novel bin Chapter 80
Chapter 80
The archbishop did not answer immediately.
His eyes, etched with the marks of time, gazed at Perfit for a long time, so long that the emperor's fingers began to tap lightly on the armrest again.
Then he slowly rose from his seat, his hand holding the power ring resting on the back of the chair. After standing up straight, he spoke in a deep and solemn tone, as if reading a decree that had been sealed away for too long: "I may be very old, but I remember that the last time a Victorian stood in this council hall was hundreds of years ago."
At that time, the Papacy had not yet split.
May the Father forgive me—this next sentence may be recorded in the heretical archives of the Inquisition by future generations.
But if the requiem you speak of can truly secure a final divine intervention for those souls trapped in dire straits, then perhaps I can sit down with this Victorian judge and pray together.”
Perfetti nodded, his face showing neither pride nor satisfaction, but calmly accepting the statement, and then turned to Ludwig and nodded again.
Ludwig stepped over the splatters of black blood that were beginning to congeal on the ground, drew his knight's sword again, and the few infected creatures that were still struggling on the stalagmite fell to the ground. Black blood splattered on the mosaic marble floor, spreading out several thin, dark streaks along the pattern of the eagle emblem.
The emperor did not lean back in his chair any further, and no one reached for their handkerchiefs.
Elector Rosenthal picked up his military cap from his lap and put it back on, Elector Stein folded the handkerchief covering his mouth and nose and put it back in his pocket, and Elector Falk stood up from his seat, walked to the nearest pool of blood, and bent down to examine the black blood that was slowly ceasing to move.
After watching for a long time, he straightened up, turned to Perfit, and asked in a clear and direct voice the question that everyone present wanted to ask after watching the demonstration: "Miss Brandlis, you just said that priests and alchemists need to be incorporated into every regimental unit."
From this moment forward, the Empire is fully transitioning to wartime operations, and the entire Frans border defenses are being redeployed. If you were to design this epidemic prevention system, where would you begin?
Perfit turned to Elector Falk and tapped his cane lightly on the floor. The mosaic marble surface rose silently beneath her feet, and soil and fine sand seeped from the gaps in the stone, coalescing into a miniature topographical model before her—undulating hills, winding valleys, and gravel markers representing towns, as precise as a three-dimensional replica of military surveying paper.
"Start by revising the tactical regulations. Your army is still setting up its defenses according to the regulations for fighting living people, with deep firepower echelons, flintlock volleys, and cavalry flanking maneuvers—all of which are meaningless against the infected."
The infected won't scatter due to casualties, nor will they stop due to suppressed fire; they will only fill the trenches with corpses and then climb the obstacles. Therefore, the core of the defensive line is no longer the density of firepower, but rather its height, thickness, and spears.
She used her cane to point at the miniature structures representing city walls and moats in the sand table, raising and widening them layer by layer. She erected sharpened wooden fences at the foot of the city walls, placed spearmen's positions between the firing ports, moved the infantry guns to the top of the city walls with the muzzles pointing downwards, and said, "The moat should be at least one and a half people deep and eight paces wide. All the gaps between the bricks and stones at the base of the city walls should be filled and smoothed with mortar, and the top of the fences should be sharpened and tilted outwards."
The spear shafts were lengthened, the spearheads were hardened by quenching, and a spearman was positioned between every two firing ports. This tactic is more like deploying troops on those forgotten fortifications in your castle archives than fighting an enemy.
She then used a few pebbles on the sand table to mark the isolation station, marking the intersection of the epidemic prevention system and the defense line: the wounded soldier evacuation channel, the classification area, the stripping operation room, the isolation observation area, and the end-of-life prayer room.
"Injured persons who have been bitten or scratched must be taken to an isolation station with priests and alchemists on standby as quickly as possible. Bandages must never be reused, medical instruments must be soaked in hydrogen peroxide or high-proof alcohol after each use, and caregivers must wash their hands between contact with different injured persons."
These aren't just nice-to-have hygiene habits; they're crucial in determining how long a defensive line can hold out against a horde of zombies.
"I will provide the hydrogen peroxide formula. Your Majesty needs to order all the alchemy workshops in the empire to switch to producing hydrogen peroxide at full capacity—the consumption for epidemic prevention is enormous, and the existing stockpiles of military doctors will not last long." She took out a folded piece of paper from her coat pocket, which was the hydrogen peroxide production formula that she had copied down during the march, including a list of required raw materials and standard production procedures.
A court attendant stepped forward, took the recipe, and presented it to the emperor.
The young emperor took the formula, glanced at it, and then ordered the attendants outside the hall to summon the heads of all departments of the empire to the council hall immediately.
For the next few hours, the council chamber was transformed into a temporary wartime cabinet.
The Minister of Finance was summoned to calculate the production cost of epidemic prevention materials, the Quartermaster General was summoned to report on the stock of gauze and alcohol in warehouses across the country, and the Imperial Medical Commissioner was summoned to hear specific requirements regarding the classification of wounded soldiers and the construction of isolation zones.
Even the president of the Royal Alchemists' Guild was dragged out of bed in the middle of the night, and stood next to the sand table wearing a coat that was buttoned up wrong, taking notes on the daily production requirements and distribution priorities of hydrogen peroxide.
Palace attendants carried trays among the sand table and officials from various departments. The trays did not contain snacks or drinks, but rather ink bottles, quill pens, maps, copies of the latest frontline telegrams, and blank official documents stamped with the imperial eagle emblem wax seal.
As the emperor listened to the reports from various departments, he kept throwing new questions at Perfit, each question blunt and to the point.
How long can the Franz border hold? Can the rout of Ross's army be reorganized? After the fall of Franz, how many infected will flood the Romulus border? How long will it take to fully mobilize and train new recruits to the point where they can climb the city walls?
Perfit answered each question.
She told the emperor that the most crucial part of the Franco border defenses was to hold several river valley passes; as long as these passes were not lost, infected people would not be able to quickly flood into the plains.
The fall of France is a fait accompli; what needs to be done is not to try to save it, but to establish a deep defensive line along the border between the two countries in the shortest possible time.
The training cycle for new recruits who are fully mobilized needs to be compressed to one month, and the training content must be fundamentally changed—no longer teaching them how to line up and fire at live people, but directly training them on how to pierce the cervical spine and skull of infected people according to the tactical regulations she just proposed.