Chapter 47: Chapter 47: The Radical North City Nobles

Meanwhile, in the Beastmen camp.

"What’s that noise? What’s happening outside?" Eric threw back his blanket, revealing a seductive Wolf Beauty.

When it came to partners, some might occasionally seek out other races for the novelty, but most with normal aesthetic tastes still found their own kind more attractive.

Just as humans don’t fall in love with dogs.

"This is bad, milord! The enemy from the city has charged out to engage us in battle!" reported the wolfman who had rushed in.

"What? They’re initiating the attack?" Eric was stunned.

You couldn’t blame him for his fixed mindset. Ever since the war began, the humans had been fighting a frustratingly defensive war.

Forget the newly opened Western Front; even on the central front, their main strategy was to fight a static war, using the terrain to stall for time. No one had ever heard of humans launching an offensive.

Could they really be this lucky?

He had just been worrying about how to use the horn, and now the enemy was delivering themselves right to his doorstep!

"Is the intelligence accurate? What direction?" Eric asked.

"Directly south, a little over a thousand of them!" the messenger reported.

"Excellent! The Beast God protects us! Quickly, summon the two Wolf Cavalry legions and make sure they tie down the enemy! Oh, and remember to notify the Goblin Corps on both flanks to move out as soon as possible!" Eric commanded.

Eric’s Wolf Cavalry were naturally no match for Kase’s Extraordinary Wolf Cavalry Legion. His were just Wolf Race People riding wolves, but his two legions combined still numbered a full 2,000.

Defeating these humans might be difficult, but with the help of the horn, tying them down would be quite simple.

As for the goblins, Eric didn’t expect them to play a major role. They just needed to block any enemy reinforcements from the flanks.

...

"For the King!"

"Charge!"

...

On the battlefield, several thousand human Knights led the charge into the goblin camp, scattering the goblins wherever they went.

"Uncle Volco! You didn’t believe me before, but look! What did I tell you? This will be the kingdom’s first victory! We’re going to go down in history!" Walker exclaimed, looking excitedly at his uncle beside him.

Volco was also beaming. Once the war entered its second phase, the Beastmen would typically resort to attrition tactics. The humans would no longer be the ones constantly on the defensive, and there would surely be victories and defeats on both sides.

But there were different kinds of victories, and a first-strike achievement like this would probably be reported directly to the Bauhinia Palace, straight to the King himself!

Volco was a standard, traditional Frankish noble. In his eyes, the glory brought by military achievements was above all else!

He had initially been opposed to Walker’s unauthorized order to attack, but Walker was the Patriarch. If Walker wanted to deploy the troops, there was nothing he could do.

’It seems I really am old, I’ve lost the drive of youth.’ Volco thought with gratification.

"Uncle! Look at these goblins! They’re going to smash right through the wolfmen’s defensive lines!" Walker said excitedly.

Volco silently took back his feeling of gratification. It seemed the young man still needed a lot of guidance.

After all, this was Walker’s first time on a battlefield. He couldn’t accurately judge the situation, and his impression of war was limited to the secondhand stories from his father’s generation and the shallow knowledge from books.

But Volco, a battlefield veteran who had survived the last Beastmen invasion from the south, could tell at a glance that the situation no longer permitted them to advance.

The chaotic goblin camp was now acting as an obstacle, severely restricting their horses’ movement.

So far, they hadn’t even seen a shadow of the enemy’s true elites—the wolfmen.

’Goblins routing wolfmen? You might as well claim Peasants could storm Madar Palace and take the Beast Emperor’s head.’

"Patriarch, the current situation no longer allows us to continue the attack," Volco advised.

What followed, however, was an incredulous look from Walker.

In his view, the battlefield situation was excellent. Wherever their army went, the enemy fled at the mere sight of them. How could they even think of retreating now, instead of riding the momentum of this great victory to crush the enemy army?

"Volco, it seems you really have gotten old..." Walker’s pupils narrowed as he sighed, dropping the respectful title of "uncle."

"Patriarch, as long as we can retreat to the fortress smoothly, we will..." Volco tried to continue persuading him, but Walker cut him off.

"Enough! Say no more! Look at these routing goblins! Look how they flee in a panic! This sentiment will spread throughout the enemy army and ultimately trigger a total collapse!"

"The advantage is ours! Send word to continue the attack!" Walker commanded. These weren’t just baseless words; it was exactly what his family’s ancestral books said.

Volco opened his mouth to object but didn’t know what to say.

Knight Walker’s theory wasn’t entirely without reason. Unfortunately, he forgot that goblins could break the morale of other goblins because their combat strengths were about the same.

When a group of routing goblins ran into a group of wolfmen, they would only be forced to pick up their blades and fight again under the wolfmen’s supervision.

...

At that moment, Eric, waiting in the center of the camp, almost laughed out loud when he heard the enemy was continuing their attack.

’The Beast Emperor protects us!’

Since coming to the human battlefield, he, Eric, had barely seen any action.

The few times he did, he was used by Dor as a sacrificial piece.

’Today, it’s finally my turn to show my might, isn’t it?!’

"Relay my orders! All Wolf Cavalry units, begin the Wolf Howl! Don’t let a single human escape.

Bring up the Beast God’s Horn! Fill it with Magic Crystals! Find some warriors and have them blow the horn!

And the goblins on the flanks? Have them dispatch their most elite troops! They are to reach their respective city gates at top speed and prepare to encircle these humans!"

...

"AWOOO!"

"AWOOO!"

"What’s that sound? Where is it coming from?"

A wolf’s howl echoed, followed immediately by a rising and falling chorus of howls from all over, making it impossible to tell where they were coming from.

Even as a Silver Knight, the sound made Walker feel a bit dazed, to say nothing of the other members of his force.

"This is bad! It’s the Wolf Howl! They’re direct descendants of the Beastmen’s Wolf Race! Patriarch, we have to retreat! It’ll be too late if we don’t go now!" Volco’s face was filled with panic as some unpleasant memories resurfaced.

Over thirty years ago on the Frankish Great Plains, the chieftain of the Beastmen’s Wolf Race had sacrificed the humans of an entire city to initiate the Night of the Blood Moon, directly crushing three regular army legions under the royal family’s command.

As it happened, Volco had been serving in the Twelfth Legion at the time. Out of the legion’s 10,000 soldiers, only a handful had escaped.

"Patriarch! There’s no time to hesitate! You may not know the terror of the Wolf Howl! In the past..."

"I don’t care what Wolf Howl it is! Franks never retreat!"

Walker shouted, channeling his Silver Fighting Qi, and charged forward, taking the lead.

...

"Chieftain, Chieftain! Lord Eric told me to act quickly! He said victory is all but assured! We’re certain to earn merit this time!"

Watching his excited tribesman rush over, Chief Suoli perked up his pointed ears and listened intently.

"Good, good! Notify the elite warriors within our tribe, and the chieftains of the other tribes! We must respond to Lord Eric’s call to action immediately!" The more Chief Suoli listened, the brighter his eyes grew. 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝒆𝔀𝒆𝙗𝓷𝒐𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝓶

Even goblins had elites, though they were barely stronger than militia.

It wasn’t easy for a Goblin Tribe to earn merit on this battlefield, but it was certain that the treatment of a tribe that had distinguished itself would be vastly different.

No matter what, the goblins were ultimately comrades within the Empire, and the war effort relied on them most of the time. They had to be given something to hope for.

This, too, was the Beastmen’s way of ruling.