What you get with a lot of effort is more enjoyable than what you get without effort. Pen Fun Pavilion wWw. ｂiquge。 The truth that is clear at a glance can be understood effortlessly, and when it is understood, it is only temporarily pleasant, but it is quickly forgotten.

- Giovanni Boccaccio (a prominent representative of the Italian Renaissance movement, a humanist)

The total length of the valley of Cádiz was more than 800 meters, and the width was about 30 to 50 meters, and the length of the valley greatly limited the effectiveness of the longbowmen, who had only a range of 400 meters, and had to be in the middle of the valley to the east.

After Gatus led his army to the west of the Cadiz Valley, he placed the Spartan hoplites and Macedonian royal pikemen at the forefront of the phalanx, followed by a standard 1,000-strong Macedonian phalanx of the Cheetah Legion.

In order to protect the vulnerable flanks of the phalanx troops after the phalanx troops broke through the enemy army, Gatus did not only send the phalanx troops to advance, but kept the width of the phalanx troops at twenty meters, and the left and right flanks were scattered with elite soldiers to protect them.

When these troops entered the valley, they were about two hundred meters long and occupied half of the range of the longbowmen, and the second force sent by Gatus was the longbowmen, and then the remaining two thousand Macedonian phalanxes.

Francis, who has grown wise, is not a fool, and the bitter lesson of the last time against the Macedonian phalanx is still fresh in his memory, and this time he had long expected that there must be this special army in the army of the city of Rome, for which he specially prepared 5,000 archers!

The barbarian warriors who have used bows and arrows to hunt since they were children are still quite good in the talent of using bows and arrows, and the five thousand ordinary soldiers who were temporarily selected by Francis to serve as archers are barely qualified archers.

When the Spartan hoplites in the big red cloak came out of the valley majestically, Francis's face showed such a smile, and the Spartan hoplites were followed by the Macedonian royal pikemen, who were no less imposing.

The two mighty troops, advancing with their spears held high, approached only a hundred and fifty meters from the exit of the valley, and the defenders of the valley exit, who had been waiting for them, immediately withdrew to the left and right flanks with a wave of Francis's hand.

As soon as the more than 10,000 elite warriors on this side withdrew, the 5,000 archers over there came to the vacant positions and began to stretch their bows and arrows and wait for the order to fire a salvo.

However, the Spartan heavy infantry is the Spartan heavy infantry, even if the front is covered by the rain of arrows of 5,000 archers, they still push forward step by step without hesitation;

One hundred and fifty meters, one hundred and twenty meters, one hundred meters, after the Spartan heavy infantry entered the 100-meter range, the archers under the command of Francis still did not start firing a salvo, and the tense atmosphere became more and more intense, but the footsteps of the Spartan heavy infantry did not have the slightest disorder.

When the Spartan heavy infantry advanced another twenty meters, Francis, who had been paying attention to the movements of the Spartan heavy infantry, finally gave the order to shoot, and then the first volley of 5,000 archers was fired at the advancing Spartan heavy infantry.

The essence of the Macedonian phalanx lies in the stability of the entire phalanx, no matter what kind of fierce blows, as long as the phalanx is not chaotic, the soldiers in the phalanx can fight, once the phalanx is disrupted, the whole army will be defeated without a fight.

All the pikemen in the Macedonian phalanx will have a round shield, and the round shield of the Spartan hoplites and the Macedonian royal pikemen can resist the fire of the javelins, but the protective area of the round shield is limited after all, not to mention that the enemy army is a salvo of 5,000 archers.

Covered by the rain of arrows from enemy archers, the Spartan hoplites and Macedonian royal pikemen suffered heavy casualties at once, and at least a dozen warriors were killed on the spot, and countless more were wounded.

But their advance was still not disrupted, the wounded soldiers were still advancing, and the position of the warriors who were shot on the spot would be immediately replenished by the robes behind them, and after being attacked by a rain of arrows, the longbowmen behind immediately stopped and began to counterattack.

The longbowmen, whose range was far greater than that of the average archer, were now in a position that could completely cover the enemy archers, so that their arrows soon rained down on the heads of the enemy archers, and the unsuspecting enemy archers were instantly killed and wounded.

Then came the battle between the archers of the two armies, with Francis's archers shooting arrows at the advancing Macedonian phalanx, and Gatus's archers shooting arrows at the enemy in waves.

This battle continued until the Spartan heavy infantry advanced to a distance of only thirty meters from the mouth of the valley, and Francis waved again to withdraw the heavily wounded archers, and the 10,000 elite warriors who had retreated to the left and right flanks re-blocked the exit of the valley.

The withdrawal of the enemy archers did not affect the performance of Gatus's longbowmen, who were still raining their arrows at the enemy, and as long as they had arrows in their quiver, their volleys would not stop, but this time they only brought two pots of arrows.

The longbowmen's fire weakened the middle and rear of Francis's army blocking the mouth of the valley, but it could not affect their forward troops, and as the Spartan heavy infantry advanced, a direct engagement between the two sides finally broke out!

The brave and fearless Spartan hoplites stabbed their spears forward in a neat formation, and the first wave of defenders blocking the exit of the valley tried to rush forward, but they were stabbed into blood gourds by the dense super-long spears, and they had no chance to fight back.

The impenetrable phalanx of ultra-long spears ran over Francis's defenders like a bulldozer, and the defensive line formed by Francis's elite warriors had high hopes was forcibly pushed out by the steady Macedonian phalanx before it could play its role.

Due to the terrain in the valley, the Spartan heavy infantry phalanx was quite narrow, and even after breaking through, they could not expand their breakthrough area, and in fact, their breakthrough was the result of Francis's deliberate relaxation.

If the pikemen phalanx of Rome were kept blocked at the mouth of the valley, the side that suffered would be the army that could not be used, and Francis was not a fool, so he naturally would not allow such a scene to occur, so he ordered the pikemen phalanx of Rome to be released to fight.

The Macedonian phalanx, unaware of the existence of the trap, seized the opportunity to kill, but as soon as this side broke through the defenders' frontal defense, their own left and right flanks fell into the defenders' key attack;

The formidable Spartan hoplites and Macedonian royal pikemen single-handedly took on almost all the enemy forces in front of them, while the pikemen behind them, under the cover of elite warriors, quickly redirected and aimed their spears at the enemy troops on the left and right flanks.