Not long after, Lind stood on the platform, with soldiers and subjects announcing this mobilization.
Lind thought a lot about how to alleviate the fear of the subjects and soldiers and considered maintaining and comforting their mental health, telling them the necessity of this battle to prevent anyone from developing war aversion.
However, the moment Lind stood on the platform, he suddenly felt he had overthought everything, just as before.
Most people in the territory, including Lind’s current body as the lord, harbored an indelible hatred towards the demon clan. Forget about mental preparation; Lind even felt he needed to first calm the emotions of these people and get them settled down.
“I remember among the selected soldiers, many had escaped with me, and many had come with Isha to Graywhite Territory.”
“I prepared many things to say; I wrote a draft for an entire afternoon.”
After saying this, Lind tore the draft apart.
“But right now, I just want to talk about what those beasts have done as they draw closer to us.”
“Lady Saintess Flora is known to many people in the Northern Border, especially those who came with Ms. Isha to Graywhite Territory. You all came from the Sanctuary Cathedral, so I’m sure you are even more familiar with Lady Saintess Flora than I am.”
As he spoke, the soldiers from the Sanctuary Cathedral clenched their fists, feeling a sense of foreboding.
“And now, Lady Saintess Flora is next to that group of beasts, with curses and plague placed upon her and the other refugees. Every day, she can only protect the refugees while being driven by these beasts, roaming the Northern Border. Because of these beasts, Lady Saintess can’t even commit suicide to prevent the spread of the plague!”
Before the soldiers below could comprehend this, Lind called up the scout he had previously sent out, who cried as he spoke about the situation of Flora and the refugee sisters.
To be honest, anyone coming from the border had more or less received the grace of the Sanctuary Cathedral, and among those refugees, there might even be family and relatives of the soldiers and subjects present.
Before the scout finished speaking, some soldiers couldn’t take it anymore. Long training in obedience kept these soldiers silent, but tears began to flow.
Affected by this atmosphere, the scout couldn’t continue and burst into tears on the platform.
Lind stepped forward, said little, but stood on the platform and asked all the soldiers and subjects, “Shall we fight?”
“Yes! Kill them all!”
“Annihilate them!”
“Kill! Kill!”
Watching the shouts below gradually become uniform and orderly, Lind gradually understood why soldiers in his past life experienced PTSD daily while some wished they had killed more.
“Good! Then we’ll fight!”
Meanwhile, due to Burken’s arrogance, the scouts of Graywhite Territory had ample opportunity to observe the demon soldiers’ camp.
Fortunately, due to the uncontrollable plague and curse affecting the refugees and sisters, there was a certain distance maintained between the demon soldiers and the refugees, achieved with alchemical powder used for isolation.
This provided a sufficient buffer zone for Graywhite’s rescue and protection of the refugees.
In fact, with just the fifty heavy cavalry brought by Lena, these demons could have been swept away.
But Lind still chose to let the well-trained regular soldiers go first.
Because in the war between humans and demons, there is a longstanding belief that all demons are professionals, and ordinary humans cannot defeat them.
There are even similar myths about how thousands cannot be defeated.
If Lind didn’t have these ordinary soldiers face the demons head-on but used Lena’s heavy cavalry instead, there would surely still be those who stubbornly maintained that only professionals could contend with the demons.
In future encounters with the demons, the mindset of the ordinary soldiers would also be affected.
What Lind needed to do now was to break these myths and dispel the mental shackles on ordinary people.
Demons are by no means invincible; the notion that all demons are professionals has been exaggerated by some with ulterior motives.
Demons can indeed use specific magic at a certain age, and this so-called magic learned through birth is referred to as Bloodline Magic.
However, Bloodline Magic is fixed; once a demon possesses it, it is difficult for them to learn additional spells.
This is also the biggest difference between demons and elves. Elves are able to sense and manipulate magic power from a young age, and all kinds of magic are acquired through postnatal learning, truly making them a magical race.
In contrast, demons behave like NPCs who inherently know a set of fixed moves; they have no understanding of what magic power is or how to manipulate it; they simply believe they can use this magic.
Moreover, due to relying on Bloodline Magic, demons have developed a natural dependency on magic power manipulation; when using other spells, whether it be spell models or magic power manipulation, they gravitate toward Bloodline Magic, leading to the majority of gifted demons learning magic at levels even higher than humans, while those spells outside of Bloodline Magic appear quite deformed.
Among humans, these demons are basically like the lowest-level apprentices at mage towers, only able to perform one or two tricks, unable to even pass professional ratings. Yet once on the battlefield, they can throw a couple of wind blades, making ordinary people feel terrified.
The demons’ most notorious tactic is to rely on Bloodline Magic for long-range harassment, fighting while running, and waiting until you are exhausted to charge in for a kill.
This already exposes the problems with demons: although they claim to be professionals, they cannot charge through rain of arrows like knight professionals nor can they rely on magic firepower to knock you down like mages; they can only wear you down with harassment before charging in for the finishing blow.
However, the demons’ advantage has been leveled by equipment and gunpowder; once firearms are developed, it will truly become a change in offense and defense.
The Graywhite troop set out, all soldiers donned their full gear, and brought grenades and healing potions.
The age-falsifying Darsi was among them, excitedly touching the chainmail on his body, which was shorter than the others.
Thanks to recruiting a large number of mountain-dwelling people to Graywhite Territory, Darsi had accumulated a lot of merits, but instead of exchanging them for supplies, he requested to join the army.
Though shorter than the others, his long-time hunter lifestyle had made Darsi’s body quite robust, and at sixteen—the minimum age for conscription—he was still growing, so no one felt anything was off.
Hearing that this mission was to combat the demon clan, many in the troop held deep grudges against them and eagerly anticipated action.
Having grown up in the mountains, Darsi did not harbor such intense hatred but also lacked the ingrained belief in the invincibility of demons.
With this gear, even if the lord claimed they would rebel, Darsi would not furrow a brow.
Moreover, behind this army, followed fifty heavy cavalry composed entirely of professionally trained knights.
These were Lena’s knights; although they wouldn’t directly engage in combat, they were responsible for maintaining order and preventing any escaped fish from slipping through.
Lind, who had grown up in a peaceful era, did not know how to fight at all; he could be said to be completely clueless, having only knowledge of war from watching movies and novels, or merely observing war simulations on a sand table.
So Lind planned to hand over command completely to Lauri, the only veteran in the territory who had experienced battlefield struggles and commanded operations.
Lind himself would only be responsible for overall coordination and resource allocation.
To say this is somewhat exaggerated; after all, the opponent was merely a twenty-person demon squad, but even when fighting a rabbit, one must use their full strength. If possible, Lind wished to bring over cannons still in the experimental stage.
“Boss, it seems a human army is approaching us.”
A green-skinned demon burped and looked at the army waving the Northern Wind Bear flag not far away.
“How many? Are there professionals?”
Burken performed a backflip, standing up and asking a demon soldier enhanced by Bloodline Magic who was squinting at the army.
“The numbers seem about the same as ours, all infantry. Although they are wearing armor, there seems to be only one professional among them.”
Upon hearing this answer, Burken lay back down. Just one profession, and the numbers were about the same, all unmounted, weren’t they just coming to deliver themselves?
Forget about being a noble demon; even if they were both low-ranking humans, as long as they got on horseback, the combat power of the two sides wouldn’t be on the same level.
Perhaps the nearby lord had become alarmed and sent a team of soldiers to put on a show before contact.
Thinking this, Burken yawned, not noticing that in another direction, Lauri had begun to flank with another squad of soldiers.
“Boss, something seems off?”
A demon soldier sensing something wrong shook Burken, who had just lain down.
“What’s wrong? Are those soldiers flying?”
Burken scratched his belly, which had swollen from overeating, and lazily sat up.
“No, it’s not that, boss. They didn’t head our way; they’re heading towards the refugees.”
“Then there’s even less to worry about! I was just concerned that the human lord was too hospitable, making it hard to send out these plagues and curses.”
Saying this, Burken pulled out a sharpened bone from his waist and began to pick his teeth.
It was a female human clavicle. Burken had once liked that human female a lot and was quite infatuated, but ever since he heard the Demon King’s theory about inferior human hybrids, Burken suddenly found that human female somewhat disgusting, so he killed her.
But after killing her, Burken felt a bit regretful; he extracted the human female’s clavicle, sharpened it, and used it as a toothpick.
Every time he used the toothpick, Burken felt that he was truly devoted and romantic.
