At dusk, the other units rushed to the valley one after another to rendezvous. Hook had arranged a flowing banquet and was waiting; the food was laid out on the open plaza outside, everyone lined up to take their share. It was simple, but being able to have a full al after a big battle was already good enough. After dinner, Luo Zheng gathered all the military commanders and formally announced the deploynt again. Hook had no objections at all, Captain Li also had no opinion on leading the raid, and the other brothers had discussed it beforehand and agreed readily.
After the al, Hook separately gathered his own subordinates and the elders for a eting. The eting took only half an hour to finalize the army-building matter. The troops were already there; they just needed to confirm official designations and organization: Groups One to Five, the final numbers determined by the size of their battle rits, but each group would make its own military flag.
Xiong Bi's group was designated as the Bear Group, with a bear head as the flag's emblem. Lang Sen's group was designated as the Wolf Group, with a wolf head on its flag. Bao Li's group was designated as the Leopard Group, with a leopard head on the flag. Viper's group was the Snake Group. Senran was the top of the food chain in this prival forest, up to twelve ters long, with sightings of fifteen-ter ones in the past. Senran was a type of snake; so tribes even regarded Senran as a divine creature. The flag's emblem was based on Senran's head. Viper's unit valued this flag very highly.
Hook designated his own Guard Group as the Tiger Group, with a tiger head on the flag, mouth wide open, fangs terrifying to the extre. After determining the units' numbers and structures, Hook followed Luo Zheng's suggestion and redistributed the weapons, which counted as formally splitting the forces. How far each group could develop from now on would depend on its own ability. As for captured spoils, they had to be turned in uniformly and distributed uniformly; no one was allowed to stash anything. That was a matter of principle.
Once captured spoils were pocketed privately, the cohesion of the troops would fall apart; individualism and factionalism would all co out. That was a major taboo for an army, and Hook attached great importance to this. As for forming Party organizations, setting up Party branches down to the company level, that practice was not yet mature here. Hook knew the benefits of doing so, but he could not rush it and could only leave it for later.
An hour after the eting ended, Hook followed Luo Zheng's proposal to hold a flag-conferring ceremony and invited Luo Zheng to attend as guest and witness this historic mont. First, the tribal Wizard prayed for blessings, then an elder representative gave a speech, and finally Hook personally conferred the flags to each group. The flags were very simply made: a piece of cloth, a wooden pole, tied together with cord, but the emblems were very lifelike, painted with juice extracted from a local tree root, resistant to wind and rain, never fading.
What Luo Zheng did not expect was that Hook conferred upon him the position of Military Chief Advisor, with overall responsibility for military affairs. Faced with Hook's trust and the enthusiasm of the Hook Tribe, Luo Zheng could only accept. After the flag ceremony, each group left with its belongings, rushing to its own defensive sector. Captain Li split his unit into four and went off with the four groups. Scholar, Monk, Gardener, and Farr were also assigned to each group as instructors to help with the construction of fortifications.
Things did not wrap up until midnight. Everyone had been busy the whole day and went to rest. There were plenty of wooden huts in the valley; with the tribal civilians gone, the houses were empty and more than enough for everyone to use.
Early the next morning, Shadow, Ghost Hand, Snow Leopard and the others launched intensive training for the Guard Group, while Drunkard and Snow Fox went with Hook's people to build fortifications. The captured prisoners were all issued weapons. Although Captain Li's unit had gone off to carry out the raid mission, he himself did not need to go and stayed in the valley to assist Luo Zheng's work.
At Luo Zheng's request, Mountain Eagle was responsible for making the sand table. Without a sand table, command would be inconvenient. Hook also knew about sand tables and assigned people to cooperate with Mountain Eagle. There was no need to recon the surrounding terrain at all—just have Lan Xing help by directly sending satellite 3D imagery. Making a sand table based on the maps was much simpler and faster, and much more accurate.
Luo Zheng, Lan Xue, Captain Li, and Hook were chatting in the largest wooden hut in the tribe. This hut had originally been the tribe's Council Hall and was now converted into the command post. Whenever anyone had sothing hard to decide, they would imdiately co here to ask. The entire tribe was invisibly operating around the command post, and the brain of the command post was the four of them.
All the work had people in charge; the four only needed to make decisions, which saved them a lot of worry. Around noon, soone brought food over, and the four ate right there in the command post while answering questions from the various units that ca knocking. They were run off their feet. The army was in its infancy, the defenses were being readjusted; everything was new, and there were too many things that required decisions.
After lunch, they finally had a rare mont to rest. Luo Zheng turned on the signal device and got in touch with Headquarters. The satellite link was quickly established, and Lan Xing's voice ca through the earpiece: "This is a secure call. Brother-in-law, the higher-ups already have a decision regarding your request."
"Excellent, what did they say?" Luo Zheng asked joyfully.
"Scholar, Gardener, Monk, and Farr are field-promoted to captains of the Military District Special Brigades in their respective military regions, sa level as Captain Li. Captain Li's rank is raised by one grade, position unchanged. The four of them will have their military regions gather personnel to rush over to support you, all of them Special Forces. For now, each is filled up to a hundred n. That ans you'll have five hundred Special Forces at your disposal. The higher-ups asked to check if that's enough. If not, they'll assign more, but that will take so ti." Lan Xing said quickly.
"Excellent, that number will do for now." Luo Zheng said happily.
"Mm, also, the higher-ups are pulling together a staff team to co assist you—ten people in all, all from the staff departnts of various military regions. The idea from above is that this is a rare opportunity to use this big battle as training. You can't just train soldiers; you also have to train staff officers. Captain Li will concurrently serve as Chief of Staff, you remain overall commander of this joint force, and my sister will serve as Political Commissar. They're expected to arrive within two days." Lan Xing went on excitedly.
"Excellent, with staff officers I'll have a lot less on my plate. Send more Single Soldier Radios and walkie-talkies. A radar station is a great thing, but it's not safe—if Sam Country discovers it, one missile and it's gone. This war is suffocating; we can only rely on Single Soldier Radios and walkie-talkies to communicate. When will the electronic jamrs and radar jamrs arrive? Oh, and what we're most short of here is rice. Eating ga every day, who can stand that?" Luo Zheng said in delight.
"I want to eat ga—real, fresh ga." Lan Xing said enviously with a laugh. "Don't worry, the relevant departnts are urgently preparing your requests. They should be airdropped soon. Be careful and take good care of my sister."
"Don't worry. By the way, your dad is living very well here, and he's in good health, so no need to worry. Your sister and I discussed sending him out first, but he refused. He said that although there's a war here, the environnt is pretty good and it's just right for recuperation. Recuperating on a battlefield—only he could say that. We'll keep him safe, don't worry." Luo Zheng said with a slightly embarrassed smile.
"Alright, I'll let Grandpa know about this." Lan Xing said with a laugh.
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