All-Out Offensive

Early the next morning.

Kelu deployed a large number of pigeon beast knights and falcon knights to meet the challenge.

On the ground, they also sent out packs of domesticated grey wolves. These fierce beasts sprinted across the earth and through the ruins, quickly clashing with the locusts.

However, when the surrounding locusts surged forward like an ocean tide and spat a barrage of venom, the magic beasts became unmanageable, fleeing in terror.

Never one to pass up high-energy crystals, Xia Jin ordered several elf bugs stationed at the rear of the battlefield to carry out long-range snipes.

...

“The 3rd position is also lost. Two provinces have completely fallen. Your army has been in a constant state of retreat; it’s a very poor showing.”

In a large city in the rear of Mia, in front of a palace, a man took a sip from a cup of tea before placing it on the table beside him.

The Mia noble before him looked anxious. “The enemy has air superiority and is using a massive number of low-tier creatures to push forward on the ground. According to intelligence from the front lines, in just three short days, at least 500,000 of their low-tier creatures have been wiped out by our firepower. Some of our cannons have been firing non-stop for twenty-four hours, to the point that the barrels are nearly melting. General Tarl, if your Empire cannot provide more support, we may not be able to resist for even two weeks with our current strength alone.”

“True. Didn’t you recruit 500,000 men in the rear? A batch of weapons has just arrived. Arm them all and send them to the front. The Empire can provide you with partial aerial support, as well as several armored combat vehicles. Their outer metal is reinforced with complex magic arrays; even a shell blast capable of leveling a house will simply bounce off.”

“Mobile fortresses?” The noble’s eyes lit up.

“Indeed. They are moving fortress vehicles. Some are equipped with firearms, and our engineers are currently considering mounting cannon barrels on them. They will be perfect for dealing with the Zerg’s heavy units.”

“I see. Thank you. When can they be delivered?”

“They set out this morning. At normal travel speed, they should arrive tomorrow.”

...

The situation in Mia was dire.

At this time, a fully armed army of 50,000 from the Novien region began marching eastward into Mia territory. However, this small group of reinforcements was detected in advance by the Swarm’s aerial reconnaissance.

Xia Jin casually dispatched a swarm of locusts—about 300,000 of them—to directly surround this army.

It was evident that the military competence of these two countries was not very high. Perhaps they were still unfamiliar with modern warfare, as the distance between their units was too small. The Swarm’s encirclement trapped the entire army within a single town.

Next, the unicycle artillery continued its bombardment, directly crippling the reinforcements. A massive number of locusts, coordinated with several hundred zerglings, closed in and easily finished them off.

The Swarm did not utilize much of its air force in this battle, using only a total of 10,000 scourges, which were single-use consumables.

Considering the limited range of the artillery, catapults were sometimes used again to strike enemies inside bunkers. They launched banelings to explode and use strong acid to corrode the buildings housing the bunkers before following up with rocket strikes.

In some poorly constructed bunkers, the baneling venom would leak directly inside, dealing a lethal blow to the soldiers hiding within.

After only ten hours of fierce combat, the legion of 50,000 was completely annihilated.

The original plan was to show off their strength and deal a heavy blow to the Swarm with a flanking surprise attack. The King of Novien nearly broke down when he realized that his entire force was gone in just one day.

Crucially, that same night, Xia Jin concentrated 500,000 locusts, 20,000 main Zerg, and 50,000 human soldiers equipped with rocket bugs and missile bugs to head south and launch an invasion against the Norn Kingdom.

The intensity of this offensive was even more aggressive than the slow advance in Mia.

On that day, Xia Jin produced an additional 200 swarm hosts to temporarily support the locusts in this direction.

Following the invasion of Novien that night, a significant force also began to concentrate in the city states region. The scale of the Swarm here was even larger, including 100,000 main Zerg, 300,000 locusts, 100,000 human soldiers, along with 500 mutalisks and 20,000 scourges.

Such a large-scale force had only one goal: to rapidly flatten the Kelu region, then turn to attack the Gexilu United Kingdom and link up with the main force in Mia to form a complete, mutually supportive front line.

As for the lakeside area of Gexilu, 50,000 Zerg would emerge from underwater to seize control of the coast.

Once all preparations were complete, the brain bugs of each theater began the unified deployment of the Swarm.

Thousands upon thousands of insects began an all-out offensive across the entire line.

Despite the massive overall scale, the number of main Zerg was actually lower than during the invasion of the Kingdom of Clear; the numbers were padded out with Tier 3 locusts.

This was because there were simply too many locusts.

Even so, it gave the enemy the sensation of the Swarm covering every hill and field.

After three days of continuous pushing, Xia Jin’s statistics showed that only a little over 10,000 main Zerg had been killed.

And that was the result of a high-intensity offensive.

Locust casualties, however, exceeded one million.