This young master truly has the ambition of a hero.

Adhering to the classic tactics repeatedly used by the orcs since ancient times, Balor immediately ordered his 20,000 troops to launch a full-scale attack and charge directly towards the opposite bank.

They didn't even prepare ladders; they planned to climb the city wall by hand!

With their physiques, orcs were capable of scaling an eight-meter-high city wall with their claws, provided that the guards on the wall were all motionless wooden figures who simply watched them climb.

In fact, before the orcs even reached the west bank, their movements had already been discovered by human scouts and reported to the allied high command. Therefore, when the orc army launched its attack, the allied forces were equally prepared, and the charging orcs were met with fierce resistance as soon as they entered the range of ranged weapons.

First came catapults and heavy ballistae, followed by longbowmen and mages, and finally, within two hundred meters, crossbow bolts were used for direct fire. The human army was essentially using the same old equipment over and over again, but its advantage lay in its sheer numbers and effectiveness, allowing for a one-sided reaping of the orcs.

Two weeks ago, a two-thousand-strong orc army charged in this same way, only to be completely wiped out beneath the allied walls. Two weeks later, Balo repeated the same tactic, but this time with ten times the number of troops!

Braving the rain of arrows hurled by the humans, the orc army quickly charged to the city walls. The crossbowmen on the walls retreated to the second line to continue firing, while a combination of shield bearers and spearmen stepped forward to defend.

Although the orcs' tactics were terrible, 20,000 was a number that could cause a qualitative change. Therefore, their mindless charge did put considerable pressure on the allied forces. If they continued to attack, the eight-meter-high ice wall could be built even if you piled up corpses.

However, at that moment, Dick, who had already become a Saint-level mage, made his move.

He deliberately waited a while before making his move, until the entire orc army had stepped onto the frozen surface of the Nie River.

It just goes to show that orcs are indeed orcs; even if the same tactics are used against a different group, they can still suffer the same losses. Dick even surmised that there was probably no intelligence sharing among them, otherwise they would be well aware of the dangers of fighting on ice.

The spell Dick used was a kind of everyday magic that even magic apprentices knew, called "Boiling Water".

As the name suggests, this spell is used to boil water. It boils water using magic instead of an open flame, and the principle is somewhat similar to boiling water on an induction cooker.

However, the same magic could only boil water and make tea when used by an apprentice, but when used by Dick, a newly promoted Saint-level magician, it could rapidly heat up the surface of the Nie River, which was several kilometers wide.

Suddenly, the orc, who was rushing across the river, felt the ice beneath his feet begin to tremble violently, and then cracks began to appear everywhere. The heated river water produced a huge amount of steam, which directly broke through the weak points in the ice and gushed out from the cracks.

Those unlucky guys who got too close were steamed alive almost instantly!

Because Dick used magic to heat the water beneath the ice, the ice layer, which was originally several meters thick, melted almost completely in a very short time. A large number of orcs fell directly into the boiling river water, screaming in pain from the scalding heat. Meanwhile, on the side closer to the north bank, the orcs that had already rushed over were suddenly cut off from their retreat.

Dick was initially worried that this tactic could only be used once, and that he should wait until the orcs had committed the most troops before launching his attack to maximize the results. However, the opposing commander seemed to be possessed by Chen Youliang, devising a "first battle is the decisive battle, one battle decides the fate" strategy, committing all his troops in the very first attack.

All I can say is that the enemy's coordination was truly brilliant!

Barlow himself was standing on the edge of the ice on the west bank. The large amount of water vapor dispelled the winter chill, but it also made him sweat profusely. He was thankful that because of his weight and slow running speed, he had fallen to the back of the group and had luckily avoided falling into the river.

Seeing the still-melting ice before him, Balo retreated hastily, followed by his tribal guards. These orcs had no idea what was happening; in their ignorance, they believed this strange phenomenon was a punishment from the gods. Terrified, their faces paled, and forgetting the fighting still raging on the opposite bank, they turned and fled in panic into the forest.

Chapter 140: The Cunning Beast

In contrast to the great victory achieved by the allied forces of the Eastern Nobles, the battle fought by the legions personally led by the Beast King Ramon at the pass fortress in the Central Mountains presented a completely different picture.

The garrison at the fortress realized the orc legion was extraordinary the moment it appeared before them. Their organization and training were unlike anything orcs had ever seen. They wore uniform armor and weapons, marched in fairly decent formations, and dug trenches before engaging in battle. They seemed to know the range and power of the magical weapons in the hands of the humans.

"What the hell! Is this even an orc?"

As a passage connecting the north and south, the pass is strategically located in the heart of the empire. Therefore, the garrison inside the pass is usually only around three thousand men, equipped with sixteen large-caliber muzzle-loading magic cannons and a magic musket squad of three hundred men.

This troop deployment wouldn't have been a problem in the past; many Imperial soldiers stationed here thought they might never see a battle before they retired. But no one expected that the orcs in the northern wastelands would rise up so suddenly and quietly, their army sweeping through the northern territory and reaching the gates of the fortress.

As for the garrison at the fortress, the commander-in-chief was not in the fortress at this time. Instead, he had taken sick leave and returned to the bustling world of the capital for "recuperation." Fortunately, his deputy was still there, and he was a very serious military officer. On the one hand, he was organizing the troops for battle, and on the other hand, he was frantically writing letters to the south for help. The messages were not only sent to the capital, but also to the neighboring lords, asking them to send troops to support them.

After several days of stalemate, the orcs launched their first probing attack. The defending human soldiers then discovered that the orc army, in their haste, had actually managed to hastily construct a batch of siege equipment. There were wheelbarrows with shields at the front, large siege ladders, and even some forward-deployed catapults could be vaguely seen in the trenches further back.

Although these machines are still inferior to the human army in terms of technology, the fact that they were made by a group of orcs is truly incredible!

The orcs deployed very few troops in their first attack, less than two thousand, but this number was clearly taken into account the width of the battlefield. The front of the pass fortress was a canyon less than a kilometer wide. If the troops deployed were too dense, it would be tantamount to sending them to the artillery inside the fortress.

After the orcs began their attack, the fortress defenders retaliated decisively.

As part of the Imperial Guard, which was subordinate to the central government, the fortress garrison was permitted to be equipped with heavy firearms, a privilege they held.

The muzzle-loading magic cannon is based on the Napoleon cannon from Earth, but it is a modified version. It uses an alchemical powder with greater power than gunpowder as propellant. To enhance the strength of the cannon, cold iron was added during the forging process, and there are magical runes on the outer wall of the barrel to increase the range of the cannonball.

The combination of drugs and enchantments has elevated this modified Napoleon cannon to a level of performance that its Earth ancestors could never hope to match.

Faced with the human race's powerful magic cannons, the orcs' first wave of attacks was quickly crushed.

However, shortly thereafter, the orcs quickly launched a new offensive with adjusted tactics and demonstrated extremely flexible response methods in the battle.

They intensified their earthworks, bringing the trenches ever closer to the city walls.

They carefully created false targets to trick the artillerymen in the city into wasting ammunition.

They even used chemical weapons in their fourth attack!

The defenders quickly began to feel the pressure, and the commander could vaguely sense that the enemy's previous attacks were merely probing and attrition tactics, and that they still had their real killing moves to make.

"War is indeed a very profound subject!"

On the orcish side of the army, Ramon hid in a concealed bunker, observing the attack from afar. The orcish troops deployed to the front lines all wore different colored robes according to their unit affiliation and function, so that the commanders at the rear could observe them. Ramon's orders were remotely controlled to direct the front-line troops to take action via messenger horns.

Ramon was initially uncomfortable with the carefully camouflaged bunker. He felt that as the commander of the legion, he should stand in a place where his soldiers could see him, which would make it easier to command and boost the morale of his troops. Crouching in the pit made him look like he was afraid of dying.

However, his idea was immediately dissuaded by his black-robed advisors, who told him not to be so reckless, because the human army had cannons.

The single-shot power of a magic cannon exceeds that of high-level magic, and it also has a longer range!

To prove that the human race's magic cannons were both long-range and accurate, the advisors specially arranged for a fake Ramon to stand in a conspicuous position. However, less than half a minute later, artillery fire came down and blew the fake Ramon and the small mound beneath his feet into the air.

From then on, Ramon never complained about the bunkers again, and at the same time, he couldn't stop thinking about the Terran cannons.

Despite being outnumbered six to one, Ramon's orc army fought for three days. Their most successful attempt was to have a small suicide squad manage to scale the city walls, but they were quickly driven down by the human army.

The human musketeers only engage in combat at crucial moments, remaining on standby in the rear the rest of the time. However, snipers are stationed in towers to hunt down the orc frontline commanders. They have already killed seven of Ramon's sons, all of whom were intelligent children whom he valued highly.

Fortunately, their deaths were not entirely meaningless. The firing rate of the fortress garrison dropped significantly starting from the third day, suggesting that their ammunition reserves were running low.

On the fifth day of the attack, Ramon received news of the defeat of the Eastern Expeditionary Army. Under his urging, Balo used a "whole-of-the-family attack" to reduce the remaining 20,000 soldiers by half. At the same time, his spies brought back some bad news: there was a suspected Saint-level mage within the human Eastern Alliance.

Upon hearing this news, Ramon's expression grew somewhat grave. The heavy losses suffered by the sweeping legion were indeed within his expectations, perhaps even intentional. Ramon had deliberately suppressed much crucial intelligence, hoping to lure Barlow into a state of confusion and suicide.

In his original plan, even if the sweeping legion was destined to be defeated in the end, it should not have been defeated so quickly. They should at least have played a certain role in restraining the human army in the east and fighting them for several months. Ideally, they should have fought the human army to the point of mutual destruction.

As a result, these 20,000 orcs were like 20,000 pigs, collapsing in just one day. It seems that the sudden appearance of the Saint-level expert was the main reason for the rapid defeat of the sweeping legion, which made Ramon have to be careful.

Thanks to its massive population, the human race has more experts at the Saint rank and above than all other races combined, making it the undisputed strongest race in the world in terms of overall combat power.

However, the human race, like the orcs, is not united. They occupy a vast territory and are scattered across many countries, which forces their powerful individuals to be dispersed throughout the world. Some experts are even locked in a state of mutual restraint because their respective countries are hostile to each other.

Take the Maple Dew Kingdom, the Black Forest Empire's number one rival, for example. This kingdom has a demigod and seven Saint-level powerhouses, forcing the Empire to also station an equal number of powerhouses in this direction. These experts are essentially nailed to the south and will not easily support the north.

It was precisely because of his understanding of these internal human circumstances that Ramon was confident in his ability to conquer the relatively weaker northern territories of the Empire. He was certain that the Empire would not be able to concentrate all its forces against him, and that other human nations at odds with the Empire would seize the opportunity to launch attacks and help him contain the Empire.

But now a Saint-level expert has suddenly appeared in the north of the empire. His existence is like a variable that could very well affect Ramon's plans.

"Looks like I need to find a way to get rid of this guy..."

On the other side, the decisive victory of the Allied Forces at Niehe reversed the balance of power between the humans and orcs. This battle directly crippled the main force of the orcs, with thousands of orcs drowning in the water. Several thousand more orcs that reached the east bank had no way to retreat and were wiped out by the human alliance.

When fighting this group of orcs, Dick did not participate in the battle. Instead, he left the opportunity to make a name for himself to his soldiers, while he served as a strategic force to guard against possible enemy countermeasures.

Dick was certain that the orcs also had Saint-level experts, and there should be more than one. Otherwise, Ramon would not have had the confidence to invade the northern part of the empire. It's just that they would not easily use their strategic forces as a trump card.

The individual combat strength of the orcs was still formidable. Even with their morale plummeting after their retreat was cut off, these orcs continued to fight like cornered beasts. The allied forces barely managed to annihilate them before sunset. During this period, there were more than a few instances of high-level orc warriors acting as suicide squads and forcibly storming the city walls.

By the time the battle ended, the refrozen river had turned red, and some orcs were frozen solid, remaining in a "lifelike" state beneath the ice.

When Hoffman inspected the front-line city walls, he remained silent for a long time looking at the hellish scene. He simply couldn't imagine what a terrible scene it would be if he were the only one to face it alone, or if his troops were forced to fight these ferocious orcs in open battle.

"Fortunately, these orcs are as stupid as wild beasts."

“No, you’re wrong,” Dick immediately replied.

"Real beasts are very cunning!"

Chapter 141: The Declaration of Independence

After the allied forces defeated the orcish sweeping legion, news of the victory spread like wildfire throughout the areas where humans had not yet fallen.

This was a deliberate propaganda effort by Count Hoffmann, who hoped to attract lords who had been observing the situation to join the allied forces, thereby further expanding the allied army's strength.

Because they only severely damaged the orcish sweeping legion, and didn't even manage to annihilate them. The enemy still has tens of thousands of reserve troops stockpiled on the border. This fresh force poses a huge threat, and if they are mobilized to support the eastern front, the border legions holed up in the fortress may not have the courage to launch a proactive attack.

Dick didn't object to Hoffman's idea, but he warned him to be wary of opportunists and potential traitors. He also stressed the importance of ensuring that those arriving later provided their own provisions. The Allied forces camp, with hundreds of thousands of people, was already nearing the end of their supply lines; to avoid famine, every grain of food had to be carefully managed.

Dick's fears soon came true. A few days later, all sorts of ragtag "rebels" began to flock to the Allied forces.

The most "powerful" force among them was a viscount who brought a force of over a thousand men, claiming to fight to defend the dignity of the empire. However, he only brought about three days' worth of rations and demanded that the allied forces provide them with food and a daily wage of one silver coin per man. In the end, he even shamelessly asked if there were any women.

It is important to know that there are regulations in the empire that stipulate that when the royal family leads the formation of a noble alliance, the nobles are indeed required to provide their own weapons and provisions. This is a legal "obligation" that the nobles should fulfill. However, if they fight well, they can be rewarded by the royal family, and their titles can be promoted and they can be granted fiefs.

If a nobleman leads the formation of a joint force, then the organizer must provide the money and supplies, because nobles have no obligation to each other; they help you out of goodwill.

Hoffman glanced at their "thousand-man army." The only ones with decent equipment were the fifty or so personal guards around the viscount, but they exuded a strong bandit aura and didn't look like good guys. The rest were all militiamen temporarily conscripted. In this damned weather, they were even wearing tattered rags and carrying sharpened wooden sticks as weapons.

Clearly! These are the "opportunists" Dick warned Hoffman to be wary of. When the situation is difficult, they stay far away, coldly watching others fight to the death with the orcs. Once the battle begins to improve, they rush out again, wanting to infiltrate the victor's camp and get a share of the spoils.

Hoffman knew that letting these scoundrels join the allied forces would do more harm than good, but he still adhered to the old-school lord's policy of seeking as many soldiers as possible in war, and agreed to let them join the allied forces, thinking of using them as cannon fodder.

But soon, the arrival of a heavyweight figure caused some undue turmoil within the previously stable coalition forces.

According to the Imperial Nobility Law, the highest rank a local lord could attain was count, while those of higher ranks, duke and marquis, had to settle in the capital and entrust their territories to a governor-general.

However, there are always exceptions. Some members of the royal family enjoy honorary titles that are "one level higher" in rank because of their special status. The Marquis Richard of the North is such a nobleman.

He was originally an earl, but because his sister married Hesse VII and became the fourth empress of the empire, his title was raised to "honorary marquis" without changing the size of his fief, making him the only marquis in the entire northern region.

Marquis Ad Richard was a powerful lord in the North. His family owned a gold mine and a silver mine in their fiefdom, making them very wealthy. They maintained the largest private army in the North, with a standing force of three thousand men, and they frequently bullied and oppressed men and women in the surrounding territories.

After the orc invasion, Hoffman also sought help from Marquis Richard, but was flatly refused.

As a result, the allied forces won several great victories in succession, annihilating a large number of enemy troops, giving people the feeling that the orc army was actually quite easy to deal with. Marquis Richard could no longer sit still.

The Marquis himself led an army of five thousand men, marching in a grand and imposing manner to the front lines!

Despite his dislike for the marquis who was clearly there to reap the benefits, Hoffman had no choice but to give him a grand welcome due to the other party's status.

As for Dick and old Banner, they also attended out of courtesy, but their faces showed no enthusiasm whatsoever.

"Grandpa, are you familiar with this person? I haven't been in the North for long and have never met him."

"It's a good thing I haven't met him. This person is a complete jerk. You can find all the flaws of human nature in him."

"Is it really that good?"

The old man shrugged, his disdain undisguised.

At this moment, the Marquis Richard's private guard of honor had arrived. The Marquis himself was sitting in a glittering, luxurious carriage, exuding an aura of nouveau riche.

After the carriage came to a stop, a middle-aged man dressed in an extravagant court robe and exuding the perfumed air of a lady stepped out. A servant immediately knelt on the snow, offering his back as a step for the man to descend. This affected and pretentious display made Dick so embarrassed he wanted to scratch his toes.

The other person went down to the ground where the snow had been cleared, ignored Hoffman who had come forward to greet him, and instead frowned, sniffed the air, then took out a handkerchief and covered his nose.

"What's that smell? It stinks!"

As soon as the other party said this, the atmosphere at the scene immediately became awkward. Hoffman, the local host, couldn't help but twitch at the corner of his eye, but in the end, he forced himself to grit his teeth and endure it for the sake of the overall situation.

However, Hoffman soon found himself unable to contain himself.

Marquis Richard claimed to be on the front lines, but he seemed more like he was there to put on airs. As soon as he arrived at the Allied camp, he made many excessive demands. Without consulting Hoffman, he arbitrarily drove away a large number of refugees and designated a large area for himself to build a camp.

Then, at the Allied Conference, he made no secret of his struggle for command of the Allied forces, demanding that Dick relinquish the position of commander-in-chief to himself, who was of higher status and position.

This made Dick laugh out loud!

"You want command? Do you know how to fight?"

"That's natural!"

When Ard Richard said this, he looked arrogant and disdainful, and his retainers immediately stood up to support him, praising his Marquis's literary and military talents.

Dick smiled, raised his hand to interrupt the other person's speech, and then said calmly.

"Fine, I'll relinquish the position of commander-in-chief of the allied forces. Also, I have an announcement to make. I, Dick Best, will be leading my men out of the allied forces. I'm going to go it alone!"

Chapter 142: Coach, I want to learn magic!

At the meeting, Dick suddenly announced his intention to withdraw from the coalition, which immediately caused a huge uproar.

Especially the earliest group of minor lords who fought alongside them had witnessed the fighting prowess of the well-trained Ragug private army and held Dick and his retainers in great awe.

That's a Saint-level mage; one of them is worth an entire mage corps.

Hoffman also rushed over to persuade him, but Dick's words were not impulsive, but a decision he made after careful consideration.

Dick knew that war was to be fought in phases, with different tasks at each phase.

In the early stages of the orcish invasion, the primary task for the humans was to stabilize the front lines and halt the orcish army's eastward advance. The allied forces accomplished this, and quite successfully.