Twenty, The Mysterious Strategy of the Spirit Army

  The evening wind blows across the quiet prairie.

  It was a moonless night, the darkness shrouded everyone's line of sight, and in this pitch-blackness, more than 4,000 cavalrymen gathered together, quietly waiting for the attack.

  Most of the troops participating in the night raid were militiamen from New Mexico, who were all long-time residents of the prairie and skilled horsemen familiar with the terrain. Even advancing in the dark was not a big problem.

  Major Torini's thousand regular cavalrymen were the mainstay of this battle. Most of them were veterans who had experienced war and had been fighting against the border demons for a long time after retiring to the New Continent, and their combat effectiveness was far superior to that of the New Enoa State Militia. Because they were going to fight at night, they all wore black night-riding uniforms, carrying sabers and lances, with the blades deliberately painted in dull dark brown to avoid exposure in the darkness.

  As they were fighting in the anti-magic zone, the mages were completely useless. Fili and his red-robed mages stayed back at the camp, only letting Bam's wild boar cavalry follow behind the night raid squad to pick up the scraps. Charlotte didn't participate in the battle due to her poor riding skills, so command of the night raid was handed over to Major Torini. The others simply stood on the watchtower using binoculars to observe the distant darkness that should be the elven camp.

  "What's going on, why isn't there any sound of fighting at all?" Governor Norm stood on the watchtower, looking at the distant flames, furrowing his brow. "Is it a soundproof barrier? No, that's a magic-prohibited area. What's going on then?"

  He couldn't answer, nor could those around him. Even Major Torini, who had rushed into the fairy camp, didn't understand what was happening.

  The raid began unexpectedly smoothly, as Idriel didn't even send out sentries to keep watch. Until the cavalry crossed the trenches and charged into the center of the elven camp, only a few elves discovered their own actions.

  At this point, Major Torini was excitedly eager to cheer, if a battle had reached the stage where you had already touched the enemy's nose while your enemy was completely unaware. Generally speaking, victory was already within your grasp.

  But things didn't go as smoothly as Major Torini had hoped, and when they rushed into the enemy commander's tent, they found no one there. The tent was empty, with no elves or any furnishings.

  "What's going on here? Where have all the elves gone?" Major Torini, who had little battle experience, was very puzzled: "Things are not normal, is this really the enemy commander's tent?"

  "This tent is in the very center of the camp, surrounded by other tents for protection." The dwarf Bamm, riding a wild boar, stroked his beard and said: "According to the rules of formation and camping, this should be their commander's residence. How can it be empty? It doesn't make sense at all."

  "Report, sir! All of the tents here are empty!" a soldier burst in and shouted.

  More than 4,000 cavalrymen turned the camp upside down, but no one found anything of value in the fairy camp: no enemies, no weapons, no food or forage, except some destroyed cannons, there was nothing in this camp!

  The officers exchanged glances, none of them having anticipated this situation. Fully armed and with a determination to die, the assault team successfully broke into the center of the fairy camp, but unexpectedly found not even half an enemy. Those guys seemed to have evaporated out of thin air, disappearing without leaving any trace in the air.

  But the camp was under close surveillance by their own side, and before sunset, the elves' activities could still be seen clearly. In all directions of the camp, there were large numbers of mounted patrols deployed. How did Eddril slip away under their noses? And where did he slip away to?

  For a moment, groups of soldiers led their mounts, standing in stunned silence at the center of the elven military camp, their minds filled with confusion.

  Until a signal flare indicating withdrawal was sent from the rear, everyone was still confused and bewildered.

  They did not notice that the four remaining ships of the Elf Army also disappeared along with other things.

  "What's that?" Phil, who was on the watchtower, suddenly felt a strong fluctuation in the nearby magical net. He looked around and soon discovered several slow-moving magical lights in the northeast direction behind him.

  "One, two, three, four, four of them! That direction is the Blue River, and that fluctuation is... teleportation magic!" He shouted loudly, grabbing Charlotte and pulling his head towards where the magical light was appearing. "Look quickly, there's a teleportation array starting up over there!"

  The people on the watchtower immediately shifted their gaze and discovered the bright magical glow on the Blue River.

  "What is that?"

  "There are four things, I'll take a closer look at what they are... They're four boats! The spirits have boarded!"

  "What does Idril want? The passage is already blocked."

  "Where do they want to transport?"

  Everyone was talking, someone loudly ordered the artillery to move their position and fire towards the Blue River. The military camp began to become noisy. But before the soldiers had time to move their positions, everyone noticed the distant flames on the eastern horizon, and faintly heard the distant muffled explosion sounds.

  Governor Nohm's dark face suddenly turned deathly pale.

  That direction is Glorious City, the capital of New Enochia State.

  The night drew its curtain low, and the broad streets of Glory City were ablaze with scattered gunfire echoing from time to time.

  Swords, spears and rifles lay scattered on the ground, human and elven corpses mingled together, bloodstains turning gray and green uniforms all red. Houses and shops were engulfed in raging fires, everywhere swirling murky smoke and flames, interwoven with the scent of blood and death, stirring up a fierce and tragic inferno.

  Standing at the bow of the airship, Idriel looked down at the battlefield below with a triumphant gaze, finally savoring the sweetness of victory once again after many days.

  "Desperate counterattack, once again using the few to defeat the many! The telegram can probably be written like this." Thinking of this, he finally couldn't help but burst out laughing, the depression brought by two months of continuous setbacks seemed to have been swept away.

  To carry out this raid, Idriel began tense planning and preparation as soon as he arrived here, the subtlety of which far exceeded that battle in June outside North Pole Port.

  He first pitched his camp at a considerable distance from the city of Glory, forcing the enemy to leave the city and pitch their own camp for confrontation, thus weakening the strength of the city's defenses. It also made it difficult for the enemy troops outside the city to return in time.

  Secondly, he chose a place in the forbidden magic zone to set up camp, so as to avoid being discovered by the enemy's scouting magic when his camp suddenly became an empty camp.

  In the third step, he exhausted all the materials at hand and ordered the military mages and priests to complete the main parts of five simple precise teleportation magic arrays that could not be used with magic. These rough products were of poor quality and low performance, but they were enough for a short distance transmission of just a few miles and only once. Of these five precise teleportation magic arrays, four were installed on the remaining four ships, and the last one was disassembled and installed on the flying ship.

  Fourth step, choose a moonless night, all the elf army secretly abandoned camp and boarded the ship, drifting downstream quietly away from the forbidden magic zone, and then completed the transmission magic array. Then, led by Idriel himself, 100 elite soldiers boarded two flying ships that had been painted black in advance, quietly crossing over the enemy's riverbank sentry, flying towards Glory City, the city lights were the best landmarks.

  The fifth step, the raid team implemented a parachute drop in Glorious City, occupying a building and setting up an accurate teleportation magic array, allowing the elf army on the ship to cross over the city walls and directly teleport into the city, defeating the defending troops with lightning speed and occupying the entire city.

  Now, Idriel's plan has reached its final step. All the elven armies have entered the city to participate in the battle, and several city gates have basically fallen under their control. Although all the accompanying mages and priests are exhausted from this. But in his view, it was still worth it. Despite the fierce resistance of the defending army inside the city, they can't hold on for much longer against the elven army's overwhelming numbers. Meanwhile, the enemy outside the city is still six or seven miles away, by the time they figure out what happened and rush over in a hurry, he will already be the new master of Glorious City.

  "This time, the entire fleet has been exhausted. If we don't make some decent achievements soon, I'm afraid we'll be court-martialed when we get back. It's really helpless!" Idriel sighed, taking a deep breath of the smoky air, and gave another adventurous order, "Rapid descent, prepare for battle! Land on the roof of the Council Building!"