Two Skills

This time, 2,000 Spearman, 1,000 cavalry, more than 900 archers, and a small number of infantrymen spent several hours jogging 40 kilometers to reach the new city.

For catapults, Ye Qian used world teleportation to quickly move them to the front lines.

Moreover, since she had more money this time, she didn't care about the cost at all and simply increased it to a full 10 units.

Upon arriving at the scene, the army didn't waste any time and immediately set up their vehicles. Ten catapults began launching gunpowder canisters at the target.

Then, the five siege towers began to slowly advance, approaching the city wall.

This is a relatively large city with a population of at least 20,000. Although it cannot be compared to a major city, it is considered a large city within the territory ruled by the nobility.

The 2,000-strong garrison was completely overwhelmed by the catapults and archers.

As the siege towers slowly approached, the ballistae and catapults on the city walls quickly returned fire, but no matter how you looked at it, their hit rate was far worse than the attacking side.

After hurling a barrage of stones, they finally managed to hit the siege tower once. The stones, weighing several tens of kilograms, caused considerable damage, creating a huge hole in the tower. The structure, reinforced with some magical materials and wood, immediately collapsed, causing several soldiers to fall to their deaths.

However, the tower as a whole is still progressing slowly.

"It's over."

Seeing the situation of the battle, the general defending the city felt his heart sink.

He used rolling logs and oil, and fired ballistae at the enemy below, but the enemy's arrows were ridiculously accurate and even had magical penetrating power. Sometimes they could pierce armor, and sometimes they could cause explosive splashes, making it impossible to fight them.

Not long after, the first siege tower struck the edge of the city wall.

Then a large number of Spearman leaped out and jumped to the top of the wall, where they fought with the remaining troops who had been decimated by the archers.

A phalanx of Spearman, wielding their iron spears, swiftly charged to the city gate, slaughtered all the garrison troops, and then opened the gate.

The cavalry then charged forward, quickly advancing and beginning a one-sided slaughter of the soldiers along the way.

Countless screams marked the beginning of this siege.

"Kalu, in this world, do soldiers massacre entire cities after they conquer them?" Cannon Fodder No. 2, the little loli, suddenly thought of some historical events and turned to ask Kalu.

"Ah, Vier, you... you wouldn't be thinking of..." Her face turned deathly pale.

"No, no, no, I'm not that outrageous, I'm just curious."

"I've heard of massacres happening many times; they're terrifying," she said nervously.

"Really."

Miss Cannon Fodder No. 2 is meant to rule, and she has no need for such outrageous methods to reward soldiers or intimidate the enemy.

She didn't need to reduce the local population, so this attack basically only killed the resisters.

The soldiers ignored all the civilians who obediently hid in their homes or knelt down to surrender.

The battle quickly reached the city lord's mansion.

The battle went too smoothly.

The Cannon Fodder No. 2 little girl is the same as always, she had all the nobles in the city, starting from the Knight rank, arrested and imprisoned by the local bigwigs.

Then came the purge of noble households and city lords' mansions.

Furthermore, and most importantly, they began to use worthless metals to mint currency similar to modern ones, replacing the original gold, silver, and copper mines, for citizens to use for consumption.

Due to technological limitations, this era of relatively backward magic and even less advanced technology was completely incapable of creating such currency. Ye Qian then considered linking the value of the currency to related resources, allowing all users to exchange it for resources of corresponding value, thus making its worth more readily recognized.

"By doing this, I can safely and gradually acquire gold, silver, and copper."

She didn't consider issuing paper money; given the preservation conditions in ancient times, the damage would be staggering. She didn't have a modern financial system; there was no internet, so coins were far more convenient.

Half a day later...

"Lady Vier, we have acquired the equivalent of 42,075 silver coins in the Main World in this city."

A soldier read the contents of the report in his hand with trembling hands.

"More than 40,000?"

Cannon Fodder No. 2 was stunned upon hearing this.

Damn, if all of this were used to recruit Spearman, the number would immediately exceed ten thousand.

If they were all replaced with archers, that would be equivalent to 4,200 people.

"What were the personnel losses in the siege?" Cannon Fodder No. 2 asked again.

"222 Spearman were killed or seriously wounded, and 42 cavalrymen were killed or wounded."

Generally speaking, the term "injury" in the context of casualties specifically refers to those who are no longer able to participate in further combat and can only return to their hometowns.

So in reality, these people are nothing.

"Compared to gains, it could even be said that there were no losses."

In the end, more than 400 enemy soldiers surrendered, while more than 1,500 were killed. I think the casualty ratio in Cannon Fodder No. 2 subsequent battles shouldn't be too high.

"If I could fight the enemy on the plains, that would be truly good for me."

Upon entering the mansion in this city, a huge map was spread out on the table.

Cannon Fodder No. 2 ran to the table, raised its head, remained silent for a moment, and then stretched out its hand.

"Let me help you."

Kalu quickly ran over and picked up the little white-haired girl.

Cannon Fodder No. 2: "..."

That's the trouble with being a loli.

Snap!

"Hey, why did you spank me?" Cannon Fodder No. 2 little loli turned around angrily.

"I'm sorry, I couldn't help it." Kalu guilty.

"Emmmmmm... Damn it."

Returning to the map, Cannon Fodder No. 2 quickly determined his location.

"I see. So we've already captured one-fifth of the cities and fortresses in the entire province?"

The province as a whole belongs to a duke.

Or rather, it was precisely because this territory belonged to that duke that it was designated as a province.

However, this territory was not entirely under the Duke's control; part of it was administered by the Kingdom. This seems to have been done during the enfeoffment process to limit the power of the nobility.

"Are we going to conquer all of this duke's territory next? Isn't that... too fast?" Cold sweat broke out on Kalu's forehead.

I've visited so many places in just one day.

"Our current forces are not enough. Let's wait another day. At our current speed, we won't even need to wait for that duke to find out; we should be at his doorstep by now."

Including the currency reserves in the Main World, the current silver coins are close to 60,000.

After preparing to expand its army, Cannon Fodder No. 2 will directly concentrate tens of thousands of troops to attack the next location.

For her, this was already a snowball effect.

"If I could completely control the Kalu World, this place would truly become my... or rather, the entire Dusk Organization's backyard. At least I could hide here more peacefully."

Thinking about it this way, Cannon Fodder No. 2 couldn't help but smile.

In the real world, although the main focus has been on unifying the Kalu World, Ye Qian No. 2 has not forgotten her own affairs.

During the day, he spends his time searching for members of the Fading Lamp Society in the academy.

She also waited for Bai Yun, who was on her way.

Then, while wandering around aimlessly, the location of the target person was found.

She originally didn't plan to take direct action because she was worried about being monitored within the academy. However, after consulting with Norton, she learned that as long as she didn't cause harm in critical situations or create trouble, she wouldn't infringe on students' privacy rights when using her abilities.

"I see."

But there must have been a survey, right?

"We may need to be cautious in dealing with the underlying issues that led to the development of the Fading Lamp Society'."

Chapter 136 Two Skills

That evening, the college announced the start of the new semester ceremony.

The content was roughly the same as a gala, with various performances, and at the end, the principal would run up and say something to celebrate.

It was a little after 7 p. m., and I heard there were still a bunch of small commodity stalls set up by students.

"This kind of thing doesn't seem very fun, does it?"

Ye Qian's original plan was to find those students who had been lured into the Fading Lamp Society.

But now that I think about it, everything is actually more convenient.

Interestingly, around 6 p. m. that evening, a Cannon Fodder Misses clone who was just lazing around in the Main World took the initiative to run to human territory and met a group of merchants from a distant empire.

This merchant team only has a little over 20 people, but more than half of them are level 20 or above.

The products they sell are also top-notch.

Two of the books were skill-related, and Cannon Fodder Misses immediately took a liking to them.

Master-level Swordsmanship (green)

[Ice Flying Disc (Green)]

The former refers to martial arts skills, while the latter refers to magic.

Master-level Swordsmanship goes without saying; second only to Grandmaster Rank swordsmanship, it can be said to have reached a first-class level.

The Ice Flying Disc, judging from the cover image, summons several thin, round ice blades that hover around the user's body and can be controlled by thought to attack opponents.

Of course, for native speakers, mastering all of these methods requires talent and long-term practice according to the book's descriptions.

However, players can quickly learn it by relying on the system.

"Are the prices 60 gold and 50 gold? That's so expensive."

"It's not expensive, Miss. Master experts are extremely rare. They have systematically explained all the knowledge they have learned in their lives in this book, and it has been certified by a professional association, so it is effective. The magic that follows is also a relatively rare high-level magic. If it weren't for our good relationship with the Chamber of Commerce, we wouldn't be able to get this."

The man opposite him had a smile on his face, seemingly having no intention of haggling over the price.

After saying a few more words and confirming that the price couldn't be lowered, Cannon Fodder Misses had no choice but to pretend to take the money out of her pocket.

"Here you go, 110 gold coins."

"Sincere and generous."

I've received both books.

Learn directly.

[Master-level Swordsmanship (green) and Ice Flying Disc (green) have been detected. Entry in progress.]

[Reward: 6000 Life Energy]

[Data entry complete. Simulation of the learning mechanism will now begin.]

[The mechanism is complete. Learning this skill requires each player to consume 1500 points of Life Energy.]

"Huh?"

Seeing that the Player System first rewarded him with 6,000 points, and then made him spend a total of 3,000 points to learn, Ye Qian No. 2 was a little stunned.

But she soon realized what it meant.

"How come these two skills aren't in the Player System's inventory?"

Essentially, she purchased it, then voluntarily handed it over in exchange for a reward.

The reward is exactly double the Life Energy required to learn this skill.

This situation inevitably gave Ye Qian a thought.

"It seems that this Player System is not omnipotent. Its internal resources are limited, and sending players to manage forces is actually a process of increasing one's own foundation."

This is somewhat similar to Ye Qian's own Dusk System.