By dusk, the vanguard of Syracuse had really arrived at the city of Hibernian, from Lokry through Medmar to Hibernian, a journey of more than 100 miles, and Dionysius's army spent more than a day forcibly marching, and actually completed this part of the journey, which can be regarded as a great miracle.

The nature of the turmoil caused by the arrival of the Syracuse army alarmed Trina's spies, who had been closely watching Hibernian's movements during this time, and they hurried back to the city of Trina, on the north bank of the Ramato, more than 50 miles from Hibernian.

The army of Syracuse is coming!!

This astonishing news shook the entire city of Trina, and both the general public and the members of the council were terrified, who had never expected the people of Syracuse to approach Trina on the third day after landing.

According to the original plan formulated by the Southern Italian Alliance, the most important main force to defend the Ramato River, the troops of Crotone, were far from arranged, and Siriting had only sent a few thousand citizen soldiers to garrison the upper reaches of the Ramato River, and the entire Ramato River defense line had not been established at all, which could be said to be full of holes. If the Syracuse attack tomorrow, it will easily break through the Ramato River and enter the Eufemiaan Plain, and Trina will be the first to suffer the ravages of war.

The situation was urgent, and the Trina Council had no time to argue, and they made swift decisions under the leadership of Chief General Sipros, who had been elected last year: first, to send men to Crotone at once, urging him to send the main force to the Ramato River as quickly as possible; secondly, to send men to the Siriting at once, and to ask him to go all out to defend the Ramato River; thirdly, to send men to Knappetia at once to ask for help from Dionia; Fourth, send people to Coronia at once and ask for the division of the 4th and 5th Legions of Dionya to come to the rescue......

For Sipros, who had always admired Dionia, he trusted the well-trained Dionian legions more than the procrastinating citizen soldiers of Sirittin and Crotone, so half of Trina's emergency measures were related to Dionia.

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On this day, the soldiers outside the Dioonian camp in Coronia continued to work on improving their defenses, but as the scouts hurried back, the camp's warning horn sounded. The soldiers immediately carried pickaxes, shovels, wooden baskets and other equipment, quickly returned to the camp, and closed the camp gate.

"The Syracuse people have finally attacked!" Dracos excitedly quickly put on his armor with the help of the guards, and asked the adjutant, "What instructions does Phellisius have there?" ”

"Let's defend ourselves." The adjutant replied.

"It's kind of interesting!" Dracos muttered a few times, put on the purple crowned helmet that symbolized the identity of the legion commander, and fastened the ear guards on his cheeks: "Let's go, let's go and see how powerful Syracuse is!" ”

The Dionian Fourth and Fifth Legions actually built two camps, the Fourth Legion on the west and the Fifth on the east, connected by a roadway.

Therefore, for the sake of command convenience, the Syracuse-Lokri coalition also divided the troops into two parts, with the Syracuse army led by Fasipesas attacking the eastern camp, and the Lockry general Diopantos leading the army to attack the western camp.

Due to the rush of time, the Syracuse did not build siege towers, not even ladders, but Diopantos still had the confidence to turn temptation into assault, in return for the humiliation of being forced back by the Dionian army in Crotone a few years earlier without a fight.

The 20,000 attacking troops of Lockrie marched slowly under the rhythmic sound of brass trumpets, until they approached about 500 meters from the Diopantian camp, Diopantos raised his arms, the trumpets stopped, and the army stopped moving one after another, and the array became uneven.

"Push the ballista!" Diopantos ordered loudly. Yes, his reliance was on the siege weapons brought by the Syracuse people - ballistas.

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The Dionian Legion had a busy day yesterday, and had only dug trenches, erected earthen ramparts and wooden fences, and had no time to dig traps outside the camp, not even set up deer barbs, and the engineers and craftsmen of the engineering battalion were racing against time to build watchtowers.

As soon as the first watchtower was built, Phellisius and Epitenis climbed up the watchtower and looked out just in time to see the Rockleys pushing a dozen ballistae out of the ranks.

Epitenis was not at all surprised, for the camp just below the watchtower was also neatly arranged with ten ballistae one size smaller than the Syracuse ballista. He frowned slightly, pointed ahead, turned back and asked the young man who was on the watchtower with them, "Kurdorod, do you think our ballistas can destroy them?" ”

Kurdorod came from the Dionian Academy, and according to the newly revised "Dionian Military Law" in the previous two years, each legion must be equipped with ten ballistae when it goes out, and the sighters must be the best students of the Dionian Academy, because they can quickly calculate the appropriate landing point according to the parabolic equation to improve the accuracy of its launch.

Although Kurdorod participated in military training many times, it was the first time he went to the battlefield. Looking at the dense enemy in the distance, he was a little nervous: "Too ...... It's too far, I'm afraid it's ...... Hard. ”

Phellisius patted him on the shoulder kindly and comforted him, saying, "Take it easy, young man. It's normal to feel nervous when you're on the battlefield for the first time. Don't worry, no matter how many enemies come, our valiant legionnaires will drive them away. ”

Kurdorod nodded, he swallowed, looked ahead again, and then he plucked up the courage and said, "I...... I suggest that we get closer to the enemy so that our ballistas can be more powerful. ”

"Same as I thought!" Epitenis praised as he looked at the handsome young man earnestly, with a strange glint in his eyes: "You are very good, young man. ”

Seeing this, Phellisius coughed lightly.

At this time, the herald of the Fifth Legion rushed to the bottom of the sentry tower: "Your Excellency, Commander Dracos asks to wait for the enemy to enter a distance of 200 meters before firing the ballista, so as not to scare them away. ”

"200 meters?!" Epitenis shrugged, "This Dracos is really greedy!" ”

"He's the same as we thought!" Phellisius laughed.

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As the leader of the squad, Ephiarte and his teammates stood behind the earthen ramparts, watching the huge stone bullets whizzing from in front of the enemy formation, smashing in front of the camp, making a loud sound and raising a layer of dust and mist, they did not show much uneasiness, because in the usual military training, they did not know how many times they had practiced with the ballista unit, and they were quite familiar with this amazing long-range weapon, so despite the amazing momentum caused by the enemy's ballistae outside the camp, the soldiers were still in the mood to laugh.

They asked Efiarte for details of their participation in the Hera celebrations, and were envious of the privileges that the newlyweds had enjoyed at the celebrations, and said that they would also go to Turiyi to attend the Hera celebrations when they got married.

As the enemy array approached, the ballista pushed forward, and the impact point of the projectile continued to move forward.

When the stone projectiles fell from the sky, smashed in front of the camp and fell into the trenches, the detachment commanders of the legion issued orders: "Cover against the wall!" ”

Just as Eiffial was leading his teammates to lean on the earth ramparts and lay down, Kurdorod's voice came down from the watchtower: "250 meters! ”

"No hurry, no hurry." Epitenis clasped his hands on his chest and patted his shoulder, trying to suppress the excitement that was beginning to arise.

"Bang!" A stone bullet hit the wooden fence, and the broken sawdust fell on the heavily armed soldiers, causing no damage.

"Whew!" A few more stone bullets whizzed, crossed the wooden fence, fell into the camp, and smashed several tents, but there were a few screams and laughter.

From the watchtower, Kurdorod stared at the ground in front of him. Yesterday, while the soldiers were working hard to build the camp, the ballista team was not idle, mapping the ground outside the camp and leaving some markings, which could be a transplanted weed, a peculiar rock, a diagonal stick......

"200 meters!" Kurdorod shouted excitedly.

"It's ready to fire." Epitenis waved.

"30-degree elevation angle, medium-sized stone bullet, full string!" Kurdorod was quick to report the data.

The ballista captain, who had been listening intently for a long time, immediately repeated Kurdorod's words loudly, and the soldiers quickly turned the pulley, pulled the bowstring, hooked it with an iron hook, and then put about 6 kg of stone projectiles into the smoothbore (after several years of further research and improvement of ballistas, Dionia's ballistae were divided into two types, one was a siege ballista, which was large in size, and the weight of the stone projectiles fired was more than 20 kg, and the targets of the attack were mainly city walls, buildings, etc., and the other was defensive ballistas, which were small in size, light in weight, and good in accuracy, and could be carried by two or three people, The stone projectiles fired weigh from three to ten kilograms, and the targets are the army, siege equipment).

Since it was not a battle, the enemy's formation was relatively loose, but the 20,000-strong team still seemed dense, so a good opportunity to attack in the first round had to be seized. To this end, Kurdolad first set the impact point of the ballista in the center of the enemy formation.

"Launch!" The ballista captain swung his right arm vigorously.

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Diopantus watched the stone projectiles whizz into the Dionian camp, and his heart felt a pang of joy.

At the beginning of the army's movement to the enemy camp within 500 meters, he also feared being attacked by the Dionian slingers, who had heard that most of the Dionian slingers came from Rhodes and threw the stones far and accurately. But when the troops advanced to a distance of 300 meters from the enemy camp, the Dionians still did not react, and he was completely relieved.