Iron Powder and Spellcaster

Officers from Lu Yuan all memorize a sentence: "The prerequisite for a main battle is that both sides have the intention to fight a decisive battle."

[The Hurd-Plato War] is the best footnote to this sentence.

The Hed tribe ran forward with all their belongings, and the Plato army chased behind until the sphere of influence was redefined - this was the pattern of war in the past.

General Szekler dreamed of having a main battle with the Chihe tribe, but as long as the Chihe tribe didn't want to fight, the battle would not succeed.

There is no other reason: the side with greater mobility has the right to choose the battlefield.

The barbarians are the most keen and cunning, and they have many people and many horses. They come and go like the wind. They are only willing to fight battles that they can win.

If they smell any danger, they will run away without hesitation and the battle will once again become a tiresome chase.

But now the Palatu people have grasped the sore spot of the Red River Department, which is Bianli City.

In the early years, there were actually some urban settlements in the wilderness.

At that time, the Hurds were in their heyday. They beat the Palatine nobles to the point where they could only hide in the castle and tremble, while allowing the Hurd cavalry to plunder people, food and goods.

Some tribes even moved their whole families into Plato in an attempt to seize the rule of Plato.

The eagle tears and devours the flesh and blood of the galloping horse, becoming stronger and stronger.

The prosperous Hed tribes built cities one after another. Although most people still lived in pursuit of water and grass, this did not prevent the ruling class from living in the city and enjoying it.

They decorated their palaces with looted gold, silver and jewels, and had Plato slaves working for them. All the Hird nobles, big and small, lived a life of luxury.

There are no luxury goods produced in the wasteland, but it doesn't matter.

Because wherever there is money, there are Veneta people.

Veneta merchants came from thousands of miles away to deliver swords, horses, spices, silks and wine to the Khed "Khans".

The chiefs of various tribes competed for wealth and did everything they could.

You use cotton to make a tent, and I will use silk to make a tent. You use one layer, I will use two layers.

Even falcons and saddles must be imported, otherwise they will lose face.

The geographer Bai Bailuo once recorded this: "...The leader wore two layers of silk clothes and was surrounded by eunuchs. There was a dwarf who was responsible for making him laugh...He ordered someone to take out three jewel-encrusted scimitars for me to choose from. When I shook my head, he gave me all three scimitars..."

Bai Bailuo also left such a record: "While the leaders lived a more luxurious life than the king, the lowest herdsmen among them only had pitifully few cattle and sheep."

With the publication of Bai Boluo's "Notes on a Journey to the West", "Chief Hurd" gradually became synonymous with "luxury, wealth, and spending a lot of money".

Of course, in the Veneta dialect, this word refers to those who "don't bargain and spend lavishly", which has a slightly derogatory meaning... and a little bit of jealousy that they don't want to admit.

But the feast must come to an end, and those are things of the past.

Since the defeat of Que Ye Khan thirty years ago, various tribes have flourished and declined.

The two sides changed their offensive and defensive positions, and the Hede cities were gradually abandoned.

Firstly, the output of the wasteland alone was unable to support the city; secondly, the Palatuan people who had recovered their strength singled out the Hird tribe who built the city.

Because cities represent the concentration of wealth, the Hed tribe consciously gathered their belongings in one place, which saved the Platuan people a lot of trouble.

Some Hedian cities were captured, plundered, and destroyed, some were occupied by the Platons, and the rest were abandoned.

[The Hurd-Plato War] turned into a mobile war in which you chase and I escape.

Therefore, while the Chihe tribe's fortification brought benefits, it also gave the Palatuan people a clear goal.

The Plato army surrounded Bianli, as if they were pinching the balls of the Chihe tribe.

If the Chihe tribe wants to relieve the siege of Bianli City, they must defeat the Plato army.

Szekeler was only worried about two things: first, the Chihe reinforcements would simply give up on Bianli and Baishi; second, the Chihe reinforcements would not dare to fight decisively and would instead use harassment tactics to delay the siege.

The former now seems to be too much to worry about. The Red River reinforcements have a strong desire to attack and show no signs of giving up on Bianli.

As for the latter, it is a game between both parties. The curtain has not yet been drawn, and it is still unclear who is the hunter and who is the prey.

…

Jashka's night attack was a great success.

According to Lieutenant Colonel Jessica's original plan, all the troops in the hijacking camp should be used to smash the chain of command of the Teldu Department with one punch.

However, the hard fighting during the day had exhausted the Platoans.

The Terdun tribe had just retreated when many Plato soldiers collapsed to the ground, unable to wake up.

Only the cavalry that did not participate in the defense of the city were left and were still capable of fighting.

Forty-four Dussac hussars, sixty-eight borrowed hussars, plus Winters and Andre.

There were only one hundred and fourteen horses in total, which turned the Teldun camp upside down.

If all the people in Teltown slept in felt tents, the result would be even more brilliant - because felt tents are very flammable.

But Teldun Camp had been burned to the ground before, and now they didn't even have a few belongings left that could be set on fire.

It was a blessing in disguise that the fire starter prepared by Winters was of little use.

The fire-warmers probably never dreamed that a camp would be attacked at night for two consecutive nights.

After baking the front side, turn over and bake again.

In the midst of the chaos, some bold Hurds took advantage of the chaos and simply went home. Although I didn't grab any loot, it was better than losing my life.

There were even centurions and thousands of foreign troops who fled directly with their own troops. They don't want to lose their family's wealth for the Tianjin people of the Terdun tribe.

I think the next time we meet, they will no longer be from Teltown.

With too few troops, our actions are destined to be limited. Therefore, Lieutenant Colonel Jessica was not in a good mood and did not come at all.

"Scare the Huds, and then come back. I don't expect you to perform any extraordinary feats, just make them afraid to camp within ten miles." When assigning the task to the two centurions, Jessica said: "Be careful, don't put yourself in trouble." Fold inside.

The result was just as the lieutenant colonel expected. Winters and Andre's men were able to create chaos, but it was not enough to completely defeat the Telltown Division.

Even if there are 20,000 pigs, cavalry No. 100 cannot kill them all.

…

It's foggy this morning.

The reconnaissance cavalry dispatched reported that several thousand Herd cavalry gathered their troops along the way and were heading east.

The scout cavalry also reported that they saw a large blue horsetail banner among the cavalry.

Obviously, the direct lineage of the Fire-warmer was not defeated, and the Fire-warmer himself did not admit defeat.

This battle is not over yet.

…

The battlefield is like randomly stacked building blocks. Pulling out any piece will cause unknown changes.

The night before, the Jashka brigade captured the golden man offering sacrifices to the sky.

Yesterday, Terdun's troops laid siege to the bridgehead.

If the causal relationship between these two incidents can be seen, then the chain reaction caused by them was transmitted to [Beizhai] 20 kilometers away in a covert way.

Colonel Bode Gates, the commander of Beizhai, must have never imagined that what triggered the desperate attack on the city by the Red River troops outside was actually the accidental loss of a joint provincial artillery officer.

Beizhai has two infantry brigades and a cavalry squadron, plus an auxiliary force of a hundred men, with a total strength of nearly 1,300.

The camp is small, but strong enough, and has a large amount of food and ammunition.

The only problem is "water".

In order to occupy a higher terrain, the camp was located on a hillside.

It is about 300 meters away from the North Confluence River, and the camp cannot directly obtain water.

This was not originally a problem, because the stronghold was originally set up here to prevent the defenders in the city from crossing the river to break out, and they could control the river bank from a high position.

But now the reinforcements from the Red River Department arrived - this was beyond the expectations of the Plato people, and Beizhai was the first to bear the brunt.

Leading the reinforcements from the Chihe tribe were White Lion Yasin's uncle and younger brother. They besieged Beizhai but refused to attack. Apparently, they had seen through Beizhai's weakness of difficulty in getting water.

The Chihe troops outside were busy intercepting and killing the Plato soldiers fetching water, while Colonel Bode inside was busy digging wells, and the battle fell into a stalemate.

But just yesterday morning, the Chihe tribe seemed to get some kind of signal and suddenly launched a general attack on Beizhai.

Colonel Bode didn't know that twenty kilometers away - on the other side of the battlefield, Turton's troops were also besieging the Jashka Brigade.

Winters didn't know that the fire they set would actually cause the Chihe tribe to storm Beizhai.

No one could get a full view of the battlefield because there was no vantage point from which to view thousands of people fighting, suffering and dying.

For most people, war only occurs within fifty meters of them.

The chess pieces cannot see the chess board. The soldiers are chess pieces, Winters is also a chess piece, and Jessica is also a chess piece.

There are only a few people who can be called chess players: Yasin the White Lion, Sekler, Arpad... But even they cannot see the entire chessboard.

Everyone is just struggling within the limits of what they can see, what they know, and what they can do.

Take Colonel Bode as an example. He only thinks about how to defend Beizhai. He neither knew nor cared about the grand plan.

The Chihe tribe made a strong effort, and the casualties of the Beizhai defenders increased sharply.

Colonel Bode was surprised to find that the Red River tribe outside actually had a considerable number of musketeers. You should know that some Hede tribe still used bone arrows and stone arrows.

Even the defenders of Beizhai did not have artillery, but the Chihe army that besieged Beizhai actually launched four artillery pieces - although the shots were not accurate.

The battle lasted all day. The Chihe tribe bullied the defenders of Beizhai because they lacked heavy firepower. They pushed the carts closer and filled the trenches in an orderly manner.

Colonel Bode led people to climb out of the village wall at night and dig out the soil filled in the trench.

When the Chihe army discovered that the Palatu people had left the stronghold, they immediately sent cavalry to kill them.

Both sides went back and forth, fighting in the dark, each leaving hundreds of corpses and retreating.

…

At dawn today, mist spread over the wasteland.

Nearly ten thousand soldiers of the Chihe tribe once again formed an array outside Beizhai, and most of them chose to dismount and fight on foot.

Most of the Chihe tribe soldiers carried horny recurved compound bows, and a few carried heavy muskets.

Mist is not good for either weapon, compound bows will unglue, and matchlocks will go out more easily.

But considering that the enemy is also suffering from the same harsh environment, the fog is not so unbearable.

Through the mist, Colonel Bode couldn't see clearly the enemy's arrangement, but he knew exactly what it would look like.

There will obviously be carts, which are a Heirloom of the Hurds.

There should still be some ladders. Yesterday, the Hud people had filled in several trenches and even pulled out a lot of wood from the wall.

There are also shovels and pickaxes. Although these two items are inconspicuous, they can explain the problem very much.

The biggest headache for Colonel Bode was the artillery. The leader of the Chihe tribe outside had discovered that his men's artillery skills were poor and there was really no threat.

Therefore, the leader of the Chihe tribe quickly changed his tactics and no longer used solid bullets to bombard him from two hundred meters away.

Instead, the artillery was moved onto a carriage, dragged within 40 meters, and the walls were cleaned with grapeshot.

Inside and outside the village, there was silence.

"You are not bad." Colonel Bode stood by the wall of the village with an expressionless face and said to himself in his mind: "But I am not bad either. Don't even think about taking Beizhai away without some blood."

"Ahach! Ahach!" The Huds outside the wall began to shout in unison.

"Ahaqi?" Colonel Bode grabbed a bunch of withered grass, wiped his palms, and casually asked the interpreter beside him: "What do you mean? Is it the name of the enemy general?"

Denel—a former businessman, now an interpreter, and a bilingual man who was forcibly recruited into the army—said with a sad face: "Ahaqi should mean lion cub. [Haqi] is a child, [Ya] is a lion, and Yassin is White Lion. As for whether it is the name of the enemy’s general, I don’t know.”

"Lion cub?" Colonel Bode raised his eyebrows: "Could he be the brother of Barbarian Chief Yasin? But I haven't heard that he has a younger brother..."

The trumpet sounded, and the Hurds outside began to advance toward the camp.

Colonel Bode waved his hand.

The military flag was waving, and the Palatine musketeers walked up to the wall, set up their muskets at selected positions, and hung the match ropes on the clamps.

The Hurds advanced to a hundred meters.

The military drummer began to beat the drum rapidly, and the musketeer gently blew on the red and smoldering match end, and then opened the lid of the gunpowder tank.

Everyone held their breath and waited for the sound of gunshots to announce the official start of today's killing.

Suddenly, a series of rapid gong sounds came from outside.

The Hurds came in like a tidal wave, and retreated like a tidal wave.

People from Plato, you look at me and I look at you, I just feel inexplicable.

"Let everyone fasten the lid of the gunpowder pool." Colonel Bode ordered the messenger.

Whether it was a command, a flag, or a drum beat, there was no order to "buckle the lid of the gunpowder tank."

After receiving the order, the soldiers ran in a circle along the wall of the village and told them in turn.

"Look to the west!" someone exclaimed, "What is that?"

"Anyone who makes noise in battle will be killed! Shut up!" A sergeant immediately yelled.

But everyone still couldn't help but look to the west, as if there was a forest approaching Beizhai.

A large army came out of the mist, and it was a real army.

The flag-bearer riding a white horse held the eagle flag high and walked at the front of the column.

Behind him, row after row of pikemen emerged from the mist, seemingly without end.

The neat spears were like wind-swept woods, moving slowly to the beat of drums.

"Eagle flag! Reinforcements!" Some Beizhai defenders shouted excitedly: "Reinforcements are coming!"

Only the legion owns the eagle flag. The presence of the eagle flag means that the legion commander is personally present on the battlefield.

This time there was no sergeant to stop the reckless soldier because everyone was cheering desperately.

The Chihe tribe also began to take action. They retreated slightly, but did not leave the battlefield.

Just adjust the direction, leave the position of being flanked by two sides, and change the front of the formation to face the newly arrived Plato Army on the battlefield.

Thousands of cavalry broke away from the Chihe tribe's main formation and circled the flank of the Plato Army.

Under the watchful eyes of both the enemy and ourselves, the newly arrived Plato army formed a formation with a set of beautiful moves.

The mist dispersed little by little, and the wasteland, the confluence river and the edge of Li on the other side of the river gradually became clearly visible.

What appeared before everyone's eyes were four phalanxes of a thousand people lined up.

The Plato army did not enter the camp, but formed a formation in the wilderness, as if they were inviting a fight to the Chihe tribe from afar.

The fog cleared, and Colonel Bode's heart suddenly tightened.

The reinforcements were much less than he had imagined. At first glance, they would not exceed 4,000 people, that is, eight brigades.

"What are you doing, old man?" Colonel Bode couldn't help but kicked the wall hard and shouted to the messenger: "Tell all the centurions to prepare to attack."

The Chihe cavalry had at least twice the numerical advantage, but apart from sending some cavalry to outflank them, the formation did not make any major moves. I don't know what their plans were.

And the Platonic phalanx stood there, as if they were sure that the Hedians would attack.

"boom!"

"boom!"

It was the sound of artillery, but it was very low, and it should have come from far away.

Colonel Bode looked around and saw streams of white smoke emitting from Bianli City behind him.

The white smoke quickly turned black, and thick smoke rose from Bianli into the sky.

Colonel Bode's pupils dilated and his eyes widened: "Is the old man crazy?"

At this moment, in the Western Acropolis of Bianli.

The six infantry brigades besieging the city were using simple trebuchets to throw iron rings and wooden blocks stained with asphalt, rosin and licorice into the inner city.

This is the inspiration that the Platuan people got from the fire set by the Hittites themselves - the acropolis has wooden walls and grass roofs, and the inner city is probably inseparable from these two.

In winter, the weather is dry and the west wind blows towards the inner city, which is in need of a fire.

Along with the simple trebuchet, artillery, battering rams and "gunpowder coffins" were carried out.

Judging from their posture, the Plato Army actually wanted to attack Bianli in one fell swoop.

Szekler has already laid out the chess game and is waiting patiently for Yashin, the white lion, to make his move.

[The previous chapter has been rewritten, starting with the attack on the fire roaster. Because the cavalry involved in the robbery of the camp included not only the hussars borrowed from Szekely, but also Dussac from the Jashka Brigade. So I re-wrote it. As well as debug, there are a total of twenty infantry brigades in Plato's standing army. Six are in Szekely's hands, six are participating in siege battles, two are in the North Fort, two are in the South Fort, and two return to the Styx to build a pontoon bridge. , there are only two left, not four]

[The end of the previous chapter has also been rewritten, but it’s just the last sentence at the end]

[The elderly in the community seem to be holding a singing competition, singing "The blue sky is filled with white clouds, and horses are running under the white clouds" and "Ah, this person is my mother, this person is my mother. After more than twenty years of hard work, give me a home." . Various bel canto singing styles, singing all day long from morning to afternoon, and using amplifiers. I'm dry. I don’t know if they only sing on weekends or if they sing every day]

[Thanks to book friends for reading, subscribing, recommending tickets, monthly tickets and tips, thank you all!

Thanks to book friends Xiaofan, Sonnets, Empty Pear Blossom Alley, Mass-Produced Magic War Tool Man, Noble Countryman, and Shield Cat on Ice, thank you all;

Finally, thank you again to the book friends who voted for recommendation today]

[There is a word limit for the author's words. In the next chapter, I will thank all the book friends who voted for me in the next chapter]

Compare your heart.