Bright sunlight fell into the government room through the skylight and fell on the face of the young man who was sitting on the chair by the window with his eyes closed.
With one hand on his side cheek, he leaned slightly, breathing steadily, as if he was taking a nap.
The shadow falling from the slender eyelashes reflected on the handsome and sharp-lined face, and the thin lips were pursed tightly, giving people a more severe feeling.
Suddenly, he suddenly opened his eyes.
The golden-red hue peeked out from the crevices of the jet-black hair.
At that moment, it seemed that the sunlight falling on his face was sucked into these deep and dark pupils.
The moment he opened his eyes, his originally steady breathing seemed to be slightly disturbed.
…
Dark, endless night...
The strange sound of the wind that seems to never stop carrying the cries and wailing of countless people...
The land of Aaron Landis was shrouded in darkness.
The heroic king fell in the small room, under the poison handed to him by the man he trusted.
The blood spitting out of his mouth stained the soft veil by the window red.
He fell in front of the betrayer in pain and helplessness.
The young prince died in the chaos of the army.
The sharp arrow shot from behind him pierced the boy's chest.
He fell from his horse.
The long golden hair was strewn pale and feeble on the ground, scattered in the mud and blood.
Then, the flames that spread ruthlessly devoured that slender body.
With a huge roar, the white snowstorm came from the west like a torrent, completely burying the land of Aaron Landis...
…
Heimos raised his hand and pressed it against his chest.
Even though he clearly knew that it was just a dream, as long as he recalled the scene in which the young man who fell to the ground was swallowed by flames in the dream, the thing that was beating deep in his chest twitched violently.
He pressed his chest, and there was a hint of malice in his golden red eyes.
The gloom quickly spread over his eyes, his dark pupils seemed to swallow all the light, and he was about to descend into the deepest darkness.
Suddenly, a little green light reflected a little light, passing from the corner of his eyes.
Heimos lowered his head and his eyes fell on his hands.
On the brown fingers, the bright green malachite ring reflected the bright sunlight, refracting a little light into his eyes.
In an instant, the hostile aura that was surging in his eyes like a black mist disappeared as if it had been dispelled.
He looked at the ring, raised his hand, and stroked the cool emerald green malachite with his fingertips.
"His Royal Highness."
A voice came from the side, arousing the attention of Heimos.
Heimos looked up, and what caught his sight was the tall figure of Shamash's priest, Shemur.
Turning his head slightly again, he saw the sun rising to the center of the sky through the window beside him.
"I'm asleep?"
As long as he could remember, the sun was still hanging in the air.
"Yes."
"You should wake me up."
Heimos glanced sharply at Xi Muer, his tone was cold.
In this critical moment, not a single second can be wasted.
"You are already tired from working non-stop for days, and I think that if you go on like this, the tiredness will affect your thinking and make you unable to make correct judgments."
Xie Muer's face was expressionless, and he also answered in a firm tone.
Heimos narrowed his eyes, looked at Xie Muer, and said nothing.
Continuing to talk about this stone is a waste of time.
He touched the ring on his finger again, the ring made from Garlan's damaged malachite earrings.
He asked, "Has the relocation of all the villages and towns outside the king's city been completed?"
The priest of Shamash gave Heimos a deep look, his eyes were a bit complicated, but he still answered Heimos's question calmly and meticulously.
"According to your order, all the villages and towns near Wangcheng have been cleaned up."
Shemuel said,
"In the past few days, tens of thousands of people have poured into Wangcheng, and the defenders of all towns have also been summoned to Wangcheng, and people have been arranged to reorganize them into an army."
After returning to the royal city a few days ago, Heimos took over the command of the entire royal city in the name of the prince.
His 'Black Knight' name and his outstanding achievements in the North made everyone in the royal city dare not object to this.
After all, even Shamash priest Xie Muer, who is a die-hard supporter of the crown prince, and Sage, the head of the royal knights, tacitly agreed to this matter, expressing obedience to the orders of Prince Heimos, and no one else would. Talking too much at this critical time.
The first order Heimos issued after taking over the command was to move all the residents of all villages and towns along the road near the royal city, especially in the direction from which the Gasdads marched.
Whether it is to move to a large city or to a royal city, everyone must move anyway.
At the same time, all the food and materials in the villages and towns must be taken away, and those that cannot be taken away will be directly burned on the spot, leaving only an empty village and town with neither people nor any materials.
Clear walls.
This is a tactic no one has ever used before.
As soon as Heimos gave the order, this strategy immediately caused great controversy and dissent in the royal city.
Many people have accused Huymos of treating the people harshly.
Others have questioned whether such a tactic, which has never been used, actually works.
Moreover, this order did arouse strong dissatisfaction among many people around Wangcheng. They were unwilling to leave their homes, and even more unwilling to burn down their own houses.
But Heimos ignored the dissatisfaction of the people at all. Hearing that the people were unwilling to relocate, he directly sent the army to force them to relocate.
Those who refused to leave, let the soldiers force them out, and then set fire to the entire town, forcing them to move out.
For a time, green smoke bursts on the ground, and small villages were burned down on the ground.
Although the people whose homes were burned down were furious, they had no choice but to drag their families and escape to the nearest large city or the royal city.
And after this incident, the 'Black Knight', who originally had the name of terror among the people, was even more vicious.
The resolute behavior and the ruthless means made everyone fear it.
In this regard, Heimos did not care.
At this moment, he casually flipped through the report submitted by the subordinate who was responsible for cleaning and driving the people, and continued to ask Xie Muer.
"How long will it take for the Gasdadians to get to the royal city?"
"One night, it is estimated to arrive tomorrow evening. Because of the harassment of the cavalry you sent all the way, their marching speed was two to three days later than expected."
The priest, who has long been familiar with the general sentiment, answered.
After Heimos issued the order to move all the people around the royal city and the enemy along the road, the second thing was to dispatch more than 2,000 elite cavalry, divided into dozens of small cavalry squads, and continued to attack Gas along the way. Dade army harassed.
They also do not face the enemy directly, and often run away when they are not prepared for a sneak attack, or shoot arrows from a distance in the middle of the night.
Even if he was driven away by the army, he went around in circles and came back to continue to harass him, making the Gastadians very annoying.
To them, these cavalry squads that harassed the army from time to time were like mosquitoes that buzzed around them but couldn't hit them.
In this way, although these cavalry squads could not inflict substantial damage on the Gasdadians, they greatly delayed their marching speed.
Otherwise, according to the original marching speed, the Gasdadians would already be under the king's city at this moment.
Heimos hummed and stood up.
He is now on the high tower in the palace, and through the window, he can see the city gate closest to the palace from a distance.
The city gate was crowded at the moment.
Countless people who were forcibly driven out of their homes by him are still entering the royal city in an endless stream, dragging their families with them, all of them looking ugly and complaining.
Following his gaze, Xie Mu'er also saw the situation at the city gate.
These days, the gates of the royal city have been like this.
The priest of Shamash frowned.
To be honest, he didn't agree with Heimos's approach at first - self-destruction before the enemy strikes - this tactic is simply unheard of.
He looked at Heimos' profile.
The prince's face was extremely handsome, but those golden red eyes looked down at the people at the city gate without the slightest emotion.
He looked at those people as if he were purely looking at the pieces on the chessboard at his mercy.
Shemuer remembered that day.
That day, when Heimos proposed this strategy, it was the same look in his eyes now.
At that time, before he spoke, Sage, the head of the Royal Knights, had already stood up to object.
"I disagree!"
The burly man with short black and brown hair frowned and said displeasedly.
"What kind of ridiculous strategy is this to let ourselves suffer before the Gasdards come over?"
Facing Sage's questioning gaze, Heimos still sat steadily, his expression calm and calm.
He said, "There is always a loss in war, whether it is won or lost, it is only the difference between more and less."
"There's no reason to self-destruct before the war! I don't agree! Priest Xie Mu'er won't agree either!"
Heimos glanced at the two lightly.
"Don't forget, the order given to you in Gallan's secret letter is to fully obey my command."
"… "
Sage couldn't deny it.
The crown prince ordered in a secret letter—to them as the crown prince.
They must obey all orders of Heimos unconditionally.
He frowned tightly and said, "Can't you think of a better strategy?"
"The best strategy? Yes."
Heimos raised his eyes and looked at the two of them with indifferent eyes that were as inorganic as golden-red glass beads.
"In my opinion, the best strategy is to give up the royal city."
"!!"
Ignoring the anger in Sage's eyes, Heimos crossed his hands on his knees and continued talking on his own.
"Abandon the royal city, abandon the northern line, abandon the eastern line, concentrate all the remaining legions to retreat to the northwest, and completely abandon the eastern area of Aaron Landis. In this way, we can take the natural danger of the Eya River. As a line of defense, and at the same time backed by friendly Tasda, we can attack and retreat and defend.”
"And once we withdraw from the eastern region, the Geshu people go south, and the Yis people move westward, they will not let go of the fat of the royal city. If the Gasdadians want to defend the just-conquered royal city, they must have to deal with this. Two nations fighting."
"When those three countries were fighting each other, we stayed in the northwest to slowly build up our strength and rebuild the army. After a year and a half, when those countries were almost exhausted, the initiative was in our hands, whether we wanted to cut them off. It is up to us to decide whether the Gasdadians will retreat or deal with the Geshus in the north first."
Heimos uttered the words calmly, his voice almost cruel.
Sage, who was angry at first, opened his mouth and was speechless for a while.
He couldn't agree with Heimos's practice of abandoning the royal city, but he couldn't refute this strategy either.
This is indeed the most effective and most effective strategy for preserving the strength of Aaron Landis' army.
Yes, to retain the strength of the army.
But what about the people of Aaron Landis
The army retreats to the northwest, abandons the eastern region, and allows those three countries to rage on the land of Aaron Landis, then during that time, the people of Aaron Landis on the eastern land will be endless. How cruel were they treated in the midst of the war
Thinking like this, Xie Mu'er opened his mouth, but he still didn't ask this sentence.
He knew it was pointless to ask.
Because His Royal Highness Heimos never thinks about things that he doesn't care about.
…
Waking up from the memory and returning to the present, Xie Muer looked at Heimos.
He has a feeling.
If there was no Prince Gallan, or if the prince died in Judas City and the secret letter could not be sent, Heimos would really have implemented that cruel strategy.
Without looking at the complicated expression that Xi Muer looked at himself, Heimos's eyes had moved away from the noisy city gate.
"At noon tomorrow, close all city gates."
On that handsome face, a pair of sword brows were as sharp as blades.
He turned to leave, the teal cloak flying behind him.
Heimos said: "From then on, without my order, anyone who wants to enter or leave the royal city will be killed on the spot."
The sun goes down.
After a night, it rose again.
When the sun rose into the sky, the gates of the three sides of the King City of Aaron Landis slowly fell, completely closing the passage of entry and exit.
Then, at the moment when the sun is about to set on the earth.
On the far horizon, white armies appeared in the twilight of the setting sun.
Accompanied by the sound of hoofs that shook the earth, they rolled in like snow and ice that collapsed in a snowy mountain.
The great army of Gasthod came under the king of Aaronlandis.
Above the high city wall, Heimos stood there, looking down at the earth and the army of Gasdad in the distance.
A black armor draped in the glow of the setting sun.
The gust of wind blew his jet-black forehead, and the golden-red pupils seemed to be burning with the fiery clouds on the horizon.
He lowered his head, raised his hand, and gently kissed the emerald green malachite ring on his right hand.
…
I will defend the royal city.
As long as it is your wish, your wish, I will fulfill it for you.
…
…
The wind whistled, swept across the sky, over the distant land.
After a night, when the sun rose, it blew to the city thousands of miles away.
The gentle wind in the morning swept over the cheeks of the young man who was standing on the ground on horseback, and lifted the long golden hair on his cheeks, letting it brush gently against the white earlobes.
The soft touch when the hair brushed over the earlobe was as gentle as someone was kissing.
Inexplicably moving in his heart, for some reason, Garlan raised his hand unconsciously and touched the earlobe that was already empty.
Then, he turned his head and looked east.
The direction in which the sun rises.
The direction of the King City of Aaron Landis.
Presumably... Heimos has already received the message he sent back.
Garlan stared silently in that direction.
The reason why he chose to stay here to counter-attack instead of rushing back to the royal city is because he knew that even if he returned to the royal city, he would not be able to defend the royal city in such a dangerous situation.
However, Heimos is different.
He believed.
As long as Heimos is still in the royal city, no one can let the royal city fall.
He believed.
Under such a dangerous situation, Heimos is the only one in the world who can still defend the royal city.
…
Following the Judas City counterattack that ended overnight before the world could react, the much-anticipated battle to defend the King City of Aaron Landis followed closely and was about to start.
…
…
According to historical records.
The battle to defend the city of Aaron Landis was the first battle in the world to use the strategy of 'hard walls and clear fields'.
It went down in history as a classic battle.
The ancient history books also record that Heimos, the military strategist of ancient Aaron Landis, created this strategy.
In later generations, this strategy he created has been used for reference by countless outstanding military strategists, and it is still used today.