Your war hammer is too fake

After dealing with the enemy's rearguard, An Jiyue did not pursue them, but turned her attention to the ground battlefield. The battle had already been decided, but she still had some personal grudges that she needed to find Ariel to resolve.

The Caledonians can be left alone for now and dealt with slowly later. Now is the time to settle accounts with the crimes of the Wood Elves.

……

Note 1: The god the protagonist invites here is Wang Lingguan. In the setting of this book, inviting a god does not mean letting a god possess you, but using magic to simulate a virtual personality of a god, thereby imitating the abilities of this god to a certain extent. The inferior god invitation is simply to find someone to play for you, and at most temporarily give you a few skills. The middle-level god invitation will come with magic tools and all-round enhancements, and all kinds of magical powers will also be available. The superior god invitation is the effect in this chapter.

Chapter 287 Breakout

Holding the Axe of Dago, Agrim stood on a small hill and observed the battlefield.

If it were normal, the thoughtful Butcher King would have rushed to the front line and chopped and killed. He had heard many legends about the sick souls living in the evil forest, and these legends usually appeared in a book of hatred in the form of hatred. It is said that the Asrai are a race with many honorless but undoubtedly powerful warriors, and there are many strange creatures in their army that cannot be seen elsewhere. Especially their king, there are reports that he is the incarnation of a certain elven god in the mortal world.

A demigod. A being that is totally beyond mortals.

Unfortunately, after searching for a long time, Agrim still couldn't find the one who was said to be three meters tall, with stag-like hooves and knuckle legs, with verdant magic tattoos on his sturdy body, and followed by two strong hounds wherever he went. The Butcher King was a little disappointed. His army was slaughtering the elves efficiently, but Orion never showed up.

Perhaps he was a coward like Caledor II, Algrim Ironfist thought.

Although the battlefield was filled with roars of killing, everyone present, whether dwarves, elves, or forest spirits, knew that the battle was over, and the only thing left was how much success the dwarves could achieve. When the dragons abandoned the Caledor army and turned to flee to the northwest, the elven coalition had already lost the battle.

Whether it was voluntary or not, the fact that the leader had fled was indisputable to the Caledonians. The morale of the High Elves was severely damaged, and even the Dragon Princes became hesitant and desperate.

The breakout began the moment the dragons retreated, and the pressure on the dwarves defending the lower city of the Fortress suddenly eased. The elven coalition sent a group of people to stay behind to block the dwarves in the lower city who realized that the situation had reversed and were actively organizing a counterattack, while the main force turned around and concentrated on the upper level of the fortress.

The rear guard was basically composed of high elves. The despair of being abandoned by their leader and the inherent arrogance of the Caledonians created a strange chemical reaction at this moment. They completely abandoned the hope of life and embraced death instead.

A warband of dragon princes with the best combat effectiveness received a mission from their compatriots that could not fail: leave here alive, return to Ulthuan, and confront the coward who abandoned his people. The dragon princes also acted with the cavalry of the wood elves. Although the latter refused to abandon their people and fled from the battlefield in disgrace, they still broke through with the dragon princes reluctantly under Ariel's unquestionable strict order.

Due to their speed, the dwarven reinforcements were unable to stop the elven cavalry and could only watch them slip away from their reach. Agrim then sent a separate reserve to guard the rear of his side to prevent the elven cavalry from making a comeback, while the main force deployed outside the Desolate Castle.

The angry dwarves waited for a while. When everyone was in place, the gate of the fortress was slowly pushed open by a team of dryads from the inside.

The forest spirits were originally staying in the camp outside the fortress. When the Wood Elves' air force was shot down like raindrops by the Eagle Guard, Dursu immediately ordered to abandon the camp and all those who could still move to retreat into the city. It turned out to be a wise decision, because soon after the forest spirits began to act, the tracking rockets hit the camp.

After suffering certain casualties, the forest spirits and elves retreated into the fortress in time. The latter were mainly non-combatants among the Asrai and Asur, as well as some wounded sent down from the front line.

Durthu found Ariel in the chaos, or rather, the latter found him. Ariel said that they must immediately organize a breakout, and they couldn't wait any longer. Durthu had a different opinion. The forest elders thought that now was not the best time to break out. They should rely on the existing fortifications to resist for a while, and then organize a breakout after weakening the dwarf's offensive, instead of rushing into the opponent's well-arranged firepower network.

"There is no time!" The Queen of Mages said anxiously, "There is something outside now... I don't know how to describe it. I 'saw' it, and it 'saw' me. I touched the essence of that thing, which should not exist in the mortal world... In short, we must act immediately, otherwise it will be too late!"

Durthu thought about it and decided to trust Ariel's judgment. As the one with the worst magical attainments among the many forest elders, Durthu would not question the opinions of experts on matters related to magic.

The surviving Asrai took the time to reorganize. Some blood warbands that suffered heavy losses were temporarily integrated together. Everyone shared the ammunition as much as possible to ensure that all archers had arrows available. After a fierce battle, many people's weapons were damaged. Even if all the spare weapons were distributed, it was still not enough. Some wood elves had no choice but to pick up the weapons and tools of the dwarves and make do with them.

After finishing the preparations, the wood elves drank the last sip of water in their canteens and tried their best to ignore their hungry stomachs. The supplies of the elven coalition were stored in the camp outside the city, and they only had breakfast today... In fact, the dwarves on the opposite side were in a similar situation. Due to the critical situation in the Desolate Castle, the reinforcements who were busy on the way had not eaten hot meals for several days. Every day, they had two meals of cold, hard bread and dried meat in the morning and evening. Today, they didn't even have time to eat breakfast.

The two equally hungry armies began their final showdown. After the city gates were opened, the first to rush out were a large group of tree spirits. Some of these ogre-sized wooden men were forest spirits, but some were transformed from wood elves who died with hatred. They had rough bark and sturdy bodies, and were better at using their bodies to block attacks for their comrades than killing the enemy.

Most of the dwarven artillery outside the city were still busy building positions, and only the conveniently deployed crossbows and catapults opened fire. As they had mastered the specific composition of the enemy's troops, most of the war machines brought by the dwarves were engraved with burning runes. As long as the scorching giant arrows and stone bullets hit the tree spirits successfully, they would soon burn into torches.

By the standards of monster infantry, the Treant's movement speed was not fast. Treant were constantly knocked down, and more Treant continued to pour out of the city gate. The front door of the Desolate Castle soon became filled with smoke, and many tall figures were looming in the thick smoke. No one knew how many Treant the elven coalition had brought. Even if cannons and other firearms were deployed and joined the ensemble, the Treant, who were charging headfirst, still gradually shortened the distance between them and the dwarves.

When several tree spirits, covered with crossbow arrows and bullet holes, staggered to a distance of about 200 meters from the front line of the dwarves, the black smoke in the open space in front of the gate of the Desolate Castle was thick enough to affect the artillery's observation of the target. Some nimble figures suddenly flashed out from behind the tree spirits, pulled out their longbows and shot arrows, then quickly hid back. Even at a distance of 200 meters, these arrows still hit the observation slits on the dwarfs' helmets with incredible accuracy, and several veterans and the flag bearer holding the clan flag fell down immediately.

Even though they were few in number, these rangers still caused a lot of trouble for the dwarves. Many officers, flag bearers and trumpeters fell under their arrows, which were as accurate as sniper rifles. It was not until the legendary brewmaster Joseph Bergman led his rangers into battle that they were able to suppress these best archers of the entire elven race.

Rangers kept falling in the shooting with the dwarves. These precious top archers were rapidly lost like cannon fodder. Taking advantage of this opportunity, more tree elves covered the elves and rushed out of the fortress. The former used their bodies as shields to ensure that the wood elves could rush through the fire coverage area in front of the city gate alive.

A wanderer in a short cloak dragged his body with several arrows in it, rushed to the shield wall of the dwarves and raised his longbow. He shot an enchanted arrow into the air, and then fell down with a sound like fried beans.

A lone enchanted arrow flew into the air, and as it fell under the force of gravity, it turned into a torrential rain of cold light, covering a dwarven artillery position. More than a dozen cannons, organ cannons, and flame cannons suddenly went silent, and the dwarven artillerymen lay scattered all over the ground.

"Witchcraft! This is witchcraft!" Many dwarves shouted and cursed. Then, they saw some suspicious-looking wood elves trying to get close to the dwarf shield wall under the cover of their teammates.

The ranged infantry of the dwarf army redoubled their efforts to pour fire on the wood elves. Iron dragon hand artillerymen appeared in front of the position with heavy dragon guns, and the billowing flames indiscriminately engulfed the tree elves and the elves hiding behind them. Many elves fell during the charge, but others remained unmoved and continued to work hard.

Another Doomsday Hail Arrow left the bowstring, and the dwarves once again lost the heavy weapons of two artillery companies. Taking advantage of the gap when the dwarves' heavy firepower was greatly weakened, the large army of the Wood Elves walked out of the gate of the Desolate Castle with the sound of horns.

Sporadic artillery fire came from all directions, but this level of firepower was not enough to stop the advance of the wood elves. In the sky, three Kingfisher-class frigates that had just completed damage control were lined up, and rocket launchers poured out a round of explosive artillery fire. The whistling sound of unguided rockets had just subsided when the three frigates slowly turned and aimed their port side at the battlefield filled with thick smoke.

The second gunner of the mortar gun cranked the elevation mechanism and lowered the barrel to the lowest position. After a brief aiming, the gunner stepped on the firing pedal, and the shrapnel was pushed out of the barrel. This cylindrical ammunition is similar to a grenade in structure. There is a small amount of powder inside the shell, just enough to destroy the shell. When fired, the shell will first fly a distance toward the target, and then the powder will be detonated, blowing up the shell of the grenade and releasing the small iron pellets inside.

Limited by the technical level, the reliability of the shrapnel was not particularly ideal. Two of the six shells failed to detonate successfully, and one of the remaining four exploded prematurely. In the end, three shrapnel shells successfully hit the target, and the dense shrapnel caused the Wood Elves' army formation to "collapse" in the blink of an eye.

"Keep going!" the gunner shouted, "Blast these bastards to death!"

The wood elves did not waver, and continued to advance despite the bombardment of shrapnel. The elves and dwarves almost simultaneously brought each other within the range of their longbows and crossbows. As the arrows crossed each other in the air, the battle finally entered its bloodiest stage. After a round of shooting, the forest guards put away their longbows, drew their swords, and launched a charge with their comrades.

To be honest, the Asrai have always looked down on the fighting ability of the Dwarves. This prejudice stems from history. The residents of Athel Loren have had more than one conflict with the Dwarves of Fort Desolation, and the Wood Elves have won every time. This has made the Wood Elves unconsciously begin to despise the Dwarves, thinking that the so-called Sons of the Mountain and Stone are nothing more than that.

However, when the battlefield was no longer the magical forest they were familiar with, and the battles were no longer elusive one-sided harassment and sneak attacks, but instead turned into a face-to-face, head-on confrontation on an unobstructed mountain plateau, the wood elves finally witnessed the true strength of the dwarves.

The wood elves, who were used to moving in loose formations through the woods, wore no armor or at most only light armor. They were beaten to a bloody pulp by the shield wall of the heavily armored, neatly lined dwarves and could not make any progress. The wood elves' allies, the forest spirits, were also in vain. Without the cooperation and assistance of the forest itself, the wooden men were even more vulnerable than the wood elves.

After entering the hand-to-hand combat phase, the two sides briefly stalemated. Not only did the wood elves and forest spirits fail to shake the dwarf shield wall, but they were forced to retreat step by step. The tree monsters screamed with resentment, but no matter how harsh their screams were, they could not change the status quo.

"Send out the Rune Guards!" Agrim ordered.

After many ancestors returned to the world, the dwarves finally revived this ancient rune art. With the order of the Butcher King, thirty rune guards with short limbs and shapes like large dwarves were activated. These metal constructs are made of star iron and are essentially magic puppets, except that they are driven by dwarven runes instead of magic.

Runeguards are about the size of ogres (Note 1). This construct designed to guard the dwarven treasure is highly similar to the dryad in terms of tactical positioning: both are better at defense than attack, and both are relatively slow. Despite this, when thirty runeguards formed a sharp arrow formation and poured into the gap left by the dwarven warriors, the already disadvantaged wood elves were still under great pressure.

What was even worse was that some of the wood elves who had not yet joined the battle due to the size of the battlefield heard dense footsteps and faint war cries behind them. When they turned around, they saw a 20-meter-tall golden-armored giant walking out from the depths of the fortress, with countless dwarves shouting and fighting on both sides.

It was obvious that the remaining High Elves were overwhelmed. Considering that they did not see a single Asur retreating, it was clear that those corrupt cousins ​​fought to the last man.

"You should go." Dursu retracted his gaze and looked down at Ariel: "Leave here and return to the Oak of Ages."

"I will not abandon my people!" the Mage Queen flatly refused.

"The web of life needs you, and you still have a mission to fulfill," the forest elder advised, "I will hold the enemy back."

Ariel was about to argue, but suddenly she sensed a familiar breath approaching rapidly. She looked in that direction and saw a forest dragon flying towards her from low altitude. It flew very low, and lead bullets, crossbow bolts, and even flying axes kept hitting its abdomen, and then bounced off the dragon scales with a clang.

The three Kingfisher-class ships in the distance aimed at the suddenly intruding forest dragon, but the captains never ordered to open fire: it was flying too low, and unless the shells and rockets hit it directly, they would inevitably hit the dwarf next to it.

"Mother!" The Twilight sisters riding on the forest dragon shouted in unison while shooting arrows at the dwarves in all directions.

"You should go," the elder of the woodland repeated what he had just said. "Go, Ariel!"

After saying that, Dursu turned around with the giant sword in his hand and stood still. Several tree people gathered together. These ancient beings stood shoulder to shoulder and faced the golden armored giant whose armor was splattered with blood.

The young forest dragon Sessin-Hal flew into the open door of the Fortress of Desolation and then flew right back out. The Twilight sisters huddled together on the forest dragon's head, offering Ariel a ride on its back. The Mage Queen didn't dare look down or back, for she knew that if she looked she would be stuck.

The shouts and screams gradually faded away, and the fresh air of the mountain plateau replaced the lingering smell of blood and burnt food. Ariel sat on the back of the forest dragon and slowly lowered her head. She covered her face and her shoulders twitched.

When only the Twilight sisters and their dragons were left by her side, she finally cried out loud.

……

Note 1: For some reason, most of the monsters in Warhammer are about the same size as ogres, which is about ten feet tall. The exception is the Minotaur, which is set in the military book as "two to three people tall", even if the height of a human is calculated as 1 meters, it is between 6 meters and 3 meters.

The author says:

Author's Note: Reply to reader "Bergman Ranger":

The Star Dragon is of course very strong. According to the setting, the individual combat power of the Star Dragon is stronger than that of the common big demon, but the protagonist is still stronger. The reason why the protagonist has to command the flying fleet personally is because there are two Star Dragons in the army of the Caledonians. If she doesn't take action, the Caledonians can really destroy this fleet.

Chapter 288 After the War

The battle is over, but the war has just begun.

The combined forces of the dwarves and the Cathayans almost wiped out the main force of the Asrai. Both the wood elves and the forest spirits suffered a devastating blow. Only a thousand cavalrymen managed to break through, and the rest were left here forever. The situation of the Caledorians was relatively better, but only slightly. Except for the minimum remaining forces and the expeditionary forces sent to various colonies, the military strength of the Kingdom of Caledor could be said to have been broken in one battle.

As the victor, the Sons of the Stone also paid a heavy price. Knowing what they had done, none of the Wood Elves and Forest Spirits surrendered, and all chose to resist to the end. Of course, even if they were willing to surrender, the Dwarves would never accept it. The Wood Elves' counterattack before their death cost the Dwarves nearly 3,000 permanent casualties. In addition, the Desolate Castle and the surrounding Dwarf settlements were all subjected to organized and planned massacres without exception.

According to the statistics after the battle, from the beginning of the invasion of the elven coalition to the end of the battle, at least 60 civilians were killed, including about female dwarves. Including the casualties of the warriors, % of the population of the Desolate Castle was wiped out at one time, and all members of two agricultural clans and one mining clan were wiped out.

When the battle was over, no one dared to stand beside Brok Ironchisel except Agrim and Anjiyue. Queen Thelma, the wife of the King of Desolate Castle, also died in the battle - when the battle was most critical, even the female dwarves took up arms and joined the battle (Note 1), and Queen Thelma was at the forefront.

Witnessed by the many kings, princes, and allies of Zhendan who came to reinforce, Brock swore to the ancestral gods and the previous kings of Desolate Castle that he would kill twice as many elves in revenge for how many of his people the elves killed!

After the oath, hundreds of bound elf captives were dragged up, including wood elves and high elves. Although every dwarf present wanted to kill these pointy-eared ones immediately, An Jiyue believed that the necessary procedures must be followed and the captives must be interrogated before deciding how to deal with them.

"Snorri Half-Hand's folly must not be repeated!" Lady Little Moon said to the dwarves.

The War of the Longbeard was able to break out because both the elves and the dwarves had their own talents to add fuel to the fire. The precious one on the High Elves' side was the famous Caledor II, while the precious one on the Dwarves' side was Snorri Half-Hand, the only son of Gotrek Starbreaker. This Dwarf prince was impulsive, arrogant, and stupid, and he was quite like a Showa advisor. While his father was still suppressing his anger and trying to resolve the matter through diplomatic means, this man had already led his army to attack the High Elves' colonies.

This unfortunate colony was called Kor Vanis, and it would later have a more famous name, Altdorf. Snorri broke through the city of the High Elves and ordered a massacre, breaking the bottom line from the beginning - and by the way, he also pitted a certain dwarf ambassador who went to the Phoenix Court to seek an explanation, which indirectly led to the poor dwarf ambassador being ordered by Ka-II to shave his beard.

Unfortunately for Gotrek Starbreaker, but fortunately for the dwarves, Snorri was killed in a battle by Caledor II, and Morgrim Elfdoom, the High King's nephew and Snorri's cousin, became the new heir to the throne. Morgrim was brave, wise, and a man of his words. He was both a brave warrior and an excellent commander, and had all the qualities needed to be an excellent king.

After the reforged triangle was launched, the cousins ​​both participated in the trial. As expected, Snorri was completely wiped out in the trial, and Gotrek Starbreaker accepted the result in silence; while Morgrim passed the test set by the ancestral gods, put on the mountain bronze armor and returned to the world, and also participated in the peripheral battles of the Battle of Fort Desolation.

After killing a Silver Moon Dragon and knocking down a number of small Karami, Mogrim was sent back to the underworld by an arrow shot from behind, and is currently being recast in the Eternal Furnace.

An Jiyue had a lot of reputation among the dwarves, and the long-bearded elders also agreed with her point of view. The throne room of the Desolate Castle was crowded with people, and the dwarves and a few Zhendan people watched the entire interrogation. There was no need for any major memory recovery skills, and the wood elves among the captives explained who was responsible for the massacre of dwarf civilians in an extremely proud tone.

They don't think their actions are wrong, and they don't have any regrets. The Wood Elves are somewhere between the Asur and the Druzy in terms of values: they are not as cruel and violent as the latter, but they definitely don't have the elven moral values ​​of the former. For the Asrai, if necessary, they never mind raising the knife to kill other races.

The Wood Elf captives told the Dwarves that the Mage Queen Ariel had foreseen that the Dwarves would invade Athel Loren in the future and cause terrible destruction, so they launched this preventive war "purely in self-defense". From the Wood Elves' point of view, they did nothing wrong, or their only mistake was that they lost the war.

This confession caused an uproar among the dwarves. After a brief moment of shock, they were enraged. The entire throne room was shaking with the angry roars of the dwarves, and even Agrim couldn't quiet them down. It wasn't until An Jiyue, whose ears were hurt by the noise, stood up and clapped her hands that the noise subsided.

"Silence! The interrogation is not over yet," the girl said loudly, "There are still high elves to be interrogated."

Compared to the wood elves, the Caledonians were equally annoying. Even though they were already prisoners, these arrogant guys still looked down upon the dwarves. They collectively stated that they would refuse to answer any questions unless the dwarves asked them to solve their doubts. An Jiyue would naturally not indulge these bad habits. With a [Reinforced Suggestion], the elves confessed everything.

According to the High Elves' testimony, they sent dragon riders to participate in the raid on the outposts outside the Fortress of Desolation, but they did not deliberately kill civilians. On the one hand, the Caledonians were extremely arrogant and regarded the dwarves as dirty and inferior creatures, "pigs rolling in the mud"; on the other hand, the Caledonians were full of complaints about the Asrai's massacre of civilians, believing that such behavior was without honor, and they complained to Prince Imrik many times.

The dwarves were enraged by the insults of the Caledonians. Alaric Ranulfson, King of the Hornhold, said that such an offense must be compensated with a large sum of gold, and the dwarves nodded in agreement. Since the massacre was committed by the Asrai, the Dwarf kings discussed and decided to execute all the Wood Elf prisoners, and to imprison the High Elf prisoners first, and then demand relevant compensation from Ulthuan after the war.

At the same meeting, the dwarves agreed that this matter could not be let go. Only when the broken forest west of the Desolate Castle was completely destroyed, the hatred would be settled.

Of course, such a major matter must be approved by the High King. Again, the folly of a certain dwarf prince must not be repeated. Moreover, attacking Athel Loren requires a lot of preparation. It takes time to assemble troops, stockpile supplies, and conduct pre-war reconnaissance. The flying fleet of the Zhendan people must also return to Xuanshui first.

More importantly, attacking Athel Loren in the spring was undoubtedly a foolish idea. An Jiyue explained to the kings the incident in 2495 of the Imperial Calendar, when the great necromancer Heinrich Kemmler attacked the forest in winter and forced the wood elves into a desperate situation. Although the existence of necromancers was even more idiotic than the elves, his approach was worth learning from.

"When the first snowflakes fall on the elves' territory, I will return with a larger fleet," An Jiyue stood on the front deck of the Kingfisher and shouted to a group of dwarves who came to see him off, "Athel Loren must be destroyed! (Note 2)"

Before the governor, the dwarves raised their axes and hammers, shouting to the sky: "Athel Loren must be destroyed!!"

……

Note 1: Dwarves, like elves, are all soldiers. Female dwarves also receive combat training and are quite skilled in martial arts. Under normal circumstances, dwarves will never let women go into battle. If even female dwarves go into battle, it means that the dwarves are really in desperate situation and are ready to fight to the death.

Note 2: This is a reference to the famous historical meme "Carthage must be destroyed".

Chapter 289: Current Situation of the Dragon Islands

On April 4, three Kingfisher-class frigates slowly landed in the Xuanshui military camp.

If the scattered state soldiers are not counted, all the military camps of Xuanshui are in the inner city, even the Land and Water Inspection Office is no exception. A piece of open space has been recently divided here, and four three-story towers have sprung up, and there are more towers of the same shape being built next to them. This shape follows the traditional pagoda of Aurora, but many details are different. The tower is the berth of the flying ship. The tower is hollow inside, and a large elevator is set up inside for the transportation of bulk materials.

All towers adopt a unified shape. Compared with the more common hexagonal or octagonal pagodas, these aviation mooring towers are all regular quadrilaterals. There are extended platforms on the north and south sides of the towers to connect to the boarding position of the flying ship. According to the relevant regulations of the Shenzhou Fleet, the anti-gravity engine of the flying ship will not be shut down even when it is parked, but will maintain a low-power operating state to keep the flying ship hovering in the air. This practice is mainly to save space, after all, the land in the inner city of Xuanshui is still very tight.

An Jiyue had considered setting up a fleet base outside the city, and even selected a site and budget. Unfortunately, the engineering forces in Sanhe Prefecture were either busy building villages, towns, roads, or building the Pingshan defense line, and they really couldn't squeeze out manpower and equipment to do such a large-scale project. In this case, even if krypton gold was used, it wouldn't work. The accelerated construction function couldn't create labor out of thin air, and using points to recruit more civilians would involve a series of problems, which would affect the whole body.

As a solution, the aviation mooring tower came into being. There are similar buildings in Jingning. After all, Xuanshui is still a large industrial city. To put it bluntly, Jingning is just a large county town, and the land is even more scarce.

Strictly speaking, these three-story aviation towers are still semi-finished products. According to An Jiyue's design, they are seven stories high. One tower can berth four frigates or six gunboats at the same time. According to Bing Ruolan, there are similar functional buildings in Zhendan in this world, which are specially used to berth sky lanterns and sky boats.

The three frigates first docked at the aviation tower, unloaded most of the crew, and were driven to the flying ship workshop of the Xuanshui Arsenal by the engine group, and docked steadily on the 800-ton slipway, and finally completely shut down the anti-gravity engine and other subsystems. The three frigates will be repaired where they were built, and the damaged ship panels and other parts will be replaced - in the air battle at Desolate Castle, they were greeted by dragon claws, dragon tails, and dragon teeth, and some parts were scratched and cracked.

If the three Kingfisher-class ships that participated in the battle had not had furnace runes engraved on their oak planks, they would probably have been more than just able to withstand a few physical attacks: this dwarf rune, which can greatly increase the carrier's protection against fire attacks, is not a standard configuration of the Kingfisher-class ships, but was urgently engraved by the flying fleet before departure.

It turned out to be very effective. The oak planks treated with fireproof liquid could resist ordinary flames, but in front of the dragon's breath, they were no different from the cork used to start a fire. Without these furnace runes, the Kingfisher-class frigate would definitely have suffered damage in the battle. After all, the wooden ship was too fragile when facing the dragon's breath, especially the dragon's breath of the Star Dragon.

"So the development plan of the Swift-class must be accelerated," An Jiyue crossed her arms and stared at the design drawings hanging on the wall. "Ordinary steel can't withstand the dragon's breath, but steel is at least non-flammable."

"Speed ​​up? How else can we speed up?" Xiao Yiyue, who had just flown back from the front line of the Dragon Islands, looked at the design for a while and then looked away: "Didn't you say last time that the progress of the new frigate has reached its limit?"

In early March, the Shuofang Army organized personnel to land on the Dragon Islands across the sea from Jingning. The Vietnam War-style battle that should have been difficult and painful turned into a clean and tiring offensive operation because of the existence of the airship.

Relying on the ability to deploy troops from the air, Xiao Yiyue played a leapfrog attack. The two grasshopper gunboats and six grasshopper transport boats belonging to the Shuofang Army never acted alone, but always attacked in groups, bringing assault troops and prefabricated parts from the sky to the key points. After arriving at the location, the gunboats first opened the bomb bays and bombed indiscriminately, blasting out a relatively flat open space in the tropical rainforest, and then the transport boats landed and released the personnel they carried.

The Shuofang Army's assault troops received special training before the operation. After landing, some of them were assigned to guard the surroundings, while others hurried to build fortifications with the prefabricated parts they brought. Unless there happened to be lizardmen troops near the landing point, when these cold-blooded creatures arrived at the scene, they would usually be greeted by a preliminary defensive position and various light and heavy firepower that would rain down on them.

In this offensive mode, the first day after landing is the most critical. The grasshopper formation of the Shuofang Army will stay above the landing point until the assault troops complete the defense deployment. They will return to the rear to transport the second batch of troops and more construction materials, and continuously strengthen the defense of the forward stronghold until returning to the rear base after nightfall.

With the cooperation of the five elements magic of the alchemists accompanying the army, by the next morning, the landing point will be leveled and a masonry wall will be built around the landing point, which will be filled with Shuofang soldiers holding flintlock rifles and on guard. On the third day, the Zhendan people will use special fierce fire oil mixed with trace amounts of spiritual stones to burn a wall of fire around the forward base, thereby clearing the firing range for long-range firepower. Even the famous green hell, where it is burned, will not grow anything within half a year.

Once it gets to this point, unless the Lizardmen are willing to send in their main forces for a fierce attack, they will have no choice but to give up, and then watch helplessly as a small but fully equipped permanent fortress rises from the ground within a week and stands on the land that once belonged to them.

The traverser who refused to show his face wanted to rely on night battles to make up for the huge gap in firepower between the two sides. However, although the elixir that allows people to see normally at night is expensive, it is still no problem to ensure the supply of artillery. In the first night attack, the lizardmen deployed three triceratops and one ancient triceratops, but they were hit one by one by the general cannon during the charge. After that, the lizardmen would not do such stupid things.

For the second night attack, the Lizardmen sent out a team of chameleons. This rare subspecies of skin lizards lived up to its nickname of "Lizard Communists". The patrols of the Shuofang Army did not notice any enemy infiltration at all. Both the sentries and the covert sentries were blinded by these cold-blooded assassins. As a result, just when they were about to enter the fortress, a chameleon triggered the alarm barrier set by the alchemist... and died.

The two sides fought back and forth, the Lizardmen used all their tricks, but it was useless. Although Xiao Yiyue was not a hammer man, An Jiyue was. The Anxi Army Jiedushi had already introduced the various background information of the Lizardmen to the Shuofang Army Jiedushi in detail in the chat group, including the composition of the troops, tactical characteristics, famous figures, etc., and it was obviously impossible for the counterparts on the opposite side to know the information about An's Zhendan. You have to know that even the group members actually don't know the little hobby that the dog group owner is tinkering with privately...

The battle of the Dragon Islands has been going on till now, and the casualties caused by the Lizardmen to the Shuofang Army are not as much as the casualties caused by acclimatization. As the border of the ancient Lizardman Empire, the Lizardmen of the Dragon Islands do not have those cool ancient sacred artifacts, at least Xiao Yiyue has never seen them. Not to mention the high-end goods such as the God Engine and the Sun Engine, this broken place can't even see the Holy Ark of Sotek, and there are no powerful war beasts such as Tyrannosaurus and Troglodytes.