The headless “St. George Type 3” knelt in the mud, thick black smoke still billowing from the cockpit, like a tombstone erected for the tactics of the old era.
The remaining two pilots of the Order of the Garter completely panicked.
Viscount George was not only their captain and a noble, but also the spiritual pillar of their squad, and the recognized “Combat Master” within the knighthood.
If even someone like him could be pierced through in a single encounter by these “Saxon fatties” opposite them, what else could they do?
Fear, once it takes root in the bottom of one’s heart, makes movements stiff.
When the mind is chaotic, the blade is slow.
Therefore, the two white Armored Knights, which should have coordinated tacitly, actually made an extremely low-level mistake at this moment—one wanted to retreat and open up distance, while the other tried to step forward and guard the captain’s wreckage.
One advancing, one retreating, the originally tight formation instantly revealed a huge flaw.
“Don’t daze out! The Saxons’ Armored Knights only have that strange defense on the chest area!”
Although the two Armored Knights of the Order of the Garter fell into a 2 vs 3 disadvantage, the death of the lead machine and that lightning-fast clash made them understand one thing.
That was, these Saxon Armored Knights, which seemed to have become uglier, should have had some kind of reinforcement applied to their armor, so they shouldn’t continue blindly attacking the opponent’s cockpit…
The pilot who tried to charge forward roared at his teammate using a communication stone, his voice changing pitch due to extreme tension:
“Hit its joints! Hit its head! Those scrap iron plates can’t possibly cover the whole body!”
This was actually a smart judgment.
After all, this “Spaced Armor” temporarily installed by the Teutonic Knights was, to put it bluntly, just a few iron plates used to block shots. Coupled with those brackets, there was indeed no way to wrap the entire machine tightly.
But the problem was, thinking it is one thing; whether it can be done is another.
“Want to hit our joints? Then you have to be able to touch me first!”
Ludwig’s eyes were already red with killing intent. After discovering the opponent adjusted their attack target, the lingering fear of narrowly escaping death transformed into an extremely violent desire to attack.
He didn’t wait for the opponent to adjust their posture like traditional dueling etiquette, but piloted that “fatty” “Siegfried Type 1” and crashed over like an out-of-control train.
That “St. George Type 3” attempting to attack the leg joints of Unit 2 had only thrust its armor-piercing lance halfway when it was fiercely smashed on the shield by Ludwig charging out from the side.
“Clang!!”
The huge metallic crash made people’s eardrums hurt.
Before this white machine could steady its center of gravity, Ludwig’s continuous attacks arrived.
Since the shaped-charge armor-piercing lance hadn’t had time to be reloaded, he directly swung the heavy shield on his left arm.
Utilizing the massive centrifugal force brought by twisting the machine, he smashed the edge of the shield like an axe toward the root of the opponent’s mechanical arm.
“Crack!”
That was the sound of metal twisting and tearing.
Even an advanced piece of equipment like the “St. George Type 3” was still fragile at the joint connections; this was also one of the inevitable pain points of the humanoid structure. That lance-holding right mechanical arm was forcibly smashed off by Ludwig, leaving only some severed magitech circuits and magitech muscle bundles still hanging there by a thread, spraying blue liquid and sparks.
“Ah! My arm! My main weapon is unresponsive!”
An Armored Knight that lost its main weapon had its threat level in an Armored Knight civil war dropped to the minimum…
On the other side, Unit 3 had already entangled the last enemy that wanted to retreat.
What should have been an evenly matched situation, or even one where the Order of the Garter had a slight upper hand, evolved into a one-sided beating in just one short minute.
Ludwig didn’t even give that one-armed opponent any chance to breathe. He controlled his machine to close in and kicked the opponent’s knee joint.
Taking advantage of the instant the opponent’s machine lost balance and knelt down, the armor-piercing lance in Unit 2’s hand accurately pierced into the side of the opponent’s cockpit.
Once again, that blinding firelight instantly erupted, followed by a muffled explosion.
The second “St. George Type 3” was destroyed.
“The last one, don’t let him get away!”
Ludwig picked up the shield again, not even looking at the smoking wreckage. He adjusted the machine’s orientation and locked onto the last white Armored Knight that was currently pinned down.
In less than two minutes, the last “St. George Type 3” also had its cockpit penetrated by the shaped-charge armor-piercing weapon and fell powerlessly to the ground. The Knight Squires around who tried to cover… but achieved nothing, also immediately retreated to the rear.
It was only at this time that Ludwig realized they didn’t have the assistance of Knight Squires this time—but from the actual combat situation, it seemed that not having the cover of Knight Squires wasn’t a big problem either?
He habitually looked toward the rear side of the machine, wanting to find the “Knight Squires” who always followed by his side.
“Where did these guys run off to? Although it was said they would operate independently, they can’t really just ignore us. What if someone sneak-attacked just now…”
Ludwig muttered while rotating his synchronized 180-degree field of vision.
Then, he saw a scene that left him dumbfounded.
Those six Knight Squires, who should originally be holding heavy cold weapons and acting as “sword-bearing guards,” were currently standing at the edge of the trench, paying no attention to the Armored Knight civil war over here.
The special racks on their backs used to fix heavy machine guns were vibrating madly.
Six MG08 heavy machine guns, plus the ammunition boxes mounted on the squires themselves, turned them into six tireless mobile firepower points. “Da-da-da-da-da!!”
The dense shell casings flew out of the ejection ports like raindrops, falling into the mud.
Those Britannian infantry trying to charge up were suppressed by this downward-firing firepower so much they couldn’t even lift their heads.
Ludwig opened his mouth, finally only shaking his head helplessly.
He suddenly realized that Morin installing heavy machine guns on these iron lumps was simply a stroke of genius.
Since the civil war of Armored Knights had become a very boring “shield-holding poking” segment after the appearance of the “Shaped-Charge Armor-Piercing Weapon” and “Spaced Armor,” the role Knight Squires could play was already very small.
Then freeing them up to deal with infantry was indeed maximizing the utilization of resources!
“Why didn’t I think of this before…”
…
At the same time, the attack situation in this section of the trench was simply a disaster for the Britannian Expeditionary Force.
Once the three Armored Knights of the Order of the Garter, which served as important support, fell, the 1st Battalion of the instruction unit no longer had such thorny enemies in front of them, and the remaining Britannian conventional infantry units were obviously not enough to look at.
The extremely narrow terrain of trenches was inherently very difficult for those heavy armor soldiers of Britannia to exert their strength. Because as “traditional” anti-infantry units, they were not like the General’s Guard on the Saxon Empire side, which also equipped modified heavy machine guns.
And “short reach” on the current battlefield was undoubtedly a disadvantage…
Perhaps they could indeed charge into infantry groups, relying on armor and modified strength to go on a rampage, but the premise was just as said before: they needed to get close to enemy infantry first.
But under the situation where the individual firepower of the instruction unit had greatly increased, the difficulty of “getting close” was already much higher than before.
The large number of MG14 light machine guns distributed down to the platoons fired 7.92mm rifle bullets that were enough to pose a threat, also causing more and more heavy armor soldiers to directly fall on the path of the charge.
“Hold on! Hold on! Don’t let them charge over!”
A Britannian officer wearing excellent plate armor, waving a broadsword in his hand, was leading a squad of heavy armor soldiers to push aside ordinary infantry showing signs of routing, desperately charging forward.
In previous battles, as long as they were allowed to charge into the enemy’s defense line, it would be a one-sided slaughter.
The ordinary Saxon infantry often had to pay a heavy price to eliminate a small number of heavy armor soldiers, while a single swing of their heavy weapons could smash the opponent, person and gun included, into two halves.
But today, the script was wrong.
Or rather, outdated tactical thinking had caused the scales of this battle to tilt…
A heavy armor soldier had just turned a corner in the trench, not even having time to raise the war hammer in his hand, when he was met with a burst of bullet rain slapping him in the face.
A Saxon soldier hiding behind temporarily stacked sandbags ahead was mounting one of those machine guns that could be operated by a single person, the flames spewing from the muzzle never stopping.
Although the single-shot penetration of a rifle bullet wasn’t enough to pierce magitech-crafted plate armor, at this extremely close range, more than a dozen bullets continuously striking the breastplate like chisels created a terrifying accumulated kinetic energy.
“Bang-bang-bang-bang!”
That heavy infantryman was beaten back repeatedly. The blue light on his breastplate flickered a few times and extinguished completely. Immediately after, the last few bullets drilled into the torn seams, shredding his internal organs.
He didn’t even touch the corner of the enemy’s clothes before falling suffocated into the muddy water.
This kind of scene was playing out everywhere along the entire battle line.
The narrow trenches became the graves of the heavy infantry.
“Sir! We can’t charge through! Their firepower is too fierce!”
“Our Armored Knights are all finished! The Saxons’ iron lumps are approaching this way!”
The commander of those Britannian heavy armor soldiers looked at his continuously falling subordinates around him, pondering countermeasures under immense pressure. Since dispersed charges don’t work, then concentrate!
The advantage of heavy infantry was group charges. As long as there were enough people, they could smash all obstacles like an iron hammer!
“All heavy infantry! Rally to me!”
The officer roared at the top of his lungs, while also having the flag bearer beside him desperately wave that damaged battle flag:
“Form a shield wall! Crush those cowards who only know how to hide in the distance and shoot!”
It had to be said that the execution ability of this unit was indeed very high.
After hearing the order, the heavy infantry who were originally scattered in different positions of this trench began to converge toward the middle braving the rain of bullets. About a dozen burly men in plate armor squeezed together, the shields in their hands piecing together into a steel wall. Then, under the officer’s commands, chanting unified slogans, they began to advance along the wider firing trench toward one side.
“One! One! One!”
This method of advancing like a mobile fortress indeed had a certain effect.
Those incoming submachine gun bullets and rifle bullets hit the dense shield formation, making crisp clinking sounds, but it was difficult to cause substantial damage anymore.
Even if an occasional grenade or two was thrown over, due to the shield wall’s obstruction, it could only injure a few people on the periphery, simply unable to shake the foundation of the entire phalanx.