In the Name of the Queen

If accidents can be predicted, they are not accidents.

After the demon octopus was repelled, any normal person could guess that the subsequent journey would not be smooth.

Roland did not need to remind him at all. Bridges was on high alert. He had not slept well for several days and was on full alert.

He had to be on guard against the short-sighted octopus parents who would avenge their children, and he had to worry about the Grimm clan and General Haiao looking for opportunities to take action, and he had to worry about the continued deterioration of the weather.

However, none of the expected accidents came.

Since the storm on the day the demon octopus appeared, the sky has become particularly clear, and even the wind direction is very favorable, allowing the fleet to travel at the maximum speed.

Bridges spent every day in anxiety.

Looking at the calm expression of Governor Roland, he said nothing, but admired him in his heart.

He is worthy of being the governor, and he can keep this stable.

Of course, he didn't know that Roland was not stable, but believed in Alina's deduction.

After the demon octopus appeared, Roland invited Alina to taste the octopus teppanyaki together.

After enjoying the delicious food, he asked Alina to deduce the next journey.

Alina concentrated and held her breath, and after careful deduction, she summarized it in one sentence.

"Calm wind and waves."

The prophet said it was fine, so Roland could sleep.

Although he was not completely relaxed, he was not overly anxious.

If everyone thought that an accident would happen, but no accident happened, it was actually an accident.

In short, the fleet arrived safely and smoothly in the southern waters of the Golden Kite Kingdom.

The fleet took the final rest here and landed at the right time.

The southern coastline of the Golden Kite Kingdom is not short, but there are only two large ports. Roland's target is the larger of the two, Port If.

It is heavily guarded here, with more than 30,000 elite troops stationed all year round.

In addition to the three standing artillery batteries on the nearby mountains and the mines that control the waterway, even if the main fleet of the peak Sussex Empire is dispatched collectively, it cannot be hit.

Landing operations are difficult, and it is even more difficult to use a fleet to attack a super port.

Roland certainly wouldn't be stupid enough to attack Port d'If.

His plan was to land 30 kilometers east of Port d'If and stab them from behind.

The landing plan was even simpler and more crude. He would use the moonlight and the power of the rising tide to lower the boats and hit the beach, and then attack the hinterland after the tide receded.

As we all know, in this era of low navigation level, sailing at night is very dangerous. It is very easy to run aground in a small boat hitting the beach in the middle of the night.

Not to mention Bridges, even the most famous naval generals in history would not dare to do this.

But Roland dared.

He was not reckless, but well prepared.

Five hundred small boats landed under the guidance of five hundred sirens to minimize the danger.

As long as the luck is not too bad, landing is not difficult.

The only danger is the moonlight.

These days are full moon nights, and the moonlight is bright, which makes the risk of landing being discovered much greater.

Although it is a bit risky to land under the moonlight, Roland can't wait.

It is very dangerous to stop for a long march.

No matter how good the reason is, stopping will seriously affect morale.

The soldiers didn't understand strategy, they just felt that something was wrong.

The Golden Kite Kingdom has the second largest navy in the world. Although its naval tradition is inferior to that of the Sussex Empire, it is not difficult to concentrate all its efforts to deal with the half-blooded Fourth Fleet.

Looking up at the sky without a trace of clouds, Roland slowly raised his right hand and issued a landing order.

As the governor, he can trust professionalism and delegate command to Bridges, but he must make major decisions himself.

This is not arbitrary, but taking responsibility on his own initiative.

Seeing Roland raise his right hand, Bridges, who had been looking forward to it for a long time, breathed a sigh of relief. After saluting the top deck, he returned to the combat command room and calmly distributed orders to each ship.

He smiled self-deprecatingly. The moonlight is so bright tonight. The only advantage is that he can directly command with flag signals, and the command system is very smooth.

As expected of the Queen's beloved lover, Governor Roland, he made a decision after a little consideration.

At this time, he must not hesitate.

All possible special situations were fully prepared before departure, and even targeted preparations were made to deal with demon octopuses, sirens, werewolves and even centaurs.

We came prepared, so what's there to worry about?

The small boats set out one by one, rowing towards the coastline against the waves.

Fortunately, with the guidance of the sirens, the small boats staggered up.

Many of the more than 500 small boats were even simple rafts. If there were no sirens to guide them, they would have suffered a lot of losses during the landing process.

The speed of the tide was very fast.

More than a dozen small boats were swept away by the falling tide before they reached the beach.

These unfortunate soldiers were swept away by the waves just as they were about to call for help after falling into the water, and turned into part of the waves.

Bridges raised his telescope and looked at the landing site with a cold expression.

For a night landing of tens of thousands of people, the loss of only a few hundred people was nothing at all.

Anyway, the people who landed were all Golden Kite people, so he didn't feel sorry at all.

The hatred accumulated by Sussex and Golden Kite over the years has made the relationship between the two sides bad from top to bottom. Bridges is a typical Great Sussexist, and his attitude towards Golden Kite is even less friendly.

He agrees very much with Governor Roland's arrangement. The only regret is that the Governor himself is also mixed in the landing team and accompanies Alina to go ashore.

Humph, Golden Kite's greenhouse flowers are really useless!

It is still our Queen of Sussex who is wise and brave, and can stand alone even without the Governor.

Bridges silently lowered Alina's evaluation from 70 points to 50 points.

He was somewhat disdainful of the leader of the Golden Kite Wanderers.

If it weren't for the help of Governor Roland and the tolerance of Her Majesty the Queen, her beautiful head would have been chopped off and sent to Xidai for public display.

Bridges looked relaxed and was about to put down the telescope when he suddenly realized that something was wrong.

No, it was too quiet!

Although this beach was not suitable for landing and was not a port, it was normal for no one to defend it late at night, but there couldn't be no birds or animals here.

The vanguard of the Golden Kite Wanderers landed on the beach and touched the edge of the jungle, but no nocturnal birds were awakened.

Something was wrong!

Bridges didn't have time to communicate with Roland, so he pulled out his signal gun and fired a yellow signal flare into the air to remind Roland to pay attention.

Without his reminder, Roland also found that something was wrong.

If something that was not expected to go smoothly suddenly becomes very smooth, it is probably not a good thing, but a trap.

Roland also pulled out the flare and fired three red flares deep into the jungle.

Bridges just felt something was wrong, and Roland directly judged that there was an ambush in the jungle.

Bridges blew the whistle and issued an emergency order.

The battleship closest to the coastline quickly adjusted the muzzle and began to fire.

The landed soldiers also withdrew from the jungle and quickly lined up outside the jungle.

The first row of soldiers quickly lay down, the second row of soldiers squatted on one leg and knelt on the ground, and the third row of soldiers leveled the muzzle and aimed at the dark jungle.

"Boom!"

The battleships, which had been prepared for fire suppression, began to fire.

A considerable part of the shells they fired were incendiary bombs.

This special shell has a miraculous effect on forests and grasslands.

Setting fire to the forest is extremely harmful, but the situation is serious this time, and Bridges can't care so much.

Anyway, this is not Sussex, so let it burn.

Although this jungle is dense, it is not connected to the southern forest and will not have serious consequences.

At most, this jungle will be burned clean.

Looking at the burning forest, Alina, who was directing the Wanderers to set up their formation, had a slightly changed expression, but she just sighed in her heart and didn't speak.

After receiving the order, Romio, who was about to go to the front line to command, became anxious. He hurriedly lowered his voice to protest to Alina, "Alina, this is our forest!"

Alina didn't speak, but used her eyes to warn him not to say anything.

Romio knew what Alina meant, clenched his fists, lowered his head, gritted his teeth and turned away.

Looking at Romio's back as he left, Alina was also a little helpless.

Romio was different from her. He was a standard Golden Kite supremacist and looked down on the Sussex people in his heart.

Accepting Roland's help made him grateful and full of pain.

Romio, Renault and Elaine understood politics and could take the overall situation into consideration. Even if they had emotions in their hearts, they could control them, but Romio's attitude also represented the true thoughts of many people.

They thanked Roland for taking them in, and were willing to express their gratitude with practical actions.

But they could not accept foreigners meddling in the internal affairs of the Golden Kite.

She had a headache. They had just landed and hadn't even seen an enemy, but it was already like this. She didn't dare to think about what would happen in the future.

Fortunately, she didn't have time to think about it. The screams, wolf howls and roars coming from the jungle proved that Roland's arrangement was completely correct.

The screams in the jungle exposed their identities.

There were human soldiers, centaurs, and werewolves.

Before she could think about why the enemy knew she was back and knew the landing site, Alina bit her lip and gave combat orders to her followers.

Roland stood beside her, not saying a word from beginning to end, with an extremely calm expression.

He held a scepter in his right hand and a consul's manual in his left hand. He didn't look like a soldier participating in the battle, but more like a young university lecturer.

After Alina issued several orders in succession, she turned and looked at Roland.

"Roland, I'm sorry, there may be a traitor in my team, I..."

"Don't blame yourself first, it may not be a traitor."

Roland comforted softly: "Such a large fleet traveled thousands of miles and was replenished in a neutral country on the way. Our actions are not a secret at all."

"What's more, the sea is not calm. The Grimm clan didn't take action, but it doesn't mean they will give up taking action against us. With General Haiao's character, he will definitely retaliate. He doesn't have to do it himself, just leak our route to the Golden Kite Kingdom."

Roland's words made Alina look a little better, but not much. She asked faintly:

"Did you know from the beginning that the landing would not go smoothly?"

"I don't know divination, how can I know this." Roland shrugged and spread his hands.

He didn't deny it directly, so it wasn't a lie.

He didn't know divination, but he and Christine had conducted countless deductions.

All the deductions showed that Alina's counterattack was like a moth flying into a flame, and she would destroy herself.

There is only one possibility for Alina to win, that is, Marco completely loses the support of the people.

When Marco offends everyone, these guys will miss Mr. Carlo, who has a moderate policy and is compatible with all factions.

If it is Carlo himself who lands in the south, it will probably succeed.

Although Alina is Carlo's daughter and can legitimately inherit the family title, her father's prestige and connections will not be inherited with blood.

Only if Marco goes to extremes, Alina will have a chance.

Is there hope?

Probably.

Even if there is only one percent of hope, you must put in 100 percent of effort.

Only the strong are qualified to be stable, while the weak can only stud, stud, and continue stud.

This is not a gamble, but the only scenario where the mathematical expectation is not zero.

Alina was choked by Roland's words.

She can deduce, but it's only about personal destiny, and it may not be accurate.

Deducing the fate of the country was too far for her.

Alina heard that the pinnacle of prophecy was the great prophecy that followed words, and Alina was a little yearned for it.

Her current divination deductions are similar to fortune telling and can only be used for reference.

Alina wanted to say something more, but was interrupted by Roland's reminder.

"The enemy is out."

As the jungle was ignited, the jungle warfare experts hidden in the jungle had to leave the dense forest that had become a flaming hell and charge towards the beach.

The wanderers, who were not occupying an advantageous position, raised their muskets and fired continuously.

Although it did not carry light artillery, the battleship's artillery support was powerful enough to blast these alien troops and human jungle troops to pieces.

After being blown away from their formation, the next battle was a one-sided massacre.

The fierce werewolf and the extremely fast centaur charge.

They didn't line up in a neat line and sprinted entirely on instinct.

They are very fast, so they get shot earlier than the human jungle troops.

This elite force of more than 3,000 people soon lost more than half, and the remaining more than 1,000 people quickly fled when they saw that something was not going well.

When the sun rose, a messy battlefield was filled with enemy corpses, and the beach was dyed red and purple with blood, showing the brutality of the battle last night.

The speed of the werewolves and centaur cavalry was too fast. Although the Rangers were well prepared, the defense line was still broken open several sections, causing heavy casualties.

Even with the overall superiority in numbers, firepower, and strategic deployment, there were still hundreds of casualties.

According to Roland's standards, this was not a victory, but a disastrous defeat.

Looking at the soldiers who were cleaning the battlefield, Alina breathed a sigh of relief and relaxed her brows.

"Roland, we won. The casualty ratio between the two sides was 623:1850. We achieved an exchange ratio of close to 1:3. This is the enemy's elite force. This is a great victory."

Roland smiled noncommittally.

He did not attack Alina directly, but he still couldn't help teasing: "We only have eleven thousand combatants. If you win this kind of victory a few more times, you should be on the guillotine."

Alina's smile froze on her face.

She understood what Roland meant. Marco could afford to fight this kind of war of attrition, but she couldn't afford it.

"What should we do?"

"Enter Port-If!" Roland looked to the northwest.

"Are you crazy? There are more than 30,000 regular troops there, and they are all elites. Before departure, you said that we would develop in the south, continuously expand our strength, and strive to echo the northern line. We will wait for changes in Xidai City before looking for opportunities to go north. Why risk it?”

Roland wanted to say that he had planned to take the risk from the beginning, and that the safe plan was just to reassure the wanderer, but he felt that saying so was a bit like using Alina as a bargaining chip, so he simply changed his explanation.

"At one moment, the situation changed. Marco could predict our landing location and mobilize the most suitable troops nearby to ambush us as quickly as possible. This man is not simple and will not give us a chance to develop. "

"We have to race against time. Port-If's army is great and it will be ours soon."

"Ah? What can you do?" Alina looked at Roland in surprise.

"It's very simple. When we march to Port-If, when the two armies confront each other, you go out alone, open your arms to them, and remember to say cool lines."

Roland thought for a while and said with a smile: "I believe that the wise Golden Kite people will not shoot at the daughter of the protector of the country. I will lead you to end the chaos."

Alina's eyes were filled with stars, but she quickly calmed down and questioned, "It's indeed a good idea. What if the enemy shoots?"

"Don't worry, I am the most loyal person. I promise to take your body away and not fall into the hands of the enemy."

After a moment of pause, Roland added: "If it's too late, I will also throw a bomb so that you will die without any body parts and will not be insulted by the enemy."

He dodged the iron glove thrown by Alina that was full of angry power, and smiled heartlessly.