Chapter 224: (Self Edited) Battle of the Crusaders* (2)
On July 14th, Angelica Sacrament stood on the coastline.
Through communication using carrier pigeons, contact had been established with the supply fleet of the Euphos Federation, and it had been planned to carry out supplies here on the coastline by hook or by crook. It had been 24 days since departing from Mital.
The main Crusader force had approached near the vicinity of Sibyaku, and during this time, they had faced all sorts of harassment and attacks. Their comfortably stocked provisions had run out, and their stretched supply lines had likely been cut off already by attacks from small groups, probably coming from the mountain side. Yuri Hou’s harassment knew no bounds.
They began by eliminating all light cavalry scouts one by one, causing them to disappear. When Epitaph adopted the unbelievable tactic of advancing with his entire army without waiting for a reconnaissance report, they took advantage of the weakness that this created and immediately began using ambushes. Just the other day, there had been a sixth major attack, and they had fallen victim to a well-coordinated large-scale night ambush, resulting in thousands of casualties to the Flusha Kingdom’s army. The atmosphere in the camp was very grim because there were no personnel available to evacuate the seriously injured and they had to be abandoned. It could be said that the Crusaders were hanging onto a glimmer of hope with these supplies.
They couldn’t go into battle with hungry soldiers. It was one thing to endure a little hunger if morale was high but if they were marching for long periods in such a hungry state, let alone going into battle without even having a meal, would make winning difficult. If they intended to win, they should at least ensure the soldiers were adequately fed before fighting.
Some commanders had said that if they encouraged their soldiers to fight and win, they would fight to the death, but hunger was still a big factor. There had been debates in the meeting about whether to feed the army with the horses or not. Even if they decided to slaughter the horses from the cart horses for consumption, and if they ended up eating the cavalry horses, it would weaken the cavalry forces.
But the soldiers going hungry was an even bigger problem, so Angelica was in favor of feeding the horses. Desperate times called for desperate measures. If the ship did not come, the horses that Angers had worked so hard to preserve would be consumed as meat.
Angie was simply staring at the horizon.
“Angie-sama—” (??)