I, who was eager to retire, became an Imperial General.

Chapter 262 Nils Pursues Revenge, Wise John's Clever Method Breaks the Deadly Situation
"..."

Looking at the night sky before him, Nils Blood Wolf, who was in the command tent, was not sleepy at all. Instead, he paced back and forth restlessly.

In fact, ever since he saw the terrifying explosion that erupted from the cliff two hours earlier, he had sent out a carrier hawk to contact the main force, but the hawk returned untouched with the letter.

At that moment, he realized that his arrogant older brother had most likely already been killed in the bombardment by the naval guns.

Realizing that the battle situation had taken an unexpected turn, he immediately led his troops to stop pursuing the fleeing Imperial army.

They then headed towards the Sea Cliff, intending to check the situation on the battlefield and retrieve the Crown Blood Core that was crucial to the Blood Wolf Clan.

However, considering that the enemy's treacherous and cunning commander might anticipate his actions and lead his magic troops to ambush him, thus annihilating the last of his Blood Wolf tribe's forces.

After a brief moment of deliberation, Nils decided to station his troops at a location 50 kilometers away from the sea cliffs, and deployed a large number of troops to impose martial law and patrol the surrounding area to prevent enemy night attacks.

"But how did things turn out this way?"

Despite their own forces being far superior in strength to the enemy's, and their advanced combat capabilities overwhelming the Imperial Army.

In a normal battle, one's side should be able to win easily.

So, can we only say that the enemy commander was too strong?

Niels sighed, and his expression gradually turned gloomy.

Now, the Bloodhowl Legion has been reduced from 50,000 troops to 2,000. Although they are all elite troops, their morale has been in an unprecedented low since the large-scale bombardment of the Imperial Army earlier.

In addition, there was news that the clan's territory had been attacked by the Imperial Magic Forces a few hours earlier, a large number of Bloodhowl Legion reserve soldiers had been killed by explosive magic, and even several large fortresses had been occupied by the enemy.

All of this has made Nils realize that if he continues to fight the Imperial Army on this damned battlefield, it will be disastrous.

Only death awaits him.

"Therefore, after recovering the blood core at dawn, I will lead my troops to withdraw from Crescent Island."

Although running away is an absolute disgrace for orcs.

But it's better to live with shame than to die.

After all, barring any unforeseen circumstances, the only person in the entire Blood Wolf Clan who could step forward and take charge of the situation was probably himself.

If I were to die on this battlefield at the hands of the Imperial Army, then the Blood Wolf Tribe would likely have no future whatsoever.

"Even if I manage to return to the tribe alive, the tribe's territory will most likely be devoured by other tribes due to insufficient troops, and we may even lose nearly two-thirds of our territory."

After all, in the world of orcs, power is everything.

No matter how glorious the Blood Wolf Tribe was in the past, without sufficient power, even the smaller tribes that were formerly vassals of the Blood Wolf Tribe will develop the idea of ​​plundering.

The more Niels thought about it, the more he felt that the clan's future was bleak, and his mood became increasingly heavy.

Just as he was about to leave the command tent, ride his dire wolf to the patrol area for a stroll and clear his head, he was about to leave.

The next second, accompanied by a series of hurried footsteps, the patrol company commander ran towards him nervously, much to Niels's puzzled look.

Before Niels could even ask what had happened, the other person immediately revealed a piece of news that made his pupils shrink:

"Reporting to the commander, just now, our patrol unit located in the east discovered the bodies of two patrol members outside the eastern patrol point. One was shot dead, and the other was decapitated with a machete!"

"what?!"

Upon hearing this news, Neil felt a chill run down his spine.

His first thought was that the Imperial Army was attacking.

His immediate thought was to order the troops to retreat immediately, knowing they absolutely could not confront that terrifying imperial commander.

But then Nils realized something was wrong.

If the enemy really intended to launch a surprise attack, then why did they only kill two patrol members and then stop?
They could even get their own patrols to report this intelligence to them, and so far their camp has not been attacked by the enemy.

This is obviously not common sense!

unless……

"Unless the enemy's forces are severely depleted, they will not give our patrol units a chance to report information!"

Thinking of this, the panic in Niels' heart began to gradually dissipate.

He then calmly looked at his subordinate and asked him in a deep voice:

"Have you examined the evidence at the scene? How many enemy troops were there when the attack occurred?"

"Reporting to the commander, according to the patrol unit's report, based on the traces left by the enemy at the scene, it can be basically confirmed that the number of enemy troops who attacked our soldiers was no more than two!"

"Furthermore, the enemy has not buried or covered the bodies in any way, and according to the patrol unit's diagnosis, our soldiers died no more than ten minutes ago. In other words, the enemy has not escaped far. If we order the patrol unit to block the road and launch a pursuit now, it is still not too late!"

No more than two people? And the soldier's death time was no more than ten minutes?

Upon hearing this news, as if recalling something, Niels's eyes began to flicker, and he quickly processed the information in his mind:
"If I remember correctly, when my brother led a large force to pursue John Maslow, the scouts said that the enemy only had fifteen magic soldiers with him at the time."

"Although we cannot rule out the possibility that the other side has laid an ambush at the sea cliff in advance, such as the elite imperial assassination force mentioned in the intelligence that took down seven cities in just a few hours."

"But since we haven't encountered any surprise attacks or assassinations yet, it proves that this assassination squad has most likely suffered serious losses, or even been wiped out, in the previous artillery barrage!"

"Therefore, this remnant of the Imperial army, most likely led by John Maslow and numbering no more than 100, was unable to fly and rejoin the main force due to insufficient magic power caused by the previous battle. They could only march on the ground, and as a result, they encountered our own reconnaissance force on their way out."

"It's even quite possible that he was caught red-handed by those two soldiers, and therefore had no choice but to kill them before fleeing immediately."

"Only in this way can we explain why the Imperial Army didn't even bother to dispose of the bodies or cover up the scene after killing their own soldiers!"

"It's not because the other party disdains to do it, but because they simply don't have the time to do such trivial things!"

In other words, if he were to lead his troops in pursuit now, he might have a very high probability of annihilating this exhausted Imperial force. Perhaps even killing John Maslow, the enemy's commander?

"!"

Upon realizing this, Niels' breathing became rapid.

But when he thought of his uncle Mortas and his own brother, both of whom had been lured by military merit and tricked by enemy commanders, ultimately losing their lives, he felt a pang of regret.

Niels couldn't help but feel extremely conflicted.

He was somewhat worried that the current situation might be a trap deliberately set by John Maslow, and that if he led his troops to pursue the enemy, he might end up losing his life due to an ambush.

But, should I really miss this opportunity?

Did they miss the opportunity to kill John Maslow because of their cautiousness?

Niels was filled with inner turmoil, but the thought of how he could easily kill John Maslow by simply leading his troops in pursuit, only to have given up the opportunity out of fear and then regret it to the point of almost vomiting blood, filled him with anxieties.

He then understood what he should do next.

"Pass on my order: order the patrol forces to immediately seal off the patrol area, and all soldiers of the Blood Howl Special Forces Regiment in the camp to assemble immediately and follow me to pursue that fleeing remnant of the Imperial army. We must kill them without fail!"

"Yes, leader!"

"Tap, tap!"

……

"Now we're in trouble!"

Inside the dense forest, as John watched the Blood Wolf tribe patrolmen ahead, torches in hand, searching the surroundings, his heart sank to the bottom.

From the scene before him, he realized that Niels had most likely seen through his current predicament and, having overcome his fear of himself, was planning to lead his troops to hunt him down.

If he remained in the same spot, he would eventually be discovered by enemy patrols and killed by the encirclement and annihilation of the Blood Howl Special Forces.

To break the deadlock, he either needs to abandon his blood core and forcefully break through the encirclement of the patrol forces.

Alternatively, they could play hide-and-seek to buy as much time as possible until reinforcements from their own forces, alerted to the anomaly, arrived and helped them avert this deadly crisis.

The former will lose their blood core, and given their current magic reserves, the probability of success is extremely low.

If the latter makes a mistake in judgment, he will be doomed.

"So, we're already in a dead end?"

After understanding the current situation, John couldn't help but sigh inwardly.

But soon, as he watched the enemy troops gradually approaching, his eyes became sharp.

Now that he has the blood core, he naturally doesn't discard it, nor does he allow Nils to recycle and fuse it, thus leaving him with a difficult problem in the future.

Entrusting one's life to an uncertain fate is also not in line with his style.

Therefore, whether to break out or delay and wait for reinforcements.

John believes that both of these approaches are essentially risky decisions, involving exposing one's own weaknesses to exploit the enemy's strengths.

"To resolve this crisis, one must take the initiative and not reveal that one is alone."

"Only in this way will Niels, who is unable to determine the specific situation, become suspicious and lose patience during the gradual investigation. He will then be distracted by the information gap he has created and ultimately miss the opportunity to kill himself!"

"And the first thing I need to do to complete this plan is to muddy the waters!"

While carefully avoiding the patrol's search, John began to think rapidly:

“Niels wanted to surround and kill the ‘imperial remnants’ he led, which he now considered to be powerless, and then seize the credit for killing their commander.”

"But similarly, the Allied landing forces not far from here, if they knew that the enemy commander was in this dense forest, would certainly not let this opportunity pass them by."

"Therefore, in order to break the deadlock, I must break free from the state of being hunted and turn this chase into a battle between two forces for the same prey."

"By using their mastery of both orc and Victorian languages, they created an information gap by constantly contacting the patrol forces of both sides, thereby provoking conflict between them."

"Let the commanders of both sides be so eager to kill you that they have no time to investigate the truth that they incite the anger between the two front-line troops, which will then lead to a conflict. This will cause the officers of the subordinate units to order the mobilization of soldiers from their respective areas due to the conflict, which will then lead to a firefight."

"This will allow us to break through the outer blockade zone, ultimately creating an opportunity for a safe withdrawal. Once the commanders of both sides learn of the conflict and rush to resolve the dispute between their troops, we can then take the opportunity to escape."

"In this way, I won't arouse suspicion from my unit by pretending to escape, thus exposing my true identity and ultimately causing all my efforts to fail."

"Nor will they risk hiding during the Bloodhowl Legion's thorough search, only to be discovered by Nils and captured by him using the power of a super-ranked mage, thus becoming his prisoner."

"Instead, by posing as different soldiers traveling between the two forces, they conceal their true identities while forcibly shifting the real focus of both sides to the inexplicable conflict that broke out between their respective forces, forcing both sides to abandon their initial goal of hunting down the remnants of the Imperial army and instead mediate between their respective fighting forces."

"This is the way to truly break through this impasse!"

Of course, the prerequisite for successfully diverting the trouble to the east is that I need to borrow something from the soldiers on both sides to complete the disguise. Otherwise, wearing an imperial major's uniform, I would probably be hacked to death by the enemy before I even started to carry out the plan.

After clarifying the next course of action in his mind, John felt reassured.

He then silently climbed the tree trunk beside him and carefully scanned the Bloodhowl Legion patrols that were still scattered around searching for traces of the 'enemy'.

After successfully locating a lone Bloodhowl Legion soldier through his Demon Eye observation, a cold smile immediately appeared on his lips.

At this point, John realized that this new game of deception was about to begin.

"despair!"

……

(End of this chapter)