novelAbuy #259 - Battle of Mayo
#259 - Battle of Mayo
“Get up, you pigs!”
“Enemy attack! Enemy attack! Enemy attack!”
The entire town of Mayo was awakened by the shouts of Kleont and the captains. The mountain infantrymen emerged from their huts in a daze.
Before they could even open their eyes from their sweet dreams, they were whipped awake by the captains.
Hooves kicked up dust as all seven or eight messengers rode back and forth on horses and donkeys, dragging soldiers from their homes and tents.
Squads of mountain mercenaries lined up in columns under the arrangement of their captains, running towards the open space outside the town.
In the darkness, many townspeople were awakened by the commotion, and the bolder ones even climbed onto the roofs to watch.
Kleont, with a bandage wrapped around his head, stood on a mound, gazing into the distance.
Although there was moonlight tonight, there were also dark clouds obscuring the moon, making everything sometimes clear and sometimes blurred.
But Kleont judged from the sound and the blurry shadows that the outposts and arrow towers on the periphery were being eliminated one by one.
“Damn it, why are they advancing so quickly?”
Kleont turned around. The mountain mercenaries were still in a chaotic formation. Some forgot to bring their weapons, some couldn't find their teams, and some fell and were trampled.
After all, it was night, and they had just woken up. If it were daytime, it would be much better.
These mountain infantrymen wore linen clothes, mostly armed vests and slat armor, with only a few wearing chain mail and breastplates.
These eight hundred men, according to the affiliation of their captains and company commanders, stood shoulder to shoulder, forming a 50x10 pikemen square and four 15x5 crossbowmen squares distributed at the four corners.
This was a modified version of the Dunjall square commonly used in the Norn region, learned by the mountain mercenaries from the Norn mercenaries.
Spears were lowered one after another, forming a hedgehog-like forest of iron spears, a wall of sharp spikes pointing diagonally forward.
“Woo——”
The muffled horns and whistles in the night sky sounded so noisy, and all the mountain people felt the ground trembling slightly.
Looking up, the Salvation Army appeared not far ahead.
At the command, they rested their long spear shafts on their shoulder sockets, and everyone took the same steps.
Viewed from the side, it looked like a straightened black thread.
The night wind blew through the corners of their clothes, revealing the faint red lining under the black.
Kleont clearly heard the sound of swallowing saliva one after another in the formation behind him.
“What are you doing? What are you afraid of?” Kleont waved his long sword. “Back then, I, Kleont, chased them around like stray dogs. Only three months have passed, what can they do?
Don't be fooled by their neat formation. From what I know about them, they must have a rope tied around their waists. As long as one person is knocked down, the rest will definitely fall.”
Kleont looked at the sky, making sure that the other party's great wizard, Horne, had not summoned vampires or undead before feeling relieved.
Not far from the mountain people, Rudylo issued a command.
“The whole regiment stops, adjust formation!”
“Halt—adjust formation!”
The neat footsteps stopped instantly, turning into slight, small steps.
In the night battlefield, dim moonlight shrouded everyone's heads.
At this moment, in front of these 800 mercenaries was a part of Rudylo's Black Hat Second Regiment.
Yes, only 100 Holy Gunners and 200 pikemen had arrived on the battlefield. Opposite them were 800 mountain mercenaries.
Rudylo's behavior was, to put it nicely, courageous, and to put it badly, reckless.
His charge not only led to disconnection from friendly forces, but even internal disconnection within the regiment.
Now, on this open space, they formed a 50x4 long spear horizontal formation in the middle and a 10x5 Holy Gun horizontal formation on both wings.
With the help of moonlight, Rudylo visually estimated the distance to be about 200-300 meters. The effective range of their 17mm Cannity Mark II clockwork guns was about 70-100 meters.
If they advanced quickly at 50 meters per minute, they could quickly engage, but the formation might be scattered, and the Holy Gunners would not have time to reload.
The opponent had no cavalry, and the initiative on the battlefield was in his hands, so there was no rush.
Rudylo ordered the division commander next to him, “Holy Gunners, spread out, advance at normal pace.”
“First Holy Gun Division, spread out one arm's length to the left, Second Holy Gun Division, spread out one arm's length to the right, adjust formation.” The division commander shouted loudly, and the brigade commanders immediately shouted to the people around them, “Take one step to the left!”
“Advance at normal pace!”
Under the orders of officers at all levels, the dispersed Holy Gunners and pikemen began to advance at a normal pace.
“Hahahaha, look, they actually dispersed their formation.”
Friends who often participate in cold weapon warfare know that infantry engagement in close combat requires the most dense formation.
Enduring the pain in his earlobes, Kleont pointed his long sword forward, personally taking the lead in the charge: “Maintain formation and attack, launch the charge at a distance of fifty meters.”
Silent footsteps echoed on the field, one side noisy, the other orderly.
The sound of metal rubbing against metal was like a countdown. Rudylo silently estimated the distance between the two sides.
250 meters, 200 meters, 150 meters…
“The whole army stops advancing, Holy Gunners begin reloading.”
“Prepare!”
The clockwork key began to turn, and the sound of gears meshing rang out. In a moment, all the Holy Gunners were fully loaded.
“Aim!”
Under the gun-raising posture that had been practiced countless times and formed muscle memory, the war monks indifferently aimed at the enemies in front of them.
For them, who had experienced the charge of long-haired zombies and giant spiders, the movements of these soldiers were simply as slow as snails.
The mercenaries raised their spears to their chests, the sharp edges of the spears pointing at the farmer soldiers who had been frightened into stopping.
What did they see? These farmers actually picked up fire sticks and pointed them at them, actually using fire sticks as weapons?
Many mercenaries showed mocking sneers at the corners of their mouths. Sure enough, without the flying vampires and undead mentioned by the Second Demon Emperor Hoth, these farmers were as weak as chickens.
“Farmers, the guards are here.” This slogan commonly used to suppress farmers rang out again from the military formation.
“110 meters, 100 meters…” Rudylo finished counting down the last number, “Holy Gunners, two ranks retreat and fire!”
“Praise the Holy Wind!”
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The giant beast with its throat caught by thorny claws let out a thunderous roar, and the recoil made the Holy Gunners tremble.
The whistling sound of the wind rang out, and Kleont heard the previous sound again. His footsteps subconsciously stagnated, but the others around him rushed out.
The sound of ripe berries being crushed rang out one after another, and metal fragments and iron pieces flew in front of his eyes. A cloud of blood instantly enveloped the front line.
Nearly ten of the densely packed charging mountain people fell instantly, but they still didn't realize what had happened and were still charging forward subconsciously.
“Bang bang bang——”
“Ah——”
“It hurts, it hurts, Mom, it hurts so much.”
When the second round of gunfire rang out, nearly ten more people fell, tripped over the corpses under their feet, and many mountain people fell into confusion.
What just happened?
Looking up, all they saw were the backs of the farmers turning and moving backwards in the gaps of the formation, and the fire sticks raised at them.
Before they could react, the infantry formation, whose speed had obviously slowed down, once again welcomed a rain of lead bullets.
The whistling sound of lead bullets piercing the air rang out around them, thick armor was riddled with holes, and comrades fell one by one beside them.
A strong bloody smell burst out, drifting to everyone's noses and mouths.
Kleont keenly noticed that scattered deserters were beginning to appear on both sides of the square.
He frantically passed through the sparse mountain people's ranks, chasing and hacking at these deserters.
“Don't run, don't run.” Kleont, with disheveled hair, tried to intercept these mountain people, but to no avail.
Kleont, wearing armor, simply couldn't catch up with the mountain people who were abandoning their armor and weapons, just to be a few points faster than their companions.
The close mountain people's square, which had rapidly charged from a distance of 50 meters to the front of the Black Hat Army's Second Regiment, had basically become a sieve-like pancake, no longer the tight formation it had been before.
The Holy Gunners who had retreated and fired had just arrived at the rear of the team and began to turn left and right, hiding behind the forest of spears.
“All pikemen, charge!”
Shoulder to shoulder, 200 pikemen roared in unison and charged towards the enemy's loose formation.
As if a hot knife through butter, the pikemen didn't take much effort to break through the front row of mountain people whose formations had been scattered.
In the blink of an eye, the mountain people in the back row didn't put up much resistance and scattered, crying and shouting “Magic!” “Wizards!” as they fled.
They seemed to have seen something terrible, discarding all the weapons and heavy armor on their bodies, just to be a few points faster than their companions.
“Pikemen, pursuit formation, Holy Gunners, advance at normal pace!”
The pikemen immediately transformed into three brigades in column formation and began to pursue and counter-charge, preventing the enemy officers from gathering the rout and reforming the formation.
By the time the pursuit was over and Rudylo's rear army, the Cheka, and the military judge arrived, it was long past midnight.
With Rudylo speechless beside him, being questioned by the military judge, Laurent was rummaging through the pile of corpses.
Soon, he saw a familiar figure.
In the midst of the corpses, Laurent found Kleont's body.
He lay across the road, his head was crushed, and there were bloody footprints on his body. He must have accidentally fallen while running and been trampled to death.
Standing in front of Kleont's body, Laurent looked for a long time, then turned around and went straight to his old friend Jourdan.
At dawn, Horne finally arrived at the town of Mayo.
When the morning light shone on the earth, the townspeople climbed onto the roofs, walked out of their houses, and crowded on the roadside.
The Salvation Army war monks in black and red coats and with black and red flags surged forward, and countless mercenaries who had oppressed them were tied up with ropes and walked forward dejectedly.
The townspeople picked up stones and mud and kept throwing them at the mercenaries, cursing them fiercely and even crying bitterly.
When Horne arrived on a tall horse, the belated cheers resounded throughout the town of Mayo.
Everyone raised their hands high, waving at Horne and constantly shouting Horne's name.
Standing up on the stirrups, Horne raised his fist high: “Friends, my friends, I am back.”