077: Indirect Harassment

Just as Xue Hui had anticipated, the ratmen forces sent to intercept them certainly numbered more than five hundred.

On the route of the one-eyed Sneech's retreat, a thousand Black Banner Army soldiers were already standing ready in tight formation.

Using the same tactics they had employed against Wu Fan, they left an opening and surrounded on three sides; should Gautrek press forward recklessly in pursuit of glory, he would inevitably face a ruthless attack from three directions.

But Gautrek, known as the Butcher of the Dwarves, possessed not only great strength but also a sharp mind. His relationship with the ratmen was nothing like that of Wu Fan’s—there was neither old nor new enmity—he was simply carrying out Xue Hui’s orders to the letter.

He kept up a relentless pursuit, but at the slightest sign of anything amiss, he would halt immediately.

Gautrek’s wildly exaggerated Mohawk made him unmistakable from afar, and in his hands, a broad-bladed axe served not only as a devastating weapon but also as a shield against arrows.

“They’ve stopped moving! What should we do now?”

A hundred meters away, as he watched the dwarf regiment halt, Hank turned to ask the one-eyed Sneech.

“Pull back until there’s a kilometer between us. We’ll maneuver around them a bit.”

“You take the troops and set up defenses ahead. I’ll pick two hundred elite soldiers and command them myself.”

Sneech’s thinking was crisp and logical. Yang Jie’s orders to him were to delay the enemy as long as possible—how he accomplished it was left to his own devices.

As dusk deepened across the boundless Nosing Plain, night fell with only a faint trace of moonlight.

The human war band stopped at a stretch of level, open ground.

“Inform the entire force: we make camp here!”

“Understood!”

“Jin Li!”

“Here, Chieftain.”

“Send word—have your thousand-strong warhammer regiment camp by the riverbank. Their only duty tonight is to rest. No matter what happens, they are not to interfere.”

“Understood!”

With a sweep of Xue Hui’s arm, the whole army halted in no time. The logistics teams offloaded planks from the supply carts and began setting up camp on the spot.

“Xue Hui sent scouts to survey this area in advance; there’s been no sign of large ratmen forces. There’s no reason to think the main strength of the ratmen is anywhere nearby.”

Five hundred meters in front of the main force, Gautrek and his men remained vigilant, keeping a distance of three hundred meters from the Black Banner Army’s main troops.

It was a long, grueling night.

Sneech had no intention of clashing head-on with Gautrek’s five hundred. It was clear this detachment was Xue Hui’s bait; as the Dwarf King’s main strike force, Gautrek’s shock troops were a world apart from Zhang Wenyuan’s rabble.

If Sneech took the bait, Gautrek was confident he could pin them down. Once the Black Banner Army’s main strength was stalled, the warhammer regiment, only five hundred meters behind, would press forward relentlessly in pursuit.

The Black Banner Army, far from gaining any advantage, risked being swallowed whole. Xue Hui held overwhelming numerical superiority and would have welcomed a decisive battle with the ratmen on the plains.

Of course, Sneech was no fool—on the open plain, to engage without numerical superiority would be sheer folly.

But the night could not be wasted...

As darkness settled, Sneech led two hundred elite Black Banner soldiers in a wide arc around Gautrek’s defensive detachment.

Having arrived half a day earlier, they had already scouted the terrain thoroughly. Using the cover of night, they moved to the right flank of Xue Hui’s main army.

“All troops, rest and stay alert. Assemble again in three hours!”

“Set up a watch rotation—keep a close eye on those humans!”

“Understood!”

Sneech’s tactical focus was clear: not to inflict the greatest possible casualties, but to delay the enemy’s march.

With nearly twenty thousand enemies encamped at night, there was no hope of catching them unprepared; a frontal assault was out of the question. But Sneech had his own plans.

The night was still; three hours slipped by in a flash...

“First group, assemble and prepare to move!”

At Sneech’s command, the first group sprang into action.

He had split the two hundred into two groups of a hundred each.

...

Before long, Liu Wei, camped five hundred meters from Sneech, was deep in a dream.

Suddenly, from the eastern edge of the encampment came a burst of frantic shouts and clashing steel.

“Enemy attack! Enemy attack!”

Someone in the camp was shouting at the top of their lungs.

Startled awake, Liu Wei threw on his clothes and grabbed his weapon, stepping outside under the protection of his personal guard.

“What’s going on?”

He seized a panicked human soldier and demanded an answer.

“I don’t know, Chieftain! I just heard someone yell ‘enemy attack’ and ran out, but I didn’t see any enemies.”

A hundred meters further east, Sneech and a hundred Black Banner soldiers were shouting at full volume—

“Enemy attack! Enemy attack! Run for your lives!”

Sneech’s plan was obvious: he had no intention of attacking, but he wasn’t about to let the humans get a good night’s sleep either.

The two hundred were divided into two shifts—one for the first half of the night, the other for the second.

Liu Wei was roused from sleep several times that night, to say nothing of the suffering endured by the common soldiers.

There was nothing to be done but curse the ratmen for their treachery and cunning. A poor night’s rest would certainly hamper their march the next day, yet they had no answer.

Unfamiliarity with the terrain was part of the problem—who knew what ambushes might await if they gave chase?

Moreover, the ratmen’s small size allowed them to disappear instantly into the tall grass, scampering swiftly on all fours over the uneven ground.

Unlike humans, who would easily sink into puddles, the ratmen’s mobility was vastly superior.

That night, most of the human soldiers found no rest. Sneech’s two hundred Black Banner soldiers worked in shifts to harass them, leaving Liu Wei, who camped closest, in utter misery.

Down by the river, Xue Hui lay flat on a bed of dried grass, snoring loudly, utterly undisturbed by the commotion outside.

He had plugged his ears with makeshift wooden plugs, carved from water-soaked twigs, to block out the noise.

He’d predicted that the ratmen would come to harass them at night, but not dare assault the camp outright.

This wasn’t like those television dramas, where two hundred men sneak into the enemy camp by night, burn the supplies, kill a thousand, and capture the commander alive. That was sheer nonsense—when the enemy knows you’re nearby, how could they possibly be caught unprepared?

Even if they were unprepared, two hundred men could hardly turn the world upside down. Even in the late Han Dynasty and Three Kingdoms period, the ancients had developed their own sophisticated systems for marching and warfare.

Like the old tales where someone opens a mysterious pouch at a critical moment and shouts, “The Chancellor truly foresaw everything!”—such stories were pure fancy.

...

Nevertheless, Sneech’s tactics clearly disrupted the enemy, successfully delaying their advance and buying precious time for the preparations at the rear.

Throughout the journey, Sneech used every trick to harry the enemy, while Hank led the Black Banner Army’s main force in a psychological standoff with Gautrek.

Though the results were not immediately apparent, the enemy’s rhythm and morale were undoubtedly shaken.

A march that should have reached Highcourt City in ten days now took thirteen, thanks to Sneech’s delaying tactics—

Winning three vital days for the defense of the main city.