Chapter 390

"Master, cough... I, I know a place with a lot of food, grass, weapons and equipment, enough for you to use for a while. As long as you let my family go, I will take you there."

The tauren laughed loudly when he heard Count Kars's words.

Then, he slapped Count Carls to the ground again.

The people in the room saw Count Carls through the broken door, and they all shouted and wanted to come out, but Count Carls just stopped them.

Then he stood up again.

"I know I have no room for negotiation, but if you kill me, you won't get anything except these women... No, isn't it?"

His body was shaking because of fear, and his words were intermittent, but they gave people a firm emotion in them.

"Ha." Hearing this, the tauren snorted coldly, and then ordered the soldiers who broke the door to stop.

"Okay, but let me say it first, if you lie to me, not only you, but your wife, children, and children, your whole family, and all the residents of the city you rule will suffer because of you!"

"I swear, I won't lie to you. If I lie to you, I will separate my body." Count Carls said this and made a gesture to the sky.

"Okay, then you can lead the way." The tauren pointed at a guard at the door of the Earl's mansion. "You take them with you, and if they report that I have nothing when you come back, just wait for death."

"I understand, of course I don't dare to lie to you."

…

On the other side, the students of Imperial College were approaching Karls City.

After the news of the fall of Karls City reached Orson, he immediately dispatched a force to rescue. The Imperial Academy also believed that Karls City, as the capital of the earldom, had great strategic significance and set its target there. .

Olivia and Elsa led students from two classes, warrior and mage respectively. At this moment, when they led the students to Kars City, they were shocked by the scene in front of them.

The city of Kars has been plunged into a sea of ​​flames. At the gate of the city, dozens of corpses were hung in mid-air tied to an iron chain. The corpses were rolled into a ball, which looked shocking.

Although the students had already been on the battlefield, most of them couldn't help but vomit after seeing this cruel scene.

The orcs here have withdrawn.

They learned in advance that the human army was coming, so they burned the place to the ground, leaving nothing behind for humans.

The leaders, Olivia and Elsa, looked at each other and walked into the city.

In the city, at least one body is hanging at the door of every house.

The corpses died in extremely tragic ways, and many of them were tortured.

"Here... it's just..." Olivia walked on the street, looking around constantly, her brows furrowed.

"Hell on earth..." Elsa's body trembled slightly as she suppressed the emotions that were about to explode.

As a royal family, everyone here was once a citizen of the empire and a people under their own rule.

But at this moment, as the ruling class, I am unable to protect these people...

This made Elsa very uncomfortable.

For the first time, she felt so powerless.

After walking through the city square, the two came to the Earl's Mansion in the center of the city. At this moment, the once magnificent Earl's Mansion had turned into ruins. In the Earl's Mansion, there was a person hanging outside every window, and at the door There were more than a dozen corpses lined up in a row, as if to welcome the arrival of the two people.

Looking at this disgusting and absurd scene, the two of them felt for the first time what it was like to be blinded by hatred.

Chapter 13: Aftermath and Liquidation (6K)

Count Karls still failed.

Although he told the orcs about the warehouse where supplies were stored outside the city, and successfully allowed the orcs to get the supplies they wanted, when he followed the orcs back, he saw his family members who had been tortured by the orcs to the point of committing suicide due to the humiliation. All that was left was the anger after being betrayed.

He angrily rushed towards the tauren leading the team, trying to find an explanation, but before he could take a few steps, he was beaten to the ground by the orcs.

"Do you want to know why?" the tauren said, looking at Count Carls.

"Because, we noble orcs, there is no need to conclude a so-called agreement with a lowly human like you." As he said this, the tauren laughed. "A lowly person like you is not even worthy of carrying my shoes. How dare you make demands on me?!"

Count Kars's eyes were splitting. He didn't know the power that burst out from there. He broke away from the restraints of several orcs, rushed in front of the tauren, took out the dagger in his arms, and stabbed the tauren.

The tauren didn't react for a while. Although he made a dodge gesture, he was still blinded in one eye.

He roared angrily and knocked Count Karls away, then took out his giant ax and turned him into a puddle of sauce.

He could not understand why a weak human being, after seeing his own methods and power, did not choose to surrender to him, but chose to retaliate against himself, so he ordered that all beasts

He took action and let everyone in this city be buried with his blind eye.

After that, the city of Karls became a living hell.

…

Not long after the massacre, the minotaur who was about to continue the march received a letter from the rear, asking him to retreat with his troops. Although he didn't know why, considering that his troops had achieved such great results, the minotaur didn't think much about it, so he led his troops and slowly retreated with supplies.

Because they were carrying a lot of spoils, the army retreated very slowly, so that it didn't take long for them to be caught up by the human pursuers.

In addition to the student army of the Imperial Academy, the black army also came on orders to pursue them.

Although the relationship between the Duke of Antica and the Earl of Kars was not good, the people here were innocent. Anyone who saw the tragic situation in Kars would not show mercy to the orc army.

The orc army was still wondering why the humans who were defeated on the front battlefield dared to counterattack. Facing the pursuers, they did not panic, but formed a normal battle formation and waited for the enemy's charge.

The minotaur, the leader of this group of orcs, stood at the front of the team.

Then, at the moment when the two armies came into contact, the minotaur was killed by the black army soldiers.

His body fell to the ground, and under the trampling of the soldiers, it turned into a pool of beef sauce like Count Karls.

In this battle, the students of the Imperial Academy worked particularly hard. They were full of anger towards this orc army and used fighting to vent their emotions.

Olivia, who was usually very calm, also killed in this battle. She went in and out of the orc army, and at least hundreds of orcs died at her hands.

This group of orcs was stunned by this fierce offensive. They didn't think about why this human army was full of hatred for them, why their previous march was obviously very smooth, and in their view, all humans were soft eggs that collapsed at the touch of a button, why are they now slaughtering themselves like livestock.

Yes, this is no longer a battle. This is completely a one-sided slaughter of this orc army by humans.

Some orcs who reacted tried to escape, but the humans behind them chased them faster than they ran.

The desire of humans to kill them was stronger than their desire to survive.

In the end, none of the troops survived and all died at the hands of the chasing troops.

But it was quite regrettable that during this chase, because the students of the Imperial College were also overwhelmed by anger, they only cared about venting their emotions during the battle, and did not analyze the situation rationally. Several students were seriously injured. Fortunately, the teacher in charge of the assessment found them in time and saved them, otherwise they would probably become the first batch of student soldiers to die in this war.

"So, Your Highness, you know why I said before that it is quite difficult to want peace."

Orson also heard about the tragic situation in Karls City in the rear. He brought the disaster assessment team and the aftermath team to the Earldom of Karls overnight.

When he arrived, no one in Karls City had dealt with the aftermath.

"Well." Lilia looked at the scene at the city gate with a pale face.

Anyone who sees this kind of tragedy will hate the perpetrators.

"We are not qualified to forgive on their behalf. Similarly, if the orcs' families have lost their loved ones because of us, we will not ask them to forgive us." Orson said this and walked into the city alone.

He just frowned from beginning to end and did not show any symptoms of discomfort.

Behind him, the team responsible for the aftermath had begun to untie the hanging bodies and prepare to transport them together to build a cemetery for the people of Karls City.

Arriving at the mansion of Count Karls, Orson sighed.

"Why bother? You picked up sesame seeds and lost watermelons, and you made your people pay for your crimes. You are a short-sighted frog in the well." He said this, complaining about Count Karls's short-sightedness, and at the same time, it seemed that he was complaining about himself, why he could not discover these situations earlier.

When Orson came here with the aftermath team, he met several soldiers who ran away on the road.

From them, Orson learned the reason.

They were not so-called border garrisons at all, but a group of peasants who were temporarily gathered together. Before joining the army, they didn't even know each other.

However, Earl Kars asked them to insist that they were regular soldiers with military training, and they would not cowardly retreat even when facing orcs.

Isn't this just bullying honest people?

As a result, Orson learned about the large number of border earls who were eating empty salaries.

In this regard, Orson could only express helplessness.

If you were an earl in the interior, without military pressure, you would just eat a little empty salary, after all, the war was unlikely to hit you.

But you are an earl in the border, and the Duke allocates a large amount of financial funds to the border every year to help you relieve the financial pressure and to form a border defense army.

As a result, not only did they not form an army, but they also embezzled it.

As a result, when the war came, not only the civilians were affected, but also themselves.

There is really no foresight at all.

The empire is just a group of people who are carnivores. No wonder there are always people saying that the empire is going to end.

According to this situation, if it continues to develop in this way, with the slightest external pressure or internal chaos, the empire will indeed be doomed.

It can only be said that the orcs are still too weak, and their size cannot even reach one-tenth of the empire. However, the orcs are only one-quarter of the empire's size. The current group of people has no ability and attitude. They are all arrogant good-for-nothing lords, and the empire must come to an end.

In the final analysis, it was because of the empire's previous policy that no nobles were allowed to annex each other, so the small nobles no longer had a sense of crisis, and naturally they began to fail.

After all, no matter how badly he behaves, he still has the support of the royal family.

This empire really needs a large-scale reform.

"Oh." Orson thought and sighed.

It was obvious that he only wanted to cultivate Li Teuk well and then started to fail, but now he is becoming more and more aware of the weight of the responsibilities on his shoulders.

Although he can't see some things, it doesn't mean that he can let them go without any worries.

"This city should be used as an immigration city after the war. Residents of nearby villages and towns that were not seriously affected by the disaster can be relocated to the city. People who cannot survive in the western part of the empire can also come here. The barren land is waiting for them. their development.”

Orson said this and started discussing with the officials behind him who were responsible for the aftermath.

"By the way, in your opinion, what should be the better positioning of this city in the future?"

"Should it continue to be the central city of the Count of Karls, or should it be a satellite city of nearby large cities that were not affected by the disaster?"

Lilia was a little confused when she saw that the two people on the side were already discussing post-war issues.

"Are you already thinking about what happens after the war? Shouldn't the top priority be to dispose of the bodies of the deceased?"

Although rationally speaking, people cannot be resurrected after death, but what Orson showed was a bit too unhuman.

Not only was there no trace of sadness on his face, but even his actual actions seemed like he was discussing the division of spoils after the war.

"But when I first came in, I already asked someone to take care of the aftermath." When Orson heard this, he showed a strange expression. "I know that the people here have a very hard life. They have paid taxes to the lord all their lives, but they still have to be defrauded by the lord until they die."

"You should also have heard what we talked about before. This incident was completely a man-made disaster. It was a tragedy created by Earl Carls and those Earls who ate empty wages."

"After a person dies, he is lucky enough to have someone who can collect his body."

Saying this, Orson sighed again.

"Lord Saint, I know that you may not have experienced this kind of tragedy, but don't forget that there were many people like me who were born in such a hell on earth. We must have lived until now. I will never forget what happened back then.”

"We still have to look forward. This city will still be inhabited by people in the future, and maybe it will become a big city. We do this to help the city recover quickly, and for the sake of future generations."

"Okay..." Lilia nodded after hearing this.

Orson has already thought of a plan to deal with this matter. He is going to write a letter to Lucius tomorrow to find out all the earls who are free of charge.

The annual financial appropriations given by the duke to the earls of the border will all be abolished and replaced by permanent garrisons.

If the border between humans and orcs still exists in the future, the Duke will set up a border garrison directly under the Duke to directly station in the territory of the border count.

At least it is much better to have the army in your own hands than to let others eat empty wages and cause the people to suffer.

As for those soldiers who escaped, although their behavior is understandable, they will also be judged.

No matter what era, the behavior of running away from battle will not be encouraged.

…

Another half month passed. During this half month, humans attacked everywhere, expelling all the orc armies from human territory, and drove the orcs back to the depths of the desert.

Today, a celebration banquet will be held in the border city of Phoenix.

From the time Orson took over as the frontline commander to now, in more than a month, the attack from the orcs has been neutralized, which is much stronger than Lucius's back then.