Badge in Azure

Most people would not feel too uncomfortable when death mages occasionally created undead soldiers, but when it came to eating enemies, that was different a matter altogether.

When Nailisi saw the disgusted expression on Ferdinand’s face, she snickered coldly.

This snicker caused a reaction within the demon army. The demons began to howl loudly while smashing their weapons on the ground.

“Marquis, all enemies are food. This is the rule of the demon dimension. It was with Her Highness’ permission that I have brought my army here to fight for her. Look at their badges!” Nailisi pointed at the demon behind her with her huge finger and said, “What does this badge represent?”

“Loyalty, unity, honor, and conviction!” Marquis Ferdinand replied with difficulty. Letting the demons devour humans seemed to be incompatible to these four values.

“We are willing to die for Her Highness, that’s loyalty. We will not attack our allies, that’s unity. We will not bow down even to Gods, that’s honor. We are willing to fight until the end of the world, that’s conviction! Marquis, what do you say?”

“You, are right…”

Marquis Ferdinand tried to console himself. The demons were supposed to fight the enemies and it would be difficult for his own men to support the demon army on the battlefield. Let them go ahead and eat then. The more enemies they ate, the less they would have to worry about logistics.

“Marquis, let me know if you are not agreeable. I will give you a list of food items. You will surely regret it when you see it.” Nailisi no longer bothered to be nice to the Marquis.

“As you wish. I will convince my men.” After hearing what Nailisi said, the Marquis suddenly understood that the ten-thousand demons would have required a lot of food. During battles, the amount of food consumed by a human soldier would increase by multiple times and this was likely the same for demons as well. These demons were four to five yards tall so the amount of meat that they would need to consume must be frightening.

After the Marquis had finally given in, Nailisi was pleased and brought the demon army to the open space in the middle of the city. There were a few small buildings in the open space and they were torn down in order to accommodate the demons there.

The Myers Mainland was fertile and the weather in Luolan was the best. Compared to the demon dimension, it was what the Gods would describe as ‘heaven’. The demons did not need any houses. They would lie down and sleep straight away, without even removing their armor.

Nailisi left the open space and headed to the Marquis’ mansion after assigning some of the smarter battalion commanders to manage the demons. She purposely remained in her devil form to discuss the battle with the Marquis in his garden.

Ferdinand felt helpless facing a gigantic devil. Fortunately, Nailisi did not scare him intentionally. She only maintained a posture of arrogance and was constantly looking down on the Marquis.

Nailisi was seated on the ground while the Marquis was on the top story of a high building. Both of them were discussing the battle that was to come.

The Marquis patiently explained the formations on the map.

Originally, there was an army of four-hundred-thousand in Sanlian City. After taking into account the one-hundred-thousand that Daliang City had sent over and the men that they had lost in battles, there was still about four-hundred-thousand left. There were tens of thousands of injured soldiers in the cities and although they had been healed, they would no longer be able to pick up weapons and fight.

Sanlian City was located on flat ground that was more than sixty miles wide. In the west was a small and narrow flat plain. There was another narrow river more than fifty miles away that flowed from south to north. The Holy See’s army had already built a bridge for the armies behind them to pass over the river quickly.

Recently, the Holy See’s main aim was to attack the city to the south of Sanlian City, harass the one in the north, and lay a siege on the main city in the center. When the city in the south requested reinforcements, the main city would deploy knights to attack the enemy troops. Nevertheless, the Holy See’s army was about five-hundred-thousand strong, which was fewer than the army on the west side of the river.

“In other words, the Tanggulasi army has more men!”

“Indeed, at least this is the case on the east side of the river. In terms of manpower, we do not have the upper hand.”

Nailisi had experienced battling expeditions before and that battle against the one-hundred-thousand strong expedition was memorable. The soldiers in the Holy See’s army were not afraid to die. In fact, they almost seemed to embrace death, as if it was a blessing.

“The main city has a two-hundred-thousand strong army while the two cities in the south and north each have one-hundred-thousand strong armies each. The enemy is now attacking the city in the south and this place is in the middle of the route that the main city will take to send reinforcements to the south. Brief me on the combat abilities of the army here and how many strong opponents there are.”

Ferdinand was well-versed in military matters and Nailisi’s questions left him troubled.

“Your Honor… the enemy has two main corps here with about twenty-thousand blood knights and two red Bishops. They should be grade-8 Professionals. Usually, the two red Bishops will not appear unless we have grand swordmasters.”

“Do we have any sorcerers?”

“There is a grade-7 sorcerer in every city, but they are unable to attack as they must guard the magic towers.”

“In other words, the enemy can only attack using conventional methods, otherwise they will have to resort to destroying the magic tower by force?”

“Yes. Destroying a seven-story magic tower would require at least two grade-9 Professionals. Since the magic towers are situated within the city walls, the grade-9 Professionals must take into consideration the threat posed by the arrow towers so they may not attack the magic towers by force after all.”

“This means that there is a seventy-thousand to eighty-thousand strong army here with two red Bishops. What about here?” Nailisi pointed to a spot nearby that was suitable for stationing troops.

“Approximately the same numbers as well, but there are only ordinary soldiers here. No blood knights at all.”

“Hmm, it is meant to fool you into thinking this way. The troops stationed here are probably the real elite soldiers. If the city in the south is pushed to the point that it may lose its magic tower, the main city will definitely send out even more troops to provide aid. When the troops we send out reached a certain number, that is when the elite soldiers here will attack and sandwich us between them and the enemy soldiers in the south city. At most, we can only deploy fifty-thousand men while the enemy can easily deploy more than one-hundred and fifty-thousand soldiers on top of the two-hundred-thousand that were already attacking the south city. What do you think about this trap?”

What Nailisi said left Ferdinand sweating. The few times that he had sent aid to the south city, the enemy soldiers stationed in the location that Nailisi had pointed out remained unmoved so he mistook them to be logistics soldiers. What the scouts discovered was also the same. If this was the enemy’s main force, the one-hundred and fifty-thousand soldiers would be able to engage the fifty-thousand elite soldiers until the main forces arrived to surround them.

In the past, the enemy remained unmoved because the reinforcements he had sent out were too few in number.

Ferdinand was perspiring because Nailisi was sharp enough to be able to see the trap immediately. If all demons were like that, it would be too frightening!

“The terrain here is too narrow, which limits the size of armies that can be stationed here. The Holy See would already have taken down Sanlian City long ago otherwise. Marquis, don’t worry. We will launch an attack on the ninth of April and eat this army up.” Nailisi pointed at the campsite of seventy-thousand men with her sharp fingernails. The thought of the demons eating people made Ferdinand shiver.

“Your Honor, why don’t we attack on the eighth instead?” Ferdinand was puzzled. It would take a full day of all-out attack on south city in order to force them into seeking reinforcements. If the main city was to send aid after a full day had passed, they would fall into the enemy’s trap. On the tenth, the entire defense of Sanlian City would more or less have collapsed completely.

“Bring forward the attack? The Tanggulasi to the west of the river are able to increase one-million soldiers in a day. If the enemy gave it their all, then the tenth would be the most dangerous day for us. If we delay by a day, this place will not be able to contain a one-million strong army anyway, so the enemy’s main forces will have no choice but to wait to the west of the river. Once we reach the eleventh and the wedding is over, an all-out attack would be meaningless.”

Ferdinand was sweating even more now. Not only was this demon capable with tactics, she was also brilliant at strategizing.

Even if the demon’s plan failed eventually, it would still manage to disrupt the enemy’s plan of taking down the city on the tenth.

It was extremely important to Bitter Water Prefecture that they survive past the tenth. If the borders were to fall on the day of the wedding, it would be a huge blow to Bitter Water Prefecture.

Nailisi’s purple eyes revealed cruelty even as she laughed and said, “Sooner or later, Cloudflow will regret collaborating with the Holy See!”

Nailisi knew that to Qin, the Holy See was the real demons. She needed a good excuse for her own demon army to go about killing in the Cloudflow Empire. Since Cloudflow was working so closely together with the Holy See, then that just included another huge meal on her demon army’s menu.

Cloudflow had made the wrong decision without her even trying anything. Nailisi had even come up with the slogan of her demon army –’devour all disciples of the evil God!’

Qin would definitely accept the slogan. Not a single church had appeared in the empire and the people there believed in magic and even astrologers in the past. When the Grand Duke of Luolan fell, his bloodline was not preserved and not many Qin noble families extended their help because the Grand Duke had allowed the Holy See onto his lands.

“Marquis, I need some sponsorship for personal reasons. Help me think of a way.” When Nailisi requested some resources for her own use, Marquis Ferdinand agreed immediately.

What Nailisi wanted was high-level magic nuclei. She already had tens of high-level magic nuclei in her bracelet, but she could not bear to mount them on the magic stone artilleries as they were all grade-9 magic nuclei. Magic stone artilleries only required grade-7 magic nuclei.

By right, grade-4 magic nuclei would be sufficient, but Nailisi did not wish to have to change magic nuclei in the midst of the battle, hence bringing up such a request.

After obtaining six grade-7 magic nuclei, Nailisi took out her magic stone artilleries. She mounted new magic nuclei and filled them with magic stone shells before finally smiling with satisfaction.

“Marquis, I will remember your generosity.”

Nailisi’s estimation was right. The Holy See gathered a three-hundred-thousand strong army on the eighth of April and began to launch a fierce attack on the south city of Sanlian City. The armies of south city immediately sounded the alarm. After what Nailisi had pointed out previously, Marquis Ferdinand did not send out reinforcements immediately. He began to prepare for the battle on the second day instead.

Nailisi was extremely excited. The terrain of Sanlian City was perfect for the demon army. If only she had one-hundred-thousand demons, she would have been confident of defeating the Holy See army. The terrain there was narrow and the Holy See would only be able to gather five-hundred-thousand soldiers at most. An army of five-hundred-thousand would not be a match for one-hundred-thousand demons. It was not as if the humans now were the same as the humans in the past!