Munitions Empire

Inside Beiyuan City, on a street filled with rubble, a Type 4 tank was advancing, followed by cautious Tang Army soldiers armed with weapons.

After two days of resistance, the Shen Army troops were almost completely in a state of collapse. They had lost organized resistance, each fighting on their own, but still stubbornly clinging to battle.

Because they knew better than anyone that their hands were stained with blood, no one would spare them, they were already... doomed.

The Tang Army was unwilling to bear the infamy of killing prisoners, so they basically did not accept the surrender of the Shen Army. After a few attempts, the people of Shen Country had almost completely abandoned the idea of surrender.

Even if they were left with only a stick, they had to bite the bullet and fight a bloody battle to the end against the Tang Army's tanks. This was their destiny, as well as their final outcome.

"Ah!" A Shen Country soldier without bullets, holding a weapon, shouted as he stood up from the ruins. He charged at the Tang Army soldiers, wanting to fight them in a bayonet duel.

What met him was a gunshot and a bullet flying straight at him. The Shen Country soldier fell, his body crashing onto the rubble with a dull thud.

The Tang Army's formation continued to advance, they searched every building, clearing out segments of rubble, dragging out those Shen Country people who had been hiding inside and hadn't eaten in two days, then killing them in the streets.

As the battle went on, many in the Tang Army had become accustomed to the things they were doing because they had seen too many things they had never seen before and understood why their superiors did not regard the Goblins as human.

Often they would push open the doors of a building only to find it filled with dead Goblin wounded. Most of these corpses were suicides, while some were killed by other Shen Country people.

Later, the Tang Army also found starved Shen Country wounded soldiers. A room was piled with corpses of Goblins that hadn't been dealt with, simply sealed up with a tag on the door as if that closed the matter.

Everywhere, one could see the suicides of Shen Country soldiers, and discarded weapons were everywhere. Cannons that had fired all their shells were simply overturned in the streets and alleys, painting a picture of the apocalypse.

The Goblins were so ruthless to their own kind, utterly inhumane, which made the Tang Army soldiers greatly disgusted.

Yet if it were only this, the Tang Army soldiers would not have considered the Goblins a species other than human. It wasn't until they saw even more corpses, more corpses of Qi Country people, that they truly realized how cruel these Goblins were.

From the buildings that had been set ablaze, the Tang Army found numerous charred bodies; Shen Country soldiers often used this convenient method when dealing with Qi Country civilians.

They would find buildings that wouldn't start fires in the surrounding houses, then herd the civilians inside, and immediately set the house alight, burning alive everyone inside.

These Goblins would also pile up the bodies of Qi Country people they had killed in one room, then simply seal the room's door and leave.

When the Tang Army soldiers checked such houses, upon opening the door, an overwhelming stench and countless flies flew out, nearly scaring the young Tang Army soldiers to death.

The sight of thousands of flies swarming out was something no one would want to experience a second time. And the scenes inside these houses were of the sort that just one glance could cause psychological trauma.

The soldiers who saw the scenes inside the houses had continuous nightmares for two days, to prevent them from attacking friendly forces, the troops even confiscated their weapons.

When they finally chose brave soldiers to muster the courage to go in and deal with the corpses, they quickly came out and made their suggestion, "Burning them, might be the best method."

There was no need to hide it or make propaganda about it, such places could be encountered all over Beiyuan City, thus all kinds of stories quickly spread among the troops.

And then almost all the soldiers began to faithfully execute the orders given to them by their superiors, just shoot when they saw the enemy, no hesitation needed.

Sometimes, one has to marvel at the tenacity of human life, even in the state of Beiyuan City, there were still a large number of Qi Country people who had survived.

They hid in cellars, on beams in houses, amidst the ruins, and in any place they could hide.

Most people were emaciated and tormented by hunger and fear, but they had survived, seeing the dawn that belonged to them.

The Tang Army was once again played by the refugees, who had a glorious tradition in this regard. They brought out everything they could offer.

Raincoats, canned goods, rations, clothing and footwear... These supplies were lost in large quantities again. The troops that entered the city, numbering over 10,000 soldiers, lost nearly 20,000 sets in total.

To take care of these survivors, who were poorly clothed and starving, the Tang Army opened evacuation routes that allowed these people to temporarily leave the city and live in the surrounding camps.

And the task of settling these survivors was even more enormous than the task of attacking Beiyuan City itself. Discover hidden stories at My Virtual Library Empire

There was no way to predict beforehand that the people of Shen Country would massacre civilians here, turning a siege into a desperate war of revenge.

"We are currently counting the number of people, but there are at most 20 or 30 thousand… Initial estimates suggest that at least 200 thousand people died in the massacre," at the entrance of a relatively clean building in the city, an officer of the Tang Army was reporting his work to his superior.

"Provide them with food and clothing as much as possible, now they are all our compatriots," the colonel looked at a few children standing by the roadside with compassion and instructed.

The children, skinny and heart-wrenching, wore large military boots of the Shen Country soldiers stained with dried blood, wrapped around their waists were the underwear of Tang Army soldiers, their upper bodies were bare, and they held unwrapped candies in their hands.

Curiously, they watched the tanks and cars parked in the distance, as well as the soldiers who were moving equipment into the rooms.

Thick smoke billowed throughout Beiyuan City, with gunfire and explosions audible from afar. However, it was clear that they were safe here, as this place was now considered part of Tang Country's territory.

The colonel, who had begun to take over the entire city, once again warned the few subordinates around him, "Prohibit soldiers from finding water sources on their own within the city! Have the epidemic prevention experts inspect all wells. This place is hell; nothing is safe."

"Yes, sir!" saluted a captain beside him, taking note of his superior's order.

"Remember to clearly state the reasons in the report that the combat ability of the No. 4 assault gun in urban combat is not as good as that of the No. 4 tank!" the colonel looked at another subordinate and assigned a task, "Also, the report on landmines— we lost another three soldiers to them yesterday. Tell the platoon leaders and squad leaders to be smarter, don't just randomly open doors!"

"Understood! All troops entering the city have been strengthened with safety awareness training, but in combat, some still forget," his subordinate replied somewhat helplessly.

The Shen Army rigged the few remaining hand grenades or explosives and landmines they had into booby traps, randomly deployed behind some doors.

Even they might not remember exactly where they buried a powerful explosive charge, so the Tang Army entering the city for urban combat suffered significant losses.

At least 100 soldiers were killed or injured by these devices, which had become a major cause of the Tang Army's casualties.

"Try to identify and account for the bodies, and find every victim possible! If we don't do this job, no one will be able to make sense of it later," the leading colonel patted his subordinate's shoulder and continued to speak about the massacre, "Investigate every living survivor. Ask them for names - their names, their neighbors' names, friends' names, teachers' names, even their enemies' names!"

"Yes, sir! This is exactly what we're doing," the officer nodded slightly and replied.

"Those damn bastards, to cover up their crimes, burned all the population records and household registration materials in the Lord's Mansion! They're bloody… madmen, bastards!" cursed the colonel, "I should have strangled that Shenwu Sanlang with my own hands!"

Speaking of him, he immediately asked, "Speaking of which, has that guy not been found yet?"

"We interrogated the prisoners we purposefully left behind. Before their deaths, they confessed that Shenwu Sanlang was in the harbor area. We've just taken that area, and the cleaning operation is not yet completed," the subordinate officer said.

After speaking, he added, "Please understand, sir, killing tens of thousands of Goblins hiding in the rubble takes time. They're like rats, evasive and hard to find."

"Alright! Get to it," the colonel nodded and tried to muster a smile for the few young boys across the street before entering his new headquarters.

Finding a relatively clean house in this city was no easy task, as this place had truly become almost a complete ruin.

In another part of the city, some Shen Country prisoners of war knelt on the ground with their hands over their heads, despairingly watching the people of Qi Country on the opposite side of the road, who were spectating the scene.

Not long ago, their situation was the complete opposite. Now with numb expressions, they lacked the ferociousness they showed when they were driving and slaughtering the people of Qi Country.

Now, they heard the rustling sound of the Tang Army soldiers cocking their weapons behind them, and then their heads shattered under a series of gunshots.

The officer who gave the order for the execution looked towards the remaining dumbstruck Goblin prisoners, loudly ordering them to carry the bodies from the ground onto carts filled with Goblin corpses.

Then, these remaining Goblins would be watched over as they led the carts, using their own bodies and those on the carts to fill in the large craters.