Trenches, Guns, and Magic

The smoke and stench of blood in Bucharest faded over these past few days. The Romanian capital, newly baptized by fire, finally began to recover as refugees gradually returned.

Although the rubble and craters on the streets had yet to be cleared, at least they didn't have to worry about monsters crawling out of the sewers to attack them.

Regarding this, Kleist commented that the cleanup was handled better than Paris. After all, the Gallic capital remained the favorite negative energy gathering spot for all necromancers.

Even with strict lockdowns, minor scoundrels still managed to sneak in constantly...

In contrast, Bucharest could remain habitable once the city was cleaned up and rebuilt.

During this period, Morin found himself enjoying a rare stretch of leisure.

Cleaning up the mess after capturing a city involved plenty of work; in his view, it wasn't much easier than the actual fighting.

Pacifying civilians, re-establishing urban defense order, and setting up a ceasefire line with the peripheral Romanian Kingdom forces...

For a "military commander" like Morin, just hearing about these tasks caused a headache.

He decisively delegated these headaches to his officer corps, letting them handle most of the tedious foundational work—which was their actual job anyway.

As for the more crucial task of negotiating with the high command of the returning Romanian forces, Morin pushed it directly onto Lieutenant General Marwitz.

In the temporary command post courtyard, Lieutenant General Marwitz held a freshly drafted temporary ceasefire agreement. He looked up at Morin, who was rocking back and forth in a chair on the other side, looking rather bored.

"Colonel Morin, are you sure you want to hand such an important task over to me?"

Lieutenant General Marwitz dragged his folding camp chair over, sat down next to Morin, and couldn't help but add, "You personally led the troops to capture this capital..."

Morin stopped rocking his chair, waved his hand at Marwitz, and flashed a smile that hid his true thoughts.

"General, I am only a colonel... Having me haggle with those Romanian generals is inappropriate given my rank~"

"You are a Lieutenant General of the Army, senior and experienced. You can definitely hold the room better than I can. It's only fitting that you handle this."

Lieutenant General Marwitz looked at the document in his hand, then at Morin, experiencing a complex mix of emotions.

He knew Morin was making excuses.

Who could use rank to suppress a ruthless man who charged through a heavy vampire siege, penetrated the royal palace, and killed the Romanian King inside?

Morin clearly didn't want to deal with the trivia, smoothly passing the credit into Marwitz's hands.

Although it wasn't commanding a combat operation, negotiating with the defeated nation's high command, hosting the surrender, and managing the aftermath would be a brilliant stroke on any Imperial officer's resume.

Furthermore, the Romanian army had lost its will to fight. No matter how you looked at it, this wasn't a difficult job.

At this moment, Lieutenant General Marwitz finally understood the Army rumor— officers partnering with Colonel Morin received light-speed promotions.

It wasn't just that Morin's strength secured massive military achievements; Colonel Morin was also an unselfish person.

On the contrary, he willingly shared credit with others. This was clearly a rare and valuable trait...

Colonel Friedrich is indeed an outstanding Imperial soldier with a heart of gold. Befriending him brings only benefits.

Lieutenant General Marwitz silently reached this conclusion.

With Lieutenant General Marwitz fully taking over the matter, Morin enjoyed some rare free time to carefully study his trophy, the "Dark Sword," which the Holy See personnel had helped process.

【Dark Sword (Legendary Magic Weapon)】

【This is a weapon with an "evil" alignment. Prolonged use carries a certain probability of causing alignment abnormalities in the wielder.】

【You gain a high bonus to attack rolls and damage when using this magic weapon.】

【Whenever you reduce a creature to 0 HP using the Dark Sword, the sword slays the creature and devours its soul. A creature whose soul is devoured by the Dark Sword can only be restored to life through resurrection.】

【Devour: When the Dark Sword devours a soul, it grants you temporary HP equal to the slain creature's maximum HP. These HP disappear after 24 hours. As long as these temporary HP persist and you hold the Dark Sword, you have advantage on attack rolls, saving throws, and ability checks.】

【Bloodthirst: The Dark Sword allows you to cast 【Vampiric Touch】 once per day, and you decide when to cast the spell.】

【The Dark Sword is an awakened weapon of Lawful Evil alignment. It can speak, read, and understand Latin and Romance languages, and can communicate telepathically with its wielder.】

【The Dark Sword completely refuses to communicate with you in any way.】

After carefully reviewing the Dark Sword's attributes, Morin realized this was the first time his "cheat" displayed this specific condition.

This surprised him.

Initially, he even wondered if his brain lacked the corresponding fonts, but he quickly discarded that absurd possibility.

Unable to make sense of it after some study, Morin temporarily set the question aside.

Regardless, this weapon made him significantly harder to kill. On the battlefield, he could even snowball into a monster with a health bar longer than his field of vision.

The only issue was the potential impact of the so-called "alignment abnormality"...

Aside from studying his "trophy," Morin also took time to rest properly.

However, Morin's idea of "rest" differed from the average person's understanding.

The instruction unit set up a temporary training ground outside the city. The terrifying noises coming from here every day made it a must-visit "tourist spot" for many companies after their own training concluded...

"Bang!"

With a muffled thud, a macho man wearing "Thunder Warrior Armor" was thrown out like a broken sack, hitting the mud heavily and dragging out a long trail.

"Whoa~"

The spectating instruction unit soldiers gasped in awe, agreeing that today's visit was well worth it.

The person thrown out was none other than the commander of the Thunder Warriors, known among the instruction unit as the "Macho Man among Macho Men," Klaus.

After lying on the ground for a while, Klaus flexed his armor and struggled to his feet. The voice coming from under his helmet carried obvious resignation.

"Commander, your strength has increased significantly again, hasn't it? My armor and I weigh nearly half a ton together. Did you just toss me one-handed?"

"Correction, I used two hands~"

In the center of the training ground, Morin stood shirtless, rolling his shoulders as he spoke.

"But it feels like I haven't reached my limit yet..."

Recently, Morin had been seizing every moment to adapt to his body, which had now reached 65% modification progress.

Strength, speed, and neural reflexes were all improving by a terrifying margin.

Initially, Klaus and the other Thunder Warriors took turns facing Morin in heavy armor, barely managing to trade a few blows and hold him off slightly.

But as Morin gained proficiency over his new body, these one-on-one sparring sessions turned into one-sided beatdowns. Throwing the Thunder Warriors around like sacks even became a staple routine.

Thinking of this, Morin turned to look at the other Thunder Warriors watching from the sidelines and beckoned them over.

"This time, all of you come at me together. Test my limits~"

"We won't hold back then, Commander!"

"Just to clarify, Commander, no spells allowed!"

"Right! Let's have a fight between real men!"

The Thunder Warriors spoke with muffled voices before stepping up beside Klaus and dropping into offensive stances. The surrounding instruction unit soldiers started cheering.

"Fight between real men! Fight between real men!"

Morin chuckled at the chants. He nodded, stretched briefly, and lowered his stance, ready to strike.

"I won't use spells, but I'll go all out this round~"

Klaus: "...Wait..."

"Start!"

"Boom!"

The moment he said start, Morin vanished from his spot. In the next second, he crashed into the Thunder Warriors' formation like a monster.

Clashing flesh directly against steel was clearly disadvantageous. So Morin relied on his agility, dodging and weaving while constantly striking the weak points of their armor.

To ensure the Thunder Warriors' mobility, the armor featured special structural designs. The joints and connections lacked hard armor plating.

Facing standard enemies in real combat, these weak points weren't easy to hit.

But with Morin in close quarters, focusing his attacks on these vulnerabilities was child's play...

The spectating instruction unit soldiers went from boisterous cheering to dead silence, watching Morin toss the Thunder Warriors out one by one until he was the only man left standing in the center of the training ground.

To the instruction soldiers, the Thunder Warriors were god-like figures of war. Yet in front of Colonel Morin, this training session looked like an adult bullying children.

"Alright, that's it for today. Good work, everyone~"

Morin walked over, pulled Klaus and the others off the ground one by one, then returned to the sidelines to wipe his sweat with a towel.

Not far away, Helga hugged a thick notebook, staring unblinking at Morin.

"Are you here to discuss the weapon testing?" Morin walked over and asked.

Helga snapped back to reality, blushing and nodding, then handed Morin a canteen.

Morin took it, took a large gulp, and continued, "So how did the field tests go?"

"Perfectly, Boss!" Helga's tone carried uncontainable excitement. "The new weapons and accessories we brought received excellent combat feedback from the frontline troops."

The girl opened the notebook and showed Morin some key information.

"First, the pump-action shotguns. When clearing trenches and in urban combat, their close-range firepower dominance completely surpassed submachine guns! The point men now prefer to carry a shotgun to clear the way when securing buildings!"

"As for our improvements to the Mauser large-caliber anti-armor rifle, they proved highly effective. The massive reduction in recoil allows the instruction unit shooters to maintain a higher rate of fire while keeping reliable accuracy."

Morin nodded. This was within his expectations. After all, these were classic designs proven by fire in another world; there was no reason they wouldn't perform well here.

As for the optical sights equipped on the Gew98 rifles and M1915 semi-automatic rifles, and the suppressors issued for rifles and light machine guns, they were kept entirely within the instruction unit.

The point men responsible for forward reconnaissance gave these "tactical fashion accessories" extremely high praise.

Currently, the instruction unit's reconnaissance detachments, especially the combat reconnaissance teams penetrating deep into dangerous areas, all carried optical sights and suppressors.

This not only improved their situational awareness but also provided stealth, preventing the enemy from quickly locating the source of gunfire.

In Morin's view, these improvements were indeed quite advanced, truly acting as "force multipliers" for the frontline soldiers.

However, seeing World War I era armies extensively equipped with optical sights and suppressors...

He had only seen that in the virtual world of Battlefield 1.

As for the Holy See, Cleric Cristiano finally woke up after sleeping for about 18 hours.

The cleric then received an urgent telegram from the Vatican, learning about the bombardment of Naples, the theft of the heart, and that the Papal State had officially declared war on the Britannians.

It felt like waking up to find the world turned upside down~

When Morin heard he was awake and went to check on the macho man, the expression on Cristiano's face looked very familiar to Morin—

It was roughly the expression of someone who led their team to push the enemy high ground, only to realize their own base was flanked by a rogue assassin.

Cleric Cristiano also noted that Morin's caution had been justified, though it was too late to say so now.

Afterward, Cleric Cristiano led his team to carefully search the ruins of the Old Royal Palace and the surrounding area again.

Morin even had Ludwig and the others pilot Armored Knights to help excavate the ruins and locate the hidden underground space.

Only after confirming that everything related to the vampires here had indeed been destroyed did Cleric Cristiano and the other Holy See personnel breathe a sigh of relief.

After Morin's training session ended this afternoon, the Holy See delegation was also preparing to return to the Vatican.

When Morin found them, the clerics were on the field landing pad, preparing to board an airship.

Seeing Morin, Cleric Cristiano walked over warmly and extended his hand.

"Colonel, thank you again for your assistance in this operation... Without you, who knows what this disaster would have evolved into. The victims might not have been limited to the civilians of Bucharest."

Morin shook his hand and smiled.

"You have it backward. It's our side that needs to thank the Holy See for its assistance... We were only able to resolve the Bucharest crisis because we had professionals like you."

"Regardless, Colonel, you have earned the Holy See's respect. It's just a pity that what I said after the battle seems to have come true..."

Cristiano released his hand and spoke earnestly. "Since the Britannians took the heart, they certainly won't just keep it as a collectible. This means the vampire crisis might not be entirely over. Under Britannian control, it might trigger an even greater crisis..."

Morin: "We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. There's always a way. Cleric... I look forward to fighting alongside you again."

"I look forward to it as well, until all heretics are purified..."

Cleric Cristiano revealed a rare hint of a smile, turned, and boarded the airship.

Soon, the L16 armored airship slowly ascended and began retrieving the landing pad. It wouldn't be returning directly to Bucharest.

This airship wasn't just tasked with transporting Cristiano and his men back to Austro-Hungarian territory for their onward journey to the Vatican; it also had to pick up a group of Saxon diplomats along the way.

The L16's final destination was another city in the Kingdom of Romania, where they would negotiate with representatives of the Romanian provisional government, aiming to force the country out of the war as quickly as possible.

Watching the airship disappear into the horizon, Morin let out a long sigh of relief.

The war in Bucharest had finally come to a true close.

He figured he could enjoy at least a few more days of leisure to train the troops properly, especially his previously envisioned plan to convert the 12th Guards Reserve Cavalry Regiment into an "Armored Cavalry Regiment."

He had already applied to the Crown Prince and the General Staff for this proposal and received approval. Exploring new tactics was originally one of the instruction unit's core duties.

However, just as this thought crossed his mind, a communications officer from the Kampfgruppe command post hurried over to him.

"Colonel! Urgent telegram from the Fifth Army Command!"

The communications staff officer jumped out of his small car, delivered a crisp salute, and handed over a decoded telegram.

Morin's heart skipped a beat, a sudden bad premonition washing over him.

He opened the telegram and scanned it quickly.

The next second, his brows furrowed tightly. The relaxed comfort that had just surfaced on his face vanished completely.

"Can't a guy get a little 'leisure time'?"

Sender: 5th Army Headquarters

Recipient: Kampfgruppe Morin (Bucharest Sector)

Number: Operational No. 447 / Classified Location / Date: 5th Army Headquarters, June 19, 1915

Subject: Immediate Deployment to the Kingdom of Bulgaria

Urgent! - Top Secret!

"Kampfgruppe Morin," currently resting in Bucharest, is to cease resting immediately.

The Kampfgruppe must board the L15 armored airship with its most elite forces and rush to the aid of Sofia, capital of the Kingdom of Bulgaria, at maximum speed.

Enemy Situation: Kingdom of Greece forces have advanced to approximately 20 kilometers southwest of Sofia. Enemy pressure has continuously increased in recent days.

Important Enemy Characteristics: Suspected Holy Britannia Empire mage units are accompanying and supporting the enemy combat forces.

Command Structure: Upon landing in Sofia, "Kampfgruppe Morin" will retain independent combat functions and operate in coordination with local allied forces. The L15 armored airship will be under Colonel Morin's command until the combat mission concludes.

Due to time constraints, no inquiries will be accepted during the transfer phase.

Attachments: None

Issued by: Commander of the 5th Army, Georg (remainder omitted)