Chapter 167: The Defense of Brandenburg—A Warrior Guards the Pass

A streak of deep blue cut across the sky, followed immediately by a severed arm spraying blood into the void. George twisted his wrist, thrusting his longsword forward, and the barbarian who had barely managed to climb onto the city wall fell back to the earth.

But before the other barbarians could react, they saw the sword light accompanied by deep blue specks rushing towards them. It was like a giant wave splashing up from the sea as it struck a reef, covering the sky and earth, seemingly about to drown the whole world in the blink of an eye! Unfortunately, the scene everyone imagined, where the body was cut in two, did not happen. Instead, that barbarian flew a long distance outward, as if struck by a heavy hammer.

Facing George’s kill-stealing behavior, I gave him a rather disdainful look. Chrispian and Aldred also looked at this section of the wall that had become almost empty, and glared at George angrily. Only Green gave him a thumbs up with a wretched look on his face.

Alright! This was a section of the wall where the watchtowers had not been repaired. It was located right above the defense section that House Cranston had previously lost. Due to a shortage of fireproof leather, if all the watchtowers were repaired, a large area would become highly effective for fire attacks. After all, the so-called difficulty of burning ebony was only relative; it certainly could not be used as firewood, but it definitely could not withstand the power of Greek Fire.

Although Sir Feld could ensure that this line of defense would not be breached, as a humanoid self-propelled cannon, he had other very important tasks to handle and could not guard this line all the time. Although this should have been his main job, sometimes one had to consider the bigger picture.

Of course, the most important thing was that ever since Sir Feld took up permanent station on the crenelations, the clumsy performance of those rookie soldiers made Sir Feld, who was previously full of vigor, show signs of a nervous breakdown.

What exactly happened during this time was, in the words of the person involved, not for outsiders to know. Although the gossip fire in George and the others burned brightly, considering Sir Feld’s arms, which were thicker than their thighs, and his fists the size of sandbags, the few of them compared the difference in combat power between the two sides. With Hiren being watched closely by Sir Val, the five of them decisively gave up the plan to investigate further.

‘I really want to know what happened in these three days!’ the hearts of the five-person group shouted constantly.

In fact, the battle in the first two days had already proved that the siege effect of dropping Greek Fire from high altitude was indeed outstanding, especially when the target was a watchtower lacking the protection of fireproof leather. The price the other side paid also added a few stars to Sir Val’s record, of course, this was according to the traditions of the world George lived in before he crossed over.

Afterwards, upon George’s suggestion, given that the number of Squires this year was ‘seriously exceeding the limit,’ the defense section originally belonging to House Cranston was vacated first. As for why this area was chosen, it was because it was the only area where the city wall had been climbed during these days. Coupled with the poor combat performance of House Cranston’s soldiers, the barbarians concluded that only weaklings were stationed here.

Since Miss Cranston and Sir Feld, for the sake of territorial honor, refused to retreat to the rear to rest, in order to ensure that they would not be dragged down by those pig teammates, the proposal to change defenses, which could to some extent cover up the fact and prevent House Cranston from losing face completely, was agreed to by most knights.

Of course, this approach, which anyone with eyes could see through, was strongly resisted by Miss Cranston. However, she, who could not even get the support of Sir Feld, could only silently accept this reality.

In any case, compared to Cecilia Pasqual Cranston, who was still a young girl, Sir Feld, who did not lack life experience, handled things more smoothly and knew how to adapt. Knowing the current performance of his soldiers, he would never let them go and die in vain. Subjects were the wealth of the Lord, let alone these able-bodied young men. If there were really heavy casualties, Sir Feld would have a hard time explaining it when he went back! One could not just care about face and ignore the inside.

From then on, House Cranston’s old defense section became a practice ground for George and the other Squires during the day. And because they could basically be considered high-end combat power, the watchtowers that were not very necessary were demolished. The fireproof leather stripped from them also happened to supplement other parts, which could be said to kill two birds with one stone. Except for a certain sulking young girl, it really could be said that everyone was happy.

As for why it was George and his five companions, that was naturally because there were no extra personnel in the other territories! Generally speaking, the team from each territory consisted of a Knight leading his Heir, or, if there was no Heir, leading an apprentice with sufficient strength.

As for those powerful Retainers of theirs, under normal circumstances, they were responsible for logistical work. Unless it was a critical moment of life and death, these guys would not directly participate in the battle. To be honest, whether this rule, which seemed very brain-dead to George, was a tacit understanding between nations or was to take care of the psychology of ordinary soldiers and middle and lower-ranking officers was really hard to say.

George and the others obtained the right to kill freely on this section of the city wall. Of course, in order to make the other side continuously invest manpower again, the few of them chose to attack only after letting the other side climb up the city wall. If they didn’t let the other side see a little hope of breaking through the defense line, it would be bad if the barbarians shrank back. Of course, to some extent, it was also to cover up the fact that those weaklings were no longer here.

Just as the few were communicating with their eyes, the palm of a barbarian appeared again between the arrow slits on the city wall. Green, holding a thin rapier in the rear, flicked his sword into a flourish and said: “Stop glaring at each other! Didn’t you notice those barbarians have already climbed up?”

The longsword cut through the air, and immediately scattered specks of blue light fell down. And in the next second, this steel sword glowing with blue light had already chopped down on the head of a certain barbarian who had just revealed his upper body, regardless of anything else.

On this battlefield belonging to George, whenever this longsword was raised, it revealed its sharpness in the midst of plainness. It was like a giant waterfall and evil waves hanging from beyond the nine heavens, whistling and pouring down!

Watching the storm-like attacks in front of him, Chrispian asked aloud: “George, do you have a grudge against these barbarians? If you try this hard, be careful you run out of stamina in a while!”

“Chrispian is absolutely right, you need to pay attention to your stamina distribution now. Otherwise, even though you seem to be cutting happily now, you might not have any strength left in a while,” Aldred also kindly reminded him.

After chopping down the barbarian in front of him with one sword, George followed up with a kick to make him fall off the city wall. This was to reduce the difficulty of cleaning up afterwards as much as possible. In order to reduce the possibility of an outbreak of plague, all corpses needed to be specially processed, either buried or cremated. Of course, this was the attitude towards one’s own companions; as for those barbarians, they were naturally thrown directly out of the city.

Unfortunately, in this weather, there would be no crows or vultures to clean up these guys. The barbarians didn’t seem to have the habit of being wrapped in horse hides either. So burying these corpses every year after the war was a huge project even with the help of Greek Fire! Ben had once joked that those barbarians were planning to use these corpses to drag down the financial power of the Duchy of Nohan. After all, in times without fighting, Brandenburg was also a key pass on an important trade route.

Having dealt with the enemy in front of him, George let the tip of his sword droop slightly, caught his breath, and said: “Some new moves I learned, I never had a chance to use them before. Now that I finally have a chance for actual combat, of course I want to see if the effect is the same as described.”

“Although that is the case, you have to take it easy yourself.” Saying that, Ben swept out with a kick and directly kicked away the barbarian in front of him.

The high-intensity slashing work continued until the low horn sounded again.

“This is the fourth wave this morning, right!” Waving the longsword in his hand, Aldred said loudly.

Green thought for a moment, and then said: “You could say that. In terms of fighting, the barbarians’ impact has always been continuous. However, there were three periods that seemed like exhaustion, or perhaps morale fading. So you would mistakenly think it was four waves of attacks!”

George touched the notches on his longsword one by one, and raised such a question: “By the way, what is going on with those barbarians! Clearly they were killed to the point where their morale was about to collapse, but in the blink of an eye, they started fighting with their lives again. Just relying on military merit rewards and punishments, as well as threats to life, can’t achieve this, right!”

“It’s the drums, there is special magic carried in this drum sound. It can suppress the fear in the barbarians’ hearts, and at the same time amplify their desire to kill. If the drums only suppressed instead of eliminated, and the barbarians’ emotions of fear also needed to be released, such obvious fluctuations would not occur.” It was worthy of Ben, who dedicated one-sixth of his time every year to Brandenburg; he, who dealt with barbarians all year round on this kind of matter, had the most say.

Hearing this, Chrispian immediately turned the topic to the only musician in the team: “Green, how do you think this drum sound compares to your songs?”

“Those drums should also be specially made magic items! If it were just an ordinary drum surface, there would be no way to transmit the sound so far. Let alone attaching special effects to it. Of course, the drum as an instrument has quite obvious innate advantages, it can transmit sound very far. So in terms of the range of enhancement, I can’t compare.” At first Green was analyzing and comparing, but soon he started to boast, “But in terms of effect, how can a crude instrument like a big drum compare to my flute and mandolin.”

Chrispian immediately put down the weapon in his hand, clasped his hands together and said: “That is to say, in squad combat, or when organizing elites for a breakthrough, the effect of you Bards is more obvious. But on the battlefield, the role of the barbarian Wizard is greater, right?”

Green shook his head and said: “Didn’t I tell you before that it’s a problem with the instruments? Among us Bards, there is also a branch of military bands specializing in the battlefield. They use a specially made vehicle-mounted pipe organ as an instrument. If there is an excellent vehicle-mounted pipe organ, the effect is definitely far beyond the barbarians’ drum sounds. Besides, we Bards can also use that big drum; I have seen colleagues who used specially made military drums or horns before!”

“I think I understand the meaning here, is it that the more complex and beautiful the song, the more obvious the effect caused under the action of special Secret Arts. And the range of sound propagation also represents the range of action of the song’s effect.” George made a summary of Green’s previous statement, and then he looked at the longsword in his hand with some regret. This weapon that had accompanied him for more than two years could not be used again before a major repair. Unless George wanted to taste a broken sword on the battlefield.

“It should be said that the more beautiful the music, the more obvious the effect. However, more complex songs are often more beautiful, so usually what you said is not wrong. But there are also masterpieces among simple songs. It’s just that the number is relatively small in general. Otherwise, George, what you said is generally not wrong!” Green corrected the errors in George’s previous statement.

Aldred, who was originally looking at the barbarians retreating on the wall, suddenly turned his head and said: “I said, then doesn’t that mean you only need to practice those few simple pieces of music!”

Green was so amused by Aldred’s sentence that he laughed in anger, and then he asked back: “When you use Word Spirit, do you only need to remember the rhythm and pronunciation?”

“It seems I thought wrong.” Aldred touched his nose with his finger and said awkwardly.

“The special effects in our songs are basically based on acting on the spirit. So the song itself must match the ability we want to release. For example, the ability to inspire courage must be matched with an uplifting march to obtain the greatest effect. This is quite particular. And those excellent songs with simple changes are basically of the happy and cheerful type, and the range they can act on is really too small…” Green was not shy about discussing the problems in detail. When he spoke of excitement, although he did not dance with joy, his eyes were shining.

One could imagine that he must have been holding it in for a while. You have to know that among the five, only he was not a Knight. Although he was also in a Knight’s family and understood a lot of relevant knowledge, without actual experience, he could not get a word in for some of the conversations between the few. There was another key point, that was, he extremely hoped that his achievements in his profession would be recognized by others. So when someone finally turned the topic to this, of course he had to perform well.

Although he was listening to Green’s long speech in his ears, George still transferred part of his attention to the barbarian camp outside the city wall and the blue-gray sky above his head. Because he was worried that if those barbarian guys suddenly pulled a surprise attack, given the current situation of the few, if they were sneak attacked, it would definitely be quite miserable.

Of course, what he was worried about was not those ordinary barbarian cannon fodder, but an attack from the sky—Wind Knights riding Wyverns. Wind Knights were named knights and were the high-end combat power of the barbarians, but compared to the Formal Knights of Nohan, they were fakes. In fact, most of these so-called knights were of the Red Iron Rank, just like George and the others. But if these guys left their mounts and fought George in melee combat, George would definitely dare to say ‘I want to fight three at once.’

But with mounts, George, who had no flying ability, basically had no good way to deal with these guys who could maneuver flexibly in the sky. This was the advantage of the air force! Although they could be shot down with dense ground fire, this would only have a chance of working when the opponent dived to attack. So it was best to rely on the air force to deal with the air force.

‘If only I had a flying mount. But if I really want one, it seems a bit late now. I’ll arrange for someone to pay attention to news in this area as soon as I get back!’ An impulse suddenly popped up in George’s heart.

Speaking of the acquisition of Sky Cavalry, it was not that easy. Otherwise, among hundreds of thousands of barbarians, there would not be less than 100 Wind Knights. This number was much smaller than the Red Iron Rank warriors, Wizards, or Shamans among them.

And the Wyvern, which served as the mount for the Wind Knight, could not be said to have the blood of a Dragon or not, because there were still dinosaurs in this world. Although Wyverns were somewhat similar to Dragons, they were much smaller. Having only two feet was the origin of their name. They had webs in their claws similar to waterfowl, and their spread wings were covered with scales or feathers. They could attack any enemy with their sharp claws and teeth. The Wyvern’s tail became a forked poison sting, and its wings were covered with scales. Unfortunately, their intelligence was not very high.

However, the mount George wanted was not this, but a Wind-Rider. That was a creature that looked like an ordinary and beautiful steed. Its color could be white, gray, or dark gray. It had an elegant, flowing silver, white, or bright gray mane. Manes of various colors extended from the shoulders to the back of the front legs. There were also some quite rare Wind-Riders that had rainbow-colored fur, shining like ice and snow, and had manes and tails with rainbow hues.

Different from ordinary horses, the Wind-Rider was a Magical Beast with intelligence. They lived on the peaks of mountains that were cold all year round and remote. They crossed glaciers and galloped in the cold sky. Flying in the wind in the air, the Wind-Rider could even have a speed faster than their flight speed. Their ability “Wind-Riding Art” earned them the common name of Wind Horse.

However, adult Wind-Riders were not so easy to tame, because they were smart enough to have their own values. But if a Wind-Rider was captured at a very young age, and was raised to adulthood with a certain amount of respect and care, then it could be trained into a warhorse.

For George, this was what it meant that it might be too late in time. After all, raising a small Wind-Rider to adulthood would take quite a lot of time.