Chapter 1038: Unified ideology and the source of the ruler's total domination

The battlefield within Jiaoma Bridge was like a giant human meat grinder, shredding every soldier who poured in into fragments.

Whether it was the government army or the "anti-government armed forces" as they called them, they were falling one after another on this land.

Life at this moment became the most meaningless thing; people had no time to use such thoughts to deal with everything happening here.

They had no time to think about who they were, why they were here, what they were supposed to do here, and where they would eventually end up.

When the commander, the captain of the army, waved the command saber in his hand, pointed toward the battlefield, and shouted, "Kill those enemies," the soldiers would rush out, slightly nervous yet filled with excitement, only to die on the battlefield.

The sound of gunfire was like the tide, rising and falling; when the "tide rose," it was also the moment when the smell of blood on the battlefield was at its thickest!

Both sides seemed to have completely abandoned their fear of life and death; at this moment, they only had one belief—smash the enemy.

A large number of wild animals lurking in the surroundings were waiting; they overcame their fear of the gunfire and watched from afar.

Whenever the gunfire stopped, or most of it ceased, these wild animals would rush into the battlefield to enjoy nature's gift!

Their tiny brains could never figure out why, in such a cruel natural world, there was still such a large-scale buffet available for them to enjoy.

The animals at the top and bottom of the food chain had no distinction of status or class at this moment; they gathered together, silently observing the largest-scale mutual slaughter in Lapa's recorded history.

"If this continues, we won't be able to hold on!"

A frontline officer had a cigarette dangling from his mouth, holding binoculars in his hand as he looked at the distant battlefield, his brows tightly knitted together.

The situation in the command post was still decent; at least it hadn't been affected by the fighting yet. The officer put down the binoculars and turned back to the center of the room.

There was a table here, and on the table was spread a deployment map of Zhuolan and the surrounding areas, where one could see their layered control over the entire battlefield.

Although they had now completed the encirclement of the Jiaoma Bridge exit as Diego requested, and had indeed eliminated quite a few enemies, their consumption was equally enormous.

This was the backward and poor Lapa; almost ninety-nine percent of the soldiers had not received any education before enlisting, and even after they enlisted, they hadn't received any target practice.

Because bullets were too expensive, the costs incurred from their target practice might be enough to hire another person to participate in the battle; there was no reason or necessity to let these people waste them.

Not to mention that bullets weren't something you could get just because you wanted them; bullets required money, and Diego's biggest problem right now was having no money.

The current combat loss ratio shows that the government army's casualties are more severe, while the losses of those anti-government armed forces are actually better than theirs.

Several officers looked at the highest-ranking officer here; this officer was himself a member of the Lavila family. In the last few months, Diego had trusted the members of the Lavila family very much and entrusted them with heavy responsibilities.

In this critical moment, this dictatorial and irritable president finally remembered his family, but the people of the Lavila family were not very willing to be remembered by him.

If this had happened a few years ago, a dozen years ago, when they were remembered by Diego and entrusted with heavy responsibilities, everyone would have jumped for joy.

At that time, as long as they became officers or government officials, they could quickly achieve financial freedom within Lapa.

Power, wealth, anything.

But now, being remembered by Diego only meant being sent to the battlefield by him.

It could be said that Diego ignored them when people most longed for his recognition, but remembered them when they least wanted to be remembered.

The officer speaking was a subordinate of this Lavila family officer, considered a trusted aide, and his face carried some worry.

He had originally thought that being suddenly promoted to an officer was a good thing, but now it seemed that this couldn't be considered a good thing at all.

Strictly speaking, the guy who was Diego's young cousin had a somewhat gloomy face. "How many people do we have left?"

"Thirty or forty thousand, no more, at most three or five thousand more."

"We've wiped out a lot of people during this time, and I don't know much about the situation on the other side, but it should be about the same as ours."

Except for the twenty thousand people guarding Zhuolan, everyone else out of the four hundred thousand had been pulled out. In fact, Diego and the people of the Lavila family were very clear that once the war broke out near Zhuolan, it meant the countdown to the destruction of the Lavila family had begun.

As a power family that had ruled this country for a very, very long time, once the regime changed, they would inevitably be ranked on the first line of the liquidation list.

This was also why, even though they knew this wasn't a good job, they still gritted their teeth and accepted it.

As long as Diego was alive and the Lavila family's rule hadn't ended, they still had good days ahead.

If Diego died, or the Lavila family's rule ended, they would all have to accompany this rotten regime into hell.

"Thirty or forty thousand people, how much longer can this last at the current rate of consumption?"

Another officer said in a low voice, "About a month, and I've been very worried recently; it's possible there will be deserters, and these deserters might trigger a chain reaction."

The battlefield was too cruel. People might not notice this during the fighting in the daytime, as a certain combat emotion hid their fear, but with the end of the fighting, in the dark of night, they would start to feel fear.

In fact, there had always been acts of desertion, but now acts of desertion were appearing more and more frequently.

The officer pursed his lips, his face somewhat solemn. "Deal with them as necessary, hold on for another half month."

"If we really can't resist after half a month, then we'll withdraw."

The other officers' faces showed expressions of astonishment, and one of them lowered his voice. "If we withdraw, it will give them the opportunity to completely break through the blockade, and other field armies might be counter-encircled."

The officer's face still had no expression, but it also appeared somewhat cold and ruthless. "It's better than us all being eliminated."

The officers didn't continue to say anything, just maintained silence; they accepted this result.

On Pedro's side, they were also discussing; the war situation was too intense.

"How about... we slow down first?" An insurgent leader showed an unwilling expression on his face. "My troops are completely crippled; let someone else take the lead tomorrow."

"My people and I will not take the lead anymore."

He spoke very firmly. He had originally brought about fifteen thousand people here to "hunt Zhuolan," thinking he would be like those great nobles in some stories, leaping on horses into Zhuolan, but when he really arrived here, he realized this matter wasn't that easy.

Before, watching others fight, he felt it wasn't really anything; war, after all, couldn't avoid deaths.

Only when he had to go up himself did he realize he couldn't bear it. A team of over ten thousand people had been reduced by half in just three days, and they hadn't gained much income from the fighting either.

Except for the control area expanding by a few dozen meters.

But this actually had no meaning.

He didn't want to fight anymore. These troops were his foundation, and as a leader of an anti-government armed force, he could also be considered one of the people stirring up the situation on the Lapa stage during this period.

He could wave the big flag recording his banner, not because he had strong personal power and could carry hundreds of pounds of things to wave.

Nor did he have any special techniques to wave this flag beautifully.

It was purely because he held such an army in his hands, a foundation that gave him the confidence to stand in front of these "warlords" and be on equal footing with them.

If this war wiped out all his people, then he would no longer be a warlord.

Where could there be a warlord without soldiers under his command?

And recently, another thing had happened: those international friends who strongly supported them in overthrowing Diego's rule had started to reduce their aid to them.

The claim of these international friends was that they had supported these resistance organizations for two years, but the resistance organizations only operated near their activity areas and had never considered advancing to Zhuolan to overthrow Diego's rule.

They started to suspect that these resistance organizations were just using the name of "overthrowing Diego's tyranny" to defraud them of financial aid.

So now, basically all financial and material aid to the resistance organizations had been cut off.

This was also why Pedro was able to gather them together so quickly.

Resistance organizations were also organizations, and they also needed a large amount of funds and materials to maintain themselves. Idealists did exist, and there were quite a few, but idealists still had to eat, and their families still had to eat.

Previously, with the aid of international friends, they could avoid engaging in production and just focus on training, fighting, and sabotage.

But now, after the loss of this aid, they were facing a very terrible situation.

If they wanted to continue maintaining their current scale, they had to find a way to find channels that could provide sustainable funds and materials.

But as anti-government armed forces, they only engaged in sabotage and not production; relying on the autonomy and output within their occupied areas, they might not even have enough to fill their stomachs.

If people couldn't eat, what ideals or doctrines could they talk about?

So these international friends gave them a requirement: to overthrow Diego's rule as soon as possible to prove that they weren't relying on a name to defraud financial aid.

This move almost choked all the resistance organizations, including Pedro; he was the same.

Pedro's strength was relatively strong among these people who considered themselves warlords, but he was also facing a situation where funds were starting to run short and materials might not keep up.

As a teacher who had received a slightly higher level of education, he was very clear that once he couldn't come up with money or materials, the team would soon disperse.

This was the conspiracy of the federal people, a naked conspiracy.

They first made him and his people completely disengage from production, get used to and severely rely on this disengagement, and put all their energy into fighting.

This way, they had no blood-supply environment of their own; food, firearms, ammunition, and funds all came from abroad.

Once foreign aid stopped, they would collapse rapidly.

This was a conspiracy, and also a public strategy; he couldn't refuse.

Having reached this step today, he couldn't let go of everything and go back to being a high school teacher; he couldn't do it.

He believed that whether it was Diego or the leader of the resistance organization who would overthrow Diego in the future, they couldn't do it either. They couldn't let a "former insurgent leader" with considerable prestige and influence stay alive; they would find a way to kill him!

Sometimes people weren't unable to see the future path; they could actually see very clearly what the future path was like, and could see through it at a glance.

There was no fog, no fork in the road, just seeing the end at a glance.

But it was precisely this seeing the end at a glance that made people despair!

On the way to Zhuolan, Pedro's emotions were complex, and his heart was cold.

He had originally thought that possessing such powerful strength, with tens of thousands of people under his command, was the solid strength for him to gain political power and counter the federal invaders.

Until this moment did he realize that he had never truly possessed these; he had always been a chess piece on the chessboard, not the chess player he thought he was.

In a trance, he was awakened by the sound of someone slapping the table. He looked at the insurgent leader who was blushing and demanding to withdraw from here.

He stiffened his neck. "No matter what you say, I can't continue fighting anyway!"

The focus in Pedro's eyes gradually gathered on him. He pursed his lips. "You can go, but have you considered what you will face after leaving here?"

That leader was stunned for a moment. "What could I face?"

The room also became completely quiet. Everyone looked at Pedro; they still admired Pedro's talent very much.

Pedro leaned back in his chair. He lit a cigarette, took a puff, and then slowly exhaled.

The movement was very slow, not fast, but these guys who didn't seem to have much patience all had the patience to wait for him.

His gaze swept across the faces of these people one by one. "Actually, we are all subconsciously avoiding a problem, which is that we are not stable at all right now."

"I know, including myself, the reason all of us concentrated on attacking Zhuolan this time is only two."

"First, being threatened or controlled by the funding groups behind us."

"If we don't attack Zhuolan, we will soon lose financial and material aid, and the soldiers under our command will immediately collapse..."

Everyone's complexion changed.

As if he couldn't see the expressions on these people's faces, he continued, "Second, as long as we break into the Zhuolan area, as the richest place in Lapa, the rich people of this country live here."

"We can plunder their wealth to get rid of the constraints those international friends have on us."

"Or to put it more bluntly, get rid of the constraints the federal people have on us, and let us truly become free resistance armies."

"This is our only way out right now."

He looked at the guy who was clamoring to quit. "Have you thought about it? Even if we agree to let you withdraw, what are you going to do next?"

"Where will you get the money to pay your soldiers? Although their income isn't high, it's probably over ten thousand federal Sol per month. Where will you get this money to give them?"

"Steal, rob?"

"You can't get that much money. Even if your occupied area has rich resources, can you turn these resources into money?"

"You can't change it; you aren't a magician, you can't do it."

"Your people will disperse. When you are no longer a..." A mocking expression appeared on his face. "... no longer a warlord, do you think those people you hurt before will let you go?"

That guy's face turned pale. Of course he knew what he had done in the occupied area. Once he didn't have those soldiers by his side, the people in the occupied area would tear him apart and swallow him alive!

Watching his pale face and shifting eyes, everyone's attention focused on Pedro again. They became even more admiring of this clever and wise high school teacher.

"So, the more we are at this time, the more we cannot withdraw, because once we retreat, it's equivalent to cutting off our own retreat."

"Without the funds and weapons and ammunition supported by those federal people, we will return to our past selves overnight."

"I will become a teacher, Luo Bu, you will become a worker again,... you will return to the roadside and start setting up a stall."

"And all of you, you will all become your past selves, and then be crushed by the Lapa government and the Lavila family like crushing a small bug!"

"We seem to have many choices, and seem to have a lot of power, but in reality, we have nothing, and have never mastered real power."

"Now, if we want to live, and live better, there is only one way."

He took a fierce puff of the cigarette, and the smoke he exhaled was also very thick. "That is to continue moving forward, defeat these people, and take down Zhuolan."

"Zhuolan has rich wealth enough for us to get rid of the federal people's control. Only in this way can we achieve independence and autonomy, and let Lapa be reborn."

"You can escape, but after you escape, we will no longer accept you!"

That person's expression was very ugly. He hesitated for a long time, and finally, with a sigh, he gave up those unrealistic ideas.

"Since this matter concerns everyone's fate, you can't let me be the one rushing to the front alone."

"Pedro, I respect you very much, and I believe everyone is the same, but this is not the reason why you and your people are arranged at the back."

"You want to take over the country that our people took down with their lives; this is not appropriate."

The eyes of others gathered on Pedro again. Pedro thought for a while and gave a solution.

"To prove that I don't have selfish motives, I suggest that from now on, each of us sends out some people for every battle. I know this can't be absolutely fair, but relatively, it's no problem."

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 1039 =====