Chapter 437

"Report, my lord, the battlefield has been fully accounted for."

"This time, we have secured 873 heads of orc servant troops and 1,389 heads of orcs themselves!"

"Excellent! Ha ha! Wonderful! Over a thousand orc heads—this achievement is undoubtedly the noblest triumph of the entire army!"

"Indeed! Congratulations, my lord! Combined with our previous thousand-plus orc heads, that's over two thousand orc heads total. The King Himself must grant you a new fief for this feat!"

Inside Castle Kalle, as Laurent announced the headcount, the great hall erupted in cheers.

This single haul of heads equaled the total of all their previous major battles combined.

Gervas's lips curled in delight, and his subordinates each offered their flattery in turn.

After a brief pause, Gervas turned to ask about casualties.

This was something he cared deeply about.

"My lord, the Storm Guard suffered nine deaths, twelve serious injuries—but thanks to Young Lady Isabella's aid, none of the seriously wounded are in mortal danger; thirty-five suffered minor injuries, all still fit for combat!"

As he delivered the casualty figures, Laurent's face remained utterly expressionless.

Even Mi Gen and others couldn't help nodding.

Clearly, they were 'satisfied' with the death toll.

After all, war never comes without loss.

Compared to the losses of other nobles' troops, the Storm Legion's casualty-to-kill ratio was undeniably a resounding victory.

Gervas, however, a man from the modern world, long indoctrinated with the equality of life, could not help it.

Hearing the death toll, he still couldn't suppress a slight frown.

After all, when he recalled his subordinates—each one gazing at him with hopeful eyes before departure, laughing and chatting, their families clinging to them in tearful farewells—

Now, they returned only as cold corpses, their living forms never returned to wives, children, or parents.

It made him ache.

"Bury the fallen guards properly, mark their graves clearly. When the war ends, we will return to bring them home. They are heroes of the kingdom—and heroes of Stormhold!"

"Yes, my lord!" At Gervas's words, whether knight or common guard, every eye shone with gratitude.

To treat their subordinates as heroes—such a nobleman could only be their own lord.

And to promise to retrieve their remains after the war—few nobles could ever manage that.

Often, merely digging a shallow pit to bury the guards' bodies was considered generous enough!

…

Time turned to the next day.

The siege of Winter's End continued.

The human position grew increasingly dire.

The Orc King had received nothing but good news daily—but this morning, with Moral's return from the west, his good mood shattered.

"What in the name of the earth happened? Three thousand tribal warriors, three thousand servant troops—and you couldn't overcome a thousand humans?"

"Even if every single human could fight one-on-one with our tribal warriors, that still doesn't justify your defeat—and the loss of over a thousand tribal warriors! Are you all useless, worthless sacks of meat?" The Orc King's roar nearly burst the eardrums of Moral and the others.

The minor chieftains and captains trembled in fear; Moral could only grit his teeth and say, "Your Majesty, at first, we were about to take Castle Kalle."

"But then, suddenly, a deafening roar and blinding fire erupted from within Castle Kalle—and in that instant, countless tribal warriors fell!"

"That fire and thunder even shattered the gentle slope before Castle Kalle... Our warriors, terrified by this sudden phenomenon, believed it was divine punishment—and immediately broke and fled!"

"Seeing the situation, we realized further combat was impossible. To minimize losses, we issued the retreat order..."

"Fire and thunder? Shattered the slope before Castle Kalle? Explain everything—every single detail!" The Orc King finally stepped out of his rage.

He knew Moral's abilities well.

So he understood: Moral and the others had truly encountered something beyond their power.

"Orc King, this is how it happened..." Moral did not delay, recounting every detail since their arrival at Castle Kalle.

After listening, the Orc King's brow furrowed.

"Are you certain you felt no magical fluctuation?"

"Your Majesty, I did sense faint magical fluctuations—but they were extremely weak, even weaker than half of a mid-tier spell!"

Moral had also considered the possibility of human magic.

But human mages always emitted unmistakable magical fluctuations when casting.

On that day, even from afar, he had detected no pre-cast magical energy—only a faint ripple at the very instant of the explosion.

Yet even that ripple was far too weak to sustain such a massive blast.

Hence his confusion—and his instinctive suspicion of divine punishment.

"Perhaps it's a new human magic. These humans may be physically weak, but their minds are sharp!"

"As for divine punishment—if humans truly had divine protection, would they still be trapped inside Winter's End?"

Moral and the minor chieftains froze, then suddenly understood.

Of course—if humans truly had divine aid, would their orc army still be besieging Winter's End?

"Your Majesty is wise!"

The Orc King's expression remained unchanged. "Now, let's discuss whether this was truly a human scheme. Moral, speak."

"Your Majesty, when we arrived, that human noble named Gervas himself admitted it was a human plot!"

"Moreover, as we retreated, they sent Storm Hawks to pursue us—resulting in the death of one Blood Bat Knight who sacrificed himself to cover our withdrawal!"

"Therefore, I believe the human's claim is likely true—we were truly outmaneuvered!"

As he spoke, Moral's eyes burned with hatred.

Twice!

He had been outwitted by humans twice.

Moreover, all of them lost over a thousand beast-race warriors.

Therefore, he now hated that Wei La De to the bone.

The Beast King, however, seemed lost in thought. "Logically speaking, the human army is already surrounded and besieged. What they need most right now is to break out of the encirclement, not to scheme against our thousand-plus beastmen from fifty miles away!"

"Furthermore, according to the scouts' report, around this Lindongcheng there are five such checkpoints in total, three of which are on the west side."

"If the humans truly intended to scheme, then the humans in the other two checkpoints should have moved out as well. When you returned, did they show any unusual activity?"

Moral was stunned for a moment. "This... Beast King Your Majesty, those two human checkpoints showed no unusual activity at all. After seeing us, they were all so scared they hid inside the wooden fortress and didn't dare to move!"

"But Your Majesty, if it wasn't the humans' scheme, the previous Grey Stone Bridge was already coincidence enough. And the humans at Baron Karle's Fort had actually set up magic in advance on the gentle slope. If it wasn't deliberate scheming, how could they have known beforehand that we would go attack, and then made arrangements!"