Translator: Tsukii

Editor: PalenMisha

Read at Watashi wa Sugoi Desu!

Chapter 24 – Gold and Shiny desuwa

The Arcelus Kingdom was quick to detect the invasion launched by the Lowlet Imperial Army and requested reinforcement from the O’Shay Federation. Although the Arcelus Kingdom was a small nation, its wide intelligence network and a large number of what the Japanese would call ninjas were the reason it could maintain its independence. As a result of early detection this time, it was possible to gather reinforcements from the O’Shay Federation before the Lowlet Imperial Army began their invasion.

The invasion by the Lowlet Empire at this time was on a small scale with few of its troops actually being skilled people. This was because some of them were invading the demon territory and others were quelling the civil war. It was still a large army at 20,000 and was a threat to the Arcelus Kingdom and O’Shay Federation.　

Since the Arcelus Kingdom chose to fight on the field instead of by siege, the two armies were confronting each other. The battlefield was large grassland and both armies were able to make use of an expanded formation.　

And the start of the war was triggered by Lydia’s army. Centered on the heavy infantry units wearing gold-plated armor, 1,600 men except for Lydia’s knight brigade charged forward. 8,000 men of the Arcelus Kingdom were waiting for them. Of course, it wasn’t like she didn’t think this through. She sent all units other than the knights ahead, and when the knights charged, their important momentum was killed due to allies in front. It would allow Lydia to reduce the strength of her knight brigade, who boasted explosive breakthrough power.　

For the sake of getting captured, she chose to cut off her advantage so she could be defeated. Such a shallow idea would be overturned dozens of minutes later.　

“The heavy infantry is fighting hard! They are pushing the enemies! But the enemies that don’t get caught with it are sieving through our army and are coming toward us!”　

The moment a messenger from Ally duchy reached Lydia, she realized her own failure. In the first place, with 1,600 clashing against 8,000, there was no way for 1,600 to stop all of them. Obviously, that meant those who weren’t stopped would rush toward them.

As a result, the army of Arcelus Kingdom was divided into an army that approached Lydia’s knight brigade and an army that surrounded the other 1,600 people. Naturally, it was no longer a battle where the knight brigade needed to be considerate of allied soldiers.　

“…We’re charging toward our heavy infantry units! All members of the knight brigade, charge!”　

Eventually, Lydia gave up thinking and charged. After being told “If our defeat is clear, abandon me and withdraw,” the morale of the knight brigade was extremely high as they broke through two enemy units of 1,000 each, and in the blink of an eye, they arrived at the location of the gold-plated-armor-wearing heavy infantry. In the scene that Lydia saw, there was the figure of her army defeating the adventurer unit who relied on their individual might through the use of brilliant collective tactics.　

There were adventurers affiliated with Arcelus Kingdom’s army who laughed loudly as they swung their magic swords, but their attacks were blocked by thick golden shields as the army protected each other. All the members of the heavy infantry were muscular men with big juniors who were trained to endure the assault of Lydia’s knight brigade every day.　

Lydia was wondering at this sight. Since she thought arrogance would breed weakness, she didn’t provide any specific training instructions to the heavy infantry units. She didn’t even YEET the weakest member of the unit, unlike the knight brigade.　

However, in order to make the armor expensive, each piece was custom-made according to each person’s physique. In order to prevent the gold plating from coming off, professional blacksmiths were hired to do maintenance for every single piece of armor.　

In addition to the good salary, they were in an environment that allowed them to spar against the knight brigade next door every day, so most members trained on their own, and due to the minimal turnover rate, there was a person who served as the commander to coordinate them, unlike the knight brigade. Due to the same number of people being in each group, it didn’t take long for the knight brigade and the heavy infantry unit to start interacting with each other.　

In the first place, having them wearing gold-plated armor made them easily targeted by enemies who made them their high-priority target, in this case causing the adventurers unit to aim at them. As a result of frequent clashes with Lydia’s knight brigade to withstand such a scenario, they gradually learned group tactics.　

This time, because they weren’t too experienced with the group tactics, they suffered many casualties and were about to be broken through by the enemy army. However, it was at that moment that Lydia arrived with her knight brigade, saving their lives.　

Due to the arrival of Lydia’s knight brigade, the army of Arcelus Kingdom completely surrounded Lydia’s army and tried to annihilate them, but they had a hard time since Lydia’s army was strong. As the general of Arcelus Kingdom’s army noticed they were gradually put at a disadvantage, he attempted to personally cut down Lydia by cutting down several members of Lydia’s knights.　

He was formerly an S-rank adventurer and since he earned the title of general, he was chosen to lead the adventurer units. As Lydia saw a person who managed to blow her knights away, she decided he might be a person who could capture her, so she gladly raised her flag and charged.　

The 5,000 men of the Lowlet Empire thought that was their signal and proceeded to charge immediately. As Lydia noticed the atmosphere, she became impatient due to lack of time.　

Tsukii Note:

Considering she still won when she tried to lose, perhaps we could consider Lydia’s talent for war lacking.

Let’s see what Lydia did in this battle:

• To align the speed of their march, she had the slowest heavy infantry charge ahead.
• This made the enemy split between dealing with heavy infantry and her main camp, and she made use of the opening to charge alongside her knight brigade, managed to spread chaos on the battlefront, and saved her heavy infantry unit at the same time.
• Using herself as bait to drag the enemy commander to battle, she gave signals to her allies to crush an unprepared enemy.

Yep, totally a tactic of a wise general that would be carved in history…

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