me remind you. I know you’re crazy, but I’ve had enough axes thrown at me to last a lifetime.”
“No, not Spring Town.” The General said amusedly.
Nero looked at his friend, then at the map, and then at his friend again. He sighed, smoothed his white hair, and then plunged his blade into the pass designation. That’s where their camp was at the moment.
“I was wrong. You’re not crazy. You’re insane!”
“What’s the difference between the two?”
Nero pondered the question.
“I think it exists,” he said slowly. “But a hillbilly like you wouldn’t understand.”
“Wow, aren’t you just a fountain of wisdom. This must be why Serra keeps going to the Scholar when she wants to talk to someone.”
“Let her talk to whomever she wants.” Nero shrugged. “She sleeps with me.”
Hadjar didn’t continue the conversation. Instead, he looked at the map and the road leading over the pass.
“I understand, Hadj. You’re a big man now—a General. But this is a crazy idea, even by your standards.”
“Maybe you have another idea? I want to remind you, buddy, that we’re in as much trouble as a virgin in a brothel.”
“That’s not a problem,” Nero snorted. “She’s relaxed and having fun.”
“When we’re defeated on all fronts, it won’t be much fun!”
Nero, agreeing with his friend, threw up his hands and returned his dagger to its scabbard.
“So,” Hadjar continued. “This is our only chance to replenish our stocks, get money, and somehow get our soldiers properly attired.”
“What are we gonna do in fucking Balium? We don’t even have a million soldiers, and almost no one in your army has armor. The soldiers have only their own weapons they brought with them, and most of those are pretty crappy. We hardly have enough arrows
to last us three hours of battle. How the hell do you hope to defeat Balium’s forces?”
Nero pointed his finger at the border town’s position on the map. It was situated just beyond the canyon and called Garnuth. It was a fortified town with three separate rings of walls. The outer wall was the most powerful, fifteen feet wide and sixty-six feet tall.
Even heavy siege artillery wouldn’t be able to break through a wall like that in under a month. And then there was the problem of the other two walls, which were situated inside it. The internal walls weren’t, of course, as huge, but they were still surprisingly large, respectably so, even. Reinforcements would have plenty of time to arrive while Hadjar and his army besieged the city walls.
They would crush Hadjar’s army in the field, and his army would also be assailed by arrows and mortar shells from atop the walls. The troops of the standing army would defeat them easily enough, even without the help of the local garrison of Garnuth. Hadjar was certain that the border garrison under the control of ‘The Black Gates’ sect was in a much better condition than the one that had been stationed in the fort near the Blue Wind Ridge.
They surely had a complete set of both guns and personnel—not to mention the disciples of the sect themselves.
These disciples weren’t like Hadjar’s army, which actually had fifty thousand mere mortals. Each disciple would be strong and well-trained.
According to the various historical scrolls that Hadjar had managed to peruse, a number of clashes had happened between different sects. These were very different from fights between two armies. One hundred thousand practitioners at the Formation Stage, together with many more of the Bodily Rivers level, would participate in these clashes. This was very different from the battles that Hadjar had experienced between ordinary soldiers.
According to the latest intelligence he had received, ‘The Black Gates’ had almost one hundred and twenty thousand disciples. The sect itself was set up in such a way that they couldn’t really boast a large number of strong practitioners, but … the six elders of the sect were on the verge of becoming true cultivators. And the Patriarch—the head of the organization— had reached the level of Heaven Soldier about a hundred years ago.
Dragon Heart: Iron Will. LitRPG Wuxia Series: Book 2 Page 13