Chương 302: 302： The Lord's Vanguard, No One Takes a Step Back

Felix took a deep, steadying breath. He understood instantly: this was a monumental test of loyalty from his Lord. Drawing the longsword at his waist, he pressed the flat of the blade firmly against his breastplate and declared in a resonant voice:"My sword shall be the unyielding military law of Greywater Village! Even if it were my own blood brother daring to sow cowardice or shatter morale, I will strike him down where he stands!"

"Excellent." Soren gave a curt nod. In one smooth motion, he drew his own refined steel longsword, the tip slamming down onto the tactical map, pointing directly at the gentle slope guarding the village's main entrance.

"The first line of defense—the frontal slope that will undoubtedly suffer catastrophic casualties and bear the absolute brunt of the Centaurs' hyper-violent charge. I will hold that line personally!" Soren stated this with absolute calm, yet the words sent shockwaves through the hearts of everyone present. The supreme commander, personally anchoring the frontline meat grinder?

"My Lord, you cannot!" Talon and Ein, gripped by shock and sudden fear, stepped forward simultaneously to stop him.

"You are the absolute core of our entire army! How can you stand in the deadliest zone?!"

"Where my sword points, the war banner of Greywater Village follows!" Soren decisively shut down all their protests, his voice radiating cold, rational authority.

"I will personally lead the hundred Black-Steel Elites—the ones who have ingested the Troll Serum and are clad in [Dark Silver Armor]! We will hold the line directly behind the poison-spike trapdoor trenches Gary has dug!" Soren was coldly running the tactical simulations in his head. The Centaur charge would be apocalyptic. The moment the trap trenches were filled with the corpses of their vanguard, that massive, unspent kinetic shockwave would smash directly into their defensive line.

His hundred heavily armored elites, possessing monstrous strength and wielding heavy weaponry, would be the ultimate, unbreakable bulwark! He intended to use heavy greatswords and halberds to physically, brutally snap the momentum of the Centaur charge! A cowardly commander breeds a routing army. But if the supreme commander stood squarely in the very first rank, bathed in blood and standing atop a mountain of corpses, the regular army behind him would have absolutely no excuse to take a single step backward!

Without missing a beat, Soren swept his blade across the map, pointing to both flanks of the slope.

"Darion! Talon!"

"Here, My Lord!" The two fierce generals roared in response, their armor clanking heavily as they snapped to attention.

"Darion, you will command the left wing of the Macedonian Phalanx! Talon, you take the right! Form up in tight, impenetrable shield-wall formations."

"Until the enemy actually crashes into your lines, no one is allowed to lower their pikes! First, you will use your repeating heavy crossbows to establish absolute overlapping fire suppression!"

"I want those thousand heavy crossbows to pour a concentrated storm of steel directly into the Centaur ranks! Wait until their heavy armor is shredded and their charging formation is completely shattered by the bolt volleys. Only then will you lock your pike formations and advance for the slaughter!"

"If anyone dares to break formation and charge early relying on brute strength, they will face the ultimate military punishment!"

"As long as a single man in the Phalanx still draws breath, no enemy will ever breach our flanks!" Talon snarled, the scars on his rugged face twitching with murderous intent.

"Luger!" Soren turned his piercing gaze to the Hobgoblin Arsenal Master.

"Wheel every single siege ballista and heavy trebuchet into their pre-designated bunker positions! I want flawless firing arcs calibrated immediately!" Luger rubbed his grease-stained hands together, flashing a mouthful of jagged, razor-sharp teeth in a wicked grin.

"Rest assured, Lord. My goblin whelps have been itching to let those greenskins taste the wrath of our siege engines! The stone payloads and incendiary jars are already stacked as high as mountains!" Soren then looked toward the Half-Elf, Ilya.

"Ilya. Those five [Pyroblast Wands] I issued to you today, operating in tandem with Luger's heavy artillery."

"Your objective is to keep your eyes glued to the Orc rearguard. The absolute second the Blackstone Alliance deploys their Ironclad Earth Dragons or tightly packed Pigman heavy infantry, I want you to immediately rain tons of crushing stone and instant-cast Pyroblasts directly onto those heavy units' heads!"

"Understood! The Magic Ranger Squad will not allow a single sub-dragon behemoth within fifty meters of our trenches!" Ilya declared with unwavering resolution.

"Buck!"

"My Lord, my wolf cubs are starving for a slaughter!" Buck, the Wolf Cavalry Commander, licked his lips, his aura radiating an untamable, primal ferocity.

"Take your ninety-three Wolf Riders. Arm yourselves with triple-shot repeating hand crossbows and lances. Before the battle begins, I want all of you lying in ambush in the deep woods on the perimeter. Use branches and snowmelt to mask your scent. When the Centaurs crash into our frontline, you will not even breathe!" Soren issued the decisive directive to his highly mobile strike force:"Wait until the Centaur charge is firmly halted by our lines.

Wait until their momentum is completely bogged down in the mud and the battle turns into a brutal stalemate."

"Then, I want you to burst silently from the forest and launch vicious hit-and-run harassment attacks from their rear flanks! Do not engage in melee! Fire cold bolts, specifically harvest the isolated Orcs on their outer fringes, and employ kiting tactics to drag out the distance. You will turn their rear echelons into an absolute, chaotic meat grinder!"

"Ein!"

"Here, My Lord!" The Master Marksman answered loudly.

"Your Longbow Squad will join Ilya's main Ranger force and garrison the watchtowers."

"Wind speed, snow drift, optical distortion over distance—I want every single variable meticulously calculated before midnight." You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

"You are responsible for omni-directional observation and precision sniping. Your exclusive targets are the Centaur commanders and Shamans!" As this rapid-fire series of impassioned, blood-pumping orders was laid out, the atmosphere inside the grand hall reached an absolute boiling point.

"Kyle! Coordinate the civilian evacuation and guarantee that our logistical supply chains operate flawlessly around the clock!"

"Victor! You will anchor the rearguard and be ready to deploy large-scale AoE Healing Water magics at a moment's notice!"

"Fina! You will lock down the command post! The casualty ledgers and the material requisition accounts must remain absolutely pristine!"

"Meyer! Scatter your Goblin Scout Battalions in a ten-mile radius! I want to know about every single blade of grass those Centaurs disturb!"

"Gary! Take your men and double-check every single trap! Ensure that the poison is concentrated enough to kill a man the second it touches an open wound!"

"Duran! Renn! You two are our raw physical juggernauts! If those iron hooves manage to tear a gap in our defensive line and the Phalanx cannot close it... you will throw your own bodies into the breach! Get in close and physically snap the Centaurs' necks!" Twelve distinct military directives. Not a single tactical blind spot was overlooked.

Soren had ruthlessly squeezed every last ounce of potential out of every person in Greywater Village, weaving together a defensive net so suffocatingly tight it possessed absolutely no flaws!

"Gentlemen!" Soren abruptly raised his longsword high, the gleaming steel reflecting the brazier light and illuminating his sharp, resolute features.

"Knowledge and absolute discipline! These are the ultimate weapons we will use to crush our barbaric foes."

"Warchief Blackstone believes a mere ten thousand Centaurs can conquer this quagmire. We will use brutal reality to teach him a lesson: Greywater Village is the graveyard where his entire thirty-thousand-strong Orc army comes to die!"

"For the Lord! For the survival of humanity! Victory is absolute!" Every single general and commander in the room drew their weapons in unison, erupting into a thunderous, earth-shaking roar. Within that roar, there was not a shred of fear at the impending specter of death. There was only ignited, bloodthirsty battlelust. Their soaring morale was so intensely palpable that it shook the dust loose from the wooden rafters above.

As the heavy doors of the command post were violently thrown open, the twelve commanders charged out, radiating a terrifying ferocity as they sprinted toward their respective battle stations. The blizzard howled mournfully across the swamp. As the supreme commander's orders cascaded down the chain of command, the entirety of Greywater Village seamlessly and rapidly shifted into a state of total, uncompromising war. The air grew thick with that suffocating, deadly silence that always precedes a massive slaughter.

The tension was enough to make a man's throat seize up. Yet, there were no weeping wails. There were no chaotic, panicked stampedes. The grueling, relentless training of the past few months ensured that every single soul in Greywater Village knew exactly what their duty was at this very moment. A defensive war that would decide the absolute survival or utter annihilation of the territory had been fully prepped. It was about to begin.

Across this snow-swept, frozen land, the fourth-echelon logistical personnel displayed a staggering, breathtaking level of efficiency.

"Team Three! Grab the children and move! Double time! Leave the pots and pans behind! Bring only combat rations!" Kyle, the Chief of Logistics, stood by the muddy thoroughfare, wildly waving his arms to direct the traffic. A massive crowd of Half-Elves, human elders, women, and children had formed a long, gray serpentine line. They wore thick, military-issue [Padded Cotton Armor] and white-knuckled one-meter short spears or triple-shot repeating hand crossbows.

Even amidst a mass evacuation, the entire column maintained an eerie, staggering silence. They marched in perfect order toward the newly excavated underground anti-siege tunnel networks, while a secondary detachment diverted deep into the primeval forest to the rear for concealed safety. Meanwhile, near the tunnel entrances, the hardier women of the logistical corps were gritting their teeth, straining their backs to haul heavily laden [Ironclad Supply Wagons].

The heavy wooden wheels ground through the frozen muck, groaning and creaking under the massive weight. Piled high within the wagons were bundles of quenched, blackened crossbow bolts, massive woven baskets of dense siege stones, heaps of pungent, sour-smelling [Swamp Tubers], and sloshing wooden casks of highly volatile rum—all surging relentlessly toward the frontline.

Every person pushing those carts understood one brutal truth: Every single second they shaved off the delivery of a bundle of bolts meant the men fighting in the trenches could slaughter one more monster. At the primary northern slope defensive line. The freezing northern winds howled, violently whipping against the exposed cheeks of the soldiers. But behind the sprawling network of trenches and sharpened chevaux-de-frise, there was only an awe-inspiring, terrifying atmosphere of absolute, cold stoicism.

The second-line infantry of the Macedonian Phalanx stood silently in the biting cold, intensely familiarizing themselves with their footing and defensive angles. The steppe barbarian mercenaries under Talon's command were meticulously, obsessively checking the tension strings and trigger mechanisms of their repeating heavy crossbows over and over again. Prone behind the heavily iced bunkers, they utilized the precise range-finding methods Soren had drilled into them.

They constantly compared their sights against dead trees, jagged rocks, and pre-placed distance markers, brutally searing every single inch of their kill zones and visual blind spots directly into their muscle memory.