In addition to the arrogance of the Persian nobles who despised the Greeks, another important reason was that the position of the two armies at this time was on the southwestern edge of the Mycian region, not far from the coast, the Persian army was huge, the consumption of military rations was huge, coupled with the continuous pursuit for more than ten days, the logistics and transportation lines were sharply lengthened, and the supply became difficult, and most of the nearby towns were subordinated to the Greek alliance. Coupled with the fact that the Greek fleet controlled the nearby seas, the logistical supply was superior, and the two sides would have to face off for a day or two, and the Persian army would have to retreat due to the lack of food, which would not only make the previous efforts wasted, but also cause the prestige of Persia in this region to be lost.

At their insistence, Fanabazos finally strengthened his determination to fight a decisive battle with the Greek coalition here.

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Upon hearing the news that "the Persian army was marching towards the camp", Leoticides, who had been prepared for a long time, immediately sent a herald to inform the Allied generals to gather their respective armies and prepare to go out of the camp to meet the battle.

At a distance of about a mile, the armies of both sides began to line up.

The Persian Coalition Army of Asia Minor consisted of the armies of the western regions of Asia Minor, the Greek mercenaries, the reinforcements of the city-states of the Star Sea, and the reinforcements of the eastern part of Asia Minor, with a total of nearly 80,000 soldiers. Because there were many Greek city-states in western Asia Minor and the sea of stars, this Persian army was somewhat different from the traditional Persian army, and Fanabazos learned the lessons of the past battles with the Greeks, and specifically emphasized that each region should recruit as many Greek city-state infantry as possible when carrying out military mobilization, so in addition to the 15,000 Greek mercenaries led by Iason, there were more than 6,000 Greek heavy infantry with strong combat effectiveness in the entire army, as well as Persian cavalry from eastern Asia Minor and cavalry from the two river valleysCombined with the cavalry of other regions, the total number of cavalry exceeded 8,000, in addition to the traditional Persian infantry and archers of more than 40,000 people, the ratio was about 1:2.

Archers and cavalry were originally Persia's strong points, and the original weakness of the infantry was also strengthened, plus the army was outnumbered by the opponent, although the terrain was not superior, Fanabazos still had great confidence in this battle, so he adopted a relatively balanced formation: the Greek heavy infantry was at the forefront of the left, center, and right flank infantry arrays, and the mercenaries of Iason were mainly in the center, with 4,000 cavalry at each end of the left and right ends, and the archers were at the rear of the infantry array......

Leoticides and the allied generals did not rush to line up, but still stood on a high place, observed the situation of the Persian array for a while, and felt that it did not exceed their expectations, and then began to arrange the formation according to the plan drawn up last night.

The Greek coalition consisted of nearly 30,000 men in three Dionian legions and cavalry legions, about 27,000 troops in Greece and the Ionian Islands, and 7,000 troops in the Central Italian Confederation, totaling about 65,000 men. Among them, there were more than 35,000 heavy infantry, and more than 2,000 medium infantry in the allied armies of central Italy, which obviously had the upper hand in medium and heavy infantry, but the cavalry only had more than 3,000 cavalry of the Thessalian cavalry corps, Macedonian cavalry, and cavalry of other Greek city-states, which was less than half of the Persian cavalry.

On the light infantry side, there were three light infantry battalions of the Dionian legion, more than 1,000 Epirus light shieldmen recruited by Leoticides in the mountains around Thessaly, 2,000 light infantry from the allied armies of central Italy, and nearly 3,000 light infantry from the Greek city-states, the total number of light infantry was close to 10,000, but still far less than the number of Persian archers, and the javelinmen were the majority of them, and they were obviously inferior to the Persian army in range.

According to the superiority and inferiority of the enemy and the difference in numbers, Leoticides listed the formation: the middle lane was dominated by Dionia, and a small number of Greek soldiers; On the right flank was the army of the Greek city-states; The formation on the left flank was occupied by Dionian soldiers in the front row and in the rear by the Central Italian allies; The cavalry was not placed at either end of the formation, but at the rear of the center.

The entire formation of the Dionian army was not entirely parallel to the Persian army, its right flank was slightly forward, the left flank was slightly behind, in fact, it was an oblique array, only different from the array of the Theban coalition at the Battle of Leuctra, Leoticides did not thicken his right flank, but he placed the Spartan warriors led by Agosillaus, the Theban holy army led by Ipamironda, and the elite Athenian hoplites led by Iphicrates, the most combat-ready of the three Greek allies, on the far right of the right flank. From a distance, the entire right flank of the Greek coalition was made up of Greek heavy infantry (Leoticides even forbade the Spartan warriors to wear red flanks), and even the thickness of the array was uniform, making it impossible for the Persians to make an accurate judgment that the center of gravity of the Greek coalition was on the right flank.

In fact, Leoticides' careful arrangement did play a role, it took more than an hour for the two armies to line up their positions, and neither immediately launched an attack, during this period of confrontation, the Persian military commander Fanabazos had a general understanding of the formation of the Greek coalition army, but did not make any adjustments to the formation, apparently thinking that the opponent's formation was not anything surprising and the Persian army was completely capable of dealing with it.

However, the reason why he did not give the order to attack for a long time was that the Greek coalition army was located on a high ground, and the Persian army would suffer a loss to attack upward, so he never ordered the whole army to advance, just to see if the other side could attack first, so that the Greek coalition army would have to go down a gentle slope and fight them on flat ground. But it was clear that the Greek commander-in-chief was cautious and had a relatively good command over the entire force.

From a distance, the Greek soldiers were like small trees standing still, neatly planted on the halfway slope of the hill...... This made Fanabazos even more cautious.

But after the half-hour confrontation between the two sides, the Persian generals couldn't help it and rushed to question Fanabazos, because it was already noon, the weather was relatively hot, and standing for a long time would be a great drain on the physical strength of the soldiers.

Even Theopampus, the governor of Misia, threatened that if Fanabazos did not give the order to attack, he would lead the Misian army alone and attack the Greeks.

Fanabazos could not resist everyone's insistence, but he did not immediately give the order for the whole army to attack, but first informed the archers to move to the front of the formation.

After completing this change of formation, he ordered again: the large army does not move, the archers advance first, and attack the Greek coalition at a distance.

More than 20,000 Persian archers approached the Greek coalition in a loose formation that stretched for six or seven miles......

Upon learning of this, Leoticides immediately ordered all the allied light infantry to move forward to the front of the formation and prepare for firing.

The two armies were no more than 500 meters apart, and the Persian archers marched at a faster pace, approaching a distance of 100 meters in a few moments, and the enemy was still out of their range; But for the archers of the light infantry of the allied Greek army standing on higher ground, this was more than a match for them.

The officers of the Dionian Light Infantry Brigade shouted one after another: "Archers ready!"

The archers drew their bows and bolts, and thousands of arrows were thrown into the air, which in turn fell into the array of Persian archers, and screams rang out one after another.

Led by the Dionian light infantry, other allied archers began to shoot one after another.

The Persian archers kept their soldiers falling to the ground, but for their sheer numbers, they were just small splashes. Moreover, in order to resist the Persian archers, the light infantry of the Greek coalition army also stretched its formation to a length of several kilometers, but their total number was less than that of the other party, and there were fewer archers among them, so the long-range attack power spread to each section was naturally weakened a lot, and it was not enough to deal a devastating blow to the Persian archers in that area, so the Persian archers firmly resisted the rain of arrows and advanced more quickly.

When the distance was reduced to sixty or seventy meters, the javelinmen of the Dionian light infantry brigade roared and threw heavy javelins at the Persians like lightning, and the archers also changed from the initial projectile to a direct fire, and the Persian archers fell more and more, but at the same time their counterattack began.

Arrows and javelins from both sides were striking each other within a distance of several tens of meters, and because they did not have much protection, the casualties caused by the arrows and javelins that covered the sky and the sun were increasing dramatically.

The Persian archers gradually turned the whole situation back from the initial hasty shooting, to the gradually stable output, and gradually began to gain the upper hand. They were one of the most powerful weapons for Persia to dominate the Middle East and Asia Minor, and apart from the well-trained Dionian light infantry, the allied light infantry began to be a little overwhelmed, and the Epirus light shields even covered their heads with leather shields and rushed over to engage the Persian archers in close combat.

The Persian archers were not afraid and drew their specially equipped short blades to face the battle, although the light shield soldiers were better equipped, but the Persian archers actually had a slight upper hand with more against less.

The whole situation of the battle began to be a little unfavorable for the Greek coalition, but Leoticides, who had been watching the battle from a high position, did not appear anxious, he just gave the order: the entire cavalry unit should be moved forward to the far right of the entire army formation.

Then he calmly ignored the struggling support of the allied light infantry, and did not take any more action. Because in his opinion, although the light infantry of the coalition army was at a disadvantage, they took advantage of the high terrain and were able to deal with the Persian archers who were far more numerous than themselves for a long time, even if they were all lost, the arrows of the Persian archers had been almost consumed by then, and there was no great threat to the infantry of the coalition army, so he would rather continue to confront each other than give up the hard-won geographical advantage and give the order for the whole army to attack, and he firmly believed that the patience of the Persians was probably not as good as his.

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