Chapter 174: Grand Beast Gorge
The Grand Beast Gorge was quite far from Roshire Plains so the march took about nine days before they reached the periphery of the gorge.
Fredrinn stared at the steep hills and the shallow river in between them. His eyes swept over every spot where the enemies could be possibly hidden.
With a sharp whistle, he signaled to the two Soaring Red Eyed Eagles, commanding them to investigate the gorge. He then gave a hand signal to the troops, telling them to halt their march.
"Let's stay here. Tell everyone to wait for my instructions." Fredrinn muttered to Bernard.
Hearing his command, the latter nodded before he turned around and left to convey his instructions to the troops.
Before coming here, he already had some information on the enemy's commander and troops.
The enemy troops had over one hundred thousand soldiers, roughly the same number they had. However, the individual strength of their soldiers was higher by a few layers since they were an army composed of elite fighters and veteran martial practitioners. They valued quality over quantity. Furthermore, their commander was also a half-step Void Tempering powerhouse who was said to be close to comprehending a full Intent!
While everyone stood nervously awaiting his commands, Fredrinn continued his observation of the gorge using his spiritual perception.
After advancing to the 7th layer of the Nascent Soul realm, he had already awakened three of his soul nodules, making his spiritual power more robust and powerful. Normal spirit attacks that affect the mind would no longer work on him.
'Going through the river would be suicidal since the enemies might be hiding behind the hills, but if we march to the top of the hill, there might be traps they laid down in advance.'
Fredrinn thought of the best path they should take from this point on, but he found himself stumped, unable to come up with a feasible solution.
In the end, he could only shake his head helplessly. He didn't find anything after using his spiritual perception. This means that the enemies had laid down an array formation that blocked his spiritual power.
'They are more prepared than I thought.'
It was impossible for the enemies to know about their movements since Nate was already dead.
Fredrinn guessed that the enemies must have already predicted that they would be the next target after Roshire Plains was conquered.
'Their commander is a cautious man, not like Gregor who was complacent and arrogant. This could be tricky.'
After less than an hour of aerial observation, the two eagles returned. They descended in front of Fredrinn and rubbed their heads on his body.
The two eagles emitted cawing sounds as they conveyed what they had observed.
With his continuous interaction with the two creatures, he could already communicate some simple sentences with them.
According to the eagles, the enemy troops were hiding beneath the hills. Furthermore, the eagles also reported that they had spotted some weird clumps of stones scattered all over the nearby hills.
When Fredrinn heard this, the first thing that came to his mind was 'bomb'.
Blue Sky Kingdom already had an artillery technology so he wouldn't be surprised if they had created an item similar to the bombs in his home world.
Fredrinn felt fortunate that he didn't command the troops to march to the hills. Otherwise, they would have fallen into the enemy's trap by now.
Just the thought of it made his skin crawl.
He might be fine since he had the Armor of Eternal Strength, but the soldiers wouldn't be the same.
'How could I use this information to our advantage?' Fredrinn thought deeply while rubbing his chin with his thumb and forefinger.
A while later, an idea came to his mind.
"Summon the commanders!" He shouted.
***
On the other side of the gorge, an army was hidden beneath the hills. They covered their armor with thick leaves which camouflaged their presence.
At this moment, a person whose face was smudged with dirt looked up at the hills and frowned. He then turned his head to look at the person beside him. "Sir, we still haven't gotten any news from our spy. It's almost two weeks since we lost contact with him."
The person he was speaking to was a lean and scholarly-looking middle-aged man who looked to be in his mid-forties. His armor was also covered with a mix of dry and fresh leaves.
"Nate isn't a careless man. Something must have happened on his side. Let's be patient and wait for his report." The scholarly-looking middle-aged man replied, but he was also uncertain about Nate's situation.
This middle-aged man was the commander of the Sky Slaying Army, Amil Galantos, a powerhouse at the half-step of the Void Tempering realm!
More than ten days ago, they received a letter from their spy that Fredrinn's army had already clashed with Gregor's troops.
Since then, they had meticulously laid down some traps in case Fredrinn's troops would target them next.
It has been almost two weeks since they last received a message from their spy and there was still no news.
Amil didn't want to admit it, but he guessed that something had already happened to him. Knowing Fredrinn's fearsome reputation, it wasn't impossible for an elite spy to fall under his schemes.
Although Amil was confident in his army's strength, he didn't really want to fight against Fredrinn's troops. However, he had no choice since they had been commanded to stay at the Grand Beast Gorge.
Thinking about the ongoing internal conflict in the Blue Sky Kingdom, Amil could only sigh.
The main reason why the Blue Sky Kingdom deployed a large number of their troops here was because of the confrontation between the princes who were vying for the throne.
The ruler of the Blue Sky Kingdom has been bedridden so the situation in the kingdom was chaotic.
Each prince had their own goals in mind and they all sought to gain recognition from their people so they sent their armies to acquire Roshire Mountain.
Unfortunately, the mountain was close to the northern borders of the Star Wind Kingdom which led to the war between both sides.
'Why do we have to be the ones to suffer for those greedy bastards?' Amil shook his head his head despondently. Find more chapters on m_v l|e-NovelBin.net