Chapter 82 Three Years
The third of the four great generals on the mainland, Marshal Feng Xiu, is a typical cold-blooded animal in my opinion. According to the information I have collected, his combat style is really disgusting, ruthless and even shameless! The country he belongs to, the Kingdom of Kart, is one of the few slave-holding countries on the continent, with 60% of the population being slaves, 35% being civilians, and 5% being nobles. In Kart, the main role of civilians is warfare, and this class is almost entirely composed of soldiers. If they achieve great merit in battle, they will be enfeoffed as nobles; if they fail, they will all be demoted to slaves. Therefore, the combat power of the Kart Kingdom's civilian army is extremely strong. However, solely in terms of combat power, it would not have been possible for them to be a match for the Qinglong Army Corps, and at most, they might have been slightly stronger than some ordinary armies. The reason why they were able to produce a famous general was entirely due to Marshal Feng Xiu's ruthlessness. He invented an extremely vicious tactic that made him invincible on the battlefield. Using an ancient alchemy formula combined with his specialty in curse magic, he created a cursed potion that was simple and inexpensive to manufacture. Because he gave it to all 200,000 of his slave soldiers, they would fight against the enemy's most elite troops on the battlefield. Any soldier who killed these slaves would be affected by the curse, which would cause them to hallucinate and think that everything around them were monsters or enemies. Under the influence of this hallucination, they would go crazy and slaughter everything around them, including their own comrades. Just like the story of Tian Ji's horse racing, Marshal Feng Xiu used his most inferior troops to consume the enemy's elite troops, while he could leisurely use his own elite troops to attack the enemy's weak points, ensuring victory. In the past, there was another kingdom between the Great Han Empire and Kart that was not much smaller than Kart in terms of strength. Unfortunately, under Marshal Feng Xiu's tactics of attrition, they lost all their elite troops and were eventually destroyed as a nation. And it was precisely this achievement that allowed Marshal Feng Xiu to rise to fame on the mainland!
If it weren't for the internal unrest, he should have clashed with my father long ago! Heaven really gave him another chance. When he learned that all the major robberies in the country were planned by the Great Han people, he immediately persuaded the king to go to war and eventually gained support. After a six-month trial between the two sides, he and his father finally led tens of thousands of troops to battle on the border. His father led 200,000 troops, while General Feng*Shou led 350,000 troops, including 150,000 cursed slave soldiers.
Field Marshal Feng* Zixun knew his father's quick temper, so he first dispatched a 5,000-strong elite force to challenge his father. My dad really brought five thousand guardsmen to charge
He went up and beat the other side until they were covered in bruises, only to discover that he was surrounded by the enemy's slave troops. Fortunately, he wasn't too stupid and knew to activate "Glory Praise" to protect his subordinates, then severely punished General Feng* Xiusu. They charged left and right under the siege of the slave army, unstoppable, and the heavy cavalry charge couldn't be blocked by infantry with wooden sticks wearing cloth armor! The slaves saw that my father's army didn't show chaos like other armies, but instead became even more frenzied in their charge, they themselves began to show signs of disorder. General Feng* Xiusu had no choice but to order a retreat, he led the elite troops to leave first, and the slaves followed. My father also didn't dare to pursue them thoroughly, he could only lead these 5,000 people to charge randomly. After all, he didn't want his troops to be wasted on these slaves. After this battle, both sides began to stalemate, everyone was worried, my father feared General Feng* Xiusu's slave army, they still had over a million, how could a few thousand people kill them all? General Feng* Xiusu worried that my father had many troops that were not afraid of curses, if he didn't have the help of cursed slaves, he absolutely didn't have the courage to face the charge of the Qinglong Iron Cavalry!
Neither side had the intention to launch a full-scale attack, and by winter, no one was interested in fighting anymore. They each withdrew their troops and returned to their respective countries. The grand battle that started with such fanfare ended with a whimper! However, Father's feat of breaking the curse on the slaves spread quickly throughout the continent, and people began discussing rearranging the rankings of their top generals! And ultimately, with the full support of the nobles of the Great Han Empire, they succeeded! Mother wrote in her letter: "You've been bragging about your deceased father to anyone you meet, exaggerating his greatness to the point where even your grandfather couldn't take it anymore. He was punished by being forced to kneel for a day and has since become more humble! Your popularity has greatly increased, and the king is full of praise for you regarding the matter of sending armor to your father!"
Cut! How rare is it for a poor Daoist like me? I've been in this territory for three years, and my mother has repeatedly asked me to return home, but I haven't budged. It's not that I don't want to see the king's face, but rather I'm unwilling to go back and see his rotten face! In these three years, the population of my territory has grown to nearly a million, with 350,000 humans and the rest being other tribes. However, I still haven't built any city walls, and the number of soldiers hasn't increased much either. My main focus over the past few years has been on exploring the surrounding forests, for which I've hired several thousand people to venture in. They've helped me discover a large amount of resources and even drawn a relatively accurate map for me. The biggest discovery is a river that can connect my territory with the southern kingdom of Vana. People used to think that traversing these hundreds of miles of forest was a journey of death, but now it's possible to safely pass through in just ten days by following this river. What's even more astonishing is that there's a mountain valley 80 miles east of the river, where a large nest of purple crystal bees exists. The purple crystal bee is an extremely formidable magical creature - ordinary members are first-level magical creatures, with bodies as big as fists, purple in color, and flying at incredible speeds. Ordinary people who get stung by their venomous stingers will undoubtedly die. They have a strict hierarchy, with guard-level bees being third-level magical creatures, the queen bee being a fifth-level magical creature, and the emperor bee being a seventh-level magical creature. Although their levels aren't high, their numbers are astonishing - even the Great Earth Bear wouldn't dare provoke them. As Gao Zhi commented, "They can swarm me, and although they can't pierce my energy shield, the continuous consumption of energy is too astonishing! We won't be able to hold out for long either! Once our shields disappear, we might really get stung to death!"
The greatest benefit of the Purple Crystal Bees is their honey, which contains extremely rich magical elements due to their ability to collect nectar from flowers with magical fluctuations. This makes their honey a premium product for beauty and health. What excites me the most is that it's said they can treat damage to the meridians, which means they could cure my grandfather's injury! According to legend, the only person who managed to obtain some was the Dragon God of Law, who bravely challenged a nest of Purple Crystal Bees to treat her beloved grandson's injured leg. She used large-scale fire magic to burn the entire nest, but at the cost of being stung by the bee king and not daring to see anyone for several months. Even with countless spiritual medicines, it took her several months to recover. Her grandson did indeed recover from his damaged meridian! Under such temptation, I racked my brains to get some of that honey, but all my efforts ended in failure, leaving me depressed for a long time. These bees are far more formidable than the legends say - their venom is corrosive! I sent Carlo in wearing full iron armor, and he was stung out in no time, with the armor corroded into large holes. No wonder so few people have managed to obtain this stuff! Later on, I tried every means possible but still couldn't get any honey, so I had to temporarily give up.
The overall situation on the mainland has not changed, and the only thing worth mentioning is the rise of a princess named Xing. The story begins with the slow start of the Wana Kingdom.
The Kingdom of Varna is located south of the Great Han, and to its west lies a small country called Kasia. Kasia is rich in resources and is known as the granary, while the Kingdom of Varna is relatively poor. To the east of the Kingdom of Varna lies a powerful Beastman Kingdom, which almost every few years launches an attack on the Kingdom of Varna, bringing great disaster to its people.
In this situation, the Kingdom of Varna has an urgent need for Kasia's land, and in its long-term battles with the beastmen, it has cultivated a large number of troops and countless meritorious generals, including the continent's first general, Nicholas Keitch. His Blue Army, also known as the Lightning Army, is invincible in battle against the beastmen, and he has achieved numerous victories.
He and his father were classmates at the Holy Light Advanced Magic Academy, and it is said that they, along with another person, formed an "Iron Triangle". It is said that Nicholas was first in tactics class, while his father was unbeatable in combat class. Their friend, the other member of the Iron Triangle, was always second in overall grades but consistently ranked first.
The Kingdom of Varna often launches large-scale attacks on Kasia during the intervals between beastman invasions. Unfortunately for them, Kasia is a small and weak country that possesses the continent's second-ranked general, Marshal Baladon. This old marshal has defended the Starlight Fortress for 50 years, during which he repelled more than 20 large-scale attacks by the Kingdom of Varna's regular army led by Nicholas Keitch.
At one point, the Kingdom of Varna even dispatched nearly 3 million troops but was unable to take down the Starlight Fortress. Baladon and his army are known as the "Rock Marshal" and the "Rock Army".
In the 10th year of Emperor Piao's reign, Nicholas Cage once again assembled over a million troops to attack Starro Fortress. Of course, he didn't have any confidence in taking it down; this time was just to cope with the king's coercion and incidentally train his soldiers. In his impression, Starro Fortress, which had swallowed countless elite soldiers of the Vana Kingdom, was an eternal nightmare in his heart! Everything went as usual, and that giant fortress stained with blood crushed the Vana Kingdom's attack once again. Just when Nicholas Cage was about to give up, a shocking message spread across the continent reached his hands: The Beastmen launched a preemptive strike!
This beastman attack was too sudden, according to past experience, in the winter when food is scarce for the beastmen, they would never take the initiative to attack. But now they don't know what's going on, not only did they attack, but also on a large scale, estimated to have mobilized no less than 50 troops. To know that the beastman's combat power is too abnormal, ordinary beastmen are all over 3-5 meters tall, one can beat five ordinary human soldiers. Their individual species can be as high as N meters, like their royal family, the Mongolian beastmen, with a height of 5 meters or more, and boundless strength. Their war thunder giant beasts are even bigger than the Gai Ci, with a height of 30 meters and a length of 50 meters, resembling an elephant in shape, with lightning magic unparalleled in the world, is an eighth-level upper-tier demon beast. Usually when the beastmen come to raid, it's just on a scale of three or four hundred thousand, but this time there are actually 500,000. Nicolas Kaito was stunned at the time and immediately ordered a retreat, but Baradon unexpectedly took the initiative to attack, bringing him a lot of trouble. When he retreated and rushed back to the capital, an even more disappointing message came, his student, the seventh princess of the kingdom, happened to be visiting her dying grandfather in the eastern border, now missing and unknown whether she was dead or alive. The king gave a death order, if the princess is not found, all generals who ran back from the eastern front line will be executed along with their families.
