Chapter 1471: A False Alarm

Their marching speed was very fast; even before noon, they had already seen the Western Development Group encampment in the distance, where faint cooking smoke could still be seen.

It was just that everyone dared not move forward at this moment; if they advanced rashly, they might startle the snake in the grass, so Zhang ordered everyone to rest in place, and then several of the commanders took telescopes to observe the situation in the distance.

The scene was very peaceful and very quiet; large groups of people could not be seen anywhere, and even less could anything related to war be seen; one could only see wisps of cooking smoke, though it was unknown whether it was the savages burning fire or the people of Huaxia burning fire.

This situation made everyone a bit unable to understand, but Zhang felt his judgment was quite correct; now there were two completely different possibilities: either the entire Huaxia army had been wiped out, or the entire savage army had been wiped out; it was just that one could not see any people there now, making it impossible to judge which situation it was.

Zhang wiped the sweat from his head: "Now there are only two situations: won or lost; anyway, they are not fighting anymore, and no matter which situation it is, we are already too late."

"How about this, tell the Soldiers to rest in place and eat lunch, and then we will go over while they are eating; perhaps they are all taking a nap, and if they are savages inside, it is also the best time to attack."

The Soldiers' moods were completely calm; following the order, they sat down, chewed on dry Dry Rations, took a sip of cold water, and swallowed after soaking them soft; in order to cover their tracks, they naturally could not use fire.

If they were savages, they certainly would not use a Telescope and would only observe with their eyes; now that they had raised cooking smoke, they should be preparing to cook; people get sleepy after eating their fill, this is a certainty, not to mention savages who have relaxed their vigilance after winning a battle.

The Soldiers finished their meal under the sun; now, one by one, they were sweating like rain; although it was already autumn, the midday sun was still very hot, but not to the degree of being as poisonous as in summer, requiring people to hide.

"Soldiers, leave everything unrelated to combat here, leave a Small Team to keep watch, and everyone else, put on armor and prepare to go!"

Those who stayed behind might be lucky, but they should be considered more unfortunate, because if the battle started, the Military Merit they obtained would be the least, but the probability of casualties had almost dropped to zero.

Zhang led the men to advance quickly and took the lead; after arriving at the foot of the mountain, he discovered something wrong, because he could smell a very thick bloody stench, as well as a bit of a foul odor; this was the smell that only appeared when many people had died.

However, this was Nature, not a cramped room; it would only take ten days or so for all traces here to disappear, just some flesh and blood buried in the ground; Heaven and Earth are so vast, what kind of smell could persist for so long without dissipating?

But because the battlefield had been cleaned very thoroughly, this made Zhang feel a little more settled in his heart, because this was something only Huaxia would do; other tribes probably would not have this behavior—not cutting off heads and placing them in their own rooms was already considered civilized, let alone cleaning the battlefield and clearing away corpses.

The members of the Western Development Group guarding the mountaintop had already discovered Zhang and the others; just by their attire, they determined they were people of Huaxia, so one ran back to notify Ce and the others, but in Zhang's field of vision, holding a Telescope, he could not see the people monitoring and keeping watch.

Fortunately, when Zhang and his men were sneaking up, the flustered Ce and others came out to greet them; the sudden appearance of people also gave Zhang a big fright.

Ce did not recognize Zhang; although he looked familiar, he had not stayed in the political center of Huaxia after all; he had arrived here when he was still working at the grassroots level, and although he could be considered to hold a high position and heavy power now, he had not held it for very long.

Fortunately, there was a Hun nearby; Hun picked up the Telescope and took a look, and he knew it was his leader; Zhang also saw the people, and after looking through the Telescope, his heart suddenly deflated, but he was also happy, because they were all acquaintances, all people of Huaxia; the Western Development Group was fine, nothing had happened, that was great, that was great.

"The one coming is the Division Commander of our 1st Division, Zhang, who can also be considered your superior; let's go down quickly to welcome him!"

Ce reacted and hurriedly said to the others: "Hurry, hurry back, no need to be nervous, prepare the food for these Soldiers, and the Regimental Headquarters will come down with me to welcome them."

Zhang said to the bewildered Soldiers: "Everyone put away your Weapons; the Western Development Group is fine, those above are all our own people."

The Soldiers also let out a sigh of relief and hurriedly put their Weapons away; there were even new recruits from Lema City in this team, but they had not killed anyone yet and were extremely nervous.

"Division Commander Zhang! I didn't expect you to come!" Hun welcomed him enthusiastically.

"I came here under the order of Wang; I set out the day after receiving your news; this whole journey was a forced march; hearing the cannon fire yesterday, I rushed here overnight; I was so anxious; I didn't expect you to have already won; it seems the number of enemies was not large?"

Hun found it hard to explain: "Division Commander Zhang, let's take the Soldiers up first; I will report these things to you slowly; there are still many problems on this journey, and there are also many important matters."

Zhang looked back at the Soldiers: "Everyone go up first, change your armor, and then go bring back our supplies."

But Zhang suddenly hesitated: "Is it still necessary to bring the supplies over? They are all military supplies inside; if there is no longer a need to attack the Wulengge Tribe now, just bring over a portion of the grain and leave it here; don't bring the rest; this back-and-forth is still very strenuous."

"Division Commander, it needs to be brought over; we only wiped out one of the tribes of the Wulengge Tribe; the real Wulengge Tribe is very powerful; let's discuss it first, and then you can decide whether to go and fight."

"Alright, then bring everything over."

After going up the mountain, Hun and the others told Zhang about their series of encounters and the intelligence obtained through interrogation, and they dragged the Tribal Chief out again to verify it for Zhang, but this Tribal Chief could not speak the language of Huaxia, so it required someone to translate, which was a bit cumbersome.

After Zhang heard the whole process, he also felt that the matter was a bit troublesome; it would not do if the Wulengge Tribe was not destroyed, as it had seriously hindered the development and advancement of Huaxia, and Wang had also clearly requested that the Wulengge Tribe be severely struck and not spared at all, so there was no question now of whether to continue asking Huaxia if they should continue the attack.

Now what Zhang needed to consider was how much further they could fight this year, whether they could find other Wulengge tribes, and furthermore, whether Huaxia really had the ability to fight two major tribes at the same time; this year was fine, the Arrow was on the string and had to be fired, but when returning to report, this had to be emphasized.