Chapter 321: Sir, Times Have Changed

The moment Big Honglang tumbled into the grass, an explosion erupted. Then, several Captains fell down one after another. She cursed inwardly: Damn, it’s that strange thunder again, the kind that kills everyone around whenever it explodes.

Damn it!

She hadn’t expected the enemy to still possess this thing.

But something so devastating must be scarce.

During the last battle, the enemy had two large iron figures, each throwing only two of those at a time. When you thought about it carefully, it was actually nothing to fear. She only needed to wait for one more explosion, then immediately lead her troops in a counterattack…

Just as she reached this thought, explosions began erupting everywhere in the woods.

“Kaboom!”

“Kaboom, kaboom, kaboom!”

One… two… three… ten… twenty explosions…

Everywhere in the woods, agonized screams filled the air.

The bandit troops had been enjoying a peaceful rest when suddenly, a large heap of exploding bombs fell right into their camp. Caught sound asleep and attacked out of nowhere, who could possibly withstand this?

A “hero” who’d been sleeping against a tree in a showy pose suddenly had his chest peppered with iron balls. He slumped sideways and collapsed, undeniably dead.

Some bandits had been sleeping hidden deep in the grass, minimizing their exposure area – they should’ve been safe. But startled by nearby explosions, they reflexively grabbed their knives and leaped up, roaring, “Enemy attacking the camp?”

“Kaboom!”

Another bomb exploded beside them. They instantly fell backward.

Bandit army casualties mounted abruptly.

Hearing the continuous, unending explosions and seeing the flashing bursts of light all around, Big Honglang’s face darkened: “This many? How could they possibly possess so many of these devastating bombs? Is gunpowder free? Unbelievable!”

Only now did she realize the enemy’s strength was genuinely unfathomable.

That rebel leader guy was perhaps right: behind Bai Family Fortress, there really existed a terrifying force supporting them. She shouldn’t have rashly provoked Bai Family Fortress like this.

Ambushed in their sleep, even the elite border army would collapse, let alone a bunch of roving bandits. After that barrage of bombs, the main bandit force was utterly bewildered and demoralized. Most began fleeing in the opposite direction.

Staying low they might have been unharmed, but standing up increased their exposure area.

Cheng Xu certainly wouldn’t miss such an opportunity. He bellowed, “Firearm soldiers, fire!”

“Bang, bang, bang, bang!”

A great volley of flintlock pistols fired…

Fleeing bandits were shot in the back and pitched forward, yet another large group falling instantly.

Among Gaogia Village’s firearm soldiers, only the very first ten Three-Eyed Divine Firearm users had real combat experience. The rest were all green new recruits. Despite months of intensive training, they remained utterly green.

After the first coordinated volley, the new recruits desperately fumbled to load a second shot.

This was when they realized: loading during a real battle felt entirely different from training.

During training, they felt calm; their hands never shook.

But now, conscious that the enemy was escaping, they thought: “Load faster, fire sooner, and the enemy won’t escape…”

This very thought inexplicably made their once-flawless loading technique clumsy. Hands jittered. One particular new recruit clumsily poured a bomb into the barrel – and poured it askew. The entire charge spilled uselessly across the ground.

Next to him, another firearm soldier was taking out the bomb when his hand trembled, and the bomb dropped. He hurriedly crouched down to pick it up. As he bent over, his backside bumped into the teammate behind him, causing that teammate to stumble and fall with a thud, knocking down another teammate.

The formation of the firearm soldiers became a complete mess.

They silently cursed in their hearts, thinking they would surely be beaten by Instructor He.

They stole a glance at Instructor He and saw he had no intention of hitting anyone.

Cheng Xu would not beat them at all. Even for simple things like drawing a bow and shooting arrows, new recruits on their first battlefield could easily mess them up, let alone the complex actions of firearm loading. This was perfectly normal.

He had seen it happen numerous times.

At that moment, he secretly felt relieved, thankful that these new recruits encountered enemies running away with their backs turned during their first battle; even if they panicked, it would only let the enemies escape without endangering their own lives.

If they had been faced with Jurchen cavalry charging straight at them from the start, those new recruits would have panicked wildly. After firing one shot, their hands would shake so badly that they couldn’t load the next round for a long time, and in the end, they would likely never see another sunrise.

Cheng Xu was rushing with pride and laughed loudly while scolding, “Stop being scared! The enemies are running away, so why are you afraid? Calm yourselves down for me.”

Hearing the laughter in his voice, the firearm soldiers were also rushing with pride; Instructor He wasn’t angry, and they thought, “Right, relax, stop panicking, we obviously have the upper hand.”

After steadying themselves, their movements finally became quicker.

They could still finish the loading in the time it took to blink thirty times, as long as they stayed calm… don’t panic…

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

The second volley of shots from the firearm soldiers came.

The bandit army, which had escaped throughout those thirty blinks, had many survive by fleeing; only a few slow runners were hit in the back and fell down.

Cheng Xu did not give chase, but loudly commanded, “Alright, spear soldiers advance slowly. If you see anyone severely injured, shoot them to help them meet their end. If it’s lightly wounded or uninjured, capture them and send them to hard labor.”

The spear formation of the militia began to move forward.

Maintaining their formation, they slowly walked into the bandits’ camp, which had just been blown apart. Inside, it was a gruesome sight, with dead bandits strewn everywhere—bombed by nearly a hundred grenades, then randomly shot by flintlock rifles. How could it not be brutal?

Even Cheng Xu couldn’t help but sigh silently in his heart, “Firearms are truly powerful.”

As a small patrol officer, he had only witnessed major battles with cold weapons before and hadn’t dealt with large-scale firearms much; this was quite an eye-opener for him.

Seeing the tragic scene of the bandit army after being “worked” by firearms, Cheng Xu had to say, “Sir, times have changed.”

The spear soldiers looked at the corpses scattered haphazardly on the ground and couldn’t help but murmur, “This is too fierce; we didn’t even make a move, and the bandit troops got beaten up like this.”

“This… in the future, we might not get to act at all.”

“I want to be a firearm soldier too! Otherwise, I won’t have a chance to earn some credit.”

Just as this man’s words faded, a “hero” suddenly leaped up from the pile of corpses, wielding a “guandao” made by tying a waist knife to a wooden pole—a poor man’s version of the guandao.

He swung the blade fiercely toward the spear troops.

The spear soldier who had been speaking was distracted and couldn’t react in time, getting badly startled. But behind him, a figure flashed—Cheng Xu darted forward. He ducked low, slipping into the blind spot of the guandao’s attack, and drove his waist knife into the “hero’s” side and belly.

The tip of the blade went in from his flank and came out through his back.

The hero screamed in agony, spat blood, and collapsed to the ground.

Cheng Xu clapped his hands and shouted angrily at the spear soldiers, “All of you, stay alert! Cleaning the battlefield is dangerous; don’t go dying right after winning the damn battle!”