allendalepharm Chapter 104 The Battle of the Golden Horse
Chapter 104 The Battle of the Golden Horse
If Tiberius were to evaluate this battle, his answer would be:
Very bored.
Yes, it's incredibly boring.
Because there's absolutely no need for any special tactics.
Once Tiberius's Lightning Legion set up their wagon camp, Valentis's dozen or so knights, along with their less than two hundred mercenaries, had no chance of breaking through their defensive position.
Instead, they initially tried to slowly wear down the edges of Tiberius's formation with arrows, but they didn't expect Tiberius's crossbowmen to teach their cavalry a lesson: the range of the crossbows was much greater than that of their hand crossbows and horn bows.
"Levers, lay down! Crossbowmen, fire freely! Shield bearers, remember to hold the gaps between the vehicles!" Tiberius roared, directing his soldiers. These orders were then executed flawlessly by the Lightning Regiment.
With the "Cold-Blooded One" buff, the entire Lightning Legion was like a sophisticated war machine, operating perfectly according to Tiberius's instructions, ready to keep the enemy out of their formation.
After several unsuccessful attempts to probe, the cavalry tried to break through the infantry defenses with a powerful cavalry charge, but as they approached, countless arrows came flying from both sides of the woodland!
"Brothers, let's teach these Valantians a lesson!" Vito shoved the arrow he had been holding in his mouth into the crossbow's groove, then accurately shot it into the back of an enemy knight's head, knocking him dazed.
"Damn, what luck! They didn't even kill them?"
Vito cursed, then said to his archers, "Fire at those knights on their tall horses! Their armor is thick; it'll take many shots to break through that damned armor!"
On the other side of the woods were Habroy's old razor blades.
At this moment, Habroy was touching the single-edged blade in his hand, muttering to himself.
"Damn, that Lightning kid is such a brilliant commander! First, he used a small force to lure the enemy out of the fortress, and by the time they got here, it was too late to escape..."
"But the enemies inside this cliff fortress are really stupid; they can't even see through such an obvious trick?"
Then he heard a whistle, and Habroy, quick-witted, immediately picked up the single-edged blade in his hand.
"Brothers, charge! Let's show those Valantis what we're made of!"
When Habrol and his men charged toward the enemy, the Valantis immediately broke into a rout, especially the soldiers at the rear, who tried their best to escape the pre-planned trap.
Tippi was slightly anxious.
Even if only thirty people run back, given the terrain of Cliff Fortress, those thirty people can achieve the effect of three hundred.
If you add to this their tearful pleas, their comrades and fellow soldiers would probably be terrified by Tiberius and his men.
Next, if Tiberius and Jules were to attack Cliff Fortress, they would not be met with weak defenders, but with a truly determined and resolute defender!
How can that be? Wouldn't we have fought for nothing if we did that?
But it was too late!
The long, ancient sound of horns rang out from their escape route.
"Damn it, we almost missed it!" "Henchman" Leon cursed as he rode his horse, leading his light cavalry to cut off and encircle the enemy.
Jules' light cavalry had clearly learned from the Doslavian techniques. They generally did not directly charge at the enemy with their lances, but instead first drew their bows and shot arrows, using the arrows and the mobility of their horses to drive the enemy to the area they wanted to reach.
Upon reaching the designated area...
"Charge! Charge!" Calvin lowered the visor of his helmet and took the lance from the servant in his right hand.
His assault knights, like him, lowered their visors, raised their lances, spurred their horses forward, and charged ahead.
As they approached the fleeing Valantis, the warriors, who had been advancing slowly, suddenly exerted their strength, ordering their warhorses to go from small strides to large strides. When they were only twenty paces away, this fierce attack completely tore apart the enemy's formation.
"Alright, my dear friends of Valantis." Tiberius looked at the surrendered knights and commanders before him, sitting on his horse as Demetrius and Habro led them to him.
"Now, each of you will draw lots to select one person to go inside the Cliff Fortress and inform your men that Jules the Keeper of Faith, commander of the White Legion, and Tiberius the Lightning, commander of the Lightning Legion, are at the city gates. Surrender immediately!"
Tiberius saw resentment on their faces, but felt at peace with themselves.
Indeed, being beaten down and captured by a twelve-year-old child would be infuriating for anyone.
But that's the battlefield. The battlefield only cares about the final result. If you win, you win; if you lose, you lose.
"Otherwise, we will not hesitate to use absolute force to force you to submit! But when that happens, it will be very ugly..." Tiberius said in an extremely indifferent tone, cracking his whip and ignoring the horror and worry in the eyes of those people.
[Damn, this is too hard to pull off!] When the prisoners couldn't see him, Tippi let out a long sigh of relief, and couldn't help but admire his own acting skills.
Absolute force, the need for swift surrender... all of that is utter nonsense!
This time they are going into battle lightly equipped. If they really want to start the siege, they can only start by building siege ladders and siege engines!
Moreover, due to the cliffside location and size of the fortress, this easily defensible and difficult-to-attack fortress only requires a hundred men to fill its battlements and towers. If a direct assault were to occur, Jules and Tiberius should be prepared for heavy losses!
This was a nightmare, because a fortress, with soldiers already prepared inside, was extremely disadvantageous to the attacking side.
Especially given that the attacking side is currently very unprepared.
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"Tiberius, do you think they will surrender?" Vito nudged Tiberius's ribs with a light elbow, looking with some hesitation at the knight carrying the white flag as he walked up the cliff fortress.
"They will!" Tiberius said with absolute certainty. "I bet they don't even have a hundred men left in the city! At worst, we'll keep fighting! They can't withstand a single attack from us!"
"Alright kid, I really hope they're as weak as you say..." Vito was a little skeptical; he felt Tiberius's assessment was far too idealistic.
Would anyone really hand over such a fortress so easily? Besides, the food inside should be enough to feed them for a month or two, right? As long as they hold the cliff fortress, they can just wait for the main force of Valantius to arrive, right?
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Tiberius stood in the main building of Cliff Fortress, which used to be the command post of the Valantis stationed here. Now, their original Valantis Blackwall banners have been replaced with the banners of the White Legion and the Lightning Legion.
Tiberius stared incredulously at the captured cavalrymen. The firelight from the fireplace flickered on their bronze-plated scale armor, but it couldn't illuminate their ashen faces.
"I see, I see..." After listening to Vito's report on the accounts of Cliff Fortress, Tiberius finally understood why the enemy would take the initiative to attack and why his clumsy plan to lure the enemy had worked so well.
"I see. Theoretically speaking, as an extremely important military fortress, the granaries of Cliff Fort should contain enough food to feed five hundred infantrymen and one hundred cavalrymen and their corresponding warhorses."
"At the same time, the marching supply depot needs to be stocked with enough food for a thousand infantrymen and three hundred cavalrymen to ensure that the army passing through this area has sufficient and excellent food. But on the books..." Tiberius squinted and threw a parchment in front of the surrendered knights and infantry commanders. He suddenly stood up and pointed his sword at their noses.
"The amounts are all below standard! Not just excellent, but you've fallen below even the bare minimum! Now you're telling me that you've already sold off most of the grain in the city?"
After Tiberius finished speaking, he found it funny himself.
"I suspect one of the reasons you're in such a hurry to go out of the city for open battle is that you don't have enough food. Without knowing how many people are on the other side, you have no choice but to go out of the city for open battle in order to avoid a siege..." Tiberius sneered.
"Indeed, if it were me, seeing only a pitiful few bags of brown rice and barley in the warehouse, and my own soldiers being half-dead every day, I would also be unable to resist going out of the city to fight in the field."
"Once the enemy launches an encirclement, we'll starve to death before our reinforcements arrive! Besides, what if the enemy really is that small? What wishful thinking!"
Tiberius put the matter of the granary aside for now. He picked up another parchment and, with even more exaggerated and barely suppressed shock, said:
"Regarding the army, esteemed knights, it seems you've temporarily disbanded the crossbowmen due to stinginess with pay and money for crossbows. And one very important reason is that these crossbowmen demanded higher prices than ordinary conscripted militia archers?"
"Most of your cavalry refused to fight because their horses were starving, and the spearman captain and his mistress were feasting all night and he's still asleep? My uncle had to shake him awake, and when he did, he asked us what we were there for!"
Tiberius's voice rose, "And your soldiers, especially the auxiliary troops and conscripts left in the castle, most of them have been starving for three days, and several inside the castle have contracted fever? Just because they are not part of the regular army?"
"And a quarter of your colleagues are bedridden with syphilis, and the remaining three-quarters—" He took a deep breath.
"Are they either drawing salaries without working or reselling military rations?"
Moreover, I bet most of you also participated in dividing the spoils? Tiberius looked at the fine wines collected on the cabinet in the room, the half-eaten roasted pig, and the gilded and silver cutlery.
"Your military pay and family businesses alone probably can't support such an extravagant lifestyle, can they? Tsk tsk tsk... You're the first to embezzle military pay to this extent! When you were exploiting your soldiers for your own wealth, did you ever think about this day?"
The captured knights lowered their heads in dejection, the candlelight flickering on their jeweled swords and tasseled breastplates.
Tiberius felt it was a bit too humorous and funny.
After all that, it turns out I lured the enemy deep into my territory, set up an ambush, and commanded with such composure...
Now you're telling me that my enemy is so weak that a mere push could bring him down?
"Vito, is the inventory complete?" Tiberius turned to Vito and asked. "How much money do these dear gentlemen have?"
"Tsk, Tiberius, you're giving me a hard time!" Vito chuckled, but quickly gave the full number.
"If you include gems, jewelry, silk clothing, and tableware, the total is roughly eight thousand gold coins. The weapons are mostly...of poor quality; the captain said we can just take the arrows. As for food, just like you said, because of the reselling, there's very little, but enough for one meal!"
"Excellent!" Tiberius clapped his hands and laughed. Then he turned to look at the prisoners whose faces were ashen.
"Your hard work has brought us a dowry!"
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"What's going on, Vito?" Tiberius frowned, looking at the two groups of people who had started to make a commotion in the distance.
"Tsk, those mercenary groups that came with us, they're arguing with Habroy!" Vito quickly reported to Tiberius. "They're accusing Habroy and his men of stealing their spoils!"
Yes, it wasn't just Tiberius's Lightning Legion and Jules's White Legion that went north; there were also some second-rate mercenary groups, as well as some stragglers who had lost their legionary status, who were attracted by their actions and voluntarily joined these "northern expeditions."
Tiberius privately disliked them greatly, believing them to be disloyal, greedy, and undisciplined. He thought his uncle was wasting food by having them with him. Moreover, they might not perform well in battle, and could easily collapse, becoming a negative force!
But Jules used a very simple analogy to explain to Tiberius why he did this:
"Tiberius, the world of mercenaries is always a quagmire. We all want elites, but when you're living on the edge, you can't be too picky. Every hand can pick up a weapon, every body can block an arrow. Put them in the chain of command, even if it's just to fill the ranks! After all, if a huge gap appears, the only thing you might really rely on is these damn bastards!"
"You think the White Legion always has thousands of members? Wrong! During the off-season, our White Legion might only have a few hundred people, but during peak season, or when we receive a big order, our legion expands rapidly!"
"After all, I can't keep supporting a team of thousands of people indefinitely, especially without contracts or final payments! Just feeding the people and horses every day would kill me!"
"Therefore, I'm keeping these people around to ensure that one day, when the White Legion's frontline forces suffer heavy losses, we have a visible, controllable, and well-known pool of troops!"
"Tsk, these guys, they're all slackers when it comes to fighting, but when it comes to dividing the credit, they're all fired up!" Tiberius spat on the stone floor and strode over to the two arguing groups.
"Shut up! No arguing! There are orders in the army! Private group fights are prohibited!" Tiberius walked to the edge of the quarreling group and immediately released the aura of the 'Cold-Blooded One', injecting the venom of fear into their bodies, which quieted things down a bit.
"Look at you! What are you doing here?!" Tippi coldly swept his gaze across both sides, and after looking at the leaders on either side, he fixed his eyes, which seemed to hold an iceberg, on the leader of the second-rate mercenary group, and delivered his verdict:
"Habulo's men entered the city first, and they defeated the cliff fortress defenders who came out to fight in the open. Naturally, they have the right to choose the spoils first! You and my uncle stayed in the rear, not sweating or bleeding, what are you barking about here for? Get out!"
Yes, Tiberius never intended to ask who started the fight or who was in the right.
He didn't have time to act as a judge and determine right and wrong; all he needed was Habroy's loyalty. As for everyone else...
[Shut up these scumbags. All I need is for my men to obey and respect me!] This thought flashed through Tiberius's mind with a rather sinister glint.
After the small leader on the other side left cursing, Habroy's eyes were filled with nothing but admiration and respect for Tiberius.
While being a "trustworthy person" is certainly admirable, it can sometimes be too demanding and too focused on relative fairness and justice. A "lightning boy" who is willing to help his own people is more respectable!
However, the joy of victory did not last long. The Valantis reacted swiftly, and a powerful reinforcement army soon arrived at the city.