Munitions Empire

The Elves were able to maintain their offensive solely because the spearhead composed of the four legions was too sharp, not because Augustin Tural's deployment was particularly brilliant.

In fact, as the head of the Augustin Clan and a senior official of the kingdom, Augustin Tural had not really focused his skills on the military.

The primary reason he had come to the front line to command this battle was that among the four legions serving as the main offensive force, three were controlled by the Augustin Family.

On one hand, the King doubted his ability to persuade Augustin to hand over his private troops for this battle; on the other hand, the battle was almost assured to be a win with the addition of the new weapons.

Augustin Tural himself had the idea of seizing credit for the victory, and His Majesty the King was inclined to let him do so, which led to Augustin Tural becoming the commander of the Elves in this battle.

Actually, everyone knew that such an arrangement was somewhat inappropriate, but there was nothing to say: the guns were procured by the Augustin Family, the troops were theirs, and with an obvious advantage and little need for command and coordination... So if they were to reap some military achievements, who could object?

Augustin Tural was not a fool, on the contrary, he was aware of his own capabilities; this time, coming to the front line was partly indeed to claim credit, and partly because he did not trust his direct troops.

Therefore, with self-awareness, he deployed the 344 formation, seeking only to be steady and make no mistakes, and completely abandoning any rash ideas.

It was because of this deployment that the offensive pressure of the Elf Race fell entirely on the shoulders of the four legions equipped with the new rifles.

Having fought all the way here, after successively crippling four Orc legions, one of the Elf legions had also suffered heavy losses and had to withdraw for rest and reorganization.

In the distance, the booming sounds of cannon fire could be heard as both sides' artillery exchanged fire, making it hard to determine who had the upper hand. Across the battlefield, the corpses of Orc soldiers, clad in armor with longswords and shields fallen beside them, could be seen everywhere.

About two-thirds of the Orc soldiers were equipped with Shireck Firearms, while the rest were heavy shield bearers and spearmen, meant to cover the gun troops.

However, faced with the K1 Quick Guns, these soldiers could essentially only play the role of cannon fodder; they stayed to cover the withdrawal of the main forces, only to lie there forever afterward.

"Sir, the officers have drawn up the battle plan, and the quickest way to victory for our forces, as you predicted, is to ignore the enemy forces deployed on both flanks and concentrate superior forces on attacking the enemy's central army.

We estimate that only two attacks are needed before the enemy's central defenses will collapse!" A deputy general spurred his horse forward, presenting Augustin with a plan signed by several generals.

"Tell the commanders on the left and right flanks that I want to concentrate superior forces to crush the central army of the Gales Kingdom's military! Order them not to be greedy for achievements and take reckless actions, just to steadily keep up! Remember! Do not be greedy for achievements and take reckless actions!"

"Yes!" The officer immediately tugged the reins, spurring his warhorse to gallop toward where the messengers were waiting.

Pulling a telescope from the cylinder at the side of the saddle, Augustin extended it and placed it to his eye, continuing to enjoy the view of the frontal battlefield.

His troops, chanting the kingdom's slogan and carrying rifles, advanced to the beat of war drums with unstoppable momentum.

Across from these Elf troops, the distant Orc forces were desperately trying to hold their line.

White smoke from gunpowder hung over the battlefield, and cannonballs whistled overhead, knocking down seven or eight Elf soldiers in an instant.

Because the formation was still dense, the Elves' progression under artillery fire also incurred significant losses, which was the main reason why Earl Tural was painstakingly aiming to break the enemy front.

His troops' main casualties came from enemy artillery fire, and victory would be at hand once the opposing artillery was dealt with.

Indeed, just as he had expected, at the forefront of the Orc formations, the Elves finally had their chance to open fire. An attacking company raised its weapons at the command of the officer and fired a volley at the Orcs.

The dense sound of gunfire echoed over the battlefield, and a swath of armored Orc soldiers in the front row fell, thinning their ranks immediately.

Having gained the upper hand, Elf soldiers rushed in, rapidly closing the distance to less than 30 meters.

Next, the revolvers carried by the Elf troops began to show their might, along with the even scarcer improved rotary rifles, and the Elf marksmen unleashed a rapid, dense barrage of fire.

Bullets poured down like hail on the Orc soldiers, promptly bringing down more screaming soldiers.

Blood splattered in all directions, and the Orc soldiers, smeared with the blood of their comrades, charged toward the Elf marksmen with longswords raised.

Unfortunately, they didn't even have the chance to engage in close combat; even if it could only fire six times in a row, the power of a revolver was not something a longsword could match.

Beyond seven paces the gun was faster, within seven paces… the gun was truly fast and accurate! As the distance closed, the firepower density advantage of the Elf Race's troops was fully displayed, and another Orc encampment was overwhelmed.

However, just as this Orc encampment suffered heavy losses and began to retreat, another Orc infantry battalion, chanting "Long live Gales," charged forward.

The Elf Race's troops were running low on loaded bullets and having lost dozens to artillery, they found their footing unsteady and were forced to relinquish the position they had just seized.

Taking advantage of the chaos, the Orcs plugged the breach, using a long-prepared volley to drive the Elves back a hundred meters away.

There was no other choice, cartridge rifles indeed reloaded quickly, but the closer combat-focused revolvers and rotary rifles took a much longer time to reload.

Despite the intense gunfire during the attack, these people were armed with weapons from 1860, not those from 1940… those weren't submachine guns that could be reloaded by just swapping a magazine.

Having already discovered some patterns after battling the Augustin Tural's troops for 6 days, the Orc troops generally would endure the slaughter of their front-line forces by the enemy's hail-like firepower, then counterattack to recapture the lost positions once the enemy's fire began to thin.

By resorting to such methods, sacrificing soldiers' lives, they managed to hold out until today, until this moment.

Packing away his telescope, Augustin Tural gave orders through gritted teeth: "Advance the whole army! Assault the enemy's central forces!"

Those were his own direct troops, and he felt each loss keenly! Moreover, he had to pull a heavily damaged legion off the front lines for rest and reorganization yesterday afternoon.

Another round of frontline offensives stalled, which made Augustin Tural once again think of that damned envoy from the Shireck Consortium.

They had threatened him with selling weapons and even providing private military support to the Gales Kingdom, forcing him to agree to Shireck Company's demands.

After learning about the Augustin Clan's primer production technology, the Shireck Consortium set their sights on the Augustin Family. Both sides clashed head-on, and it even reached the point where war seemed inevitable.

Eventually, the King of the Poplar Kingdom stepped in, mediating the covert and overt battles between the two. A reconciliation on the front of new weaponry was reached.

The cost was that Shireck agreed to ensure the Augustin Family's factory's autonomy within Poplar Kingdom territory and voluntarily abandoned the kingdom's future munitions market.

At the same time, Shireck also guaranteed not to sell any military supplies to the Gales Kingdom and even took advantage of their weakened state by selling a significant number of cannons to the Elves, giving them an edge over the Gales Kingdom in terms of artillery.

Shireck would no longer intervene in any benefits after Gales Kingdom's defeat… Shireck even promised that they would be willing to assist the future expansion of the Poplar Kingdom.

In return, Shireck got what they wanted: they confirmed the new weaponry indeed originated from Brunas of the Leite Kingdom, with Tang Mo being the developer behind these new weapons.

After confirming the source, Shireck generously gave up its interests within the Poplar Kingdom—this was their compromise for preparing to target Tang Mo's influence within the Leite Kingdom.

As the higher-ups at Shireck saw it, eradicating Tang Mo meant removing the source of the new weaponry's research and development, making it obviously easier to deal with the Poplar Kingdom in hindsight.

Furthermore, to counter Tang Mo's restriction on providing primers, Shireck purchased 100,000 paper cartridges from Earl Augustine and reserved a third of the future production capacity!

With these additional ammunition supplies that Tang Mo couldn't track, Shireck felt even more confident about initiating a localized war against Tang Mo.

The biggest sacrifice that Augustin had to make was handing over the primer production technology—what Shireck Consortium truly desired.

In the end, by giving up an Orcish Gales Kingdom and nearly all industries within the Poplar Kingdom while offering some support to the Augustin Family, Shireck finally obtained the much-coveted primer formula.

But it also resulted in Earl Augustin Tural currently facing a slightly insufficient supply of ammunition.

As Tural cursed the Shireck Consortium in his heart, within the command tent of the Orc central forces, two orders were issued.

Seeing the 17th Legion about to be completely annihilated, the Orc generals and commanders could no longer withstand the pressure; they dispatched messengers, ordering the Wolf Riders, who had been hovering on the flanks and lingering at the edges of the battlefield, to launch an immediate charge.