The goblin officer seemed quite disdainful and had no intention of answering themander of the First Company''s question. Themander of the First Company waited a few seconds, and finding that the other party seemed to have no intention of answering his question, nodded.


    He looked at the somewhat embarrassed officer of the Second Company and said, "I''ll give you a chance to hit back..."


    The officer of the Second Company was at least 1.78 meters tall. Hearing this, he nced at the goblin officer who was roughly only 1.45 meters tall, and a cruel smile appeared on his face.


    The goblin officer was taken aback and before he could react, a fist in front of him grewrger andrger.


    Amid the exmations of the remaining goblin captives, the goblin officer was struck in the face by the punch from the officer of the Second Company.


    At that moment, his world was a kaleidoscope of colors, with only chaotic and fragmented images left in his mind. He remembered his grandfather and seemed to see his own backside.


    After spinning around in ce for about a circle, the goblin officer finally realized he might have been hit. But before he could prepare to defend himself, his chin was met with another heavy and forceful uppercut.


    His brainpsed into a state of shutdown, and his body involuntarily leaned backward. He staggered three steps back and still couldn''t stabilize, eventually copsing onto the sand.


    The goblin captives behind this officer began to stir, but the shiny bays and the dark muzzles of guns brought them back to their senses. Everyone watched helplessly as theirmander was pinned to the ground, receiving punch after punch.


    "How did you discover us and set up here in advance?" Picking another captive at random, themander of the First Company patiently asked the same question again.


    "We didn''t set up in advance, we were just rotated in..." The goblin being questioned nced at hismander, who was being pummeled on the ground, and swallowed before answering.


    "Rotated in? How many of you are there?" Themander of the First Company faintly felt that things might not be so simple.


    "A legion..." The soldier spoke without reservation, clearly not wanting to get hit.


    "We crushed apany... This means there are still twopanies of the enemy nearby." An officer looked at themander of the First Company, offering a reminder.


    "Get the second toon to work with the Third Company to deploy a defensive line along the shrubbery! Prepare for the enemy''s next wave of attacks!" Themander of the First Company immediately made a judgment, "People of the Second Company, help set up that 105 howitzer! We might need artillery support."


    "Stop hitting him! Wait for the regimentmander to handle this!" Watching the officer of the Second Company who continued to throw punches while straddling the other, themander of the First Company called out to stop him.


    Rising to his feet with bloodied fists, the officer of the Second Company looked at the goblin officer sprawled on the ground who had only the energy to moan weakly, spat, and turned to carry out his duties.


    Soon, the troops on thending site began to mobilize, some helping to set up cannons on the beach, while others armed with weapons started to arrange defenses against the direction of the enemy''s charge.


    As themander of the First Company had estimated, the Shen Country''s military finally obtained some intelligence from the fleeing soldiers, understanding that thending force was not the ipetent Zheng Country troops they had been previously fighting.


    Zheng Country''s military was weak inbat and usually dares notunch attacks proactively. Moreover, once they were engaged in meleebat, they would often copse swiftly.


    This was exactly why the Shen Country''s troops did not form squares and charged directly in an attempt to drive thending forces of the Great Tang Group into the sea with a melee attack.


    ustomed to meleebat, they attempted to use their most familiar tactics to dispose of the enemy before them.


    What they had not expected was that this time they were not facing the bby forces of Zheng Country, but the fierce and fiercely armed troops of the Great Tang.


    The feeling of kicking on solid iron was not pleasant. The Shen Country''smander discovered that less than one-fifth of thepany he had sent out had returned!@@novelbin@@


    An entirepany had lostbat capability, even when the encounter was unexpected, which caused the Shen Country''smander to sense a crisis.


    Just like the captives said, the Shen Country''s troops were just passing by; they''d been deployed nearby, ready to go into the mountains in search of the Zheng Country civilians hiding there.


    Someone then spotted ck smoke at sea and discovered thending forces of the Great Tang Group. After confirming that there were fewer than 500 people on the beach, the Shen Country''smander deployed his troops while sending out apany to mount a probing attack.


    Little did they know, this probe would lead to the copse of apany...


    After realizing the strength of the enemy, the Shen Country''smander decided to change tactics. He had already deployed subsequent troops and still held numerical superiority.


    However, he was quite wary of the continuous gunfire mentioned by the fleeing soldiers, as nearly all of them described the enemy''s gunfire as dense...


    So, he made his own countermeasures—artillery fire!


    If the enemy seemed strong in individual firearms, then start by using the longer-range cannons to regain the upper hand.


    Once the enemy was thrown into chaos, then deploy the superior troop strength for meleebat and crush these fools who had dared to provoke Shen Country in one fell swoop.


    After devising their tactics, the artillery barrage from the troops of Zheng Country began. A dozen muzzle-loading cannons were lined up, aimed in the direction of the beach, and started firing.


    Solid cannonballs burst through the thicket, flying across the beach, startling thending troops of the Great Tang Group.


    The battalionmander felt like the gods were ying a joke on him today, ever since he beganmanding the front-linending troops, it seemed that nothing was going smoothly.


    It was supposed to be a stealthynding, without even considering the possibility of an enemy attack, yet, against all odds, they encountered a counterattack from the enemy''s troops amid the chaos ofnding.


    The second battalionmander had a sudden inspiration, instructing the soldiers to abandon their baggage and weapons to ensure safety, resulting in at least one-third of the valuable first batch of troops whonded bing "nonbat personnel" who couldn''t participate in the battle, further weakening thebat capability of the Great Tang Group''snding troops.


    Now, their defense line was not even fully deployed, and the enemy''s shelling had begun… Although it was only solid shot, those were still cannonballs after all!


    Watching a cannonball whistle over the heads of the soldiers and smash into the water, the battalionmander felt terrible.


    "Where are the artillerymen? Can they open fire in response?" he asked his adjutant, pointing to the smoke rising in the distance.


    "We don''t have the range data, sir! We can''t just fire blindly, can we?" the adjutant reluctantly exined on behalf of the artillerymen.


    They had only one cannon; without the ability to perform suppressive fire, uracy was extremely important.


    After all, they didn''t even know if the enemy''s position was elevated or not, and firing the big guns there likely wouldn''t have much effect.


    Knowing this, the battalionmander abandoned the idea of getting his own artillery involved in thebat and started to think of other solutions.


    The enemy''s gunfirecked precision; it was aplete shot in the dark. So while it seemed fierce, it was essentially ineffective.


    A blind cat won''t catch a dead mouse most of the time, and firing solid shot blindly was unlikely to identally hit a high-value target.


    Aside from a cannonball that hit the beach, kicking up gravel and leaving a group of soldiers who had justnded covered in dust, most of these cannonballs''nding spots were unknown.


    "We can''t let them keep firing blindly! If one shot hits by chance, the loss would be unbearable!" When he saw a solid shot plunge into the sea, spurting a water column less than ten meters away from a small boat, the battalionmander felt that sitting idly by was not an option.


    "Even if it''s just to scare them, let the 105 howitzer fire!" He knew that although there was only one cannon, a high rate of fire and powerful artillery from the Great Tang Group were iparable to Shireck''s muzzle-loading cannons.


    Just as the adjutant was about to ry the order, the Goblin''s artillery fire unexpectedly ceased. The battalionmander was taken aback, then realized... the enemy''s cannon reloading speed couldn''t keep up.


    "The enemy''s gunfire... has stopped... then, should we still return fire?" the adjutant asked with some uncertainty.


    Sighing, the battalionmander thought for a few seconds and made a decision, "Let''s wait for now! Since they can''t keep up with the rate of fire, let''s wait!"


    After he spoke, he gave another order, "Organize troops to scout! Find out the exact location of the enemy''s artillery..."


    Before the battalionmander could finish his sentence, the sound of tearing through the air came from above, the terrifying whistling noise made everyone on the beach involuntarily shrink their necks.


    Dozens of cannonballs whistled past, over the beach, andnded beyond the small thicket where the white smoke had not yetpletely dispersed.


    The next second, mes shot into the sky, the earth trembled, and the st wave carrying broken branches swept everything around, a series of explosions followed, echoing in the sky.


    These were rounds fired by the 150mm caliber guns of the Navy''s cruisers, which passed over the beach, also soared over the troops of Zheng Country, andnded further afield, turning an open space upside down.


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    Unaware that a battle had already started on shore, the lookout on the Navy warship saw the remnants of white smoke from the muzzle-loaded cannon fire.


    That clearly wasn''t their own fire, as most of their howitzers were still on the ships, waiting to be unloaded. The surprised Navy realized that the stealthynding might have turned into a frontal assault, and the troops on the shore were being attacked by the enemy!


    Bernard, acting as the highestmander on the battlefield, immediately ordered the warship to open fire to cover thending troops. Out of concern for avoiding friendly fire, they decided to elevate the guns just a tad...


    As a result, these shells flew over the beach and the troops of Zheng Country, falling further away, creating explosions in istion.


    Fortunately, the warship''s naval guns were equipped with semi-automatic loading mechanisms and had a high rate of fire, allowing for a slight adjustment of the gun elevation to quickly fire a second salvo...


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