At the flanking ambush point, Oser seemed frozen solid in his saddle.
He had already drawn his sword, ready to lead the Silver Fang Knights down from the heights the moment the 17th Legion broke out of the mire, cutting off their rear.
But then he saw those hundred Steam War Chariots push through the fog side by side and fire together, erasing nearly a thousand Black Steel Knights from the world on the spot.
His sword hung in midair, but he could not bring it down.
"Wh... what... are those things...?"
Oser's throat tightened. Thirty years of experience had become useless.
Some things brought more than a tactical advantage when they appeared. They marked a rupture between entire eras.
He had never seen a weapon capable of destruction on this scale without battle aura, without chanting, without even relying on a commander's orders.
Those were not siege engines. They did not even look like magic.
They were more like... a pack of monsters rolling out of a hell of steel.
As he stood dazed, a steady, cold hand slapped onto his shoulder plate.
Ferran's voice struck like a sledgehammer on a winter night. "Oser, pick your jaw up. If you don't charge now, that boy Lambert will steal all the glory."
Oser jolted as though someone had kicked him awake, his face flushing crimson.
To cover his earlier loss of composure, he thrust his sword overhead, his voice hoarse but thunderous. "Silver Fang Knights! For Lord Louis!! Charge!!"
More than a thousand silver-gray cloaks snapped in the wind atop the heights, and the knights swept down the snowy ridge like a blade.
On the other side, the Cold Iron Knights advanced alongside them, as steady as a descending iron curtain.
Nearly two thousand Frost Halberd Knights, led by Ferran