Iron Powder and Spellcasters

   Chapter 109 General Attack

   Both the Veneta and the Tanirians can clearly feel that the final hour is coming.

  The arduous siege is a huge torture for both the offensive and defensive sides. Everyone is looking forward to the end of this, but they are also afraid of the arrival of the last moment.

   The battlefield was so quiet for the first time. The night before, the thunder that never stopped was silent for the first time. But it was clear to everyone that the temporary tranquility heralded more blood.

  The grinding wheel collided with the sword, sparks splattered, and the Veneta polished their weapons over and over again. Musketeers are also grinding their buckshots grain by grain so that they fit the barrel just right.

  The defenders on the city walls were also frantically making preparations, tirelessly bringing stones, brimstone, bundles of arrows, and barrels of asphalt to the top of the city all night.

   In the early morning of the next day, the Veneta began to assemble, and the meat supply was put into the hands of each soldier for the first time by human hair.

   Believers, devout and ungodly, all knelt down in front of the military priest to pray and receive blessings. The priest of the army walked past the soldiers and sprinkled holy water on all of them.

   The massive shelling has been going on for eleven days.

During the period of   , the defenders tried every means to reduce the damage of the shells to the city wall:

   Sprinkling lime and mud plaster on the outer surface of the city wall, trying to add a layer of protection to the city wall;

  Hang wood, bags of wool, and even precious tapestries outside the city walls, hoping to absorb the impact of the shells;

   Mounds are piled up behind the city wall to thicken the city wall in disguise;

   He used palisades, dirt and stones to mend gaps in the city walls overnight, and used buckets filled with dirt to act as battlements.

   However, none of these measures helped, and the city walls were inevitably falling apart.

The Veneta imitated the attackers of the Constantinople siege, and improved the artillery method, so that the impact points were distributed in a triangle: first, they blasted two horizontal gaps eight or nine meters apart with cannons, and finally completed with the heaviest artillery. Final blow.

   When the thirty-two-pound iron ball whizzes and slams into the city wall, a chain reaction is formed, creating an even bigger crack on the basis of the previous two shellings.

  This kind of damage will cause the connected part of the wall to bear the tensile stress exceeding the limit, just like a tree that has been cut down in a V-shaped gap, accompanied by a terrible cracking sound, the originally indestructible high wall collapsed.

  From the fourth day of the large-scale artillery bombardment, the rate of destruction of the city wall has exceeded the rate of repair by the defenders. Even if the Tanirians were able to mend the gap, they could not clear the soil under the walls under the guns of the Veneta.

   Although piling up soil behind the city wall can slow down the rate of damage to the city wall, once the city wall collapses, the pile of earth behind the wall collapses. The outflowing earth and stone will form a gentle **** in front of the gap, and instead become a helper for climbing the city.

The   Veneta Army continued to launch tentative attacks on various gaps. One of them even planted the battle flag at the top of the city, but in the end, the troops who climbed the city were driven out of the city wall by the defenders who arrived.

  The Veneta soldiers sighed, but the senior officers were unmoved.

With the tenacious fighting spirit displayed by the Tanirian defenders alone, no one expects to win the Tacheng through such a small-scale attack, and no one expects to put the military flag on the city wall to make Taniria popular. collapse.

The    exploratory attack never took down the city walls, but Antonio and Layton would always unswervingly launch the next exploratory attack, using this method to kill the fighting spirit, energy and soldiers of the defenders.

   Maybe it was the brutal performance of the stake execution that shocked the defenders, or maybe they had no more strength, and William Kidd no longer sent people to attack the artillery positions of the Veneta Army at night.

On the sixth day of the    large-scale artillery bombardment, the two centenarians who circled the back mountain successfully intercepted the stream flowing into Tacheng from Crater Lake and cut off the water source for the defenders.

On the seventh day of the    massive shelling, the defenders had almost given up on repairing the city walls. At night, Veneta soldiers could swagger under the city wall and use a long pole with iron hooks to drag the barrels that act as battlements from the city wall, and at the same time recover the shells under the wall.

  The Tanirians…looked exhausted.

The twelfth day after the large-scale artillery bombardment, the twenty-eighth day of the siege, and the thirty-ninth day that Winters set foot on the island of Red Iwo, the general attack on the last stronghold of the Federation forces on the island of Red Iwo is coming. .

   After praying, being blessed, and receiving communion, the Veneta, armed with weapons, began to enter the sortie position. The Tanirians, who had not slept all night on the city walls, heard the noise outside the city first, then deadly silence.

   This is a sign of momentum.

   Everyone clenched their weapons.

  At dawn, signaled by a salvo of all artillery, the Venetas simultaneously launched a full-scale attack on the seven gaps in the city wall in the sound of war drums and bugles.

  The screams of terror made every living person in the city tremble as the Veneta charged.

   Under the cover of cannons, muskets and crossbows, the Veneta crossed the ditch and rushed to the gap in the city wall with ladders.

  The soldiers in the front stepped on the ladder and climbed up to the top of the city, while the soldiers in the back tried their best to remove the temporary wooden fence that blocked the gap.

   In the dark night, two armies fought together.

  The stone was thrown from the city wall, and the stone that hit the Veneta soldier directly took away a life. The stone that didn't hit the person was bounced off the **** of the wall, and the Veneta soldiers vomited blood.

   Cannons loaded with shotguns can take away more than a dozen lives each time they roar, and iron **** the size of walnuts can pierce one person’s body and kill another.

  Burning oil, burning sulphur and bubbling asphalt were poured down from the city head, and there was a horrific wailing from below.

  The Veneta people on the triangular fort were also cleaning the city walls, and the cannons and muskets battered the Tanirians on the city walls to pieces.

  The troops who climbed the city stretched out a ladder from the triangular fort and placed it on the top of the city. Sword and shield fighters in heavy armor strode into the city wall and slashed and killed each other with the defenders on the city gate.

The roar of    cannons and muskets, the warning bells of the Tacheng church, the crisp sound of weapons colliding, and the screams of dying soldiers mixed together.

   The fire of the muzzle of the gun is like lightning, and the mixed sound is like thunder, and the gods will be shocked by the cruelty displayed by human beings today.

   Fires were set ablaze in many places, and the stench of asphalt, burning sulphur, and the terrifying scorch incense of burning people permeated the walls of the city.

The smoke from the fire on the front and the white smoke spewed out by the guns and the thick smoke billowed. The thicker and thicker smoke obscured the entire city. In the end, the two armies could not see each other, and neither of them knew who they were fighting. .

The Veneta and the Tanirians just slashed and killed each other in a small space - no, there is no such difference between the Veneta and Tanirians, there are just people struggling to survive .

   When the Veneta army and the defenders fought fiercely, Winters was anxiously waiting for the signal.

   Beside him were Major Moritz, and seven other lieutenants. All members of this particular squad have another identity - spellcasters.

   The best weapon against a magician is another magician, and the generals of the Veneta Army know this all too well.

   The enemy may have a legendary court mage assisted, but the Veneta now have their own spellcasters.

  Antoine Laurent initially believed that alliance spellcasters could not reach the single level of court mages in the short term, so he suggested that potential spellcasters be admitted to military academies, and caster officers were trained to provide spell support for front-line operations.

   But this idea eventually went wrong in practice: the status of the caster became the rank of an officer, and the caster officer was promoted as soon as he was old enough, and quickly became a colonel.

   So how can spellcasters who have left the battle line provide spell support? How can a military chief who is busy with business still have the energy to insist on spell practice every day?

   In the end, a strange circle was formed: the more senior Veneta's spellcasters were, the worse their spell skills were generally, and the colonel's spellcasters were not as powerful as the lieutenant's spellcasters.

  Antoine Laurent also made a mistake, but unfortunately he has no way to correct it.

   So in the end, Major Moritz was assigned to be in charge of this "countermeasure" team. You can't transfer the military chiefs of the various battalions, right? Besides, it's hard to say how much of those people's spell abilities are left.

   On the contrary, Moritz's spell level, who has been sitting on the bench for many years, has become increasingly sophisticated.

   In addition, as a spellcaster with a small number of actual combat experience, although he is not an official officer, Winters was also recruited into Moritz's anti-magic unit.

Major   Moritz was not important in the army for various reasons, and he didn't care about other people's opinions. On the contrary, he was happy to relax. But at this moment, Antonio and Layton can only rely on the most powerful spellcaster in the army - Moritz van Nassau.

   "Why hasn't anyone signaled yet?" Lieutenant Kirk paced back and forth under the parapet.

Faced with an unknown enemy, everyone in Moritz's squad became a little neurotic: Captain Laylo checked his weapons over and over again; Major Moritz played with the steel cone he got from Winters-Major Today Portability was no longer an issue; Winters was sitting in his seat with his hands on his knees, as much of his brain as possible.

   This squad, made up entirely of officers, now wears soldiers' uniforms.

  Not just them, all the caster officers in the Veneta army today have taken off the spellcaster insignia.

  The centurions and battalion leaders on the front line also took off their eye-catching officers' armor and helmets and put on soldiers' armors. Although it will reduce the efficiency of the command system, it is also a helpless move in extraordinary times.

   "No signal is a good thing." Major Moritz took off an exquisite silver pot from behind his belt and threw it to Lieutenant Kirk: "I'll give you a drink."

   Lieutenant Kirk pulled the plug suspiciously, put it in front of his nose and sniffed: "Is it wine?"

   "It's a special wine. I added some potions to suppress the caster's emotions and make it easier for the caster to enter the spellcasting state."

Lieutenant    Kirk took a sip and returned the silver jug ​​to Major Moritz.

   "Winters." Lieutenant Pisani couldn't help but patted Winters on the shoulder.

   Winters' conditioned reflex with a blank brain stood at attention.

   "Sit, don't get excited." Pisani was also taken aback and patted Winters on the shoulder: "I want to ask you something."

  Pisani is only two years higher than Winters. The two were very close when they were still in Guitucheng. Naturally, Winters knew everything.

   "You are the only one of us who has killed a magician. You are idle and idle. Let's talk about experience." Pisani asked Winters' neck.

   Hearing Pisani's words, the others couldn't help but **** up their ears. Few of the elders will ask the younger for advice, and this is the first time Winters has been asked about his "killing experience".

   "But I'm not sure that man is a magician." Winters said with a wry smile.

   "Come on, don't talk nonsense between us." Pisani gave Winters a dissatisfied punch: "Just tell me, what is the battle between spellcasters like?"

   "I think about it..." Winters thought for a while and replied, "If I have to say it... I feel like eggs are smashing each other with hammers."

   "Eggs smashing each other with hammers?" Major Moritz laughed: "That's an interesting analogy."

"I think it's like this... The battle between two spell casters is to smash eggs with hammers." Winters said solemnly: "Even if the spell ability is strong, the body of the spell caster is as fragile as that of ordinary people. A knife stab will bleed, and a shot in the head will kill you. So in the battle of spellcasters, whoever moves first will live, and whoever exposes first will die."

   "'Whoever strikes first will live, and whoever exposes first will die'?" Pisani thought thoughtfully.

"And... it is absolutely impossible to capture the caster alive-unless it is a voluntary surrender." Winters said decisively: "Seniors, don't leave your hands in battle today, and don't take it lightly until the opponent is dead. Even if the opponent is dead, We're only safe if we chop off his head."

   This is the conclusion that Winters came to after the first battle of the replay: it is absolutely impossible to capture the caster alive.

  The limbs are tied with ropes and can be interrupted. As long as the price is spared, even the bravest warrior can be subdued. But how to bind the third hand? What about interrupting the fifth limb?

  Spells come from consciousness, even if the magician is cut into a stick, he can continue to use deadly spells. Even if the magician can be knocked out temporarily, once the magician regains consciousness, it will become extremely dangerous again.

In the battle of   , the mysterious mage had almost killed Winters. However, the other party was only interfered by Hestas for a few seconds, and Winters, who was almost dying, killed him.

  Eggs smash each other with hammers in turn. If they don't smash each other completely, they may be killed. This is a brutal battle between spellcasters.

   After listening to Winters' explanation, all the officers were dumbfounded.

   "Why use this concealed, fast weapon?" Second Lieutenant Laylo muttered to himself with Winters' improved short gun in both hands.

   Winters' improved short gun has become the standard for spellcaster officers in the legion, and the spellcasters who have seen Winters' demonstration immediately fell in love with this "spell firing gun".

   The biggest problem in the use of firearms is how to fire, the match rope is dangerous and troublesome, the structure of the spring wheel is complex, and the reliability is poor. Using magic to ignite the gunpowder in the chamber is a brilliant idea, and not only reliable. And because there is no need for a firing mechanism, the weight of the firearm is also reduced.

   In order to make up for the "only one shot" problem, Winters changed one barrel to three barrels, which the caster could fire sequentially or together. In theory, more barrels can be stacked, but considering the weight of three barrels is already the optimal solution.

Major   Moritz certainly didn't need such a thing, but not everyone had the major's proficiency in kinetic spells.

  Many casters who are good at fire spells and shock spells lack the ability to lethally kill enemies, so this kind of firearm that can be used with only the lowest fire spells is well received.

   Many spellcasters couldn't help but feel annoyed that they hadn't thought of this idea, which made Winters very ashamed, because he also had this idea when he saw the mysterious spellcaster firing a cannon through the barrel.

"Don't worry so much, maybe that person won't show up at all today." Pizarro patted Winters on the shoulder and said with a smile: "It doesn't matter whether that person makes a move or doesn't make a move, Tacheng will definitely make it today. Captured. If I were that person, I would definitely hide in the soldiers and wait to surrender, and would not come out to die."

   Before he finished speaking, the sentry on the Triangle Fort ran down from the top floor in a panic and shouted, "Flare! Red! The east wall!"

   Stone, a covalent material, has the characteristics of being compressive but not tensile, and can bear weight but cannot be used as a beam. Therefore, in the ancient Greek period, the span of the pillars of the temple was very small, and it was only after the advent of the vault technology that the large-span structure of the Roman Pantheon came into being. Another example is a reinforced concrete structure, because the tensile stress is resisted by the steel bars, so it does not matter if the concrete has cracks.

   Therefore, once a V-shaped gap appears in a pure stone building, it is easy to collapse. Making a triangular gap on the city wall was a real tactic in 1453. It is said that the Hungarians gave the Ottomans an idea.

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   (end of this chapter)