When the Saintess Arrives, No King Exist

The blaring bugle echoed through the heavens and earth, startling countless birds in the groves.

The drumbeats quickened, accompanied by orbs of Divine Art descending upon the soldiers.

The formal assault had commenced.

Rows of neatly aligned boots stomped down, kicking up clouds of dust beneath their knees.

The soldiers rested their long spears or spring-loaded rifles on their shoulders, palms supporting them, marching in step with the drumbeat.

Pebbles bounced, and even the frogs in the small pond couldn’t help but poke their heads out.

Every step was taken with utmost stability; it seemed slow, but in reality, it was not.

Incorporating the Holy Alliance’s drill manual and modifying it according to the Falan temperament resulted in this unique Falan tactical system.

Sunlight glinted off the shiny spear tips, but the reflected light failed to brighten the matte black rifle muzzles.

"Spread half a step to each side!"

At the officer’s command, standing on the hill, Zeao could clearly see the once somewhat loose formation becoming sparser.

This signaled entry into the shooting range of the blood covenant rifles.

Although the drill manual stated that soldiers needed to stand shoulder to shoulder to maintain courage,

standing shoulder to shoulder led to concentrated hits by lead bullets. Thus, Falan maintained morale with courage through Divine Art.

The first wave of attack began!

"Twelve-pound cannon, fire densely at the left wing!"

With three-pound small cannons rapidly firing at the front of the formation, and six-pound cannons lob shots from behind, Zeao was not to be outdone.

As the heavy artillery command was issued, massive iron balls shot out explosively, landing on the left-wing battlefield not far away.

The left-wing battlefield was on the edge of a village, with not only the village entrance paths but also fences and several large shade trees.

Zeao knew very well that with the current situation and distance, a few rounds of ranging are necessary to hit the targets.

So this round of artillery was merely for interference, with random trajectories.

There was no choice; this battle arose so quickly, they hadn’t even had time to survey the battlefield or perform initial range adjustments.

The dense cannonballs bounced on the left-wing battlefield, toppling two houses, and tearing down a section of fence.

One even precisely hit the pond, causing frogs that were watching curiously to soar into the sky with the water column.

Pond water rained down sparsely, causing more than a few high-level vampires to change expression.

With such powerful cannons, even a glancing hit could be quite painful.

However, not all cannonballs missed the enemy.

Thanks to the weather, today was a sunny day, providing a vast field of view and a rather hard ground.

To their surprise, two iron balls penetrated the enemy formation.

Due to the long distance, the entry angle of the twelve-pound cannon became shallow, easily achieving the task of ricocheting like skipping stones.

The two iron balls bounced within the vampire ranks, severing limbs and flesh, and even several blood basins were overturned.

Even when not bouncing, merely rolling iron balls could shatter the shins of those blocking their path.

Standing atop the hill, holding up a spyglass, Zeao couldn’t help but break into a smile.

The two lines of vampire formation were nearly severed in half by the artillery, causing disorder in the ranks.

Combined with the six-pound and three-pound cannons below, the vampires facing them had already fallen into considerable chaos.

Due to the blood mist obstructing their view, Zeao even vaguely sensed the shadows of deserters.

However, all the high-level vampires were there, easily leading the supervisory squad to behead these vampires.

"Continue calibration," Zeao said confidently, waving his hand to let the sleeve slip down, "Bring smoke!"

His nephew, the adjutant, promptly pulled out tobacco and a pipe, handing them to his uncle during this brief lull in the battle.

Taking two deep puffs of the pipe, exhaling a smoke ring, Zeao sent messengers down the hill to claim credit while continuing to observe the battlefield for opportunities.

It had to be said that these vampires chose a poor day to attack.

For several consecutive days, it had been rainy weather, considered the vampires’ domain.

Yet, just as both sides came within fighting range, the morning suddenly turned sunny today.

The vampire army immediately wanted to retreat, but it was too late; they were surrounded by the coalition summoned by Duke Villar and had to fight.

If it weren’t for those blood basins, they would have likely suffered a massive defeat right at the start.

Just their bad luck, Zeao blew a smoke ring: "Hmm, entering firing range, adjust the elevation angle, don’t hit our own troops."

"Understood."

Just as Zeao said, soon both sides entered the maximum firing range.

As if some unseen signal had been issued, the officers from both sides simultaneously shouted: "Prepare to fire!"

The spring-loaded rifles, leaned against their shoulders, were removed, and lead bullets wrapped in Holy Oil were inserted into the barrels, rammed back to the firing pins with ramrods.

A series of creaks immediately resounded through the Falan ranks, followed by the click of locks tightening, concluding the winding process.

The vampires opposite were equally unwilling to be outdone, also starting to load ammunition.

The blood covenant rifles could actually directly fire blood bullets.

But most vampires still prefer using iron pellets, as blood pellets are too fragile and internally inconsistently condensed.

When striking armor, it’s easy to cause only blunt impact damage without penetrating.

They took the blood-sucking vine from their lower back, wrapped one end around their arm, and placed the other end on the clip of the blood contract gun.

The index finger dripped a drop of blood into the small opening of the blood contract gun, and the blood-sucking vine immediately snaked into the gun barrel.

In an instant, the previously transparent white obsidian tube turned light red, crimson, dark red.

Once the color changed to dark red, the vampires immediately took scissors and clipped a section of the blood-sucking vine.

The distance between both sides had already closed to about one hundred and thirty meters.

It’s time.

Tsao silently recited in his heart, and then simultaneously, the sound of dense gunfire erupted across the fields.

Whether on the side of the Falan or the Royal Court, a spray of blood flowers burst forth, and many people immediately fell.

The difference was that when humans fell, they clutched their wounds, turned pale, and cried out in pain.

When low-level vampires fell, their wounds seemed to burn, rising with wisps of smoke,

The wound clearly wasn’t large, yet it caused them to roll around in agony, visibly listless, even fainting.

Against regular lead bullets, unless hitting the heart or head, other internal organs didn’t bother the vampires.

Even if their arms broke, they could stop bleeding themselves without relying on any external means.

The real pain for them was from the layer of Holy Oil wrapped around the lead bullets.

The sound of the spring-loaded cannon echoed from behind, Tsao took a complicated drag on his cigarette.

This scene differs from the stories his father told him in childhood.

The once unpredictable battlefield situations, formation changes, and valor were all gone.

What remained was a mechanical advance, stop, aim, fire, reload, advance again in fixed patterns...

Every meter of progress showed soldiers from both sides continually falling, yet the actions repeated constantly.

Tsao sighed, having to admit that this kind of battlefield was truly meaningless.

The first wave of attack clearly failed, with large casualties prompting a mass retreat.

However, this didn’t matter because the second wave of attack followed closely behind.

In a sense, the first wave was merely a shield for the second wave.

Even though the Falan army claimed to be without class, most noble offspring were arranged in the second wave.

As for the first wave, it was filled with children of commoners.

Of course, if the second wave lost, the first wave would become the third wave to continue the attack.

In a way, there was a sophistic kind of fairness.

But today, it seemed there was no chance for that.

As the second wave pressed the attack, the distance between the sides quickly closed to thirty or fifty meters.

The captain of the nine-column elite squad lowered his visor, drew his longsword: "Charge!"

Under the cover of lead bullets, the formerly nine-column melee soldiers swung their halberds and greatswords, charging towards the enemy.

Meanwhile, the third and fourth generation intermediate vampires in the vampire ranks also began their melee counterattack.

This flesh-and-blood struggle was no different from the century-old wars of the past.

The only difference was the Falan armor was lighter and had higher protection.

After all, the Alchemy Revolution brought by the Holy Alliance spread, not only boosting the productivity of the Falan but spilling over into the entire empire.

Divine Art and undead spells splattered, while a large number of Skeleton Soldiers surged forward only to be smashed by the arriving Military Police Knights.

Those heavily armored Extraordinary Knights descended like divine soldiers from the side into the vampire array.

Under the two-fold assault, the vampire phalanx confronted by the elite squad swiftly collapsed, rapidly spreading apart.

"We’ve won... no, you can’t say it like that." Tsao wiped the sweat from his forehead, knowing well that bad things often happened when people thought that, "Let’s say we won a round first."

The elite squad wouldn’t miss this opportunity, quickly pursuing and pushing forward, tearing through the enemy’s entire formation.

The previously solid bloodline soon dispersed into blood rats fleeing chaotically across the hills.

Honestly, these vampires didn’t seem all that formidable.

Tsao continued to issue orders, targeting the vampire center for bombardment to cover the next action.

He picked up binoculars, continuing to observe the battlefield, but suddenly jerked his gaze back to the left wing.

"No, what’s that?" Tsao widened his eyes, watching for a few seconds before abruptly turning, handing the binoculars to his nephew.

"You’ve got sharp eyes, take a look, what is it?"

Picking up the binoculars, young Beizayez watched for a while, then hesitantly spoke: "Armored ogres? No, how come they’re wearing plate armor, and they’re so tall?"

"Turn the cannon, continue bombarding the left wing!"

Tsao had just issued the command when he froze entirely, even his hair stood on end.

Because just at the moment he spoke those words, in that quiet instant, he heard the whirring sound of wind above.

"Haha, I can’t let you bombard our Blood Titan Knights."