Chapter 407: They Have Arrived

Baoxi led the troops forward that very day; the vanguard troops spread out directly into a flat plane, and since they were all experienced hunters, they fanned out like a carpet, searching bit by bit for traces of Huaxia's activities.

Baifeng was actually overthinking it; there was no need to send out decoy troops at all. Those who contacted the borders of the two departments were almost entirely people from the Old City, and their traces of activity were far too obvious—as long as one was not in a rush and searched carefully, they could be found completely.

Although there were still traces of their deserters' activities on the riverbank, Baoxi was very clear about the situation on both sides of this Dahe; Huaxia City could only be in the hinterland and would not be on the banks of this river (within Huaxia territory, there are many rivers, and the one beside Huaxia City is the main thoroughfare, broad with a large volume of water; the river here is just a nameless small stream).

Therefore, even though Baoxi discovered those messy footprints, he still gave up on tracking toward those places, judging that it might have been caused by Huaxia people searching and patrolling in this area.

Furthermore, the encampment discovered next also indicated that their search direction was correct. Of course, that one house also caused a great shock to Baoxi; he had never imagined that such a thing could be made using earth and wood—not only sturdy, but also relatively warm. He had already secretly noted it in his heart; after returning, he would have people build such houses for him as well, to leave that dim cave early.

Baoxi was also thinking, could it be that all the people of Huaxia lived in this kind of house? Then how could they not think of this method? From the first generation of the Fire-Driller until now, they had always lived in earthen pits and wooden shacks.

This house was just a small interlude and did not delay their marching speed too much. By the time evening arrived, the traces of Huaxia's activities they discovered became more and more obvious, which made them even more certain that they had not gone the wrong way.

Their soldiers now numbered a full thirty thousand; the daily grain consumption for so many people was terrifying, but they had only brought about twenty days' worth of grain, relying mainly on foraging along the way.

Along the way, they picked, collected, and packed up everything edible to take with them.

Like some scattered chestnut burrs and jujube trees, it was unknown why the Huaxia people had not gathered them; they just hung perfectly intact on the trees, becoming food for birds and various small animals.

Thus, whenever they saw a tree, everyone would join forces to shake it frantically, shaking down everything that was ripe to pick up; if the tree was too thick, they would climb directly up to pick, or hit it with sticks, not intending to leave a single one for Huaxia.

This was extremely important to them; with a little more food, their hope of winning would be a little greater—this was all experience accumulated through their repeated campaigns.

Of course, the main force did not stop and continued to advance steadily while maintaining their speed. They would split off a portion of people specifically to collect, because with enough people, the speed of collection was naturally fast enough; moreover, they also had hunters who would do their best to hunt every animal they saw within their line of sight, just to add more food for the tribe.

They set up camp on the spot that night. By now, they had already spent several days, and their grain was still enough to support them for about fifteen days; if they still could not conquer Huaxia in fifteen days, then they would have to return on empty stomachs.

This was the thought of the others in the army, but Baoxi naturally would not think this way. His attacking Huaxia was partly to seize territory and food, but consuming the population was also his main idea. He calculated Huaxia's combat power at the highest level; this time, their Fire-Driller tribe should also be able to reduce by ten thousand people. For him, rather than starving or freezing to death, it was better for these ten thousand people to die on the battlefield attacking Huaxia—that would be dying with value.

The next day, Huaxia continued to fell fruit forests incessantly. The fruit trees in the distance were too much trouble to pull back to the city, so they threw them directly into the Dahe, letting them flow downstream with the river water until they finally ran aground on some shoal.

After another half-day of processing, the area in front of their city gate was completely empty, without any cover. In this case, their long-range weapons could exert their maximum effect. Moreover, those tree stumps, in Baifeng's view, were like anti-cavalry stakes; although the Fire-Driller tribe could not possibly have cavalry, this could still affect infantry. At the very least, when they were dodging Huaxia's stone-throwing attacks, they would not only have to pay attention to their heads, but also to their feet.

Suiren tribe had completely approached Huaxia because they found a road manually cleared by Huaxia. The trees in the middle had been cut clean, and the road surface was very flat; following this road, they would certainly be able to reach Huaxia directly, and this also greatly accelerated their speed of advance.

Near dusk, the Huaxia Soldiers were all a bit lax because it was about to get dark; at such times, the enemy would almost never attack, and these people were also due for their rotation to rest.

But just as they had let out a sigh of relief, a Soldier on a high platform nearby, who was staring into the distance with a Telescope, immediately issued a warning, his expression very panicked and his tone somewhat flustered.

Because in his field of vision, he saw a dense, countless number of enemies; even at the Citizen assembly, he had never seen so many people.

In an instant, the entire city wall sounded an alarm, whistles blew continuously, and then the Drum sounded to inform the whole country that an enemy was invading.

Baifeng, who was still patrolling elsewhere, felt his heartbeat accelerate abruptly after hearing the Drum; he then mounted his ox and, after a pat on the ox's rump, began to gallop toward the city wall.

He handed the ox to a Soldier under the city wall, then jogged up to the wall and took over the Telescope to look for himself. By this time, Suiren tribe had approached them infinitely; he estimated that Baoxi had already seen their city wall.

The Suiren tribe troops were truly endless; he had never seen so many people even during his university military training back in the day. Was Baifeng panicked? Of course he was; the number of the other side's Soldiers was greater than their entire national population. He had no confidence in his heart; after all, their Soldiers' tactics and Weaponry had not yet been tested in actual combat in this era.

But at this moment, no matter how panicked he was inside, he could not show any of it on the surface; he had to stir up the morale of everyone.

Baoxi also saw that strange city wall; he did not understand what a "city wall" was, but just looking at the exterior, he could understand what it was used for. He immediately raised the difficulty of attacking Huaxia by several levels, and his estimate for the degree of loss of their Soldiers was also raised once again.