Chapter 338: Battle of Moncruz (End... Oh, it's not over yet)
Rolling dark clouds covered the sky, and the hooves of the Boar Riders and Hussars trampled the broken blades and arrows on the ground, sending them flying everywhere.

The war monks of the Black Hat First and Fourth Legions escorted the prisoners of war to the Heitao Town in the rear.

The old soldiers leaned against the wall with lingering fear, passing a pot of beer from one to another and drinking it.

The new recruits who had just joined the army began to cry, laugh, sing and dance together, and shouted the names of their deceased relatives and friends.

Others frantically strangled the Templar prisoners with ropes and did their best to perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation on them when they fainted.

Even though the knights' tongues turned blue and purple-red blood oozed from their throats, the war monks still refused to give up on the rescue efforts.

"Victory! Victory!"

The high and mighty knights were really defeated by them. They had previously lost their loved ones and homes, and lived numbly like cattle and horses.

But at least at this moment, they launched the most unforgettable revenge against the once noble masters.

Even though they were only collecting interest, they couldn't help but get excited, and they vented their anger by howling or beating the prisoners.

Horn often trains them as synths, but they are still human after all. No matter how strong their faith is, they still feel fear and sadness.

Jeanne did not forcibly restrain their behavior, and even turned a blind eye to some activities that violated military discipline.

After such a long military career, she is no longer the village girl who could not tolerate any grain of sand in her eyes. Naturally, she knows to leave a channel for the war monks to vent their emotions.

Besides, she has more important work to do at the moment, which is to compile statistics on the results of the battle.

"After Helwin's final charge, most of the knights surrendered." Coleb reported with a bruised face.

"Have you figured out the prisoners?" Jeanna's voice was as clear as a magpie as she fed carrots to her warhorse.

"The statistics are out." Colebour was the clerk of the Holy Gun Cavalry Regiment, so it was natural for him to do this kind of thing.

Relying on his memory, Colebour reported several numbers one by one: "We have annihilated and captured approximately 150 extraordinary knights, 200 squire knights, more than 500 night watchmen, and more than 1200 peasant soldiers."

"What about the specific captives? I mean the extraordinary knights."

"We captured 83 extraordinary knights, including 23 Kush Knights, 46 Leia Knights, and 14 Fran Knights." Colebo used his fingers to wipe off the dried blood stuck to the helmet.

Jeanna stopped feeding him carrots. "83? Why so many?"

"After all, the hand cannon fires range shotgun shells, which are enough to penetrate armor at a distance of about ten meters, but not enough to kill, so we have thirty more knight prisoners."

Jeanne nodded in sudden enlightenment and easily calculated the result in her head using her knowledge level which had finally reached that of a fifth-grader.

In this battle, they killed nearly seventy extraordinary knights, more than half of whom fell under the holy guns, and the rest were divided equally between the boar knights and spearmen.

Jeanna's eyes sparkled, and she hesitated before speaking, "Is this a great victory?"

"Of course, we have wiped out more than 150 extraordinary knights."

After the previous tension and killing, Jeanne, with blood still on her hair and face, smiled brightly.

This battle was the first time that Jeanna led the army independently, without any guidance from Horn or Jeska.

This was also due to Helwin's eagerness after his last failure, and his continued attack regardless of the consequences.

Although she was cheated on many times in love, Jeanne applied her experience of failure in love to the battlefield.

She led the Holy Gun Cavalry and Hussars in a big circle, galloping for sixty miles, bypassing the battlefield of Moncruz, and first went to steal from Helwin's house.

This left Helwin with nowhere to escape, and he had no choice but to fight to the death with the Knights Templar.

But he was served by the three major cavalry forces: the Norse Knights led by Murat, the Hussars led by Grush, and the Holy Gun Cavalry led by Jeanne. Didn't this look like a small death?

However, compared with Enrico, Helwin was a man of integrity. He committed suicide by taking poison and only brought back a bloody corpse.

Of the remaining thirty or so Temple Knights, except for a dozen who died in battle, the rest were sent to the war monks to vent their anger.

At this moment, the remaining surviving Temple Knights, with their extraordinary bodies, were beaten beyond recognition. A gust of wind blew with the grass leaves, and Jeanna closed her eyes and turned her head to the side, and suddenly felt a little cold on her cheek.

There was a rumble of thunder and she looked up. The sparse rain had drawn circular spots on the walls of the fortress.

"It's raining. Let's go back to camp."

After taking off her armor with the help of the orderly, Jeanna took a cold shower first.

After wiping the blood off her hair and body, she changed into a slim-fitting jacket and trousers and walked towards the castle hall inside the fortress.

Passing through the abandoned corridor filled with the smell of decay, Jeanne pushed open the door of Moncruz Castle, and inside was the hastily renovated meeting room.

"...So, from now on, it's best not to let any outsiders stay inside the defense line."

"Even if we have to let them stay inside the defense line, if they dare to disrupt the front line, we should fire and disperse them without hesitation!"

"Before the enemy arrives, we should practice the rotation several times and simulate all the emergencies..."

"If it's a battle to defend the city, with the protection of the wall, there's no need to save the holy power too much, otherwise..."

Hearing the heated discussion in the conference room, Jeanna knew that they were holding a review meeting.

Bernardo, as the legion clerk, sat on a small stool and took notes quickly with charcoal.

The sound of the door opening was not loud, but the legion commanders immediately sat up straight, waiting for Jeanne to take a seat.

"Why are you so serious? It's not like you don't know me."

Jeanne walked up to them carelessly and patted their shoulders: "Congratulations on your great victory. You have at least destroyed one-fifth of the combat power of the Ibe Knights. Well done!"

Jeanne walked to a small stool and sat down, looking around the conference room.

Outside, dark clouds were bringing down heavy rain with lightning, while at the corner of the conference room, it was drizzling.

Turning her head to look at Momri who was sitting on pins and needles, Jeanna hit his chest and said, "Who are you showing this dead face to? Everyone makes mistakes sometimes, and one mistake cannot cover up your past achievements."

"Your Highness, I..."

"Stop whining." Jeanna's voice lowered. "The military judge's report will be sent out tomorrow. Those who have made contributions will be rewarded, and those who have made mistakes will be punished. The battlefield is always changing rapidly, and no one can control everything."

After calming Momli down, he asked Na to sit at the head of the group and asked, "What do you think about the next step of dividing the land?"

Speaking of this point, several legion commanders became excited.

"Based on what we've learned in the past few days, it might be difficult to divide the land," Coleman said, curling his lips. "The villagers here are too stupid."

"It's not that they are stupid." Zhu Erdan sighed, "The church has been poisoning us for too long, they still regard us as rebels."

Compared to the Kush Territory, which has scarce arable land and is more oppressed by the church due to the existence of the Duke of Kush, Jinhe Township, which has many fields, unexpectedly does not have such sharp conflicts.

In their eyes, the church is the righteous side. The Black Hat Army had previously tried to divide the land on a small scale.

Although it was obviously a good thing, the villagers resisted it very strongly because they believed that it was a favor from the devil and they would be punished by the knights and the Holy Father.

"No matter what we say, they don't want to believe us, especially the Blue Blood Monastery. They insist on seeing it with their own eyes. I can't move the monastery here."

Coleman became angrier as he spoke, and he wished he could go out and engage in a special fighting operation with those "troublemakers" right away.

"We encountered these problems when we were recruiting soldiers in Heitao Town, and we now have a preliminary solution." Jeanne thanked the flattered maid and took a sip of butterbeer to drive away the cold.

"Just wait a few days. When Grampven arrives, you will know."

"What is the solution?" Jourdan asked curiously.

"Didn't you say that we had to move the Blue Blood Monastery here to see it with our own eyes?" Holding the warm butter beer, Jeanna opened the review meeting minutes recorded by Bernardo and scanned them. "Who said we couldn't?"

(End of this chapter)