Chapter 568 - 350: We Treat You Like a Dragon King, but You Treat Us Like Beasts of Burden

Chapter 568: Chapter 350: We Treat You Like a Dragon King, but You Treat Us Like Beasts of Burden

The heavy machine guns were impressive, but that was the extent of it.

But the howitzer... that was something beyond their comprehension.

Figxin, Gelda, and the officers of the New Northern Army were all speechless.

A Magic Array of that magnitude wasn’t unheard of.

But it shouldn’t be possible to deploy one like this.

Normally, unleashing a strike of this magnitude required a team of Mages, or perhaps a single top-tier Mage. Even then, it would only be possible after lengthy material preparations and a complex Casting process, and only at a fixed location.

But this howitzer...

It took only seconds to prepare and could strike any coordinates within its range. Even if the gunners needed to understand some principles of Magic, they would be far easier to train than a true Mage.

And judging by its name—the multi-purpose howitzer...

Figxin naturally concluded that the shells could be loaded with more than just one type of Magic Array.

"I need this. Lots and lots of this!" Several ideas about how to use this weapon were already forming in her mind.

However, Zog poured cold water on her enthusiasm. "I can’t give you ’lots and lots.’ This thing is quite expensive and complex to manufacture. For the first batch, I can only give you six artillery pieces."

Figxin was visibly disappointed to hear that number.

’If she had more of them, they could deal with the Loman invasion without losing a single soldier. The enemy might even be annihilated before they could even lay eyes on them. She had hand-picked and trained every single member of the New Northern Army. She didn’t want to lose even one of them if she could help it.’

"Don’t think that six is too few. You can already achieve many tactical objectives with them."

Zog said, "Besides, six artillery pieces will require an entire company to operate."

"An entire company?" That wasn’t what Figxin had imagined. "Doesn’t a single gun only require three to five people to operate?"

’Let’s see,’ she thought. ’You have people for spotting, loading, and aiming... what else is there?’

"An artillery piece requires more than just the gun crew," Zog prompted.

As a leader with extensive combat experience, Figxin was exceptionally sharp. Despite her lack of experience with this type of weapon, she caught on quickly.

"Oh, right. You also need command staff and runners to relay the commander-in-chief’s orders, plus reserve gunners. You can’t have the whole gun go offline just because something happens to the main crew."

An officer to the side added, "By the same token, you can’t have a minor issue with the gun itself take it out of commission, so you need dedicated mechanics. The artillery company also needs close-quarters combat capability, or it’s game over if the enemy gets near. That means you need a security detail."

"And then there’s logistics. How do you move the cannons? How do you ensure a steady supply of ammunition?"

As the chief steward of the Northern Domain, Gelda naturally thought of these issues.

After discussing it for a bit, they suddenly realized that for a single company, six guns seemed like a stretch. Three or four might be more manageable.

As for logistics, moving such large cannons was another problem.

Treasure Chest Monsters large enough to carry a cannon weren’t exactly common.

So the solution seemed to be the most primitive one.

Towing them...

"You can use carts where there are roads. Where there aren’t, you’ll have to rely on Los Beasts," Zog said. "Of course, for urgent missions, you can also use precise, short-range teleportation. That’s what Scrolls are for—use them when you need them."

High-tech artillery being towed by beasts of burden—the image was certainly a bit strange, but it was the most logical solution for now.

Likewise, ammunition would primarily be transported by the same beasts of burden.

Benz had already developed a vehicle that was supposed to be a truck, but it was still a long way from practical application.

It only had a two-ton payload, which wasn’t much better than a Los Beast.

It wasn’t fast, either, and it had extremely high requirements for road conditions. It basically couldn’t leave the city, struggling even on slightly uneven dirt roads.

Therefore, the amount of ammunition Zog’s side considered "one basic load" was determined by how much a single Los Beast could pull.

For example, one basic load for the howitzer was twenty rounds.

Using "basic load" as a unit of measure, rather than a specific number of rounds, was also for the convenience of logistical planning.

This way, when transporting ammunition, they wouldn’t need to calculate the required transport capacity based on the number of shells. A few basic loads simply meant a few Los Beasts—it was simple and clear.

The exact number of rounds in a basic load would be adjusted depending on the ammunition type and the primary mode of transport.

Once proper trucks were developed, a basic load of howitzer shells might increase to sixty rounds.

"My suggestion is that you first select a group of people and send them to Deepwater City for operational training. This equipment is heavily dependent on proficiency. Ammunition with prefabricated Magic Arrays is very expensive, but the training rounds are cheap, recyclable, and you can fire them as much as you want."

Zog continued, "The gunners’ training shouldn’t take too long—a month at most. They’ll be able to fire even if they aren’t experts. Oh, and remember to pick people who are literate. They’ll need to read to operate the calculation Magic on the main console."

"Understood. I’ll start selecting people as soon as I return to the Northern Domain," Figxin replied.

One of the key features that set the New Northern Army apart from traditional armies was its literacy rate. Academic classes were a mandatory part of the curriculum, following practical training. Everyone from command staff to frontline combatants and logistics personnel was required to master a basic vocabulary of three thousand words in the common tongue.

That vocabulary wasn’t enough for creative writing, of course, but it was more than sufficient for this training.

Zog had emphasized the importance of education in the army to her before, and now she was seeing a prime example of why.

If you were illiterate, you couldn’t even read the instructions on the screen.

"Also, the personnel responsible for complex calculations and maintenance will need training too," he added. "Their educational requirements are higher, and the training takes longer. It’s possible they won’t be ready in time for the Loman invasion, so I can provide you with a group of skilled technicians to start."