Morin, lying in the shell crater, gasped for air, but his nostrils were filled with the acrid smell of smoke mixed with blood.
He had just survived a life-or-death duel. Although he had won, the feeling of his heart trying to leap out of his throat had not completely subsided.
He glanced at the corpse of the ‘Sentinel’ he had dragged into the crater. The enemy’s dark gold mask reflected a faint glow in the dim light.
These Gaulish Battlemages were completely different creatures from the Britannian ‘Academic faction’ who stayed in Mage Towers.
Their combat style was more direct, more lethal, and better suited to this brutal, blood-soaked battlefield.
Just as Morin prepared to catch his breath and think about his next move, five red signal flares rose into the sky in quick succession from other directions across the battlefield.
“It looks like we weren’t the only ones to encounter the ‘Sentinels’…”
Morin muttered to himself, then looked at the system map. Sure enough, friendly forces on other axes of attack had also run into these difficult ‘Sentinels’.
Along the entire two-kilometer-long breakthrough point, the First Army Group’s ‘Blade’ Assault Group was engaged in a final, fierce struggle against the Gaulish soldiers led by the ‘Sentinels’.
The wave of Field Gray and the dam of Gallic Blue repeatedly clashed and tore at each other in this narrow area. Countless lives were extinguished every second.
General Gallieni had indeed played his last trump card.
The main force of the ‘Sentinels’—about 150 men—had mostly been sent to the Southern Front by Joffre. Only about 30 ‘Sentinels’ remained in Paris.
Gallieni had directly committed 25 of these ‘Sentinels’ into this collapsing breach.
If the First Army Group had continued fighting with the previous rigid tactic of sending troops in waves to be consumed,
The attacking forces would likely have been thoroughly routed by these elusive Battlemages, combined with the desperate countercharge of the Gaulish soldiers, and possibly even pushed back out of their own positions.
However, the Saxons had not fought according to conventional expectations today.
The extremely dense artillery preparation, coupled with the large number of elite troops General Mackensen had concentrated in this two-kilometer breach, completely stunned the Gauls.
Even Gallieni had not anticipated a tactic like the Creeping Barrage.
When the shelling began, the main body of the Gaulish garrison had already withdrawn to the second trench.
Based on previous experience, the main force should have been able to quickly counterattack toward the first trench via the communication trenches once the shelling ceased.
But as the Saxon artillery fire began to extend, the Gaulish soldiers in the second and third trenches also suffered significant losses.
This was even with the primary caliber of the Saxon Empire’s artillery still being the 77mm and 105mm guns; if there were more heavy artillery of 150mm or greater, the resulting casualties would have been even higher.
The individual combat strength of the ‘Sentinels’ was indeed formidable. In the initial phase of the battle, they inflicted considerable casualties on the elite units of the ‘Blade’ Assault Group.
Especially in areas without a special Mage Unit like Morin’s for counter-spelling, the General’s Guard and Knight Squires were, at times, unable to hold their ground.
But the problem was, compared to the massive base number of the entire ‘Blade’ Assault Group, the losses inflicted by the ‘Sentinels’ were negligible.
More importantly, Mages are not perpetual motion machines.
Both the Britannian Highland Mages and the Gaulish ‘Sentinels’ are strictly limited by Spell Slots in their casting abilities.
A short burst of magical power must inevitably be followed by a period of weakness.
When the ‘Sentinels’ in the other sectors realized that even after unleashing a brilliant series of spells, they had indeed taken down quite a few Saxon ‘tin cans,’ they were fundamentally unable to stop the endless flood of Field Gray surging forward, and they understood the problem.
Their surprise attack seemed to have little effect.
To continue fighting on this front would lead to a meat grinder exchange with the Saxons.
This kind of exchange was clearly one the ‘Sentinels’ were unwilling to accept.
Particularly the five-man squad in Morin’s sector, having lost two members in a very short time, had already started to consider retreating.
Especially since they were facing a Saxon spellcaster of unfathomable strength…
[Dispel Magic], [Counterspell]… it was clear that the opponent was specifically prepared for Anti-Magic Combat.
The ‘Sentinels’ naturally had training for ‘Anti-Magic Combat,’ but this training was mostly geared toward the Holy Britannia Empire’s Highland Mage Corps…
Simultaneously, the Saxon artillery positions behind the line, guided by the red signal flare Kahn had fired and the observation balloons in the sky, finally began a new round of intense artillery fire!
“Boom—Rumble—!”
The piercing shriek of shells sliced across the sky again.
Countless shells flew over the heads of the engaged Saxon soldiers, landing relatively precisely in the area occupied by the Gaulish soldiers and the ‘Sentinels’.
“Damn it! The Saxons’ shelling!”
“Retreat! Retreat quickly!”
The commander of this ‘Sentinel’ squad immediately led the remaining two men to withdraw.
Almost instantly after his words, the first 105mm howitzer shell landed near their position.
“Boom—!!!”
An earth-shattering explosion sounded. The ground seemed to be struck violently by an invisible giant hand, shaking violently.
A massive fireball shot into the sky, mixed with black smoke and thrown-up dirt, forming a terrifying flower of death.
Immediately after, more shells rained down like hail.
The entire breakthrough point was instantly consumed by a storm of steel.
In a massive shell crater about three hundred meters from Morin, three surviving ‘Sentinels’ gathered.
Their condition looked poor.
Every man’s combat suit was covered in rips and scorched marks, showing that they had taken losses during the fight with the Instruction Assault Battalion soldiers.
“Captain, we must evacuate immediately! The Saxon artillery fire is too fierce. If we stay any longer, we will all be blown to pieces!” one ‘Sentinel’ said urgently.
“I know!”
The leader, a Conjuration-specialist ‘Sentinel’, said through gritted teeth:
“That damned Saxon Mage! He must be nearby! He’s probably the one calling in the artillery!”
He could vaguely sense a familiar magical fluctuation in the area of the most intense shelling through the mana-sensing capability of his mask.
That fluctuation was identical to the one who had toyed with them earlier using [Dispel Magic] and [Counterspell].
“Can’t we find him! Eliminate him and then retreat?” another Evocation-specialist ‘Sentinel’ asked fiercely.
Since the formation of the ‘Sentinel’ unit after the Saxo-Gallic War, they had never suffered such a loss.
Twenty-five elites were sent on a simple counter-attack mission, yet they had achieved no substantive results and had already lost two men.
Now, they were pinned down by enemy artillery like cornered rats, unable to even raise their heads.
This was an utter humiliation!
“There’s no time!” the Conjuration-specialist Captain shook his head, his voice filled with unwillingness.
“The artillery fire is too dense; we can’t pinpoint his exact location, and our Spell Slots are almost depleted.”
This was the most critical factor.
Battlemages, after all, still relied on spells to fight.
In the high-intensity combat just now, they had almost expended all their offensive spells.
The few spells remaining in their Spell Slots were reserved for self-preservation and retreat.
Gallieni had indeed granted these Mage Units significant autonomy, including the authority to retreat in emergency situations.
“Prepare to initiate the emergency evacuation protocol!” the Captain decided instantly.
He pulled out a blue crystal carved with complex runes from his chest, then pressed it forcefully onto the floor of the shell crater.
The Conjuration-specialist Captain took a deep breath, channeling his mana continuously into the blue crystal.
As mana flowed in, the crystal began to emit an increasingly bright light.
On the ground, centered around the crystal, a complex Magic Array composed of multiple concentric circles quickly emerged and unfolded.
[Fifth-Circle Conjuration Spell – Teleportation Circle]
This was one of the ‘Sentinel’ unit’s emergency evacuation methods.
Using this specialized crystal, they could quickly construct a temporary Teleportation Circle on the battlefield.
This circle was connected to a permanent Teleportation Circle within the city of Paris.
However, the process required about one minute and was highly susceptible to interruption.
“Faster! Hurry!” the Captain’s heart was in his throat.
He could feel the whistling of shells overhead growing denser. Several times, shells landed on the edge of their crater, making the ground beneath them shake violently.
Just as he was about to collapse, the Magic Array finally fully formed.
“Buzz—”
With a soft sound, the space in the center of the array twisted and folded, then slowly pulled open an elliptical doorway shimmering with blue light.
“It worked! Go now!” the Captain sighed in relief, shouting to his comrades.
The two ‘Sentinels’ did not hesitate. They immediately slung their rifles, turned, and charged through the Teleportation Door, vanishing instantly.
The Captain followed close behind. Just before stepping into the portal, he turned back for a deep look at the battle-ravaged field. His eyes beneath the metal mask were filled with resentment and unwillingness.
“Saxons… and that damned Mage…”
Then, he plunged into the portal.
In the very next second after his figure vanished, a 105mm howitzer shell landed directly into the shell crater.
“Boom—!!!”
The violent explosion ripped the newly formed Teleportation Door, along with the temporary Magic Array constructed by the blue crystal, into countless fragments scattered across the air.
The shelling continued, but Morin already felt the impact points start to extend deeper toward the Gauls’ positions once more.
In Morin’s sector, a Captain from the 42nd Infantry Regiment had followed the instinct of a battlefield veteran the moment he heard the first shell whistle, rolling and scrambling into the deepest shell crater and tightly clamping his hands over his head.
He felt like a small boat in a raging storm, liable to be smashed to pieces at any moment.
In the trench, he could hear nothing but the shelling, see nothing, only feel the ground shaking frantically beneath his feet, as if the whole world was tearing apart.
The Captain didn’t know how long the shelling lasted—perhaps a minute, perhaps a century.
When the explosions finally faded into the distance, he cautiously raised his head and peered out of the shell crater.
The sight before him made him gasp.
The entire battlefield had been plowed over again, covered in newly formed, smoking shell craters.
He saw many Saxon soldiers who hadn’t managed to find cover shattered into pieces, with fragments of limbs scattered everywhere.
Friendly fire was always the most brutal occurrence on the battlefield.
But there were many more corpses of the Gaulish soldiers who had launched the counterattack.
He also saw that the several ‘Sentinels’ who had caused massive casualties had vanished in the artillery fire.
He didn’t know if they had been blown to pieces or had used the chaos to escape.
But either way, the biggest threat seemed to have been neutralized?
The Captain spat out bloody saliva and struggled to climb out of the shell crater.
He looked at the surrounding soldiers, who were also emerging from craters, covered in mud, with expressions of relief after surviving the ordeal, and raised his rifle.
“Soldiers! The Gauls can’t hold us back!”
He shouted a triumphant roar in a hoarse voice.
“For the Empire! Charge again!”
Morin also carefully raised his head from the shell crater where he had been lying.
He saw the surrounding Saxon soldiers gradually crawling out of their respective covers.
Although many were wounded, and far too many had been left on the ground permanently, those who survived had a look of post-trauma excitement and a burning desire for victory in their eyes.
They had endured the Gauls’ most frenzied counterattack, and even the Mage Unit that the enemy had been holding back was seemingly bombed away by their own artillery.
The scale of victory had begun to tip in their favor.
Just then, Morin suddenly saw a signal flare rise in the distance, in the direction of the large Anti-air Magic Device arrays behind the Gauls’ positions.
However, that signal flare was green.
And green meant the mission was complete.
Morin’s heart began to pound uncontrollably once more.
He knew this meant that the mission executed by the other small detachment of the Instruction Assault Battalion was a success!
The Gauls’ sole protective umbrella over the Creil Line had been taken out!
He abruptly looked up, gazing toward the rear of their own position.
He felt as though he could already hear the thunderous roar of engines coming from the sky.
“Green signal flare! It’s the green signal flare! It’s in the direction of the Gauls’ Anti-air Magic Device arrays!”
In the command bridge of Armored Airship No. L29, in a safe airspace nearly ten kilometers from the Creil front, a lookout shouted excitedly, his voice slightly strained with emotion.
Captain Schneider, the airship commander, instantly sprang from his seat, looking toward the direction where the signal flare had risen.
As the color green, symbolizing ‘mission successful,’ clearly registered in his eyes, the blood of the Saxon Empire Air Force Colonel felt as though it was boiling.
“Thank God! The Army boys succeeded!” He couldn’t help but fiercely pump his fist.
He and his airship had been hovering here for nearly an hour, waiting for this signal.
Every single minute had been an ordeal for them.
They had watched the soldiers below surge toward the enemy lines like a tide, watched countless shells explode on the enemy’s positions, and watched red signal flares, representing danger, rise again and again.
Meanwhile, they could only wait here, unable to do anything.
That feeling of powerlessness had nearly driven every airman on the bridge mad.
Now, the opportunity had finally arrived!