Terra Nova Online: Rise of The Strongest Player

Chapter 304: Problems within the Empire’s Army

( Eren’s POV )

Demon Count Vaugn had given Eren a bunch of human texts such as the territorial maps of the Empire and more and asked him to translate them into Demon Tongue for the Demons to understand.

As the days passed, Count Vaugn began releasing the true potential of Eren when Eren started to provide him with key insights about the Empire and its current state by translating scriptures that the demons had captured from human territories over the years but were unable to understand due to the language barrier.

Concepts like the human military structure and the ranks of officers serving within, were previously impossible to understand for the demons, however, with Eren’s arrival, everything started to become crystal clear.

The highest military officer within the Empire’s forces was called the ‘Chief Army General’, who currently was a Master Swordsman by profession.

Underneath the Chief Army General, were the four Vice Army Generals, who were all master level fighters as well.

These Vice Army Generals, each served within a particular Dukedom, alongside the four Arch-Dukes, taking care of the Duke’s army.

Underneath these four Vice Army Generals, were the Field Commanders, who commanded anywhere between one to fourteen legions of soldiers.

Each ‘Legion’ was further headed by a Legion Commander and consisted of anywhere from 20-50 squads.

A ‘Squad’ was a term for a group of soldiers consisting of anywhere between 25-200 individuals and were headed by a squad leader.

Finally, at the bottom of the food-chain were the common soldiers that made up the squad.

Previously, when the demons took in prisoners, they were unable to negotiate a hostage transfer properly with the humans, as they did not understand the value of the hostage they were holding.

A normal soldier was never going to be as valuable as a squad captain who was in-turn never going to be as valuable as a Legion Commander.

Understanding the Empire’s army structure was hence important for the demons, as only by understanding the enemy army structure could they then hope to understand just how many forces the enemy had mobilized for any given battle and what was the rank of the enemy commander.

“This report is most excellent! All these years we never understood that the bald old man we captured from the North-War was actually a Legion Commander!

Because he was old and his bones were brittle, we considered him to be an inferior quality slave, however, he turned out to be a hidden gem” Count Vaugn said, as he read Eren’s break-up of the enemy military and realized that some of the slaves that they had taken from the human territory were more valuable than what he assumed them to be.

“The Empire’s military structure is corrupt, imagine being bestown military titles not because of merit in wars but because a noble named you the leader of his forces.

*Ptui*

You humans and your weakness disgust me” Count Vaugn said, as he read the bit in Eren’s report where Eren explained how military officials were appointed within the Empire and it immediately disgusted the Demon Count.

Unlike the demon society, where nobility and military titles were earned through merit rather than hereditary succession, the human system operated differently.

In theory, the Unity Empire boasted a singular, cohesive army under the Emperor, however, in practice, this was not the case at all.

Each Kingdom within the Empire, such as the Elf Kingdom and the Beastmen Kingdom had a ruler of their own whom they called ‘king’ and these ‘kings maintained their own independent army, separate from the main forces.

When the unity Empire was being formed, one of the conditions put forward by the leaders of the myriad different races was the request to maintain their own armies so that they could protect themselves against oppression if the need ever arise, however, as a result of them having armies of their own, it lead to a situation hundreds of years later where the Emperor’s primary army was overwhelmingly composed of humans, with over 98% being human and the remaining 2% consisting of mixed breeds, highlighting a clear bias against the myriad races within the main army.

With joint exercises between the Empire’s forces and the Kingdom forces being minimal, the cohesive army was only cohesive on paper and not in practice, however, the woes of the Emperor’s forces unfortunately did not end there.

Contrary to the demon realm, the appointment of the four Vice Commanders in the Unity Empire was not based on merit but rather on the sole discretion of the Arch-Dukes who appointed them as these Vice Commanders also led the Arch-Dukes’ personal forces, and ensured that peace and stability was maintained within the ‘Dukedom’ and not the Empire.

Similarly, every noble under the Arch-Duke, including the Marquis, Counts, and Viscounts, had the authority to appoint a Legion Commander, with these Legion Commanders serving the dual role of protecting their noble’s territory and acting as soldiers in the Empire’s forces.

This corrupt and useless hierarchical system extended all the way down to the Barons, each of whom had the right to appoint twenty squad commanders to secure their territory.

As if this system was not bad enough already, it was only made even worse by the fact that army salaries were paid by the nobles who employed them and not by the state, which inspired little to no feeling of nationality within the individual forces.

This fragmented system meant that while the Empire’s military structure appeared uniform on paper, it was actually a patchwork of independent bannermen who had all pledged to support one another in times of war, a pledge that was flimsy and weak at best and could easily be broken in times of duress.

“I had no idea that the Empire’s forces were so fragmented and weak….

The Demon King will be most pleased when I present him with this news” Count Vaugn said, as he tossed a piece of juicy meat towards Eren as if feeding a dog, to signify a job well done.

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