Chapter 179 Beginning Engagement

While all of this battle prep was going on, Biao Gong was just lounging around curious as to what Baron was thinking. After all, Biao Gong knew that there was no way in hell that Baron would be able to repel such a tactician like Xuan Feng. Though he had not been a part of the Chinese community for a few centuries, he did make sure to note anyone who might seem to be worthy of praise in many of the high ranking communities. As such he knew a bit of what Xuan Feng was capable of and more importantly, this strategist's style of warfare. Biao Gong went to go tell Baron immediately once he found out what had happened, but unfortunately, this was all he could do. After giving Baron some tips on how to combat Xuan Feng, he had to return to his own base as what they were planning was near completion.

Baron took everything that Biao Gong had told him to heart and made sure to incorporate as much of that as he could into his tactics. Around the same time, Meng Wu and his men reached the battlefield that would be filled with death in but one or two days more, just having missed Biao Gong. This time, Meng Wu had brought along the two who were with him shooting the dual Gatling guns while they were defending against the alliance as they were also planning to use those weapons in this battle as well.

Ever since that defensive battle with the alliance led by Zhang Da Zhi, these weapons have been dismantled and rebuilt again so that they would be able to transport it to different battlefields. This was a big component to their success as it worked quickly and was able to deal so much damage. Meng Wu and his men began to set it up on a platform that they had felt was the best place to put it and began to work.

This time around, Baron had about 40,000 soldiers, they were mostly split up into 6 groups. The biggest of which was the 20,000 infantrymen who were equipped with the m4a1 that had been provided by Roxi and were one of the reasons for their quick conquests. Another group was for their tank division, yet another for their artillery section, a heavy weapons corp, the military aircraft squadron, and lastly the elite guard that only had a handful of men. There were many more groups but they had very small and niche jobs that would have almost no impact in the battle.

A few more days pass, and Xuan Feng finally showed up with his army. Going by Baron's guesses, Xuan Feng had brought along with him close to 30,000 men. It was a slight relief for Baron that he had the numerical advantage, but he knew that if he wasn't careful, that would all have been for naught. Slow and steady may win the race, but Baron wasn't sure if Xuan Feng would allow him to even do that. The two sides just stood still and stared at each other the first day that Xuan Feng's forces had come because the day was almost at an end. Therefore, both sides had almost an unspoken agreement to wait until the second day to begin the battle.

Unfortunately for Baron, he was way too naive in thinking that he could trust his enemy to something like that. Disastruck in the middle of the night for Baron's army as a couple thousand of Xuan Feng's men snuck into Baron's camp and dealt a massive blow to their numbers and morale. They had snuck in after masterfully taking out the guards that were supposed to warn the army of impending attacks, but that never came to be. The night raid was short, only lasted about 2 hours, but the effects had an everlasting effect in the minds of the soldiers who were almost killed that night. Many of them would not be able to sleep until early into the morning and some not at all. Baron had already lost the first engagement in the battle of wits.

Baron and Yue Fei were quick to take a reassessment of their forces and realized that they had suffered at least 1,000 deaths and a minimum of 5,000 more casualties that night. From witness accounts, they now knew that Xuan Feng also had guns in his arsenal. Some of their enemies had dropped their guns in the midst of confusion and desperation and these were handed over to Roxi to investigate. She recognized the weapon immediately and dug inside to see if the insides were what she had anticipated. She found a little device that should not have been there and upon further discovery, she found out that it was likely a very small explosive. She immediately gave the intel to Baron.

(RB) "Baron, it turns out that these post WW2 guns have a very tiny e explosive inside their system. It likely won't do much damage but will incapacitate whoever uses it. It could be a switch to turn these on, I'm not quite sure."

(BM) "I knew there was something going on. There was no way they would have been able to drop nearly a thousand of those. Even the flimsiest armies would not be able to achieve such a feat."

(RB) "Would you have equipped them into our army if you did not know about this?"

(BM) "I'm honestly not sure, and that slight possibility of uncertainty is what scares me most. Go to your station and prepare to begin firing your sniper rifle. We will need you to be on your best right from the beginning."

(RB) "You don't need to worry about me, you just have to do the best you can on your end and we will come out victorious."

(BM) "I can't guarantee victory, this opponent will be the most dangerous one I have fought in a long time. He is the real deal."