As long as the battle could be sustained until the Governor arrived, it would be considered a success.
But those Green Skin Orcs seemed to have no intention of backing down, they still had ideas of breaking through human defenses.
But this time, Perbov wasn't going to be polite with them.
Ten miles from the front lines, the 155mm howitzer positions were fully constructed. It wasn't the rush stage anymore, a large number of adventurers had retreated from the front lines and reorganized, there was no need to worry about friendly fire, and the shooting elements from the front lines had already been transmitted back.
Without a second thought, they fired five rounds of artillery.
Sixty heavy artillery shells fell on the Green Skin Orcs' attack route within less than ten minutes, and the nearest shell landed less than a hundred meters from the front-line soldiers.
It was difficult to determine the exact casualties caused by these five rounds of artillery beyond the front line defenses, but a rough estimate suggested that the Green Skin Orcs suffered more casualties than previously inflicted by tanks, armored vehicles, and infantry combined.
After another loss of three to four hundred Green Skin Orcs, the attackers at the Fifth District had basically lost 20% of their fighting force.
After five rounds of shelling, the surge of strength the Green Skin Orcs had been gathering for a charge came to an abrupt end, and they finally ceased their aggressive push.
A 20% loss, of course, hadn't exceeded the threshold of what the Green Skin Orcs could withstand. But casualties must have meaning. Stubbornly advancing under heavy artillery to attack layered defense positions isn't about bravery, it's about stupidity.
Green Skins are never stupid in battle.
Moreover, the Green Skins weren't necessarily forced to continue this deadly struggle. The width of the first battalion's combat front stretched at most five to six kilometers. Yet the overall width of the attack front toward Rubbish Town within the High Tower ruins probably exceeded sixty kilometers, encompassing the entire High Tower District as well as the surrounding suburban areas.
There was ample frontline width for maneuvers such as flanking and encirclement.
If they couldn't bite through, then they would simply stop biting and strike elsewhere.
Perbov understood this as well.
The scale of this war was, after all, nearly a hundred thousand adventurers and armed scavengers facing off against ten to twenty thousand Green Skin Orcs. An eight-hundred-person Composite Camp, however well-equipped, served as a significant weight, capable of tipping the balance of the scales.
But that was the extent of it, one couldn't expect a single camp to hold a sixty-kilometer front line.
Achieving the current battlefield results was sufficient.
They had inflicted significant casualties on the Green Skins' fighting force and stabilized the defense line, holding off the peak of the Green Skin Orcs' assault forces, gaining time to reorganize the follow-up troops.
Perbov had done all he could. What remained to be seen was how people like Dennison Henry and Jason Swan would handle the situation.
Oh, and one more thing, he had received intelligence that the leader of the Beast Slaughter Group had been rescued by them.
Perhaps he could be counted on as well.
Perbov had an estimate of how long he could hold out: he could defend until the artillery support ran out of ammunition; if the pressure became too great and the 155mm howitzer shells were exhausted, then there was no room for discussion, it was time to retreat promptly.
Not to retreat would mean sacrificing the troops for nothing.
A 155mm howitzer shell weighed 60 kilograms, and with twelve guns firing five rounds, they had already shot out three and a half tons of shells. The logistics support had three trucks dedicated to transporting ammunition. Subtracting the ammo used at Sanchi Town, the remaining shells were enough for, at most, thirty rounds of fire.
That was the limit of their defense.