Chapter 24: Battle Spoils
“This issue isn’t that important.”
On the way back, Gu Hang answered Yan Fangxu’s question.
The Captain found him and asked about his doubts, to which Gu Hang responded:
“Even if it’s false, so what? The Navy needs merits, I need a target, and a heretical cult that doesn’t worship the God Emperor is one of the main culprits preventing Fury Owl Planet from recovering. This merit will satisfy Commodore Alicia, provide me with enough benefits, and help me unite the people of this world. Therefore, this cult must be real, and that Wohan must be a genuine cultist.”
Seeing the slight hesitation on Yan Fangxu’s face, Gu Hang smiled and patted the Captain’s shoulder: “Moreover, it is indeed true. The Original Owl Beast Sect is a cult, and that man named Wohan is indeed connected to the Original Owl Beast.”
“How did you determine that he is a heretic and not just a regular psychic?”
Gu Hang pointed to his head and explained: “A psychic’s power comes from within, from our minds. We have enough talent and spirituality to borrow spiritual energy from the omnipresent but imperceptible spirit realm and form psychic spells. Heretics, however, derive their power from the filthy evil gods they worship, not from themselves. These two sources of power are entirely different and clearly distinct in my perception.”
At this point, Gu Hang silently added in his mind that the divine spells mastered by the priests of the Imperial Church followed a similar principle, but he didn’t say it out loud.
Hearing this, Yan Fangxu scratched his head: “I never knew about these things before. But since it’s true that he’s a heretic, then there’s no problem.”
“Rest assured,” said Gu Hang, “we are on the right track.”
…
Gu Hang was quite serious about reassuring Captain Yan.
This man was one of the few capable individuals under his command.
He came to Fury Owl Planet alone, without taking over the Union government’s powers, and had no team to speak of.
The only person he could rely on was this Captain Yan.
The people from the Wasteland Company seemed to have settled down for now, but they were a bunch of illiterates and couldn’t be counted on for big tasks; his little attendant Zhang Chao was trustworthy enough but lacked experience. Perhaps with long-term training, he could become a talent, but for now, he was far from it.
That only left Yan Fangxu.
At least he was a Naval Captain, a formal officer of the Imperial Navy.
Gu Hang didn’t care that Yan Fangxu still belonged to the Navy and wasn’t his man. He listened to his commands because of Alicia’s orders.
It made no difference, as long as he was currently serving him, capable, and trustworthy, it was enough.
Gu Hang turned his head, looking past Yan Fangxu towards the main force.
The entire group consisted of nearly three hundred people, pulling ox carts along the way back to the Governor’s camp.
This time, they had quite a harvest.
He left twenty soldiers from the Wasteland Company stationed at the Mantan River Valley Estate, both to protect the estate and to ensure the hired farmers worked properly. Among the hired farmers, he selected a man named Silamu as the manager.
The remaining soldiers, about two hundred in total, along with roughly a hundred hired farmers, embarked on the return journey together.
These hired farmers were responsible for transporting the reloaded supplies back to the Governor’s camp.
The so-called “carts” were ox carts, pulled by a type of livestock known as “brute oxen.”
These brute oxen were likely not native to Fury Owl Planet but were species introduced from other planets long ago.
After the apocalyptic war, these creatures did not go extinct but further evolved, while still retaining the trait of being tamed.
In the current wasteland world, brute oxen were important draft animals.
The batch of supplies transported from Fuxing City was originally pulled by ox carts, and now they were all in Gu Hang’s hands.
The supplies were inventoried and matched what Gu Hang had requested from Fuxing City.
These items were returned to their rightful owner.
Additionally, Gu Hang captured nearly two hundred sets of individual weapons and equipment, primarily rifles.
These rifles came in various models, and their overall manufacturing quality couldn’t compare to the “Assaulter” rifles.
The latter were at least standard rifles for the Imperial Army and Marine Corps, though used by cannon fodder, they met minimum production standards and technological levels.
As for the firearms used by the mercenaries, produced locally on Fury Owl Planet, their quality varied. Even the best among them wasn’t as good as the “Assaulter.”
But at least they were far more reliable than the iron pipe rifles carried by the “Prisoners,” which Gu Hang didn’t even bother to take and considered scrap metal.
At least these could be considered military-grade products.
Gu Hang planned to put this batch of equipment to good use.
Including this batch, he had around one hundred sets of “Assaulter” rifles and two hundred sets of local products. He could arm three hundred soldiers.
With weapons and equipment in hand, sourcing soldiers wouldn’t be a big problem.
The Wasteland Company could provide more people, and he could also draw from the three thousand servants he brought down from the starship.
Those servants were not qualified soldiers; their physical fitness was even inferior to the servitors. However, they were certainly stronger than the undernourished people of the Wasteland Company.
Under Gu Hang’s system, the Wasteland people could be transformed into well-trained soldiers, so it would be even easier for the former servants.
The low quality of the recruits would at most limit their further upgrades, but with the system’s capabilities, training them to T5 level, reaching regular army standards, was not an issue.
Apart from the supplies that were rightfully his and the captured weapons and ammunition, the biggest gain was the rewards obtained from the victorious battle.
[Decisive Victory, earned 33 points of Grace]
[Losses: 20, Eliminated: 116, Captured: 42]
[1st Servitor Light Infantry Battalion (partial): Losses: 16, Eliminated: 43]
[Wasteland Company: Losses: 4, Eliminated: 21]
[Marine Corps (partial): Losses: 0, Eliminated: 52]
In this battle, they eliminated and captured a total of 158 enemies, while suffering 20 losses.
The T5 level troops, combined with the thirty T4 level marines, had a much greater combat effectiveness compared to those second-rate mercenaries.
Even though the defenders had the advantage and the soldiers attacked aggressively under Gu Hang’s orders, the exchange ratio was still an impressive 1:8.
Of course, without the marines’ walkers and Gu Hang, the psychic, participating in the battle, the exchange ratio would have been worse.
Most of their soldiers’ casualties were caused by machine guns and rocket launchers.
Heavy machine gun fire cutting the femoral artery leading to massive bleeding, or being directly hit by a close-range rocket explosion.
Among the 20 losses, apart from a few who died instantly, many were severely wounded and unable to return to the battlefield.
These losses were still within Gu Hang’s acceptable range; one couldn’t expect to fight a war without casualties.
However, replenishing the troops was something Gu Hang had to consider.
The losses in the Wasteland Company were not a big problem; they could be replenished directly from the Wasteland society.
Drawing out four more people was not an issue.
But for the servitor soldiers, there was truly no place to replenish them from.
In the future, the main force of Gu Hang’s army couldn’t rely on servitors for the long term.
Eventually, he would have to recruit soldiers locally.
These things could be dealt with later.
What he needed to think about now was how to use the newly acquired 33 points of Grace.