The Lord Of Blood Hill-Chapter 33: Crossing the River (Part 1)

Henwell had a solid plan: break through the enemy's defensive circle with his hundred-man squad, allowing the rest of the Iron Wall warriors to scatter the border army's last stronghold. Initially, everything goes smoothly, but soon things go awry when several knights emerge from the enemy ranks. These aren't mounted knights but warriors of knightly rank.
These armored tanks, though their Fighting Spirit is depleted, are clad in heavy armor and wield massive swords. With their formidable physiques, they become merciless machines, mowing down Henwell's squad with brutal efficiency.
Henwell is forced to intervene; he had intended for the soldiers to cover and distract while he dealt damage from afar with his bow, playing the role of an ADC.
However, whether in games or reality, archers always attract hatred! After Henwell stealthily takes down one knight with an arrow, the remaining knights immediately turn their attention to him. One knight charges through the soldiers, heading straight for Henwell, while the others push back the Iron Wall soldiers trying to rescue him. In this way, Henwell finds himself forcibly isolated from his squad.
Fortunately, the knight attacking Henwell is already heavily wounded, with blood seeping from multiple gaps in his armor. Henwell, after over three months of intense training, has developed physical strength far surpassing that of an average adult, giving him the ability to hold his own for now. With shield and spear in hand, he engages in a series of fierce skirmishes, ultimately managing to finish off the injured knight.
However, more elite armored soldiers soon rush in, forcing Henwell to grit his teeth and continue battling. The knight he killed with the hand crossbow was already the sixth elite soldier he's taken down. Now, Henwell wields a longsword in one hand and a shield in the other, barely fending off the attacks of two elite soldiers.
But he's no longer worried; the sounds of battle behind him indicate that his guards have dealt with the four knights. Just as Henwell parries the longswords of the two armored soldiers, several spears thrust from behind him, knocking the soldiers to the ground. Before they can get up, the advancing spearmen pierce through the gaps in their armor, finishing them off completely.
The spearmen quickly surround Henwell, providing protection. Henwell pushes them aside, pointing his longsword at the enemy's banner, "Don't worry about me! Charge forward and cut down their flag!"
Minutes later, Henwell stands atop a pile of bodies, slicing through the enemy banner with a single strike. The border army's main general, however, has already been escorted out by his subordinates during Henwell's advance into the inner defensive circle. As previously planned, Duveen orders the general to be intentionally allowed to escape.
With the fall of the banner, the dynamics of the battlefield shift dramatically! The guards around Henwell, having practiced this scenario countless times, shout in the language of the Ika Kingdom, "Your commander is dead! Surrender and you will be spared! Surrender and you will be spared!"
The repeated cries echo across the battlefield, causing the border troops to lose their will to fight. A mass retreat begins! Seeing this, Duveen immediately deploys the five hundred cavalrymen at his side to chase down the fleeing soldiers.
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By dusk, the right flank of the Iron Wall Legion begins to regroup. After a quick sweep of the battlefield, they move with the advancing logistics team toward the border river.
Two days later, by noon, the right flank of the army arrives at the border river. They immediately set up camp, establishing defenses to support Fabio's arrival, and begin chopping down trees to construct rafts. Another day passes before Fabio and the left flank reach the river.
Henwell approaches Fabio, urging him to order the soldiers to rest while the logistics team works in shifts to continue building the rafts.
Fabio is puzzled, "Henwell, we've just been through a brutal battle and rushed here without a break. Everyone's exhausted. The border troops and allied forces' blocking units have been decimated, and they're no longer a threat. Even if they want to harass us while we cross the river, they'll need several days to recover. We should rest, at least for a day!"
Henwell points to the map, "Precisely because we've crippled the kingdom's border forces, we need to expedite the river crossing. This is the border between two nations. The kingdom's key fortresses, main garrison, and support forces have been severely weakened by us."
"Now, with the allied forces counterattacking, the kingdom cannot afford any issues here or allow a third front to emerge within their territory. They will likely dispatch elite troops to eliminate us and deter the duchy from joining forces with the Vorry Duchy to create a breach here. Therefore, the kingdom has probably already received news and is mobilizing elite forces to crush us. If we see border scouts around tomorrow, it will confirm my suspicions that they intend to do just that."
Sure enough, by the following morning, several groups of scouts appear in the distance, observing the situation.
Recognizing the urgency of the situation, Fabio quickly organizes scouts to drive away the border scouts while mobilizing everyone to chop wood and construct rafts. That very night, they commence the river crossing.
Crossing the river at night is fraught with danger, but Henwell opts not to send people across one raft at a time. Instead, he ingeniously links the rafts together to create a floating bridge. Throughout the night, they manage to transport over two thousand wounded soldiers and more than a thousand logistics personnel to the opposite bank.
By now, early winter has set in. The river hasn't frozen yet, but they've passed the autumn flood season, and the water flows gently. The river is only about two hundred meters wide. Apart from the central channel, most areas have water depths of just over four meters, allowing them to drive long stakes into the riverbed to secure the floating bridge.
As dawn breaks, they dismantle the floating bridge back into rafts, effectively confusing the scouts observing from a distance.
On the second night of the river crossing, they construct another detachable floating bridge but only manage to send two thousand more people across. Most of what they transport are supplies. As Henwell explains, returning to the duchy means there won't be consistent resupplies for quite some time, if any at all.
Even if there are supplies, they won't be abundant, as the duchy isn't keen on supporting an oversized, battle-ready army—especially one that answers solely to Fabio.
Therefore, they need to bring all the winter clothing, bedding, and food supplies across. Combined with the materials provided by the duchy, they can endure the winter. If Fabio withstands the pressure from the duchy until spring, the sizable army of over ten thousand will be enough to make the duchy reconsider its stance.
Thus, on the second and third nights of the crossing, they focus on transporting supplies and mules across the river. During the day, to confuse the border scouts, they send several rafts across, though the efficiency is nowhere near that of the floating bridge.
These rafts carry cavalry and even some gold and silver treasures, creating the illusion that Fabio is leisurely transporting his loyal followers and wealth.
Based on the number of rafts and their efficiency, the border scouts estimate that it would take at least a month to transport over ten thousand people across the river.