Steel, Explosives, and Spellcasters

Resting at his watch post, Sergeant Taylor heard footsteps outside. He called out alertly, "Who's there? Password!"

"Torrent." The person replied with the passphrase, "It's me."

The passphrase matched, and the old Taylor relaxed, responding with the countersign, "Blossom."

The footsteps approached rapidly. Centurion Montaigne deftly vaulted over the parapet and jumped into the corridor.

Taylor immediately noticed that Centurion Montaigne was holding a strange short musket—strange because this musket had no firing device, like those old hook guns that required one hand to hold the gun and the other to ignite it, but it was indeed a firearm.

"What's the matter, sir? Enemy attack?" Sergeant Taylor hurriedly asked.

"No enemies spotted." Winters pulled out a bell, "But the alarm tripwires have been cut."

"What do we do? Sound the alarm?"

Winters hesitated for a moment, then gritted his teeth and said, "Ring the bell! Sound the alarm!"

Seeing the duty officer so resolute, Taylor actually became frightened. He licked his lips and tried to dissuade him, "Should we double-check? The tripwire could've snapped on its own… What if it's a false alarm? It'd be a huge mess. Should we wait?"

Winters wasn't sure if the tripwire had been deliberately cut either. To be on the safe side, it would be better to wait, to wait until they actually encountered the enemy before sounding the alarm.

Because if it turned out to be a false alarm afterward, Winters was sure to face severe accountability, and even the other sentries might get into trouble because of it.

"Ring the alarm bell now! Light the beacon!" Winters bit his teeth again, "Better to report in error than miss out! Go sound the alarm, I'll take the responsibility if something goes wrong."

Seeing the duty officer's determination, Sergeant Taylor had no choice but to comply. He rushed to the alarm bell and began to ring it vigorously with the hammer.

The urgent bell reverberated across the battlefield in front of the city wall, first from the west-four position, then the sentries on the old siege wall behind Winters also rang their alarm bells.

The camp was shaken from its slumber, officers dashed out of their tents, bellowing "Emergency assembly!" Soldiers fumbled for their clothes and weapons in a panic.

Next to the west-four battery, two beacons were lit on the earthen wall, signaling an alert.

The other batteries and watch posts lit a single beacon, indicating their positions were still tranquil.

Winters climbed onto the rampart and counted the beacons again three times carefully. Once he was sure there was no mistake, he called over Sergeant Taylor, "West-three battery hasn't lit any beacons, there might be trouble there. Which of your men don't have night blindness?"

"Dan, Weck." Old Taylor named two soldiers without hesitation.

"Have them grab their weapons and follow me." Winters buckled his helmet, drew his sword, and threw the scabbard on the ground.

"You're going out too?" Old Taylor was surprised, "We just have to hold the cannons and wait for reinforcements."

"We have to find out what exactly happened at west-three battery," explained Winters. "Cowering in our post is like being blind, not knowing where the enemy is running to."

Sergeant Taylor grabbed Winters' arm, "Then let me take men out, and you stay here."

Winters asked sternly, "Are you as good in combat as me? Besides, I don't trust others to scout; I need to see it with my own eyes."

Taylor's ten-man squad were Halberdiers, it was difficult to use their long weapons in the cramped corridor, Dan and Weck left their polearms and followed Winters along the corridor towards the west-three battery with swords in hand.

Designed to protect against cannon fire, the corridor snaked like a serpent, with a turn every four or five meters. As they were close to the battery, Winters heard footsteps in the corridor ahead.

"Password?!" He immediately shouted.

The person approaching didn't reply, their footsteps quickened.

"Enemy attack!"

Dan and Weck only saw a figure flash out from the corner; then Centurion Montaigne drew his strange short musket and shot the person down with a round to the head.

Dan saw clearly that the short musket in the centurion's hand had no fuse, no wheel lock, not even a trigger—just a stock and a barrel. However, in Centurion Montaigne's hands, it fired as if it were a normal firearm.

"A wizard's dark magic," the thought simultaneously struck the two privates.

The recoil of the firearm numbed Winters' palm. It was his first time using this kind of spell-activated firearm in combat and he hadn't expected it to actually work, yet it was highly effective.

For Winters, a spell-activated firearm was far more convenient than an Arrow Flying Spell. He wasn't adept with kinetic spells, but he had a knack for Fire-type magic.

Before he could take pride in himself, more enemies wielding short daggers rushed out from the corner ahead.

The disadvantage of a spell-activated firearm was also clear—it had only one shot.

In a moment of urgency, Winters threw the empty firearm towards the foes.

An idea suddenly struck his mind, "Perhaps bundling three barrels together?"

But now wasn't the time for such thoughts. Winters switched to his sword and thrust at the enemy.

Even a coward, weak and ineffective like Winters, having been forged through several bloody battles, would have long become a fierce warrior, not to mention that Winters was already a long-trained officer.

Dan and Weck watched in shock as Warrant Officer Montagne efficiently killed—no, slaughtered the oncoming enemy.

The corridor was narrow, with enemies able to advance only one by one. As each one came up, the warrant officer took them down, none of them proving to be a match for him.

As a result, it was only Winters, Dan, and Weck who advanced forward, without a need for Dan and Weck to swing their swords. They followed behind Winters, and would thrust a sword into anyone they saw who wasn't quite dead yet.

After killing eight or nine men in a row, the will of the Tanilians completely collapsed. The remaining Tanilians, stricken with fear, began to crawl and scramble away, turning and running.

Winters watched the Tanilians flee over the parapet wall towards the city wall but did not pursue further.

He picked up the pistol he had dropped from beneath a corpse, while Dan and Weck watched him with awe.

"Move out, to the western artillery position three," Winters commanded, once he had retrieved his gun, leading the way at the front.

Dan swallowed his saliva and couldn't help but whisper to Weck, "I finally understand why they call the warrant officer 'Blood Man'…"

Continuing towards the western artillery position three, they began to encounter the bodies of Vineta soldiers. The fallen Vinetans were strewn about in the corridor leading to their artillery position, their bodies still warm.

"Sir! There's a centurion here!" Weck reported loudly to Winters. Read latest chapters at My Virtual Library Empire

A body clad in an officer's uniform lay sprawled on the ground, arms limply dangling, the eyes no longer showing a spark of life.

Winters took a good while to recognize him as Lieutenant Dyke, the duty officer of the western artillery position three. There was a terrible wound on Dyke's neck, which appeared to have been the fatal blow.

"Dead," Dan summarized succinctly.

Weck spat out his saliva, "No shit."

Winters tried to reconstruct the scene of Dyke and his subordinates' last stand in his mind but there was one question he couldn't figure out.

Furrowing his brow, Winters pondered with confusion, "No matter how you look at it, a fierce fight took place here, but why didn't I hear any noise right next to the western artillery position three?"

The cannons were on their mounts, but the touchholes were firmly nailed shut, rendering them all useless for the foreseeable future.

Clearly, the goal of the Tachi garrison's surprise attack was to destroy the Vinetan cannons, and for that reason, the Vinetans had prepared thoroughly. But why didn't he hear any alarm?

Winters checked the alarm bell next, which was undamaged.

A shrill whistle came from the west side, and Dan shouted in panic, "Sir! It's our artillery position!"

"Move! Let's go back!" Sword in hand, Winters sprinted towards the western artillery position four, leaving Dan and Weck far behind.

Among the eight artillery positions, the lower the number, the closer to the central axis, with the western position four being the closest to the city wall.

Tanilian soldiers carrying nails and hammers climbed over the parapet, jumped into the artillery position, and rushed towards the cannon.

Winters' two squads of ten tried to stop the enemy, but were vastly outnumbered and had been pushed back into the signal post.

The two signal posts were positioned like horns in front of the artillery position, structured according to Winters' specifications: narrow at the entrance but large enough inside to accommodate a squad of ten.

A ferocious Tanilian swordsman howled as he charged into Taylor's signal post, only to be impaled in the belly by Buba's halberd as soon as he entered. The second Tanilian who tried to rush in was also repelled by the halberdiers.

Seeing no chance to break through from the front, the Tanilians moved to the outside of the signal post, climbing the walls and jumping in. Old Taylor, holding a crossbow, shot a Tanilian climbing the parapet, then pulled out his dagger and turned to cut down another who leapt into the post…

Outside the signal post, a Tanilian archer, bold as brass, simply stood on top of the parapet, firing arrows down at Taylor and his soldiers.

With a single Arrow Flying Spell, Winters knocked the bowman off the wall. He didn't stop to check if the archer was dead, drawing his sword and cutting his way toward the signal post.

The Tanilians had focused all their attention on attacking the Vinetan signal post, not noticing Winters approach from behind.

Only when screams suddenly erupted from behind did the Tanilians realize they had been flanked by a single man.

"Fight! Warrant Officer Montagne has come back! Reinforcements are here!" Taylor, with a gash on his head, blood flowing down into his eyes, wiped his face haphazardly with his hand, raised his dagger high, and roared, "For Great Vineta!"

"Huzzah!"

The Vinetan soldiers inside the signal post were invigorated and, shouting, counterattacked from within.

Trapped between attacks from both sides, the Tanilian soldiers collapsed, many jumping the wall to escape. Those who were too slow were dragged back and killed.

After dealing with the Tanilians in the corridor, Winters leaned on his knees panting heavily and hoarsely asked Taylor, "What's the situation now?"

"The cannons! We've lost the cannons!" Taylor was so anxious he'd forgotten to show respect, "At least a hundred Tanilians! The other signal post has fallen too!"

"What about the reinforcements?"

"They haven't arrived yet."

"Move! To the cannons! Follow me!" Winters wiped the blood from his face with the bottom of his shirt and switched to a dead man's curved sword—because his own had become blunt—leading everyone toward the artillery position, leaning against the wall for support.

Soldiers of the Third Legion rumor: Bloody Montagne is the bravest officer in the legion, and just now, Taylor's squad of ten have personally confirmed that the gossip is true.