The Invincible Overlord of Heroes

In the evening, Xu Lai received some good news and some bad news.

The good news is that the attacking ranger Kate, in cooperation with the teleporting archmage group, almost completely annihilated the orcs' flying corps with the roc as the main force.

Nearly 3,000 Dapeng, more than 500 Golden Eagles, and more than 300 Thunderbirds were annihilated. In the end, only more than 1,000 Dapeng merged with the main Thunderbird Legion and escaped.

There was a lot of bad news. The flying corps, which was divided into multiple groups, attacked from both ends of the defense line, defeating and annihilating more than a dozen defending corps.

This time, the flying corps was only a tentative attack, and they withdrew to the base camp in time when their physical strength was still half. Otherwise, the human race, which did not have enough air force, would probably have destroyed all the peripheral defense lines.

The empire's front line really doesn't have much advantage and can only rely on the three original towns. The middle one has been upgraded to a fortress, with only one city wall more than 5 meters high inside.

This height would be difficult for ordinary orcs to climb, but if the Cyclops were present, it would probably be about the same height as the city wall.

Another piece of bad news happened to be that the scouts discovered that a Cyclops had appeared in the orc base camp.

This thing is too tall. It's okay to have a small number, but it will be difficult to cover up if there are a large number.

The last bad news is that the stronghold's flying corps launched a large-scale attack, resulting in the death of more than a dozen knights and at least 5 heroes on the empire's side.

Their counterattacks were almost ineffective. Although they were equipped with crossbowmen, their levels were not high.

The 2nd and 3rd level crossbowmen, in front of the powerful thunderbirds and rocs, could barely shoot one or two rounds of arrows before they got close to them. After getting close to them, those knights who were temporarily promoted were fine, and most of them could still encourage them. Have the courage to fight to the death.

However, most of the heroes who also belonged to the legion chose to escape directly. Only a few ran slowly and were killed by the Thunderbird's thunderbolt lightning.

The most egregious thing is that these escaping heroes may be worried about being punished and simply run away without a trace.

In the vast prairie, if you want to find traces of these people, it may not be impossible to leave it to professional elite scouts, but neither Count Aini nor the temple can spare their efforts.

This also led to the fact that the aborigines had some trust in the heroes because of Xu Lai's heroic performance on the battlefield, but in the blink of an eye they lost it again.

Even Xu Lai encountered a lot of criticism and supercilious looks when attending the military meeting.

Of course, Xu Lai is not a good-tempered person, so forget about criticism. As long as it's not a quarrel with him, he doesn't bother to pay attention to it.

If anyone dares to roll his eyes at him, he will roll his eyes back at worst. Who is afraid of whom?

He wasn't afraid even if he really wanted to start a fight. Firstly, he didn't run away, and secondly, so what if he ran away. Count Ani had made it clear that he would throw these heroes over and use them as cannon fodder.

They are not real imperial people, so why do they still have to sacrifice their lives for this group of ridiculous nobles?

Seeing that the situation was about to turn into chaos, the leaders began to blame each other, and Archbishop Durr quickly stepped in to mediate.

A good military discussion, but in the end no useful strategy was discussed.

In the end, they only made temporary adjustments to the coalition's cavalry archers, and adjusted three cavalry archers capable of high-speed movement and support.

Ranger Kate firmly disagrees with the division of troops. He is willing to temporarily station his archers in the fortress. It is already very good. If he wants him to distribute the dragons to human generals, it is simply a fool's errand.

The archer troops are still stationed in two towns and one fort, and most of the resources of the human coalition are hoarded in these three places.

If this place is attacked by the enemy, even if only part of the supplies are burned, it will be a huge blow to the morale of the entire coalition forces.

Xu Lai was the commander of the Temple Knights, so he was not forced to separate, but they were still required to form a mobile unit.

Among them, Xu Lai and his escort team will definitely take action. The entire Temple Knights cannot find more powerful archers than Xu Lai's rangers and heroic Yan Feng.

Then Pierce personally conducted the selection and selected all the knights in the entire knight order, including all the knights who had minored in bow and arrow, even if they only brought a crossbow.

In this way, it is just a small cavalry archer group of about 300 people. Let alone the Thunderbirds unit that challenges the orcs, even the weakest Golden Eagle unit is not enough.

Fortunately, they were only supporting troops. Count Aini also did not want his precious knights to suffer serious damage, so he gave them the order to perform freely on the battlefield.

But even if you give free play, there are two bottom lines. One is to prevent the stronghold flying troops from going deep into the rear hinterland, especially on the supply routes of caravans and materials.

Once this area is cut off, the entire Stubborn Castle front will become completely isolated and helpless, and it will be impossible to escape the final outcome of defeat.

The second is to gather the fleeing troops in time to avoid causing a large number of meaningless casualties.

With such a tactical order, Xu Lai led more than 300 temple knights to set off. This time, there was no Pierce, which meant that these more than 300 temple knights were completely under the command of Xu Lai.

Although Xu Lai has an extra vitality holy bottle on his body, which is equivalent to adding 12 points of life to the entire army, and also adds advanced offensive skills and advanced leadership skills, the pressure on him is really not small.

Xu Lai did not dare to approach the large-scale flying troops at the stronghold. He only dared to harass some golden eagles and Dapeng who had dispersed to surround and annihilate the human troops on a small scale.

With Xu Lai's specialization and attribute blessing, the long-range firepower of more than 300 people is indeed powerful. Most of the small-scale troops can be wiped out before they get close, and the melee combat is no match for this group of paladins.

However, Xu Lai only accomplished one of the two tactical goals requested by Count Aini, which was that the stronghold flying corps did not dare to really go deep into the hinterland.

Flying is also an extremely physically demanding thing. Once you get deep inside, you will be surrounded by knights from the rear, and the entire flying corps will be buried in the grassland.

In order to be able to fly, some even have to carry people. Even the seventh-level Thunderbird cannot be equipped with armor.

Therefore, compared with their offensive capabilities, their defensive capabilities are down several levels, and are completely incomparable with knights who are good at frontal combat.

The visibility was not good at night, so both sides consciously returned to their camps to stop fighting.

Xu Lai's team had the most fruitful results. Except for one unlucky man who was hit by the thunderbolts of two thunderbirds in succession and died without even taking a drink of medicine, the rest of the army was completely intact.

However, after a whole day of fighting, more than 500 golden eagles died under their arrows, and more than 100 Dapeng and Thunderbirds combined.

The remaining two cavalry archers, one with 2,000 people, were all killed in the battle. Although the cavalry archers moved fast, the thunderbirds were not slow either.

Under strong pursuit, all the troops of more than 2,000 people were chased and killed.

Of course, they themselves also paid a heavy price. With the reinforcements of the Dragon Legion, this larger Thunderbird Corps also lost more than half before they could barely escape.

Although another cavalry archer unit also killed nearly a thousand flying soldiers, they themselves also lost most of them.

It was almost a one-to-one exchange with the flying troops in the stronghold. This was done even though the 5,000-man defensive corps was being attacked by the main attack.

When the battle losses were finally calculated, the number of confirmed stronghold units killed was only about 5,000. According to the proportion, there should only be more than 1,000 real orc masters and cultivated rocs.

The human race has lost a large number of militiamen, low-level soldiers, and horse archers in the past two days. Even if those recruited troops are removed, the damage is as high as tens of thousands.

Count Aini was disadvantaged because Xu Lai gathered the militia. Even if the average combat merit was the highest, he was only sentenced to a balance of merit and demerit.

It doesn't matter if Xu Lai comes, anyway, Count Aini is neither willing to give him an official position, nor can he be promoted to a noble title, so he has nothing to do with his merits and demerits.

On the contrary, what he thought was a strategic retreat was judged as a defeat. Even if the battle loss ratio was more than 600 to 1, Xu Lai still lost the morale bonus of winning every battle.

Fortunately, he now possesses advanced leadership skills, obtained a new battle flag, and is commanding all imperial troops.

The base is 60 points, plus 5 points for senior leadership, 1 point for all mankind, 3 points for all empire, 3 points for battle flags, 10 points for charging ahead, and 5 points for the first victory in decisive battles and stronghold combat bonuses, for a total of 87 points.

The overall morale can still be stably maintained at a high morale state, with a 5% attack and defense speed bonus.

There was silence in the conference room, and someone suggested disbanding the militia and basic troops and letting them hide in the rear towns.

Others suggested shrinking the military strength, but the three major towns were already filled with people, and if all these militiamen were shrunk into the towns, there would be no one to manage the land, and the entire army would starve to death within a month.

This was under the condition that the rear transportation channel had not been cut off, and a large amount of meat had just been seized from the orcs.

Of course, it is also difficult for the orcs, but they have been in the wilderness for a long time and have already adapted to the harsh environment.

The food production in the wilderness will be halved, so the lowest level big-eared monster in the stronghold camp can not only be used in battle, but also a mobile food reserve.

In addition, the grassland is rich in flora and fauna, and the products are much higher than those in the wild land. With continuous transportation from the rear, the food problem is completely tolerable.

In the end, after much discussion, no one had a good idea, and some even suggested giving up the grassland altogether and retreating to the heavy town area centered on Count Aini's castle.

Not to mention, this suggestion was approved by most nobles.

Archbishop Duer rejected this suggestion with a single word.

If you want to give up the entire grassland, then there is not much point in us staying here.

I might as well tell you that the Burning Legion is well prepared, and the two empires in the northwest are fighting fiercely. At this time, several large towns and castles behind you have been occupied by demons.

If nothing can be done, our temple can only withdraw, hoping to preserve as many core cities as possible for the empire and prevent the human race from being destroyed.

Count Aini was startled and said: Bishop Duer, do you mean to abandon us?

Duer shook his head and said: It's not that I want to abandon you, it's that you have abandoned yourself. Even the God of War will not blame his warriors for this.