175 – Fishing Operation (2)
As the Count spoke, my immediate superior, Baron Eclair, stood up and spoke.
“I agree with the Count’s opinion. However, since Soldeu Castle is Barcelo’s territory, I think it would be best to procure food locally as much as possible.”
Because he is a high-ranking person, he wrapped it up in fancy words about local procurement, but in the end, he meant plundering.
Still, since this was a war in which the emperor personally participated, he would not do the things that soldiers often do, such as massacres, rapes, burning villages, and destroying fields…
‘What difference does it make if you say bad things in a nice way?’
Count Dion also nodded at those words.
“It may be the territory of our empire, but if you enter the territory of an enemy country, the supplies provided by war merchants may be cut off, so it would be important to procure food locally. “Thank you for pointing it out.”
“It is an honor.”
“I will carefully write down your suggestion in the report I will write and submit.”
Having your name written down in the report was like saying that your achievements would be recognized by the emperor.
The barons, knights, and mercenary leaders who noticed this worked hard to express their opinions.
Most of the opinions were at the level of mentioning only very basic things and moving on, so the Count said, ‘That’s natural.’ And moved on.
Among them, there were often very helpful opinions.
“Aren’t you going to build siege weapons when you siege Soldeu Castle and other castles? Then we will have to hire some of the artisans from nearby cities.”
“We, the Count of Dion, already have enough craftsmen, right?”
“If we hire more craftsmen to make at least one more catapult, we can reduce the sacrifice of our troops. In addition, the time it takes to capture a castle will be reduced accordingly.”
In a siege, even if a single small catapult is operated well, it can handle the work of 10 to 20 ordinary soldiers.
If you fire a catapult once, you can definitely blow up the enemy’s pottery to some extent, and there is almost no chance of it being destroyed by the enemy.
So, in order to increase the number of siege weapons, such as catapults, it is a very wise plan to hire more craftsmen to make them.
Moving in the game plan laid out by the enemy is a bad idea in terms of top, middle, and bottom.
“Martin Mayer, the mercenary leader of the Whitebeard Mercenaries, has something I would like to suggest.”
Everyone’s eyes were focused on me at those words.
“What is it?”
“Rather than moving forward while capturing Soldeu Castle and other castles one by one, I think it would be better to move forward in a straight line to Lamasana Castle and catch the enemies.”
No matter how freely the Count was allowed to speak at the operation meeting, what I am saying now directly contradicts his proposal.
And the Count, who has lived in a world of great aristocrats where those who are not assertive cannot survive, would not be willing to make such a rebuttal even if he were in a ‘strategy meeting’.
‘Now is the time for someone to come forward and refute my claim.’
Instead of directly refuting, Count Dion signaled with a glance to one of his barons.
After receiving the signal, the Baron sighed and said.
“Martin Mayer, your argument is too idealistic.”
“Is that so?”
“If our Count Dion army just passes through the enemy’s castle without occupying it, it will be quick and convenient as we can just advance to La Massana Castle without having to engage in a siege at first. But unless the heads of the castle lords of the Barcelo Kingdom who protect the castle go blank…”
The Baron pointed the road to Lamasana Castle and scolded him.
“They will try to cut off our troops’ supply route first. Then we have no choice but to be isolated!”
This is a well-expected rebuttal.
Common sense tells us that when occupying enemy territory, at the risk of wasting time and troops, the reason is that we carefully occupy each and every small fortress.
As the baron said, if you ignore at least one fortress and advance, a disaster will occur where your supply route will be cut off by the enemy who ignored you.
“I know. Obviously the enemy will try to isolate us. “It’s just that.”
After intentionally interrupting the conversation, I looked into Count Dion’s eyes.
“If we procure food locally, even if we ignore all the forts and advance, there will be no problem of running out of food as long as we don’t do something crazy like immediately surrounding Lamasana Castle.”
If it were a world where magic did not exist, you would have had to pay attention to food and water while marching.
In this world, the water that any mercenary unit drinks is made by a wizard, so there is no need to worry about that.
The count listened to me because I said that we would not run out of food and that we would not make the worst move of immediately sieging the castle.
“Interesting. “Then what specifically do you plan to do?”
“March our troops from their current location to the Seville River, about a week away from Castle Lamasana. Then, we will withdraw our troops from there and intercept the enemy forces that may be chasing us.”
“Why are we so sure that the enemy will come after us?”
“I will explain in detail and clearly.”
With a confident smile, I began to point out and explain each thing one by one.
“First of all, this battle is a war where the authority and status of the Montmartre Empire and the Kingdom of Barcelo are at stake. That is why His Majesty is personally fighting this war.”
When persuading someone, they say that briefly pointing out facts that everyone knows has the effect of making your argument seem more convincing, right?
“In this battle, our Montmartre Imperial Army was victorious, and with their defeat, King Barceló’s status has already fallen to the ground. Therefore, the king will be pecking at the nobles and anxious to give them victory at any cost. Therefore, the nobles must be longing for ‘a level of victory that can turn the war around’ in order to survive.”
In Korea, even if the nation’s status falls a little, there may be times when it is overlooked, but for the kings of this fantasy world, their status is directly linked to the survival of the nation.
Not to exaggerate, but once you are labeled as a weakling in school, you cannot escape being bullied until you graduate, even if you transfer to middle school or high school and make a fuss.
The moment a country is branded as weak, it makes unfair treaties with neighboring countries, takes money and pretends not to know, sends ‘friends’ who are regular soldiers but pretend to be pirates or bandits to earn foreign currency, etc…
In addition, they are thoroughly crushed by methods such as constantly waging war on those around them.
“But what happens if we go in a straight line to La Masana Castle? To them, it would seem that we are in desperate danger as we have to wage a siege and our food supply lines have been cut off. So, if I were the lord of Lamasana Castle or the general on the way…”
Count Dion responded to the next words.
“Those guarding the fortresses and castles along the way will have no choice but to bring all the troops they can and come down to Lamasana Castle. “To attack us while we are isolated.”
What if a considerable number of troops stationed at Lamasana Castle attack from the front, and the troops stationed on the road to Lamasana Castle push in from the back…?
“If we surround Castle Lamasana, Count Dion’s army will be annihilated that way. Of course, we will retreat a week before we arrive at Lamasana and intercept those who come after us in a hurry. “The expectations of the Barcelo guys will end up being nothing more than a dream.”
A smile was suddenly drawn on the count’s face.
“It’s a good enough strategy. I feel like I want to adopt your strategy immediately. But before that, let me ask you one question. “What do you think would have happened if we had gone in the direction of capturing the castles one by one, as I suggested?”
To be honest, I wanted to say this.
‘King Barcelo must have gathered all his troops from the rear and tried to attack us, targeting us who were tired and had spent a lot of time taking over several castles. Then we would have ended up with just a few castles.’
However, just as telling an ugly person honestly that they are ugly only leads to a fight, if you honestly say that the count’s strategy is inferior to mine, it will be the end.
Besides, there are a lot of the Count’s vassals here, so we have to save the Count’s face at all costs.
So, I calmly answered with a bit of a lie.
“It would have taken a little more time. But it would have been successful.”
The count heard my answer and laughed.
“Actually, His Majesty our Emperor has a very impatient personality. I can’t help this. Let me adopt your strategy. “Three days later, we begin our march to the Seville River, procuring food locally.”
And three days later we began to march up to the Seville River, according to the strategy proposed by me and adopted by the Count of Dion.
‘Either take it or die.’