About an hour later, the fire completely engulfed the entire forest. The fire shot straight into the sky, turning the dark night sky red. Viewed from a high altitude, it looked like a huge red patch appeared on the earth.
Three or four kilometers east of the woods, soldiers who had narrowly escaped death gathered there, looking at the fire in the distance with lingering fear.
"... Let's count the number of people."
After an hour of desperate rescue, Benjamin was very tired and his head was dizzy. He stood in the crowd holding his knees and said this to the system.
After a while, the system said: "There were 20,000 soldiers who successfully escaped, and more than half of the entire army was lost in the woods. However, the number of mages remained at about 2,000. More than half of the ordnance and supplies were damaged and were used for support. This dilapidated army now is barely enough."
Benjamin nodded when he heard this and said nothing.
At that moment, heavy emotions came over me. In any case, it was he who set up the ambush plan, and he was also directly responsible for the spontaneous combustion of the bishop and the priest. He suddenly realized what he had to bear as a decision-maker.
Even General Kent seemed to have died in this ambush...
"Don't feel guilty about this, this was a great ambush." The president suddenly said at this moment, "Annihilated tens of thousands of knights and thousands of priests in the Kingdom of Hori in one fell swoop, and killed three bishops at the same time. For For the Church, this is a heavy blow. You defended Ikol’s dignity and all the sacrifices were worth it.”
"…Thank you."
Benjamin took a deep breath and gradually came back to his senses.
"Let's go, we'd better leave here as soon as possible." The president continued, "The Kingdom of Hori may send more pursuers, and we need to meet up with other armies as soon as possible."
"Of course."
In this way, after a moment of silence in front of the fire, the president led the remnants of the army to leave here and continue to march towards Rock City in the east. On the way, Miles also explained a little about the circumstances of his rescue of the president.
When Regina's coup just started, Miles happened to sneak into the palace—don't ask him what he did when he sneaked into the palace. At that time, the bishop happened to be interrogating the president, and Miles had been lurking in the dark. After the president was put into a sack and dragged out of the city by several mercenaries, he quickly followed from behind and at the same time sent the message to Benjamin.
Because of this, the message was mixed with the sound of rapid footsteps.
After that, those few mercenaries mixed in with the fleeing people and headed north, making it difficult for Miles to start. It wasn't until they separated from the main road and began to take a detour toward the border that Miles jumped out and was rescued by the general.
The rescued president was so impatient that he didn't even have time to go back to Regina to report that he was safe, so he wanted to rush to the border to alert the defenders there. However, as Benjamin knew, the defenders had been defeated, and instead they found Benjamin and his friends hiding in the woods.
"We ambush so well, how did you find out?" Hearing this, Benjamin felt very strange.
"Absolutely..." Miles shrugged and said, "There are too many traces of activity near the woods. In fact, as long as you look carefully, it is easy to find. After that, I sneaked into the woods secretly, and it turned out that it was you. , we were also shocked at that time.”
"As for why we need to dig holes." The president continued, "It is still too dangerous to ambush people in the woods. At that time, I felt that the enemy might set fire to the forest, so I did not show up in a hurry, but did something else. Prepare with one hand.”
"… All right."
After listening to Miles' side of the story, Benjamin felt a faint sense of helplessness for some reason.
If he had known that the president would be saved, he wouldn't have had to fight like this, right
But... Anyway, as long as it's okay, Benjamin felt relieved. As long as the president returns to Regina and presides over the situation together with the executive prime minister, the situation will definitely be much better than now.
Two days later.
"No problem, our soldiers have already garrisoned Rock City as much as possible. Now that there are 70,000 troops in the city, they should be able to resist the enemy for a while."
Benjamin and the president returned to Regina half a day ago. At this moment, in the palace, they were discussing the current countermeasures with other officials.
"What we want is not to resist for a while, but to completely repel the enemy." The executive prime minister shook his head and said to the reporter, "What about the Kingdom of Hori? What are their movements?"
"They just broke through several cities in succession and encountered little resistance. However, the majority of the troops are still stationed in the Morant Wasteland and have not continued to attack."
"Morant Wasteland..."
Benjamin couldn't help but frown.
It was a fairly wide terrain in the west-central part of Ikol, surrounded by bare land, but it was the closest route to Regina. From there to Regina, there is only a small hilly area in the middle, and Rock City stands in it. It is almost the only level with a defensive advantage.
And once Rock City is also breached, Regina will be in danger.
It seems that the situation is still very serious.
"How many people have been dispatched by the Horli Kingdom? Have you investigated their armaments?" the executive prime minister also took a deep breath and asked.
"The detailed situation has not yet been investigated, but judging from the scale alone, the enemy's army is at least 200,000. Powerful siege equipment... may have been deployed in three figures."
"Three digits? Hundreds of Holy Light Cannons?"
"Forgive me, sir, we can't be sure, but... it's still possible."
Everyone was in an uproar.
"Hundreds of Holy Light Cannons... Let's just surrender. Rock City can't stop it." An official showed a desperate look and said in horror, "If they fire at the same time, even Regina will be destroyed in an instant. Razed to the ground.”
"What nonsense are you talking about!" the president immediately refuted, "The situation has not been determined yet, why are you just thinking about surrendering?"
"You are a mage, and there is a church over there. Of course you cannot surrender. But Icol is a place where people live and work in peace and contentment. If it is destroyed, what can you mages do? Besides... Besides, we don't necessarily have to surrender. All the church wants is missionary work, we can sue for peace!”
"What peace are you asking for? Get out of here if you're afraid of death. We don't need a waste like you!"
"I'm not afraid of death, I just think about the people of Ikol..."
Because of the terrible disparity in power, serious differences have arisen even among officials. The main war faction and the peace-seeking faction began to split from here for the first time, and the voice of the peace-seeking faction was not even small.
Sum…
Benjamin clenched his fists.
There is no reconciliation between them and the church. Send a bunch of things over and then sign a bunch of shameful treaties? What's the difference between that and surrender
Besides, if Icol sued for peace, he would have no choice but to throw the Magic Academy out—don’t forget, the church’s original intention of launching the war was to regain their keys. These peace seekers want people to withdraw their troops? Unless they can send Benjamin away tied up.
And what can an organization like the church do even if it withdraws temporarily? Will they really let Ikol go
"enough!"
Finally, the executive prime minister waved his hand and forcibly stopped the current debate. Then, he turned his head and suddenly looked at Benjamin, who had been silent.
"Dean Benjamin, what do you think? How can we resist the invasion of Horli Kingdom?"