Lord Harland.

In the northern region of Stanik, there are more than a hundred barons and seven viscounts. The aristocratic coalition composed of them has a total of 40,000 troops. Because it has been facing the invasion of orcs all year round, its combat effectiveness is also very impressive. Unlike the Grant Kingdom, there were no counts or marquises in Stanik, only the royal family and the southern dukes. A few big nobles monopolized the channels for advancement and suppressed all families that could threaten their status.

Although the small and medium nobles combined are very powerful, they are very scattered.

The main army on the northern front, commanded by Duke Jonathan, also had difficulty getting supplies. After entering the Grand Duchy of Stanik, they also fell into a predicament of food shortages. In order to avoid forcing the noble coalition forces to the side of the Linus family, the northern front troops did not dare to loot at all.

Judging from this problem, the situation of the Northern Route Army is even more difficult.

The provinces directly under the Stanik royal family carried out the order of strengthening the walls and clearing the country very well. Although Duke Jonathan conquered some castles, the food he grabbed could only last for a month.

Among the three armies, the southern front is in the best condition and can be supplied through the Duchy of York. The Duke of York is relatively wealthy and has accumulated a large amount of grain. It also has enough manpower, livestock, and carriages in the territory to transport grain and grass to the front line.

The main opponent of the Central Route Army commanded by Li Cha is the coalition of nobles in central Stanik.

There are sixteen barons and three viscounts among the border nobles in central Stanik.

More than a hundred years ago, the Jonathan family took refuge in the Grant Kingdom. In order to prevent interference from the Grant Kingdom, the Linus family assigned branch members to the central border area to serve as the first line of defense.

These border nobles, with the blood of the Linus family flowing in their veins, resisted even more resolutely when facing foreign enemies.

What's more, Li Cha brought the coalition forces of the three provinces to invade, and because of the lack of food, he had to snatch it from them. This contradiction was almost impossible to resolve.

After Li Cha led his troops into the Grand Duchy of Stanik, he directly led his troops to surround Bursen Castle, which was three kilometers away from the border.

Bolsen Castle is built on a mountain, with a river nearby, on the official road.The location of this castle is dangerous. If it cannot be removed, the grain road is in danger of being cut off at any time.

Through early investigation, Li Cha found that the castle had already concentrated a lot of troops, and the defenders were close to .

After besieging Bolsen Castle, Richard did not rush to attack the city, but ordered the scouting cavalry to attack the nearby villages, capture the serfs, search for food and fodder, command the soldiers to cut down trees with the camp craftsmen, and make counterweight trebuchets and other siege equipment .

Despite the lack of food, Li Cha still waited for three days in Bursen Castle.

Within three days, Morgan led a reconnaissance team, broke through more than a dozen villages, grabbed a batch of food, and captured more than serfs.

The six nearby baronies were all plundered by Morgan.

Seeing Morgan returning with a full load, Li Cha stood in front of the camp gate and asked, "How is it? How much food did you find today?"

"Today we divided our forces and captured four villages, and we collected more than 300 tons of grain. Counting the day before yesterday, the total of the grain grabbed yesterday was only 1,500 tons, which is enough for us to eat for a month at most."

After hearing this, Li Cha nodded, thinking secretly.

Now that nearly serfs have been captured, Li Cha can't ignore them.

Although the serfs ate less and consumed only one-third of the food consumed by soldiers every day, the total number of 20,000 people consumed ten tons of food a day.

If you want to send these 20,000 people back to Harland territory, it will take you one month to forty days.

Counting the consumption of livestock along the way, tons of grain would need to be left behind, and only nearly tons of military rations could be left for the soldiers.

One thousand tons of food can only sustain the battle for twenty days.

In the army, not only the soldiers are big-bellied men, who consume three kilograms of food every day, but the war horses and beasts of burden that accompany the army also consume a lot of food every day. Together, they consume slightly more food than the soldiers.

On average, an army of 10,000 people consumes a little more than 30 tons of food every day. The coalition army of three provinces has 16,000 people, and the monthly supply of military food is 1,600 tons.

Richard and Morgan returned to the tent together. He spread out the map, thought for a moment and asked: "We captured a large number of serfs, robbed food, and burned down the houses. Have the enemy's reinforcements appeared?"

Morgan pointed to the map and said: "The reinforcements didn't show up. We also discovered a situation. The enemy was carrying out the order to fortify the walls and clear the fields. Maple Leaf Village actually filled the wells, burned the grain, and moved the serfs to the rear. When we arrived , is already in ruins."

The situation reported by Morgan confirmed what Richard had in mind.

Richard stationed troops under Bursen Castle, originally wanting to encircle the area for reinforcements. As a result, the enemy commander saw through his plan and discovered the weakness of the three-province coalition army's lack of food. Instead of sending reinforcements, he began to fortify the wall and clear the country.

The strong wall cleared the field and hit the weakness of the coalition forces of the three provinces, making Li Cha a little passive all of a sudden.

The situation has developed to this point, and Richard can only open up the situation by conquering Burson Castle at the cost of casualties.

If you want to conquer the castle, you must use the alchemy bomb.

However, in front of the Allied Forces of the Three Provinces, a large number of alchemy bombs were used, and it was difficult to hide the formula of the alchemy bombs in the territory of Harland.

Compared to explosive arrows, Harland Territory alchemy bombs are average in power.

However, the biggest advantage of the alchemical bombs made in Harland's territory is that they are cheap and can be used by soldiers in large quantities.

In the face of several orc invasions, alchemy bombs were almost the most powerful weapon in the hands of the soldiers in Harland territory.

For so many years, most of Harland's territorial troops have fought independently. When fighting with the nobles of Heihe County, they rarely threw alchemy bombs, at most dozens of them.

Dozens of alchemy bombs can be explained to the Grant royal family.

After all, the Elemental Heart openly sells alchemical bombs, and almost all the great nobles of the Grant Kingdom have some in reserve.

Moreover, the nobles of Heihe County and Luomen County were very close to Harland's territory, and they did not dare to inform Nolan easily.

In recent years, the nobles of the two counties have benefited from the rise of the Harland territory, blocking the orc army, and the external situation has become safer.

As a qualified noble, the first requirement is not to provoke powerful enemies, and the second requirement is not to have too much curiosity. Exploring the secrets of Harland's territory is undoubtedly asking for trouble for the nobles of Heihe County and Luomen County.

However, some of the nobles in the three northern provinces are very far away from the Haaland territory and will not face the threat of the Haaland territory. Some people still have blood from the royal family. If they find any doubts, they may have to report to the royal family and the Duke of Jonathan.

Richard analyzed the situation carefully and slowly deduced it in his mind. After weighing the pros and cons, we finally decided to use the alchemy bomb.

Although the strength of the Harland family has developed rapidly, it is far inferior to the Grant royal family and the Jonathan family in a short period of time. The territory is facing the invasion of orcs, and the Grant royal family and the Jonathan family need to play an important role in order to deal with the orc threat.

If this intervention wins, the Jonathan family will definitely focus on Stanik.Without the support of the two legions of the Jonathan family, the situation in the north will become even worse.

Using alchemy bombs to strengthen the strength of the Jonathan family and the Grant royal family can maintain the balance in the northern region and give the Harland family room for development.

Moreover, the value of the alchemy bomb is almost inestimable, and it can increase the combat effectiveness of the army by five or six levels at a relatively small cost.The Harland family can use alchemy bombs to exchange various precious resources with the nobles.

Even after exchanging the alchemy bombs, the Harland family's equipment advantage will become smaller in future battles with the Grant family and the Jonathan family.But under the current situation, it is more cost-effective to do this kind of exchange for Harland's territory.

After making up his mind, Richard mobilized 200 soldiers, appointed a deputy squadron commander in the Harland territory as the commander, and escorted the captive population back to the Harland Earldom with 500 tons of grain.

Then he ordered the craftsmen to build a counterweight trebuchet and erect it in front of the camp.

It has been ten years since the heavy trebuchet was invented in Harland Territory, and it has been seven years since it spread to the orc army.

Starting four years ago, the orcs used heavy trebuchets in the Grand Duchy of Stanik, conquering seven baronies in one fell swoop and pushing the border southward for more than thirty kilometers.

The principle of the counterweight trebuchet is very simple, as long as it appears behind the battlefield, it is not difficult to imitate it.In the battle of the orc invasion last year, the army of the Grand Duchy of Stanik successfully imitated the counterweight trebuchet, which unexpectedly dealt heavy damage to the orc army.

So after discovering that the counterweight trebuchet was erected in the camp of the Allied Forces of the Three Provinces, the defenders of Bursen Castle suddenly changed their expressions.

Countries on the Dawn Plane have almost no military exchanges.

The counterweight trebuchet used by the Stanik frontier nobles as a secret weapon appeared in the opponent's army stronghold, which caused a great shock to the enemy.

After assembling the counterweight trebuchet, Richard began pre-war mobilization.

"The Jonathan family is the master of Stanik. We entered Stanik this time not for invasion, but to help the Jonathan family drive away the traitors and restore their past glory.

We have dispatched 100,000 troops for this battle, and we are absolutely sure that we have a 100% chance of victory.

After conquering Bolsen Castle, we will, as victors, obtain everything in this castle, including food, women, and money.

Let us cheer, victory will be ours! "

After simple mobilization, Richard found that the mobilization effect was very average.

The soldiers had numb expressions on their faces, and their morale looked rather low.

Morale is a very volatile emotion.

The morale of an army may be relatively high in the morning, and it can fight bloody battles with powerful enemies.

At night, it may become very low due to the large number of casualties. A few cries caused the battalion to roar, and they mutinied and collapsed without encountering the enemy.

An excellent army can rely on organizational skills and can maintain the morale of an army to the average level for a long time.

The organizational ability of the army is actually the key to combat effectiveness.

To keep the organizational capabilities of an army alive, it needs fair rewards and punishments, logistical support, qualified grassroots officers, experienced veteran backbones, and military discipline that conforms to everyone's simple values ​​to maintain order.

Generally speaking, when guarding their hometown and relatives, the morale of soldiers is often very high, and there is no need to mobilize much.

However, if you want to keep the morale of the army high and dare to fight during the expedition, you can usually only rely on looting.

Even the army in the territory of Harland had very good logistical support, but after entering the Grand Duchy of Stanik, their morale was relatively low.

If you want them to fight bravely, you can only promise to let them rob, kill, and rape after the city is broken, releasing the evil side of human nature.

Although Richard also knew that once this hole was opened, it would be difficult for military discipline to be so strict in the future.

But if the requirements of the soldiers are not met, the officers and soldiers will not fight bravely at all.No matter how well he said it, Li Cha knew in his heart that there was no difference between the intervening army and the invading army.

An army that invades other countries can only rely on killing and looting to maintain morale.

There are a large number of magicians in the Harland territorial army. They are proficient in advanced mathematics. Before the trebuchet was built, they had already calculated the trajectory in advance and erected the trebuchet about 270 meters away.

Following Li Cha's order, the counterweight trebuchets threw alchemy bombs and kerosene bombs one after another.

Oil bombs are war materials provided by the Jonathan family. When he was in Wrightburg, Richard applied for some from Duke Jonathan.

Oil was discovered in the Duchy of Jonathan, which can make petrol bombs.

The kerosene bomb contains petroleum, asphalt, rosin, and resin, which are sealed in an earthen jar according to different proportions.

When launching, the earthen jar was ignited in advance, and as the earthen jar shattered at the top of the city, the flames of the kerosene bombs also splattered everywhere.

This kind of flame can burn for a long time, and it is difficult to extinguish it unless it is covered with earth.

Alchemy bombs and kerosene bombs exploded on the top of Bursen City. In a blink of an eye, a raging fire ignited on the top of the city, and puffs of gunpowder smoke rose.

Rows of soldiers walked out of the camp and slowly approached Burson Castle.

Bursen Castle is built on the mountainside, with the northwest leaning against the mountain. If you want to attack the city, you can only attack it from the east or south.

The east side is considered the front, and the terrain is slightly better, and a formation of several hundred people can be deployed frontally. The terrain in the south is difficult, and the city wall is built on a cliff more than 20 meters high, and simple wooden ladders cannot be climbed up at all. Only a small number of troops are needed to hold the line of defense.

Because the defenders had a geographical advantage, the coalition forces from the three provinces could not take full advantage of their strength. Even though the defenders at the top of the city were unprepared and were killed a lot by kerosene bombs and alchemy bombs, the siege still did not go smoothly.

The first echelon of the Gascoigne Province held shields and pushed ladder trucks and had just approached the city wall. A large number of rolling stones and wood were suddenly thrown down from the top of the city. In an instant, the first echelon of the Gascoigne Province suffered hundreds of casualties. They could not hold on and retreated. The damage they caused to the enemy was almost minimal.

With this kind of exchange ratio, even if it is completely destroyed, it will still not be able to take down Burson Castle.

Li Cha is already the commander of the army, and the army in the territory of Harland is also the backbone of the three-provincial coalition forces. Of course, they don't need to be cannon fodder to rush to the front line of the siege battle.

It was the Gascoigne Provincial Allied Forces that attacked the city on the first day. This army was the weakest of the three-provincial allied forces.

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