Taking Ankandela would be easy.
Just as Marlow had predicted, Knife-in-the-Butt had already sent men to investigate the situation inside the city. He knew its defenders were a local garrison numbering fewer than a thousand. They were professional soldiers, but poorly equipped, and he had already mauled them once before.
Little Knife felt that beating these enemies really would not be difficult. A bombardment from the Crouching Tiger Cannons, a volley of gunfire, then a charge by the heavy infantry would crush their resistance in one go.
Even storming the city would be easier still. With so few men trying to defend Ankandela, a city with over a hundred thousand permanent residents, breaking through would be a breeze.
The Garrison Regiment had only a few hundred men. Even if the entire regiment stood on the walls, they would be spread thin. A few waves of players charging with siege ladders would pretty much exhaust their manpower.
But taking Ankandela was easy. What came afterward?
Besides investigating the defenders, Little Knife had also asked about the current situation inside Ankandela.
That was easy enough to find out. He did not need to send anyone inside. All he had to do was stop a few laborers who had come out to work, sit them down, give them a few flatbreads, and chat for a while. That would tell him what things were like inside.
Ankandela was full of starving people now. Of its hundred thousand-plus permanent residents, at least a third were going hungry.
That was downright terrifying.
Little Knife was already employing two or three thousand refugees, and that alone was wearing him out. Cartload after cartload of grain arrived from the rear, only to be eaten clean in a matter of days.
Damn it, Little Knife finally understood just how