The moment the war started, they felt that the ground shook a bit, and soon thousands of people emerged from the array, and it would come out in continuous streams.

Before long, these thousands would increase to tens of thousands, and then hundreds of thousands.

Other than them, there were also hundreds of powerhouses beyond the level cap who appeared, obviously camping nearby. They were not surprised by them. After all, they had detected them coming thanks to the allied territories before.

The enemy did take some care about being subtle, with most of their forces stopping over villages rather than towns. Villages didn’t have Post Offices, and they also looked down on the insects, even if they were elementalists.

Rather, seeing so many villages with thousands of elementalists made their stomachs tumble in greed. When they were called to this region, they really didn’t expect to see so many...resources.

So...this place was hiding so many good things, they thought?

They had been hearing about this place, but only now did they realize why Valov and even Hassen were investing in this!

Now that Alterra was well known across a vast area, and regions away from them, many people—especially nobles from towns and above—were starting to think of the entire Alterra Region as a piece of pie they could divide.

It was not just Alterra now. Even Valov’s allies were excited, believing they’d get a share of such a huge place. Even if they didn’t get Alterra itself, the surrounding territories weren’t bad at all! They just saw it as receiving a larger pie, so more people could get more.

This kind of thought naturally reflected in how they interacted with villagers, regardless of whether they were elementalists or not. It was very reminiscent of how it was when the Protection Period ended, except they were just a bit more mindful of attacking outright because it could alert Alterra.

Fortunately, all of the associated territories had invested in rules against violence (and more, for richer villages) so it was controlled.

Many villages offered food, pretending to be subservient, but while some took it, most did not.

For the latter, it was a pity. They could’ve poisoned them. As for those who did eat them, the effect of the bad medicine in their stomachs was limited, and they also had delayed reactions, which also saved their lives.

The point was that many did get bad stomachs when they were already near Alterra, which was satisfying. It couldn’t kill or even injure such strong people with food, but any discomfort brought was welcome. For the villages, it felt like they helped out in such a big war.

Anyway, back to the war between the two towns.

The people heading out of the array were seemingly endless. It was overwhelming numbers, and they knew more and more people would still enter via the array soon.

At least a hundred thousand, excluding the assistants, would probably be heading here. Valov was one of the better-off towns after all, and there were definitely a few hundred thousand people there, not to mention they called on some allies as well.

This was much more than the biggest war before, which was the alliance of five villages.

Because Valov itself was fairly strong and equipped, they also had higher thresholds for allies and mercenaries they could borrow, so it wouldn’t be a surprise if they had a lot more quality reinforcement than others as well.

The mob spread out and stopped right outside the scope of the nearest sentries.

The nearest sentries were the loose sentries placed a few hundred meters before the main walls. They were naturally less dense than the sentries on the walls, placed every 600 meters or so, which was just the standard (and even denser) than sentries for many towns that had this level of construct.

At this level, the sentries’ scope was 300 meters after all, and 600 meters between each one was supposedly enough to cover a sector. Alterra was just too willing to throw money in, so even sentries not on the walls were splurged on.

This was also annoying for another reason. This was because the walls were farther away from the territory line, which meant there was more work for the attackers. Not to mention, after reaching the walls, there’d be sentries behind their backs attacking them from there as well.

For the unprepared, this was a formula for losing manpower before they even reached the gates!

It was why they knew they had to bring in special weapons, and it was why Balthazar had to go and eat his pride, begging Hassen for assistance!

Besston, the heir, was the leader in this war. He was a level 36 swordsman of the wind element. Honestly, he didn’t think he’d ever be mobilized for a war at all.

They spent a good portion of their deep wallets on this war! It was extremely painful to watch!

He even questioned his father’s brain at some point, wondering if he had gone senile, and then started making plans to propose handing over the token to him.

Since they were at war, the token was finally detached for the first time in so many years. Perhaps he could receive it by the end of the war.

As such, he was determined to win this war beautifully!

...

Alterrans on the battlement looked through their scopes, seeing more and more big things emerging from the dense forests around them.

The most notable ones were large trebuchets, some heading to other portions of the walls. Their eyes twitched when they saw there was more than one, then more than two, and then they counted several more coming.

The design was similar to the one they saw in Papell Town back then, except it was much more slick and compressed. However, they could tell their power was definitely not inferior to the dwarven weapons Papell Town had.

This one looked...updated. If one were to compare to Terran cars, the ones Papell Town revealed were like a ten-year-old semi-outdated car, while the ones Valov brought out—all of them—looked like top-of-the-line new releases.

Similarly, Alterra’s cannons were in position.

In terms of the number of fighters and big weapons, Valov easily took the cake. But...was it the basis of victory?

Who would win in the end?