Over the following week, a large-scale battle involving hundreds of thousands of troops took place. After both sides lost over 100,000 men each, the front line entered a brief stalemate.
The Dawn Empire did not launch any further wide-scale offensives, instead using its legions to seize key strategic points in localized areas.
The fighting between the two sides primarily revolved around several key cities.
One such city in Mir, named Kaxing Fort, received special attention. In just five days, both sides collectively deployed over 200,000 combat units into this city, which spanned only twenty square kilometers.
Reinforcements and interception operations continuously occurred around the city. The Dawn Empire even sent 300,000 reinforcements from the southwest, attempting to form a massive encirclement to swallow the city whole.
In fact, this location was also vital for the Swarm.
It sat right at the center of Mia and the Gexilu United Kingdom. If the Empire controlled it, they could use their massive numbers to push directly north and cut the Swarm's land-based main force in half.
While the Zerg could move underwater, the battlefield was primarily on land. Once the Empire controlled the coastal regions, it would be nearly impossible to push back against such immense land-based firepower.
As both sides continued to commit troops, the previously sparse Zerg rear gradually filled with more insects.
After all, Xia Jin never stopped production.
While maintaining this level of intensity on the front lines, she was also constantly deploying reserve forces.
But compared to her, the Dawn Empire's commitment was truly insane.
To date, 3.5 million main legion troops were stationed on the front lines. Combined with several vassal states, the total force reached 4.5 million, putting the Zerg on the front lines under ever-increasing pressure.
Following the end of the last large-scale battle, both sides entered a brief standoff.
Then, less than two days later, the Dawn Empire finally made its move.
Nearly five million main troops advanced in four routes. The Western Route, consisting of 500,000 soldiers, pushed directly north into Novien, intending to strike deep into the Kingdom of Clear.
The Eastern Route, with 700,000 men, launched an attack near the east coast. Supported by the navy and air force, they prepared to push north from the Kelu region to eventually control the coastline of the city states region.
The remaining forces launched a pincer attack on the Swarm in the Gexilu United Kingdom, coordinating with the Eastern and Western Routes to completely devour the Zerg's main force.
By this point in the war, the Dawn Empire had a rough estimate of the Zerg's numbers.
Through several battles, although the Swarm had been increasing its forces, they had mostly been in retreat.
Currently, only an area less than 200 kilometers south of Clearwillow Lake remained under Zerg control. The Empire believed that by simply deploying main units to block both sides, they could completely wipe out the hundreds of thousands of Zerg remaining in the middle.
“They really think highly of me, don't they?”
Seeing 3.8 million troops directly encircling her Swarm, Xia Jin was left speechless.
However, she had her own plans. She chose two lines to hold, resisting stubbornly. She didn't aim for a total victory, only to delay the enemy's progress and make every step forward agonizingly difficult for them.
Then, Xia Jin mobilized over 800,000 Zerg from the rear and concentrated them on the West Line to encircle the 500,000 Imperial troops of the Western Route pushing into Novien.
Furthermore, Xia Jin had a reserve of 50,000 main Zerg units on Primitive Tribe Island. During this time, a massive number of Swimmers had opened a corridor from the island to the mainland, allowing these Zerg to bypass the front, land on the country's southwest side, and launch a joint strike with the encircling Swarm.
As for the Gexilu United Kingdom, which was being completely sandwiched by the Dawn Empire, if the Zerg there couldn't hold out, they would simply retreat into the water.
Since they could all submerge, they wouldn't be annihilated on the shore.
This plan was quickly supported by Brain Bug No. 1, and orders were issued immediately.
This time, 300,000 main units in Gexilu would submerge and circle to the rear, leaving only 300,000 to resist the enemy's millions of main troops.
With 500,000 mobilized from the rear, combined with these 300,000 and the 50,000 from Primitive Tribe Island, they would launch an encirclement operation against the Imperial main force from the west in two days.
“Concentrate superior forces to annihilate the enemy's smaller formations.”
The two routes totaling 3.8 million were too powerful, and the route through Kelu was also difficult to contest because the Dawn Empire's navy was too large. For now, the only option there was to keep retreating.
In the Dawn Empire's rear, reinforcements were still streaming in.
Because the fighting on the front was so intense, the Dawn Emperor, who already harbored ambitions of world unification, was growing impatient.
However, the three million troops in the south suppressing the remnants of the demons could not be redeployed to the Zerg front immediately. He could only draw from the garrisons stationed across the country and from newly conscripted soldiers.
Even with a mobilization rate of only ten percent, this country could field an army of thirty million.
This made Xia Jin wonder for a moment—who was the real human (Zerg) wave?
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