Chapter 332: Only the East Wind is Lacked
The fighting power of Lord Crow Boris was indeed very strong. He led a force of several hundred people and managed to withstand the siege of countless Fallen.
This burly giant, with his Ravenspear Knights and Rogue Knights of Ravenstern, charged left and right among the group of Fallen. Although he was caught in the melee, he still held out for a whole day.
He even managed to rush to the east wall of Lion Lake City and built a simple defensive structure against the wall.
But building fortifications on the edge of Lion Lake City actually meant that he couldn't escape...
It was actually normal that Boris failed to break out of the siege. He chased Sigismund for seven or eight hundred miles and basically exhausted his physical strength, especially the strength of his horse.
Although the horse he rode looked very special, the Ravenstern knights under his command were just ordinary northern horses.
The horses in the North have some very distinctive characteristics. They are thick-stuffed and have long hair, making them relatively cold-resistant. They also have wide hooves, which are adapted to the snow.
However, this kind of northern horse has a very difficult time adapting to the climate in the southwest of Jatu Grassland and Lion Lake City - it is midsummer now, the weather is hot, and the area around Lion Lake City is a junction of hills and grasslands, with a lot of grass and vines on the ground. The northern horses will quickly run out of horsepower in this terrain.
This was also the main reason why Boris and his cavalry could not catch up with Sigismund. If it were the Jatu people, they would have hacked Sigismund to death on the grassland long ago.
The Firdsaway people in Lion Lake City did not attack Boris's troops. After all, the main enemy now was the Fallen, so they allowed Boris to organize the defense near the city wall.
Of course, the people of the Firdsvain did not let Boris into the city because he looked too tall, and the horse he rode looked very similar to the demon horse of Aigrrim the Devourer. The people of the Firdsvain were not sure whether this guy was a human or a ghost.
In addition, Vidis was going to take this opportunity to break out to the west, and he hoped that Boris would attract more firepower in the east.
However, on the west side of Lion Lake City, the breakout launched by the Firdsvain people and the Knights of Dawn was still suppressed by Aigrim.
In this battle, Aigram demonstrated an extremely high level of coordination.
In other words, it demonstrates the unique command style of this spirit.
There are hundreds of "fallen ghosts" in its fallen army, probably the knights whose souls were devoured by it as mentioned by the prophetess Media.
These people may have once been members of the Lion Lake City Flag Guard, but after losing their souls and skins, they became a kind of peculiar "leader puppets".
Each Fallen Ghost will lead a hundred or so Fallen, which can be considered a combat unit.
And Aigram seems to be able to directly control these Fallen Ghosts, and in a way similar to remote control, and use the Fallen Ghosts to control all other Fallen.
This allowed all the Fallen to react in a very short period of time. These puppets that had lost their souls and had no ability to think were as easy to use as his own arms in Aigram's hands.
After Sigismund returned, Leon spent the whole day looking for suitable terrain and opportunities. He witnessed the breakout battle west of Lion Lake City with his own eyes.
In fact, King Vidis, Count Edin, and the Knights of the Dawn are all elite troops with strong combat effectiveness, with a total number of more than three thousand people.
These troops joined forces and tried their best to break out of the city, and this happened while the battle was taking place in the eastern part of Lion Lake City, so it should have been easy to succeed.
But those Fallen Ghosts seemed to have opened their third eye, and they were always able to lead teams of Fallen to accurately block King Vidis and his men - just like the situation when Klose brought the Silver Hand to reinforce Guihu Town.
Li Ang had been watching from afar from the outside. Now he understood that the level of reaction shown by the three prophets in Changhe Town back then was probably similar to that of Aigram at this moment.
It is no wonder that the three prophets, facing the chaos caused by the fire, were still able to marshal part of their forces to fight against the coalition forces in just three minutes.
The blood-sworn witches of the Three Prophets were probably equivalent to Aigram's Fallen Ghosts, except that the Three Prophets could not use the Fallen Ghosts to continue to control more Fallen like Aigram did.
Aigrim's ability means that he can control his troops with his mind alone without giving any orders, and all his troops can execute their orders in place.
Therefore, the result of this breakout was that the Firdsvain and the Knights of Dawn suffered heavy casualties, leaving behind hundreds of corpses and hundreds of "prisoners" before retreating back to Lion Lake City.
These hundreds of corpses did not become Fallen, but those 'captives' all became Aigrim's troops without exception.
Especially those 'captured' Dawn Knights, most of them became 'fallen ghosts'. It seems that the Dawn Knights have more evil thoughts in their hearts than the Firdsvain pirates...
Of course, Leon also knew that it was impossible for anyone to surrender to Aigram and become a prisoner. Those 'captured' people were obviously attracted by Aigram's magic and took the initiative to offer their souls to him.
In Lion Lake City, after Vidis suffered huge losses in the breakout battle, he released Lord Crow Boris into Lion Lake City.
But when Boris entered the city, there were only about two hundred people left around him.
Fortunately, Aigram didn't come to him, otherwise this guy would definitely become a powerful Fallen Ghost.
After this, the situation in the city was completely unclear. Leon could no longer contact Vidis, and Aigram tightened the siege of Lion Lake City again.
Now, Leon has a comprehensive understanding of Aigram's abilities.
Aigram is not a necromancer, and he cannot turn dead bodies into Fallen, so the soldiers who died in the battle will not turn around and attack their own people.
The Devourer's greatest ability is not reflected in his personal strength, but in his ability to control the battlefield - he is actually a 'soul manipulator'.
Every Fallen ghost whose soul he devoured was equivalent to his clone. Even if he led an army of tens of thousands, it was equivalent to directly commanding each squad - this was an extremely huge advantage when commanding on the battlefield.
In addition, its "soldiers" are all fallen, with great strength and fearlessness, and they don't need military pay or logistics, and they don't feel bad if they die...
These alone are already extremely terrifying, but it can also directly convert the Fallen from its opponents - some Dawn Knights turned into dazed zombies as soon as they approached Aigraim.
However, they were not turned into Fallen before the battle was over. It was probably because Attraction and Transformation were two different spells and could not be used at the same time.
But those who dare to approach Aigrim on the battlefield are mostly powerful knights, which makes it easy for it to devour more powerful souls and create more fallen ghosts...
If we cannot destroy it completely in one go, its troops will only grow larger and stronger.
Such a demon is indeed difficult to deal with.
A sneak attack or a charge won't have much effect on Aigrim, because his troops won't be in disarray.
If you want to deal with it with conventional means, you can only rely on a head-on push, oppressing its tactical space little by little until all the fallen ghosts are killed, and then kill it before it devours more souls.
However, fighting a head-on battle with a monster like this would be a bottomless pit!
Li Ang felt that the number of troops he had was probably not enough to fill in here.
Therefore, Leon began to pray for the first time, praying to God for help and a thunderstorm as soon as possible, otherwise when Lion Lake City was conquered by Aigrim, the army of the Fallen might double again...
In late July, Li Ang found the most suitable battlefield.
This is a hilly slope between Payne Village and Lion Lake City.
This place is a gentle slope, not very high, with a drop of only a few dozen meters from the flat ground below.
In fact, this is the place found by Gondor - Leon asked everyone to look for places nearby that are prone to being struck by lightning.
Although Gondor the Doomseeker did not understand physics, this captain who had been committing crimes at sea for many years did understand better than most people what kind of situations were likely to attract lightning.
Gondor found this place because there were many towering trees on the top of the slope, but the surrounding area of the slope was bare, making it look like a huge ship with several huge and tall masts.
There are several ancient giant trees on the hillside, which are a bit similar to redwoods. They are estimated to be at least 1,800 years old. The height of the crown must be more than 80 meters, and the diameter at the base is at least 6 or 7 meters.
Only in this era can there be so many giant trees...
There are many scars on the trunks of these giant trees - Gondor said that they were all marks of being struck by lightning.
The roots of these giant trees occupy most of the land on the hillside, making it difficult for other similar trees to survive, so the hillside appears sparsely populated with trees.
The huge tree trunk is nearly as high as a thirty-story building, and it is at the top of a slope, surrounded by wasteland.
In this situation, whenever there is lightning, it will usually hit these giant trees.
Li Ang could even see some patterns in the tree trunks...
The tallest tree had an obvious twist in the middle of its trunk about 40 meters above the ground. It was obviously broken by lightning and then grew again.
As for the other trees, the traces of lightning strikes were all above 50 meters - obviously, the tallest tree was struck, and after being struck off, the upper half was burned, making it shorter than the other trees, and then another taller tree was struck again...
The latest trace of lightning strike was on a broken giant tree, almost cutting the entire tree in half.
The upper half of the tree was burned black, broke, and fell to the ground, forming a huge obstacle, like a wall.
The tree trunk that fell to the ground had the charcoal on its bark still not peeling off, and there was not much moss on the tree, which showed that it had been struck by lightning not long ago.
In this world, no matter if it's a human or a plant, anything that sticks out is likely to get into trouble...
Of course, the most important thing is that the scene here shows that lightning strikes often occur in this area, making it a natural lightning-attracting area.
The battlefield was found, Leon prepared things like chains, asked the Noldor elves to climb up the trees to make careful preparations, and sent fast horses to observe the "celestial phenomena" in all directions.
It's not really about looking at astronomy, it's mainly about seeing which direction there are dark clouds. Once you find clouds gathering nearby, you have to lure Aigram over immediately.
Everything is ready except for the east wind, but this east wind is not something that can be determined by human power.
Just wait.
However, there is still good news. Wendelf has brought a large number of Noldor warriors to reinforce.
Wendy has been touring Leon's various territories during this period. On the one hand, she was delivering messages, and on the other hand, she was checking whether there were any problems in various places. She was also responsible for meeting Fothert and Eric.
Fothert was an undercover heretic in Erminede, and Eric led troops to encircle and suppress the heretics in Changhe Town. The two worked closely together, one in the open and one in secret. After Wendy led the Noldor troops to enter Changhe Town, they wiped out all the heretic supplicants in Changhe Town.
Speaking of which, Fothert made a great contribution this time - if he had not gone undercover in time, Changhe Town would probably have faced a similar situation to Shihu City.
However, Fawcett was as cruel and ruthless as ever. Except for a few heretic leaders who were kept alive, he killed all the other heretic followers on the spot and then burned their bodies to ashes.
During this period, he captured and killed more than three hundred heretics.
There must be some innocent people among them who were deceived by heresy, but both Fawcett and Eric chose to kill the wrong people rather than let them go - Eric was the administrator of Changhe Town, and he was in charge of government affairs when Leon was away. In fact, Fawcett needed his consent to kill the heretics without trial.
Today, Fawcett has earned the title of 'butcher', but whether he is a butcher or a murderer, at least he and Eric did not put Changhe Town in danger.
After confirming that most of the eastern areas were safe, Wendy brought the Noldor troops to Lion Lake City to help. At the same time, she mentioned some minor situations in Kwen Village and Fletcher Village to Leon.
Dallion organized an unknown knight group in Kwen, who originally performed chivalrous deeds and protected the villagers.
However, this chivalrous knight group suddenly disappeared recently.
Charles returned to Fletcher Village some time ago and organized a troop of archers. He had been waiting for Leon's orders, but he suddenly disappeared recently.
Kwen Village was Leofric's territory, so Wendy certainly wouldn't care about it. But Charles was Leon's subordinate, so she had to tell Leon about the lord's mysterious disappearance.
However, Charles' status in the system list was quite good, so Leon didn't pay much attention to it. The knights who were sent out were all independent individuals. Charles might have his own things to do, so it was understandable that he was not in the territory. Didn't Leon himself run around all day...
Anyway, Leon had no plans to recruit Charles for the time being.
Wendy's arrival gave Leon more room for maneuver and security. She brought more than 400 Noldor warriors, half of whom were "new residents" from White Hart Castle and other places, and half were mercenaries. But without exception, all the Noldor respected Wendy and Leon very much.
This was probably the work of Vendatil and Aldarian. Vendatil said that Wendy's "blasting open Eagle Claw Castle with one arrow" was "magic awakening", and Aldarian saw with his own eyes Leon letting three ordinary soldiers use "Thunderstorm" in White Hart Castle. In addition, the Elf King Felgus Anr of the Finwe family also insisted that Wendy was about to awaken for some reason...
So now most of the Noldor elves have basically recognized Leon as a magician. They think that Wendy will fully awaken sooner or later and become the first Sindarin elf in a thousand years...
If Wendy hadn't been a minor, she would have had another crown on her head by now.
Aigram had also discovered the camp set up by Leon in Payne Village, but it did not let the Fallen army launch an attack.
Perhaps it still wanted to devour the army and residents in Lion Lake City first - after all, it had been besieged for so long and had been building siege equipment. If it turned around and attacked Payne Village at this time, it would likely lead to the people in Lion Lake City successfully breaking through.
