I Became a Genius Commander at the Academy

Chapter 195: Linz Plains Giant Slalom (7)

About 30 minutes had passed, at the command post of the Deputy Commander of the 7th Guard Division of the Imperial Army.

“Pull back the 5th Division on the right and put the 12th Division in its place! If we don’t push as hard as we can now, there’s no chance of winning!”

Following that order, 16,000 soldiers moved in unison to change their positions.

Meanwhile, the Reich Empire’s military, like a crocodile clamping its jaws shut to tear apart its prey, gradually pressured the Ostarica infantry through a coordinated assault from both the right and left flanks.

“Pressure those Ostarican bastards! Disarm and release any soldier who surrenders, capture the officers! Or kill them all! Kill one more if you can!”

“The necks of enemy soldiers turn into money! Remember this and fight to the death!”

“Remember the Crown Prince and the 7th Guard Division, who are risking their lives to protect our rear!”

Even with a force of 180,000, the loss of momentum made them very weak, and unlike the soldiers of the Reich Empire, the Ostarican soldiers had not received proper physical training.

Actually, soldiers of this era were all engaged in farming, which was a form of hard labor, so it was not so much that they lacked basic physical strength.

It was that they had no strength to fight when they reached their physical limits, being one-sidedly overpowered by the Reich Empire’s military.

For example, while soldiers of the Reich Empire could stab with their spears twice, the Ostarican soldiers’ movements slowed to the point where they could only stab once.

Soldiers started to collapse without even being touched, exhausted and depleted of energy.

“The spear, the spear is too heavy. The armor is too heavy. I have no hope. If you spare me, I’ll just surrender.”

“What the hell do those bastards eat that we’re struggling so much and about to die, but they’re still fine?”

“Win or lose, I don’t care; just let me go home, damn it. This isn’t right.”

The exhausted soldiers of Ostarica were being unilaterally slaughtered by the physically superior soldiers of the Reich Empire.

In such a situation, a retreat order should have naturally been issued, but the Grand Duke of Ostarica had lost his reason and continued to seek only methods for victory.

“We must win here at all costs. If we lose, the Grand Duchy, the Ostarica Grand Duchy, will never be able to rise again!”

However, no matter how hard they searched, it was impossible to find a proper solution, so only the sounds of yelling and scolding grew louder, and the response was delayed.

The Grand Duke and the officers wracked their brains to find a way to turn the situation around but couldn’t come up with a proper operation.

Meanwhile, the officers on the ground had to keep fighting somehow, as no retreat order had been issued.

Therefore, they ordered, ignoring the fact that the soldiers couldn’t fight and were dying due to exhaustion.

“We must fight to the end, even if it means death here. His Highness the Grand Duke will soon give us a plan!”

“If you fight prepared for death, there will surely be a reward for it, and if you retreat from here, you and your families will not escape a miserable fate.”

“Don’t die! Keep your wits about you and fight to the end. Even if you die, take down the one who killed you!”

If General Yaeger had heard this, he would have certainly failed the officers giving such orders in this situation.

Because in a situation where the unit’s strength was completely collapsed, each division’s commander should order ‘a full retreat and reorganization’ to focus the offensive where the encirclement looked thinnest.

These guys were not even attempting ‘a retreat and reorganization’ because the division commanders prioritized their own safety over waiting for the Grand Duke’s next order.

Meanwhile, Max, who had completed his mission as a double agent by killing his friend Matthias von Griffin, watched this scene and thought.

‘The order from my brother-in-law was to cause as much chaos among the enemies as possible if I could plunge them into confusion.’

So, even while deserting, he risked his life to enter the Grand Duke of Ostarica’s camp to spread false rumors, playing the role of a staff officer he was never meant to be and contributing to the collapse of the Ostarican army.

‘With this merit, I think there won’t be any problem getting promoted to Colonel in the merit award after this battle. I could also regain my honor. But there are still opportunities to make a mark… What would my brother-in-law have done if he were in my position?’

Thinking this way, while pretending to be a communications officer and naturally fleeing along the front line, a good idea came to his mind.

‘After all, the Grand Duke of Ostarica’s army is already cornered by my brother-in-law. But the current situation of not being able to retreat is because the officers are insisting on unreasonable orders. If this situation prolongs, unnecessary casualties will accumulate on our side.’

The current situation was as he thought; the Ostarica soldiers were maintaining their formation against the soldiers of the Reich Empire, somehow preventing a ‘massacre.’

From a slightly distant third-party perspective, the state of the Ostarican army looked like it would collapse instantly if touched even a little.

Max von Benner, as an officer of the Reich Empire’s military, valued the life of a single soldier of the Reich Empire but regarded the lives of tens of thousands of Ostarica soldiers as worth less than ant droppings.

Holding high the flag, symbolizing the courier officer he had robbed on his way here, he shouted.

“His Highness, the Grand Duke of Ostarica, has ordered the main force to retreat! The main force has retreated! Everyone, reorganize your units. Reorganize and attack again!”

The order to reorganize the units might seem, at first glance, like an order favorable to the Grand Duke of Ostarica’s army.

However, reorganizing in this situation meant giving the soldiers a justification to break through the encirclement of the Reich Empire’s army and retreat.

Even though it wasn’t an official order, given the situation, the soldiers, hearing that they could retreat from a supposed friendly courier officer, lost their senses trying to retreat, and as a result, the order that kept the army functioning properly collapsed completely.

Telling soldiers driven to this extremity to retreat would make them blind with the thought of a way to survive, making it impossible for their superiors to control them.

This created a situation where the Reich Empire’s army could unilaterally massacre the Grand Duke of Ostarica’s army due to the collapse of Ostarica’s military control.

“Damn, damn! Finally, a retreat order! Move aside!”

“No, it’s a retreat order; let’s retreat! Let’s go home!”

“Aaah, this is crazy.”

The Ostarican soldiers, as Benner had anticipated, lost their order and even the will to fight, and began running towards the rear in disarray.

The officers resorted to killing those fleeing with swords or shouting loudly to control the escaping soldiers.

Logically, they knew that following a single courier officer’s shout to retreat could result in their heads flying off for violating military orders.

However, the greatest fear for the Ostarican soldiers right now was the threat of the Reich Empire’s army, not the unlucky few who might be summarily executed by their officers.

Such harsh control by the Ostarican officers did not help in commanding the units.

And this situation was soon reported to General Yaeger.

“This is the perfect opportunity! Signal the 14th, 17th, and 19th Divisions to clear a path for the soldiers of the Grand Duchy of Ostarica to escape. Use the gap to mobilize knights resupplied with lances to sweep away the fleeing Ostarica infantry. Lieutenant Colonel Anya’s archer cavalry regiment, kill even one more fleeing soldier or knight!”

Following that order, the three divisions massacred the Ostarican infantry, who were blindly fleeing until the Reich Empire’s knights could strike their rear.

Then, the knights who arrived shortly afterward trampled the fleeing Ostarican infantry, and any surviving knights and infantry were thoroughly slaughtered by the archer cavalry and knights.

And when the Grand Duke of Ostarica, along with the Duke and his staff at the main base, judged that the war had become completely irreversible, they chose to abandon the unit and flee as fast as possible.

The Reich Empire’s army suffered over 10% casualties, with 5,000 killed and 7,000 wounded.

In contrast, the Ostarica Empire’s army suffered near-annihilation with 45,000 dead, 27,000 wounded (many died due to delays in treating the wounded), and 23,000 prisoners, with casualties reaching 30% of the force.

And, of course, Max von Benner, Lieutenant Colonel and brother-in-law of Peter Yaeger, who safely made it to the Reich Empire’s camp, officially succeeded in regaining his honor that day.

One regret was that they failed to capture the Grand Duke of Ostarica and his headquarters.

It was an unavoidable circumstance.