Chapter 882: Willing to Be the Blade

"My lord, the subterranean waterway front has stabilized."

Henwell lets out a long breath after hearing Cumberland's report.

At least the situation has stopped deteriorating. That was far too close.

A collapse of the subterranean waterway front would trigger a chain reaction.

Lumir would be devastated and lose its ability to organize its people and sustain production.

The Western Lumir Federation would be helpless against the calamity creatures.

That would also allow the Subterranean River Bandits to threaten the Western Federation's forward territories directly.

The new lands Peace Haven has seized in the Western Federation would then face attacks from the Lightchaser and the Subterranean River Bandits on opposite sides.

Whether to protect Livos, which is already within its grasp, or to rescue Henwell's father and his family, Peace Haven would have to commit itself fully to the war.

If the Subterranean River Bandits also poured out and struck Ogiro's defensive line, the situation would become worse still.

Peace Haven could be completely cut off from the expeditionary zone, and the brewing crisis in Ogiro would erupt even sooner.

Refugees would pour into Peace Haven and place an enormous strain on its resources.

Worse, Peace Haven would have to face the Subterranean River Bandits and the Quiet Forest Wanderers alone.

An uncontrolled Calamity War is no great opportunity, whatever the ignorant might think. For Peace Haven, it means all cost and no gain.

Henwell begins reviewing the campaign.

Sera had launched his attack on the third day after taking command.

His counteroffensive was divided into three phases.

In the first phase, he checked the Subterranean River Bandits' advance and stabilized the second defensive line.

He used the strike group's mobility to cut the enemy's lines apart.

The fortress clusters serving as strategic strongpoints were relieved. The mobile combat battalions then rapidly concentrated around them.

The second phase began with a reorganization of the second defensive line. Once it was secure, Lumir's eldest prince was left in charge there.

On the ninth day, Sera detached four legions to carry out a textbook strategic feint.

They made a show of advancing to relieve the core fortress cluster on the first defensive line, forcing the enemy to intercept them.

Once the enemy had been drawn out, Sera again exploited the strike group's mobility.

By the time the enemy scouts realized what was happening, it was too late.

Each legion carrying out the feint had two mobile warbands nearby to support it.

The enemy had barely formed up to meet an infantry warband's assault when both supporting warbands struck hard.

With the enemy formation in disarray, the infantry legion pressed forward and routed it.

A mobile warband followed each retreating enemy force at a measured pace, driving it onward.

The pursuers drained the fugitives' strength, allowing them neither rest nor a chance to form an effective defensive formation.

The enemy needed to cover the retreat of those tens of thousands of survivors and hold back the coalition's advance.

To do so, it unleashed a legion-scale spell: Torrential Rain Spell.

The downpour was intended to halt the coalition's pursuit temporarily, speed the enemy's own march, and wash away its tracks.

This was exactly what Sera had been waiting for.

On reaching the front, Sera had studied the intelligence and recognized the enemy's weather magic as the main obstacle to the relief operation.

The counterattack could only succeed if he destroyed the enemy's spellcaster formation.

All the earlier fighting had been intended to help the scouts narrow their search and locate the formation's general position.

Sera personally led the Ninth Warband forward, traveling light. They crossed the front ahead of the main advance and moved into the enemy's rear.

After lying hidden for three days, they finally established the spellcaster formation's exact location.

Another secret march brought them to a point the formation would have to pass.

When it cast its weather magic, the powerful extraordinary fluctuations could be sensed from several miles away.

The rest would be easy.

The Ninth Warband ate the last of its food, drank stamina-restoring potions, and rode straight for the target.

Sera's timing was exact. When the enemy discovered the Ninth Warband, its spellcasters were caught in an impossible position.

If they continued casting the weather magic, they would have no means of stopping the cavalry warband bearing down on them.

Switching to another kind of strategic magic would take time. They were also short of mana and spellcasting materials.

Soon they no longer had to agonize over the choice.

The Ninth Warband had already activated the "War" aura. The more than seven thousand elite subterranean troops guarding the spellcasters could not withstand its charge.

The guards had no time even to adjust their formation before the Ninth Warband hit them at full speed and swept them aside.

After breaking through that last barrier, the riders discarded their damaged Heart-Piercing Lotuses and drew fresh ones from behind their saddles.

For this operation, Sera had requisitioned every stored Heart-Piercing Lotus along the entire front.

His aim had been to equip every soldier with at least three, so they could tear through the enemy's defenses as quickly as possible.

As the Ninth Warband charged into the spellcaster formation, Heart-Piercing Lotuses flashed again and again. The enemy's high-ranking spellcasters still tried to mount a final counterattack.

But Sera and the other three Iron Knights were at the head of the charge. They ran several of the mana-depleted high-ranking spellcasters through.

A one-sided slaughter followed. The Ninth Warband's soldiers drew their cavalry sabers. At more than a hundred kilometers per hour, a passing cut was enough to slice an enemy open.

The battle that decided the campaign was very brief.

From the first enemy warning to the end of the fighting, only a little over half an hour passed.

The Ninth Warband's orders were to kill every enemy spellcaster it could find.

Only after that task was complete were the soldiers to hunt down the scattered elite guards.

Once they confirmed that the enemy's three-thousand-strong spellcasting unit had been wiped out, the Ninth Warband immediately withdrew.

They avoided the retreat route of the enemy's frontline troops and went back into hiding.

The second phase lasted five days. Nearly a hundred thousand Subterranean River Bandits and more than twenty thousand elite subterranean troops were destroyed. Most important of all, the enemy spellcaster formation was eliminated.

The enemy was now desperately short of effective troops between the first and second defensive lines.

A ten-day period of rest and reorganization followed.

Sera used the time to work through the problems along the second defensive line.

Lumir's eldest prince proved decisive in the crisis.

He trusted Sera completely. Whatever problem Sera raised, the prince dealt with it.

Officers were dismissed or beheaded as required, without hesitation.

Many corrupt officers from powerful noble families were dealt with, along with several members of the royal family.

The eldest prince even ordered the execution of two men from his own family: his younger cousin and his younger sister's husband.

Large numbers of junior officers were promoted in their place. The more than ten legions along the defensive line took on a new spirit.

Sera was busy executing men, but he still found time to kill calamity creatures.

The Mobile Strike Group settled into the rhythm it liked best.

The warbands divided the area into sectors, then swept between the two defensive lines in combat battalions.

They swept the area in a broad net, wiping out small groups and surrounding and destroying larger ones.

Whenever they found a tougher target, they called in reinforcements, encircled it, and cut it apart.