In the northern region of Northrend, most areas are extremely cold.
Duke didn't know the circumstances under which the Silver Northern Expedition was organized in history. He only knew that even though he had made so many preparations for the conquest of Northrend, various pitfalls still emerged one after another.
However, there are many knowledgeable soldiers in the Alliance.
An old dwarf soldier taught the new recruits: "Let me tell you, the Alliance Commander Edmund Duke is the commander who knows the soldiers best. In the past, you could only wear worn leather boots, and when your toes were frozen black, they would die and become useless. Now you have to wear animal skins imported from the Horde and cotton boots made of cotton to protect your feet."
Cotton boots, cotton jackets, spiked shoes, snow tracks, rations and hot soup that could be heated by pulling a cord, and even Duke's strict order that toilets must be connected to the barracks, because if a soldier left the barracks to go to the toilet in the middle of the night, he might not be able to find the way outside due to the snowstorm and freeze to death even if the toilet was only five meters away.
All the details reflect the meticulous preparations made by the Alliance for this Northern Expedition.
Normally, if a soldier slept in such a snowy and icy place, even if they had tents, many of them might never wake up the next morning.
Not dying on the battlefield but dying in an unknown place was quite a blow to morale.
But since the invention of simple heated beds and new types of movable centralized heating, the non-combat losses of soldiers when camping in the wild have basically dropped to single digits in each legion.
Varian led the Alliance army to attack Howling Fjord. Historically, only less than 10,000 people could reach Utgard Keep. It was not that the Alliance and the Horde did not want to invest more troops, but that the logistics could not keep up.
Now it is completely different.
The flying fortress Naxxramas opened the way, and the Alliance forcibly landed on the shallows on the east and west sides. Then huge conveyor tracks were set up on the shallows, and diesel engines drove the tracks to transport boxes of military supplies to the Howling Fjord Plateau, which was dozens of meters high. Soldiers and heavy tanks and other weapons were transported back and forth by large elevators.
Looking at a group of soldiers burning the lower part of the diesel engine with a pre-prepared fire, Varian felt like the sky was falling.
He smiled bitterly: "Could it be that Uncle Duke really has the ability to predict the future?"
Once upon a time, Valeera always played the role of cheering Varian up, saying that he could surpass Duke, but after getting along for a long time, Valeera was not sure: "Maybe..."
the Alliance has only popularized diesel engines in the past few years. Steam engines cannot operate in extremely cold weather, which has been tested after all. But how diesel engines will perform in a place like Northrend is really hard to estimate.
After all, there weren't many extremely cold regions on the Eastern Kingdoms. Even the snow-covered Loch Modan or the former Alterac were only a few degrees below zero. No military advisor or staff officer had ever proposed how to start a diesel engine completely frozen in ice at minus 40 degrees.
When the problem arose, most of the Alliance Legions were in despair. If the Alliance's technological products were excluded, it would mean that they could only rely on the most primitive infantry and air forces such as Griffin Knights to fight.
If they fight like this, the Alliance will definitely suffer heavy casualties.
Who knew that after the question was posted, Duke replied within two minutes and asked them to set up a stove under the engine.
It sounds ridiculous, but during Second War on Earth, both the Soviet and German armies did this in extremely cold weather. Otherwise, even if the soldiers used hammers to smash off the ice debris on the outside, the inside would still be frozen into a lump of ice and would not be able to move at all.
If you want to bake it, how deep should you bake it?
Answer: "Once the ice has melted and the outer armor starts to turn black, the antifreeze oil will do the rest."
A simple, violent, yet meaningful solution, and it was done.
But everyone knew that Duke had never been in the snow in his first half of his life. He managed to solve the problem that even the dwarves couldn't solve. Not only did he use a fire to deal with the frozen machine, he also used antifreeze oil.
Others have to go through thousands of experiments to try out a better formula, but Duke, on the other hand, has already established a project and given the result formula, so you just go and do it.
One after another, new technologies emerged, making the gnomes and dwarves inventors dizzy.
Gelbin has complained more than once that Duke's actions would ruin their scientists.
Duke shrugged. "The Burning Legion will return in less than ten years. There's nothing I can do about it! How about you make the Burning Legion late, and I'll give your scientists more time to practice?"
Gelbin had nothing to say.
Even with such powerful modern equipment, the armies on the eastern and western fronts advanced and laid railways at the same time, with an unstoppable momentum. In just over a week, they were surrounded by Utgard Castle.
The army on the eastern front set up heavy artillery directly across the Ymiron Falls east of the castle, while the main force led by Varian on the western front set up artillery and deployed the orc infantry corps of the younger Saurfang.
This is both a way to make the best use of resources and a deterrent.
The bombardment of the 155mm heavy artillery destroyed the fortress of King Ymiron, the leader of the Vikus, in just a few minutes. The castle, which was not reinforced by magic protective arrays, was just a large target in the eyes of the Alliance gunners.
The city that the Vikings spent ten centuries building was razed to pieces by Alliance Cannons in just a few minutes.
"Air defense forces, prepare!" Varian raised high the sword Seramene which was composed of his two swords - Shadow Tearer Sharator and Shadow Reaver Eremeni.
As expected, the huge Vikus, who were half-giant in blood, continued to pour out from behind the destroyed walls of the castle. They spread their legs and swarmed towards the coalition forces of the Alliance and the Horde in a disorderly formation.
The Vrykul are loyal to their King Ymiron. Although the orcs always say that they are a race born for battle, compared with the Vrykul, the Vrykul seem to deserve this title more.
If they were just giants, the Alliance wouldn't have paid enough attention to them. The real clan name of these Vrykul was the Dragonflayer Clan.
The most commonly seen proto-dragons are these beasts. Unlike their five-colored guardian dragon relatives who have been endowed with partial power and high intelligence by the titans, the proto-dragons have no magical physique and are slightly inferior in intelligence. Strictly speaking, they are standard dragon beasts.
They do not have the long necks of their distant relatives, the Guardian Dragons, and their tails are relatively short, but their heads are larger in proportion, and their mouths with strong jaws account for more than 40% of their head weight. Their wings are very powerful, but their front legs are almost completely degenerate.
When not flying, their wings play a major supporting role for their bodies. Their hind legs are thick and are their main tool for hunting. Their overall body shape is more streamlined for flight than that of the Guardian Dragons.