Chapter 511 - Cruel Arts

An uncontrollable battle did not stop with a closure until late that night. In fact, Scarlet had decided to ask the soldiers to leave the battle at dusk. She did not want to be as crazy as Baery, who had seemed to realize something at the same time, so he gave the same order to his own military. However, neither party left the battlefield until late that night, which obviously showed what chaos there was on the battlefield.

Scarlet was good at employing different strategies to minimize her loss in battles. In Golman's world, she even had a history of winning battles with zero fatalities. However, once she was in real battles, she did not seem to have the control and management skills as did Baery. Baery had been trying to make the battlefield more chaotic, while Scarlet tried to keep it in order. The reality proved that Baery won, just as he had wished. Scarlet had been putting reserves on the battlefield in hopes of stopping the soldiers from feeling discouraged and losing the battle. If this were all Scarlet could do, any general could have done it. In other words, Scarlet had not been able to show anything special that she could do.

Scarlet had seen dead bodies before, but never so many. The trees in the valleys surrounding the battlefield had been destroyed. Bodies were everywhere, from the peak of the mountains to the bottom of the valley. Bodies piled on bodies, along the valley road, which was over 10 miles long. Some areas even had hills of dead bodies piled up. With the bright moonlight, Scarlet could clearly see everything.

Both parties sent out thousands of soldiers without weapons. Their job was to clean up the battlefield, move their peers' bodies, and save any survivors who were still mingled with the dead bodies. The craziness during the day had now gone. When soldiers from both parties met, they did not even care to look upon one another. Rather, they passed by each other without any facial expressions. There was an unwritten rule that soldiers cleaning the battlefield could not be attacked. It would not be good if anyone went against these rules.

The valley road had become a swamp, a murky situation created by the blood and flesh of humans and horses. Usually, blood dried quickly, but the power of nature did not seem to be enough, not when there was so much blood. There were dead bodies everywhere on the mountains, the blood of which trickled down to the bottom of the valley like streams, turning the whole valley into a bloody hell. Every step the soldiers took, there were squeaking sounds underneath their feet. It was easy for them to stumble on an arm, or to accidentally kick a head. The sounds of kicking or breaking an arm were always scary. The moaning from people, who woke up from the coma or screamed from the pain, were not the most scary sounds. The most scary part was the thought that the dead bodies could get up with the screams, if those soldiers accidentally stepped on them. Soldiers felt that even their souls were scared.

There was also a weird stinky smell in the valley. It was disgusting. A doctor told Anfey before that human's blood and flesh would not rot quickly. The weird stinky smell that lingered on the battlefield was from the not-digested food, or waste, left over after people's intestines were attacked. Of course, it did not matter that they were the soldiers from Maho Empire or Shansa Empire, they would not understand about anatomy. They only knew this was a hell for them. They wanted to throw up and run away. They wanted to scream with all the strength they had. They would rather be unconscious at this moment. However, they had to complete their job before any of those things happened. Otherwise, they would become part of this hell. Military law would not allow them to escape. 

Was this one type of art? Scarlet remembered Golman used to tell her often that wars were a type of art. Seeing this bloody hell, Scarlet wanted to adapt Goldman's saying. If wars were a type of art, they must be the most vicious and cruel art that human intelligence had ever created. However, Scarlet still had to get revenge upon Anfey. She had done so much, and had taken in so much, that she had to kill the murderers of her mom by herself. She would enjoy it, or at least take anything that benefited her, no matter how vicious or cruel they were.

Scarlet walked to her tent with heavy legs. She knew well that today's battle had hit the Shansa Empire soldiers' morale hard. These soldiers held ambitions of building their careers and making contributions to their country as they chased after Baery's military. They did not know that Baery would give them a taste of what hell could be like. It was unknown just how many of them were scared. At this moment, the key was not to encourage the soldiers tonight, but to think about what they could do tomorrow. If Baery wanted to continue to fight with her, would she fight? The military resources of the Maho Empire were far superior to Scarlet's. If she had to fight with all she had, all the soldiers would die in about ten days.

Scarlet had headaches. It was like a swordsman, who was not confident with his sword skills, was being challenged by a barbarian. When the fight started, the judge suddenly made a new rule that the two participants could only fight with fists. One could give a strike first, while the other one could fight back with another strike. If the fight continued without any strategies involved, the loser would be the one who fell down first. Scarlet felt that she was that helpless swordsman.

The air in Scarlet's tent was filled with tension. Menkin had blood on his face. He sat on the chair without saying anything. Today's battle had left the guardian knights with high casualties. Over two fifths of the soldiers were either hurt or died in the battle. Before the battle started, many old men, whom he rarely saw, came to see him and asked politely, hoping Menkin could take care of their sons or nephews. However, on the chaotic battlefield, where generals could not see their soldiers—and vice versa—he could take care of no one. He was scared of estimating how many soldiers had died. He subconsciously knew that he would not be a commander anymore, no matter whether he won or lost this battle.

Scarlet walked to her seat and slowly sat. She cleared her throat before speaking. Suddenly, griffin screaming was heard from outside of the tent, and a gust of chilly wind passed by. Obviously, a griffin had tried to land outside the tent. The griffin rider pushed away the soldiers at the tent door before he could report to Scarlet. The rider rushed into the tent, "General, Miorich-led royal palace guards attacked the exit of the valley. The mercenaries of the League of Mercenaries surrounded us."

Scarlet was stunned. Menkin jumped up from his seat out, enraged, and shouted:"Bullshit! We had a fight with Sacred City palace guards today. It could not be them. Are they ghosts?"

"Miorich, Miorich has not showed up yet," A general said with a trembling voice.

It became deadly quiet in the tent. He was right that Miorich had not shown up yet. If he showed up, the casualties of guardian guards would be higher. What made them feel lucky before, now became their nightmare. If it were possible, they wished they had heard wrong. If Miorich showed up on the battlefield during the day, he could have wiped out the entire guardian guards.

"Are you sure the information you received is right?" Scarlet asked in a low pitch. Her voice was trembling a bit.

"Yes, I am sure," the griffin rider said with a sad face. "General, do you remember how many days it has been since we have not yet received information from Blackwater City?"

"What did your griffin riders do?" Menkin yelled. "Why did not you send people to scout?"

"Master Menkin, I sent many griffin riders over, but eagle druids have been working for the Maho Empire. No matter how many griffin riders I sent out, they would disappear. I did not find that the exit of the Cross Valley was taken over by them until I took a squad of griffin riders with me to check it out."

"Did the terrain around the valley exit look normal?" Scarlet asked slowly.

"Normal? General? I do not get what you mean," the griffin rider asked.

"I mean, did the valley exit have any magic explosion?" Scarlet asked.

"No," the griffin rider answered.

Scarlet punched her fists down heavily on the table, causing it to suddenly collapse and resulting in everything upon it to fall on the floor, scattering everywhere. The faces of the generals in the tent changed. They had never seen Scarlet lose her control.

"Are you sure the valley exit did not look like it had exploded before?" Scarlet asked again.

She needed to double-check, because she needed to know if her trump card, the magic weapon, was under the control of Miorich and Anfey.

"No, there was no explosion, general," the griffin rider said.

"General, what should we do?" a general asked at the top of his voice. When things came to this point, the strategic intent from the Maho Empire had become obvious. Maho Empire wanted to lure them to the Cross Valley to wipe out the main force of Shansa Empire with a flank attack.

Everyone looked at Scarlet, hoping she had an answer for them.

The chief commander's tent in Maho Empire was not as busy as Scarlet's. There were only two people in the tent: one was Baery, while the other was Stegar. Stegar casually tossed a mail on the table and said with a low pitch, "Saul said Scarlet should have known that valley exit is under our control now, especially after those few griffin riders escaped. It will take him some more time to set up the magic array. He asked you to…"

"I got it. I will buy him some time. I have tried my best today," Baery said with a smile.

"Today?" Stegar rolled his eyes. "Not to mention that Scarlet has known that the valley exit fell into our hands, even she did not know about it, you would have already scared her away."

"You are not as good as me in terms of that," Baery smiled. "Many people think the military maneuvers could be so different—hard to predict and understand—but I think it was all about human nature. Scarlet only knew about military maneuvers, but she do not understand human nature. She is still a young girl. Her understanding of wars is limited."

"Hehehe, I wonder who lost the battle to that little girl at the One-Line-Sky," Stegar said.

"This is the advantage I have, but Scarlet does not." Baery was not mad at all. "I can lose battles, but Scarlet could not. If she lost one battle, she would lose everything."

"Don't trump it up. Saul reminded us many times, asking us to be careful about Golman," Stegar said slowly.

"Golman." Baery repeated in confirmation, frowning.