# Chapter 19: Siege
Thump, thump, thump...
The impassioned war drums sounded from the rear of the Imperial army. At this moment, over three hundred thousand Imperial troops were advancing toward the Black Earth Fortress.
Facing the towering pitch-black city walls, the Imperial soldiers showed no fear. Instead, they maintained orderly ranks and advanced at a steady pace.
At the very front of the Imperial army was a large formation of heavy shield soldiers. Their shields were raised diagonally upward. Since no enemies would appear from the front, the deadly attacks would surely come from the several-dozen-meter-high fortress above.
The troops behind the heavy shield soldiers were quite special. They wore light armor and carried no weapons. Each had a bamboo basket on their back, filled with irregularly shaped stones of various sizes. These stones were the key to this battle.
The front of the Imperial army was arranged in this pattern: a row of heavy shield soldiers, transport soldiers carrying stone baskets behind them, then another row of heavy shield soldiers, and so on in cycles.
As the Imperial army advanced, the tribal soldiers on the Black Earth Fortress walls tensed their bodies.
Large siege crossbows were mounted along the edge of the fortress walls. These crossbows resembled artillery emplacements, entirely forged from metal. To load them, one had to use a crank wheel, which looked somewhat like the starter handle of an old hand-tractor, only larger in scale.
Click, click, click...
The sound of crossbows being drawn formed a continuous chain. These large crossbows couldn't be drawn in advance. If not fired within one minute after being drawn, the powerful tension of the bowstring would deform the crossbow, showing just how terrifying their power was.
Dwarves busied themselves on the city walls. Near each crossbow were three dwarves: one responsible for firing, one for loading, and one for cranking the drawstring. Their movements were synchronized. In less than ten seconds, over three hundred crossbows on the wall were drawn. But don't think the Black Earth Fortress only had these three hundred crossbows. Looking across the fortress, there were at least a thousand crossbows. It's just that the battle line was only so long, and the other crossbows couldn't be used. These movable crossbows had already filled this section of the wall.
Before the Imperial army reached the Black Earth Fortress, it was almost a one-sided slaughter by the tribal side. As for countering with volleys of arrows, it was basically ineffective.
This terrifying war machine was called the "Heavy Siege Repeating Crossbow," invented and crafted by the dwarves.
If the "Heavy Siege Repeating Crossbow" only fired ordinary large bolts, the tribal side wouldn't use it to defend the fortress. No matter how powerful the bolts were, they only attacked a single point, having minimal effect on a battlefield of hundreds of thousands. But the "Heavy Siege Repeating Crossbow's" attack range wasn't a single point—it was a large area.
"Prepare."
A dwarf almost wrapped in an iron barrel stood at a high point, holding a small red flag.
As the dwarf flag-bearer raised the small flag, the Imperial army had already arrived at the foot of the fortress. The soldiers carrying bamboo baskets charged forward, untying their baskets mid-run, intending to dump the stones at the base of the city wall. If they completed this "simple" task, they could retreat to the rear of the army.
Unfortunately, they never got the chance.
"Charge!"
Soldiers rushed forward one after another.
"Fire!"
On the fortress, the dwarf flag-bearer swung his raised flag down. The dwarves behind the three hundred "Heavy Siege Repeating Crossbows" forcefully pulled the triggers.
Twang, twang, twang...
The bowstrings emitted a dull sound. This wasn't the strings breaking, but the force of the strings being so powerful that they rapidly friction against the air.
Three-meter-long bolts shot out. These bolts didn't have pointed tips but oval-shaped heads, like oversized matches. Midway along the bolts were several rows of reverse air holes. Once the bolt's speed reached a certain limit, this killing machine would reveal its ferocious side.
The entire bolt shaft was spiral-shaped, so after firing, the bolts began to spin at high speed.
Ding~
A large bolt deployed a ring of "wings" mid-air. These weren't wings at all, but three-meter-long thin double-edged blades.
The bolts were already spinning at high speed. After the double-edged blades deployed, each bolt became a high-speed rotating reamer.
Whoosh~
A piercing whistle came as hundreds of high-speed rotating bolt reamers descended upon the Imperial soldiers below the fortress.
The bolt reamers flew into the crowd, beginning to cut through bodies. Armor couldn't protect against these things. Blood and minced flesh splattered. Over a dozen soldiers were instantly chopped into meat paste. And it didn't end there. Because the tips of the bolt reamers were round, they continued to slaughter enemies after landing. If the angle was just right, these things spun like tops.
Mud splattered, severed limbs flew everywhere. After one volley from the tribal side, a large area of corpses appeared below the fortress.
"Hahaha."
"These bastards."
"Come again!"
The dwarves on the fortress laughed loudly while preparing their second volley.
Below the fortress, Legion Commander Carlos's expression was cold. Beside him lay a shattered bolt reamer.
"Continue."
Carlos roared. Hearing their legion commander's voice, the soldiers carrying bamboo baskets charged forward with shouts. Their legion commander was watching them—the man they admired.
Twang, twang, twang...
The second volley from the fortress began. Although the Imperial soldiers suffered heavy casualties, under Legion Commander Carlos's leadership, wave after wave of soldiers charged fearlessly forward.
Within two minutes, the stones at the base of the fortress had piled up to a meter high. Stones alone wouldn't have this effect, but combined with the broken corpses, it was different.
While the dwarves on the fortress busily reloaded, the elven archer units at the rear of the Imperial army had been waiting for some time.
Whoosh~
A dense rain of arrows arced toward the fortress. Seeing this arrow rain, the dwarves on the fortress didn't care at all. The "Heavy Siege Repeating Crossbow" was originally invented not for defending cities, but to counter the elven arrow rain. It was just that these things were difficult to transport and ineffective against the agile elven archers.
But this was a siege battle. The "Heavy Siege Repeating Crossbow" now showed its ability to counter arrow rain.
Before the dense arrow rain could fall, bolts with reamers had already rushed forward to meet it.
Crack, crack, crack...
The arrow rain was shredded into wood shavings filling the sky. Not only that, but the bolt reamers flew toward the middle section of the Imperial army.
The bolt reamers landed. Large groups of soldiers were turned into meat paste before they could even scream. The tribal side's situation looked excellent.
Was that really the case? No. Once the stone + corpse pile at the base of the fortress reached a certain height, the Imperial army would charge onto the fortress and begin hand-to-hand combat.
Strangely, no large-scale magic appeared on either side. No fire rain spells, no windstorm spells had been seen at all.
It wasn't that neither side lacked mages, but that spellcasters in this world weren't strong in group combat. One-on-one, spellcasters weren't weak. As for large-scale magic, that hadn't appeared since the empire was established. The specific reason was unknown.
Nowadays, spellcasters rarely participated in wars. They preferred to explore magic, not getting involved in power struggles. As for second-rank contractor mages, their chances of mastering large-scale magic were even smaller. Large-scale destructive magic couldn't be obtained at this stage, and the mana cost of such magic was astronomical. Second-rank contractor mages could at most toss small to medium spells at the fortress.
The backbone of this world was the army. Every soldier had decent physical fitness. Under the pressure of a massive army, even the strongest spellcaster could only pack up and flee.
Su Xiao was currently in the middle section of the Imperial army, on a slightly elevated small hill. He was holding the Spider Empress.
Although the Spider Empress appearing in this world was somewhat incongruous, under Reincarnation Paradise's disguise, other soldiers only thought it was Su Xiao's special ability, similar to alchemy or magic.
Of course, Su Xiao wasn't the only one using a sniper rifle on the battlefield. In this special battle situation, contractors began to show their influence on the war.