Chapter 189 - Facing the Marshal (12)
Unlike Belliang, which mostly trained their Baltrachers for targeted assassinations, Konchanya also raised many Baltrachers who specialized in using the Balt Wind for naval battles.
As a result, the Imperial Army now faced the same hardships that the Alliance Army had endured, battered head-on by the Balt Wind so strong they could barely keep their eyes open.
However, the Imperial Army didn't panic, even in these circumstances.
In fact, they were much more experienced in dealing with these 'regular' Baltrachers than the ones from Belliang, and they knew exactly how to respond.
"Form an Oblique Formation!"
With Soren's loud command, the 1st Battalion of the 13th Regiment sprang into action.
Company by company, the right wing pushed forward into an oblique formation.
As soon as the Balt Wind hit, the other units also quickly shifted their formations.
Changing formation so abruptly in the forest terrain would normally make battle difficult.
But with so many highly skilled field commanders assigned to the 13th Regiment—veterans hardened by war—they handled everything with remarkable proficiency.
Before the battle, they had meticulously surveyed the terrain and prepared to form an oblique formation.
That much was only natural when you're up against Konchanya, who rely so heavily on the Balt Wind.
Truthfully, the 14th Regiment, which had recently suffered heavy losses, was struggling, with many new recruits fumbling through the motions.
Still, it wasn't enough to cause major problems in the battle.
Rather than saying the 14th Regiment was performing well, it was more accurate to say that the Konchanya Army was just too slow to react.
If any Imperial officer had seen the enemy faltering like the 14th Regiment, they would have launched a fierce attack and finished them off without hesitation.
"Isaac! Balt Wind!"
"On it!"
At Ernest's shout, Isaac, who had been waiting at the far edge of the right wing, began blasting the Balt Wind straight ahead.
Crash!
The Balt Wind collided head-on, creating a powerful current.
Leaves and dirt whirled violently in the air.
This was happening all along the front line at once.
And the Imperial Baltrachers, who had trained specifically for combat against 'ordinary' Baltrachers, began to skillfully control the turbulent chaos.
Order slowly emerged within the once-clashing, chaotic Balt Wind.
The Imperial Baltrachers shot their Balt Wind straight forward to block the Konchanya Baltrachers, then subtly redirected the force to the right.
Whoosh!
"Aaagh!" '
"Get down!"
"Over here!"
The Balt Wind, which had been bottlenecked and blocked, suddenly accelerated explosively along a path carved out by the Imperial Baltrachers.
The Konchanya's Balt Wind was swept along the oblique formation created by the Imperial forces, skimming past to the left rear.
Because of the formation's slant, there were still some soldiers who got caught in the wind, but all they could do was duck down as officers quickly dragged them to safety.
In the end, the Balt Wind took on a herringbone pattern of pushing and pulling against each other.
The Imperial Army's oblique formation, shielded by their own Balt Wind and diverting the enemy's, allowed them to fight almost without taking any damage.
"What the—!?"
"Pull back to the right! Move!"
On the other hand, the Konchanya Army, which was charging at the Imperial forces, was helpless in the face of this sudden disaster.
Their formation was already a mess from charging through the forest, and being battered by the unpredictable blasts of the Balt Wind left them completely disoriented.
Driven purely by determination to stop the Empire in the forest, Belliang had poured all their resources into the Army, training Baltracher as assassins to make the most of the limited Balt Battery supplies.
However, Konchanya, which had staked everything on its Navy, trained its Baltrachers to excel at ship maneuvering and defense, optimizing them for naval warfare.
As a result, they never properly trained for ground combat tactics or how to handle clashes of Balt Wind on land engagements.
This was because even just training the Navy left them scrambling for enough Balt Batteries—there was simply no room to spare any for the Army.
Konchanya was about to pay dearly for such complacency.
"What the—these guys are pushovers, aren't they?"
Even 'Clueless John,' an Imperial Army soldier and former farmer, could tell that the Konchanya Army had no idea how to respond to the situation.
Truthfully, it was the 1st Battalion's rigorous training under Major Bailey Hoffman that gave them the edge over other units—but regardless, there was no denying that the Konchanya Army's level of training was abysmal.
To be more precise, their tactics themselves were shoddy.
Konchanya had sent all their capable people to the Navy, leaving the Army with no one qualified to advance tactics, write manuals, or put effective plans into action.
And from the very beginning, the Konchanya Army was wrong to even attempt an attack.
Their real role was to hold out until the Navy won.
Every tactic of the Konchanya Army was designed for defense.
You could see this just by looking at the hilly area right beside them.
The Konchanya Army had dug in and built a defensive line there that was so formidable the Imperial Army wouldn't even dare assault it.
If they'd just hunkered down like a turtle and held their position, even the Imperial Army wouldn't be able to break through—that's the true strength of the Konchanya Army.
But, eager to keep Bertrand in check and claim military merit, they'd recklessly gone on the offensive.
That was as foolish as trying to fight a naval battle with the Army!
"Goddamn it! Do we look like a joke to you just because Bertrand won?"
"To think we'd be underestimated by bastards like that!"
Seeing the disorganized Konchanya Army unable to maintain their formation, the Imperial soldiers felt a deep, boiling anger rise from within.
It was like running away after being bitten by the tiger that rules the forest, only to have a rat think it could take you on.
Their pride was wounded.
"What are you all doing? Get a hold of yourselves!"
Ferdinand thundered at his angry subordinates. This was still a battle.
No matter how unskilled the enemy seemed, if they dropped their guard, they could lose their lives in an instant.
They must not forget: since the invention of the gun, the value of a human life on the battlefield has hit historic lows.
Even a three-year-old could become a killer if handed a loaded gun.
"Hold!"
"Hold position! Hold!"
Ernest's voice was cool and composed as he gave the order to stay put.
Andersen did the same.
There wasn't a single incompetent officer in the 2nd Corps who had experienced the Battle of Bertagne Forest.
Even the most capable commanders died like flies there, so there was no way the incompetent ones could have survived.
All the incompetent ones were already dead.
A great general always secures victory before the battle begins, focusing everything on supply lines, training, and reconnaissance.
Under a great general, there are no incompetent subordinates.
Even those less capable are placed in roles that suit them best.
Under Colonel Levin Ort, commander of the 13th Regiment, there wasn't a single incompetent officer.
The 13th Regiment truly was the elite of the 2nd Corps.
"Bruno! Barrier!"
"Yes, sir!"
Positioned on the Imperial front line, sheltering from both the Balt Wind and enemy fire at the center of the oblique formation, hidden behind a tree, Ernest ordered Bruno to raise a barrier and then peered out, glaring at the staggering enemies rushing toward them.
Even amid the swirling pale lights of the Balt Shield and Balt Wind, a well-trained soldier can clearly track the enemy's movements—especially someone like Ernest.
"Do not be afraid! Trust in your fellow soldiers!"
Ernest's sharp voice rang out, striking the 2nd Company members like a blade clashing or the crack of gunfire.
"Prepare to fire!"
"Prepare to fire!"
Following Ernest's command, the 2nd Company readied themselves to shoot.
The soldiers, still hidden behind cover, braced their guns against their shoulders and aimed down their barrels.
On a battlefield where it was nearly impossible to even reload a powder gun due to the fierce Balt Wind, the loading of the Balt Gun was unaffected by such winds.
The charging formation of the Konchanya Army naturally shifted because of the Balt Wind.
Rushing straight into the wind was nearly impossible.
As a result, the Konchanya Baltracher who had created the Balt Wind unintentionally forced their own troops to run with the direction of the wind's flow, and this twisted the entire charge off course.
With their low level of training, the Konchanya soldiers became so consumed with chasing the wind through the tangled forest that many believed they were actually charging straight ahead.
This led to a catastrophic mistake: they charged straight into the gaps of the Empire's oblique formation.
"Fire!"
As soon as the Konchanya Army pushed into those gaps, Ernest finally gave the order.
The soldiers aimed their guns at the Konchanya troops in their yellow uniforms appearing in their sights, pulling the trigger without hesitation.
But instead of aiming at the true front, they shot toward the right side of the line—west, targeting the enemy's flank.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
"Argh!"
"What the—?! What's going on?!"
With a crash of Imperial gunfire, Konchanya soldiers toppled in droves.
Utterly shocked, the Konchanya troops had completely lost their sense of direction due to the raging Balt Wind—so it seemed like the enemy's bullets were pouring in from their right rear.
The Imperial Army, arrayed in oblique formation, fired only at their right flank.
In fact, the only ones really looking toward what was supposed to be the front—the direction of the wind and the enemy—were the Baltracher generating the wind, the Company Commander, and, farther back, the Battalion Commander and staff officers who had a wide view of the battlefield.
Our company on the left should be able to cover the true front.
So, we just need to trust them and focus on guarding the front of the company deployed to our right flank.
The 13th Regiment, composed of highly trained elite soldiers, didn't panic or look back, even when the enemy was running along their backs through the oblique formation.
They simply followed orders, firing at the enemy who recklessly exposed their flanks as they ran past right in front of their eyes.
"Ret– retreat! Retreat now!"
As every Konchanya soldier who charged in between the lines of the oblique formation was shot down one after the other, the Konchanya Army commander gave the order to fall back.
It was understandable, since the only thing they saw running between the lines was trees and nothing else.
All the Imperial soldiers directly to their front were hidden from view behind cover, so they saw no one there.
But then, completely unexpectedly, gunfire erupted from their right rear and poured into them.
On a battlefield where visibility is severely limited, the Konchanya soldiers' perspective had narrowed so much that it felt as if the enemy was using fairy magic to turn the battlefield into a maze.
If this had been open terrain, the Imperial Army wouldn't have used such a bold tactic—they'd have simply fired at the enemy coming from the front.
But the forest was chaotic, filled with obstacles.
That's why they could rely so thoroughly on their allies on the left to guard the true front line.
Above all, the enemy was inexplicably weak.
The Konchanya retreat order laid bare just how poor their offensive skills were.
Giving a withdrawal order in these circumstances only showed they had no idea what consequences it might bring.
"Spare me!"
"Aaagh!"
At the retreat command, the soldiers simply spun around and ran for their lives, and even the Baltrachers of the Konchanya Army—who had been stirring up the Balt Wind—stopped the wind and turned to flee.
The Konchanya troops who had ended up relatively farther to the rear managed to run in the right direction, south, as they escaped
However, the Konchanya troops at the front, still under the influence of the Balt Wind, fled diagonally just as they had charged.
Since they spun around and bolted the moment they heard the order to retreat, they could only assume they were heading straight south.
"Now's our chance! Charge!"
"Chaaaarge!"
"Waaah!"
And in that instant, as the enemy turned to flee, Captain Ernest "Fox" Krieger, Company Commander of the 2nd Company, Vanguard of the 1st Battalion, Vanguard of the 13th Regiment, Vanguard of the 5th Division, Vanguard of the 2nd Corps, did not miss his moment.
The 2nd Company, who had been firing unilaterally at the enemy that had entered between the oblique formation while watching to the right and to the west, threw off their cover all at once and sprang out, launching their charge.
Unlike the Konchanya soldiers who had lost their sense of direction, the 2nd Company charged straight due south.
This was because Isaac, who had been raising the Balt Wind at the far right edge, didn't cut off the wind at the moment of retreat but instead forcefully pushed the wind toward the direction he'd initially been facing—directly south.
It was only a single company commander, Ernest, who began the charge first.
And it was only because the Konchanya Army fought so poorly that he initiated the charge much earlier than the original planned terminus of the enemy's offensive.
Ernest's timing was perfect.
Yet, because it was a charge not coordinated in advance, if something went wrong, the 2nd Company might have surged out alone and thrown the whole plan into chaos.
"Prepare to charge!"
"1st Battalion! Charge!"
"Charge!"
"Waaah!"
But the elite 1st Battalion of the 2nd Corps responded immediately and without hesitation, even to Ernest's sudden charge. The 1st and 3rd Companies, positioned on either side of the 2nd Company, prepared to charge the instant the 2nd Company surged forward, and immediately afterward, 1st Battalion Commander Soren gave the order to charge.
With the 2nd Company at the forefront, the 1st Battalion formed a broad wedge formation and began a fierce assault.
"Charge! Charge!" "Now's the time! Charge!"
Tasked with leading the vanguard in this battle, the 1st Battalion of the 13th Regiment was deployed unusually in the very center of the front line.
As the 1st Battalion of the 13th Regiment launched their charge, the other units stationed on both sides began to join in, and soon the entire front assembled by the 13th and 14th Regiments became a massive wedge formation, surging southward.
Bababa-bang! Bababang!
"Die, you bastards!"
"Argh!"
The Imperial Army charged straight south, easily overtaking the Konchanya troops who were fleeing diagonally to the southwest.
The Imperial soldiers relentlessly gunned down the Konchanya from the side and rear as they ran for their lives.
This could hardly even be called a battle.
A battle only exists when both sides are fighting one another.
The Imperial Army, suffering virtually no losses, killed several hundred Konchanya soldiers and drove the front line forward—all in less than five minutes after the battle began.
This was a massacre.
The Empire had abandoned even internal affairs, pouring everything it had into its army.
At the time of the Battle of Bertagne Forest, the military couldn't function as intended, plagued by deep-rooted corruption that festered as a consequence of neglecting internal affairs.
But things are different now.
Years of war and purges have carved out the rot, reforging the army into steel.
Now, the Imperial Army truly lives up to its reputation as the strongest on the continent—it's no exaggeration.
With talented commanders, precise tactics, and well-trained soldiers, the Imperial Army exerts overwhelming power on the battlefield.
So, how dare the Konchanya Army—no better than thugs and unable even to use their cannons in a forest—brazenly launch an offensive?
Did those bastards really think they had become Bertrand just because the Imperial Army lost to him once?
In everyday life, arrogance might cost you some money or get you a beating, and that's the end of it.
But on the battlefield, the price of reckless bravado is paid in death.
The Imperial Army advanced, massacring the enemy with ease.
The exhausted Konchanya Army, having worn themselves out charging first, grew slower and slower—the Imperials caught up and kept killing.
The Imperial soldiers, who had started under cover and then shifted to attack, had a big advantage in stamina, and with their morale riding high, they barely even noticed the strain as they charged forward.
At the very front of this Imperial advance, 2nd Company was almost godlike in its strength and bravery—unstoppable.
It felt as if no one could stand in their way.
2nd Company sprinted according to the flawless and precise commands of Ernest, the Fox Company Commander, who had already memorized every inch of the terrain, and before anyone realized it, they had reached the area near the line established in the previous battle.
It truly seemed that nothing could stop them.
"Stop!"
But it wasn't the enemy that finally halted 2nd Company's rapid advance—it was their own Company Commander, Ernest Krieger, shouting the order to halt.
Even as the troops, bewildered, turned to look at Ernest, they followed orders and stopped.
The moment they saw Ernest's face, set and harsh, they realized immediately: something was wrong.
"Tight formation!"
And as soon as they heard Ernest's order, a flash of realization struck everyone like a bolt of lightning, and they turned pale, hastily scrambling into tight formation.
No one could truly grasp what, exactly, Ernest had seen.
The others simply couldn't process as quickly as he did that the disorganized, fleeing Konchanya Army was suddenly moving with purpose—that their retreat was forming into a new flow, following an invisible front line hidden in the tangled terrain.
And since they had no way to distinguish the subtle differences in the forest, they couldn't possibly have recognized that this very spot was where Bertrand had established the Belliang front line during the previous battle.
Likewise, Ernest was the only one who realized so quickly that the Star of Summer, Estelle Pouarrié, could very well be somewhere along the line that Bertrand had created.
He recalled that Bertrand had been positioned at the defensive line in the hilly area, along with the Belliang Royal Flag, and had confirmed Bertrand's own whereabouts.
Bertrand was not here.
That much was certain.
However, with the front line that Bertrand had once organized now functioning perfectly—allowing the once-panicked Konchanya Army to regain order and rejoin their positions—there was no denying that Bertrand's influence was claiming control of this land.
'Count Lafayette! How far ahead did you see?'
And that is when Ernest understood.
Even if Bertrand himself was gone, some of his troops were certainly still stationed here.
And the Star of Summer, Estelle Pouarrié, was a Baltracher who excelled at brutal close combat in tangled, forested terrain far more than in open ground.
Bertrand Belliang Lafayette had foreseen all of this.
Anticipating that the hard-won front might collapse in a complete Konchanya rout, he had risked having his military achievements diminished by pulling out troops for redeployment, and prepared a new defensive line in the forest's rear.
And, to block the breakthrough led by Ernest Krieger—who was sure to be at the Imperial vanguard—and to kill him, Bertrand had set the most reliable counter in motion.
"Krieger!"
"The Star of Summer."
A meteor streaked down through the trees.
Ernest and Estelle locked eyes.
Their killing intent was unwavering, aimed squarely and unerringly at each other.