Harris's sudden intrusion surprised everyone present. He looked extremely disheveled, with a pale face, bloodshot eyes, and cracked lips that were even purplish-black from congealed blood. Clearly, he had rushed back from Mount N'Zoth, where he should have been.
"Harris, how could you..." Jacob had barely begun to ask when Harris rushed to Brewster and exclaimed urgently:
"General Brewster, there is no time to lose! You must immediately order the troops to evacuate the military base!"
"We saw it on the mountain..."
Before he could finish speaking, Brewster shouted angrily, "I don't need you to teach me how to fight!"
"Just do your own thing!"
The stern reprimand did not deter Harris. He gritted his teeth and said, "Sir, the situation is already very serious. You should be able to tell that the enemy has a very good stockpile of artillery shells and a large number of troops, at least 500,000 to 600,000! Maybe even more. The military base is no longer enough to be a defensive barrier for us!"
"The first line of defense was breached in less than 24 hours, and now the fighting on the second front is so intense that our defenses are showing signs of weakness. If this continues..."
Before he could finish speaking, Brewster roared:
"What do you know?!"
"Now is the most critical moment! Those bastards are launching a fierce attack on the second position without regard for casualties. If we don't put an end to their offensive momentum, they will storm into the base unstoppable!"
At this point, a communications soldier ran in from outside. Seeing the argument taking place inside, he seemed at a loss. Zoyer, upon seeing the communications soldier, immediately went out with a stern face. Meanwhile, Harris was still urgently trying to persuade Brewster:
"They can't stop us, sir!"
“Our defenses simply cannot withstand such bombing. You may not be able to see it clearly from here, but I saw it very clearly from the mountain.”
"Shut up! I'm perfectly clear-headed! How could I not know what the situation is like right now! You bastard..." Brewster's forehead veins bulged, and his bloodshot eyes, already swollen from lack of sleep, turned even redder. He was almost contorted with rage.
Harris continued speaking urgently:
"The entire front line has been bombed to pieces. Our troops can only fight the enemy amidst the ruins, while the enemy..."
Harris spoke too hastily, panting and even cracking his voice: "The enemy is continuously sending reinforcements into the battlefield."
"Although the smoke was too thick and obscured part of the view, we could see that multiple forces were reinforcing the rear of the Houyan Army."
"If you still send all the troops to the front line, not only will the second position be lost, but everyone will die there!"
With a sharp "smack," Brewster slapped Harris across the face in a fit of rage. The force was so great that Harris staggered and nearly fell to the ground, blood trickling from the corner of his mouth.
Harris, however, paid no heed. Instead, he suddenly spread his arms wide and roared at Brewster and everyone else:
"It's not too late to remedy the situation. If we act rashly and fight the Yan people to the bitter end, our troops will be finished! The military base will fall, and we won't have enough manpower to defend the Enzos Mountains. Then we won't be able to stop those bastards anymore!"
At this point, Harris stepped forward again, grabbed Brewster's arm—who was trembling with anger—and said in an almost pleading tone:
"Sir, you need to calm down..."
Brewster, his face contorted with rage, abruptly shoved Harris's arm away, pointing a finger at his nose and shouting:
"I am calm and clear-headed!"
"This is the most intense time of our battle, how dare you disrupt the morale of the troops!"
"Can't you see our soldiers fighting fiercely? Those damned bastards are being wiped out quickly! Soon they'll all be corpses!"
“But after I arrived, what I learned was that our casualties were increasing rapidly, and many units had already lost their combat capability. If we continue fighting, we will be the first to be unable to withstand it!” Harris said, both anxious and angry.
Before the positional warfare began, he had some doubts about Dingle's words, but after seeing the enemy's terrible artillery offensive and the powerful waves of attacks, he realized the seriousness of the situation and understood that even if the Heinrich military base had the strength of an army group, it would be difficult to become a defensive barrier to stop the enemy's advance.
Therefore, he stopped Dingle from coming down the mountain to persuade him, and instead came himself, hoping to preserve as much of the Fourth Army's strength as possible and withdraw it back to the Enzos Mountains before the base was completely lost.
But Brewster remained defiant. He may not have completely lost his mind, but he was certainly blinded by rage. His insistence on fighting the Yan people to the death came at a price that the army could not afford.
"Enough! Harris! We will never be defeated! Just watch how we crush these damn scum on the second line!" Brewster finally said.
Harris's throat bobbed, but he could no longer speak. His face was filled with helplessness, a deep sense of powerlessness mixed with his frustration.
“Sir, we might really have to prepare for an evacuation…” Jacob suddenly spoke up after observing the confrontation between the two.
Brewster turned to look at him in surprise, then shouted angrily, "Jacob! What are you thinking?!"
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