"This is not the Pallas camp."
Jert shook his head.
"Not?" Ma Youfu was taken aback.
The young man nodded slowly, moving his frozen and stiff limbs slightly: "They're mountain people."
"Mountain people?"
"Weren't they fighting with Pallas—?" Ma Youfu asked in surprise. "Why are they here? Are they planning to invade at this ti? That would be a stroke of luck for us!"
But Jert shook his head, it wasn't that simple: "There are many groups among the mountain people, they might be coming for us."
"What?"
"Are you sure?"
"Of course, I know them better than you do. Alright, go inform the communication team, we're preparing to retreat," Jert replied, "It's snowing, we can't hide here anymore, we need to switch our clothes."
Ma Youfu looked at his companion and nodded.
...
"Mountain people?"
The snowflakes in the sky grew denser.
Leaving the South Gate not long before, Brando ran into a rcenary head-on. The man was an Elental Mage—the young man recognized him—he was one of Char's subordinates.
Under Brando's request, Char had initially picked out those with casting abilities from among the rcenaries and adventurers—wizards who knew a bit of magic tricks, third-rate Elental Mages, frauds, witch doctors pretending to be mystics, and a large group of apprentices—to form a so-called Wizard Group.
With Char, a wizard from the Golden Domain, as the figurehead, this didn't take much effort, and many wizards even voluntarily left their rcenary groups to join the so-called Wizard Group. Although the action drew criticism from various rcenary group leaders for a ti, Brando's support ant they didn't encounter any real trouble.
Brando knew that the advantage of concentrating spellcasters had been proven in the later stages of the war, both by players and NPCs. Of course, Char had complained to him more than once that these people weren't qualified to be called a 'Wizard Group', not because a mix of odd characters would be better, but Brando didn't care. At least from his perspective—
This was the first fully-fledged Wizard Group under his command.
Moreover, among these people, there were so with outstanding talents who, with a bit of training, could form the backbone of a future Wizard Association. It was just a pity that despite Char's strength being at the Master Level, he had no experience training apprentices, so for now, this so-called Wizard Group was still an empty shell.
However, it wasn't without its uses. Many of these people with even a hint of ability had once followed so ntor or at least served as apprentices for a period. So even ca from the academic background. They had one thing in common.
They were all literate.
Therefore, Brando, Antitina, Hu Que, and Char typically employed them in handling intelligence and so clerical work. Clearly, the person he encountered now was from Hu Que's so-called 'Intelligence Departnt'.
In response to Brando's question, the Elental Mage nodded: "Yes, Lord, Lord Char asked to inform you. You may urgently need this information. The intelligence ca from 'those people in the north,' and it's about the mountain people—"
Those people in the north?
Brando was montarily stunned before recalling that he had indeed ordered Hu Que and Reto to organize personnel to infiltrate the Pallas Region to gather intel on Count Rangdenier's army movents.
This matter was solely managed by Hu Que, but he was aware of the specific plan. Char mixed those third-rate wizards or apprentices he had gathered from the rcenaries into these reconnaissance teams, disguising them as adventurers—to relay ssages back to the rear.
The thod of relaying ssages was also simple, though it was his own suggestion: animal ssengers. In fact, this was nothing new but rather a use of summoned demons—long before the Cave Beast Year, the Cruz people had already used this thod in the November War, though in this era, few thought to send wizards to the front lines, so this thod hadn't yet spread widely.
But starting from the outbreak of the Black Rose War, years later, with the arrival of the first Magic Tide, the number of people with wizard talents increased significantly, and this thod gradually spread.
In the later stages of the war, it beca a very mature thod. By then, even more stable alternatives existed—such as using magical tools, but Brando didn't have such resources, so he first thought of this 'old thod.'
With animal ssengers, the range of an apprentice delivering ssages was about one day and one night. In theory, through a relay station system, ssages that used to take nearly a week to return could now reach the Lengshan Domain almost instantly.
However, Hu Que and Char had limited manpower, especially those who had both casting abilities and scouting skills, so they established only two or three such scout teams.
So, their monitoring of the Pallas Knight Domain was still quite limited. Brando hadn't expected that with such limited surveillance, they would receive useful information so quickly.
But now it seed that the nobles still looked down on them as 'rabble.'
Perhaps they valued them enough as warti opponents, but outside of war, Pallas still relaxed their guard against them.
This was understandable though; Brando, despite having few people, had thods even surpassing the regular army of Erune—though he himself wasn't fully aware of this, dealing with soone like Sir Pallas would give these traditional military n headaches.
Deploying wizards to the front lines as scouts? To the nobles, this didn't seem like sothing that a person would do.
Only soone like Brando, accustod to such tactics, would find it routine. When he first proposed this idea, even the ever-conservative Antitina and Char were taken aback.
...
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