Another Worldly Summons

Chapter 48: Successful?

While the flames of chaos engulfed the city. Several Parpaldian soldiers are tightening the security around the perimeter of the city, as they are mainly ordered to capture any possible escaping saboteur from the city or, the other way around, ASEAN sneaking in additional hostile infiltrators while using the chaos as cover.

Many of them are hot-blooded young men, newly enlisted in the imperial army. Most are aged from 16 to the oldest, some 50 years old, who returned to the service. They are only issued with the old 1590 Standard Issue Parpaldian Musket, in other words, a 50-year old gun, as old as some of the oldest recruits and returnees here.

"Ugh! I want to fight!." Those are the wailing young commoner recruits who want action to immediately rise in rank and prominence, as they think killing one ASEAN saboteur alone could earn them medals for slaying a soldier of an enemy country. But they are being admonished by veterans and obedient yes-man to the high ranking officials of the Imperial army, "Shut up greenhorn, we are ordered to defend this place and not go there fighting needlessly."

"Same goes here. We are needlessly standing here waiting for nothing. We also join the fray in hunting down those ASEAN. Our officers will definitely reward us handsomely." Even before the beginning of war between ASEAN and Parpaldia, the imperial army was already suffering from a chronic shortage of disciplined and decent soldiers, as these types of undisciplined and relatively braggarts were so overconfident. Because being born in Parpaldia and serve a superpower of this world, they believe they are invincible, resulting in a proliferation of unprofessional soldiers in service, with the exception of Parpaldia's main armies, of which only a handful are decent enough to say. However, due to the ongoing war with ASEAN and its allies, their forces have been reduced to only about 1/3 since then, thus making the imperial army suffer more from the undisciplined and lack of manners of their newly recruited men.

If those recruits have no officers or seniors in the field, they will undoubtedly leave their current position to join the fight against the infiltrators of ASEAN, much to the chagrine of Imperial army officials.

"As we said earlier, no can do. We are ordered here. We will stay. If we fight thoughtlessly, we are likely going to hinder those units who were originally tasked to fight the enemies and turned into unnecessary casualties instead. Lastly, according to my experiences in Kooze, 15 years ago, charging directly at the enemies will undoubtedly kill you, 9 out of 10." The veteran reminisces about his previous wars and campaigns he participated, much to the chagrin of the rookies, who can't relate because they haven't experienced the horrors of war. They knew the ASEAN was strong at the very least, but they only thought they were strong in air and naval battles as they were too slow to launch an attack via land and when they finally moved, they only stopped a few tens of kilometers away from Esthirant. They may be strong in ground warfare, but they can't stretch their forces no more than a few tens of kilometers, making their ground forces useless in the eyes of recruits and ignorant people, as they thought, what's the point of having a powerful army if they can't reach their enemies or least show their fangs against them. However, it was different in the eyes of higher ranking officials of Parpaldia as ASEAN simultaneously subjugated dozens of communities, towns and cities within 2 days then, came to a halt next day later. It was too fast in their common sense, too impossible for them to replicate.

"If my time comes, then it's unfortunate, but if destiny wills it, thy won't perish, even if I charged directly into them." The recruit who thinks positively on his life and letting the destiny choose his fate barked on the veteran who has a complicated face, "Charging against ASEAN, eh? I heard one of the calvary regiments of army group III in Esthirant was destroyed by a few dozen patrolling ASEAN soldiers in the early skirmishes between our country and their forces a few days after the occupation of Esthirant. According to the account, 250 horsemen were dispatched by no more than 50 ASEAN soldiers within 10 minutes. They were outgunned and outranged by much smaller force even though they tried to charge to close the distance, so now brat, they got butchered in no time... Tell me if you still want to try charging against them, head on?."