"Immediately order all the musketeers and artillery brigades to set up positions in the city, with the Athenian infantry corps as the center, and the rest of the troops to be distributed in the rear to keep in touch with the navy. Josel was summoned to immediately send a fleet back to Taranto, urging Dodd to send as much of his army as possible, and if necessary, to bring in the royal guards. Eridoan, his bloodstained land, kept spitting out orders from his mouth, so that the army that had just taken Byzantium and had not had time to rest was dispatched again to repair the city defenses that were about to be in ruins. Eridoan's surprise attack can't hide from Amdullah for a long time, once he finds that there is no army on his front, he will inevitably react after a little aftertaste, and then it will be a bloody battle, if he can't block Amdullah's full attack, then the last elite force of the Great Qin Empire will inevitably be completely ruined by his own trick. On the other hand, if he blocks the attack of the Great Eclipse army and holds Byzantium, then the last force of the Great Eclipse led by Amdullah will inevitably return to the Aegean Sea. It's just that Elidoan looked at the distant East and sighed, both he and Amdullah can understand that even if one of the two sides can win this battle, it will be a miserable victory, and in the end, the fisherman will only benefit from the Eastern Empire, right?

Elidoan guessed correctly, Amdullah actually reacted faster than he expected, and almost as soon as the vanguard reported that the Great Qin Legion was not following the pursuit, Ulam sensed the movement of the Great Qin Army. After this battle, Ulam no longer dared to ask Elidoan, so he hurriedly reported it. When Amdullah learned the news, he immediately sent scouts to reconnoitre, and soon learned that the main force of the Great Qin army had disappeared from its original place. The situation was immediately clear, and Amdullah immediately ordered the remaining cavalry in Ulam's command to immediately return to Byzantium, and at the same time personally led a fully armed musket team across the Balkan Mountains by starry night. In this way, after Elidogan hastily arranged the defense, Ulam's cavalry was already in the sight of the sentry.

"It's time to come." Elidogan originally planned to dismantle part of the artillery from the battleship and go ashore to assist in the defense, but after seeing the cavalry of Ulam, he still gave up decisively, after all, in addition to the interior of Byzantium, the rear and the fleet harbor defense were scattered infantry regiments and Slavic regiments of less than 10,000 mixed troops, and the port was not in danger to defend, once it was rushed by the other side, I was afraid that the previous scene of the infantry regiment being slaughtered would be staged again. You must know that you were stubborn in Sophia's war before, and you can resist with the flesh and blood of the infantry legion to block the opponent's charge.

Elidogan's retreat order had not yet been issued, and Ulam had already begun to order a charge, and the Byzantine city defense could not rush in, the other party was obviously prepared, and the muzzles of the rows of musketeers made him turn his horse's head and head east without hesitation, and then almost without thinking about it, he directly charged. In this way, under the nose of Eridogan, Ulam took the assault tactics of the Great Eater cavalry to the extreme, and the hurricane-like rush made everyone feel an inexplicable fear, and at the same time expressed admiration for the infantry regiment that fought to the death in the previous battle of Sophia and the Slavic regiment that finally rushed to fight the cavalry hand-to-hand and was almost completely annihilated. It's just that this admiration can't change the destruction of the more than 10,000 mixed legions outside the city. Even if Elidoan hastily brought in the musket team to support nearby, those big food cavalry riding tall horses domesticated from the heavenly desert made a name for themselves here, and the defeat in the previous war did not mean that this watchman cavalry, which had been fighting everywhere since the beginning of the Great Food Empire, would fall in the war with Great Qin. On the contrary, the almost flowing slash of the knife took away the lives one by one, and at the same time, it also made the expression on Elidoan's face even more solemn. The 10,000-strong Slavic warriors were able to barely contend with one or two, but they were immediately drowned under the hooves of the charging horses.

"Boom, boom" Josel's warships began to bombard the troops on the shore, but Ulam quickly turned his horse and hurried away after killing most of the more than 10,000 people stationed in the harbor in a near-massacre manner, leaving only the corpses in the spot. This kind of almost ostentatious battle not only greatly dealt a blow to the morale that had just been raised by the capture of Byzantium, but also made the already exhausted Eridogan face an even more severe shortage of troops, which became more obvious after the arrival of Amdullah's main army.

Because Byzantium was taken by Elidoan, his retreat was completely cut off, and after the battle of Sophia, his proudest cavalry regiment was abolished by the other side, and Amdullah, who was enraged, immediately launched a fierce attack early the next morning, and once again sacrificed his killer weapon, organized countless death squads to launch a decisive charge, and the fanatics holding the explosive bags did not even pay attention to the dense bullets at all, and launched a cluster charge towards the fortifications built by Elidoan round after round, It didn't give Elidoan a chance to breathe. The artillery on both sides of the battlefield is you come and go, dense shells on the battlefield shuttle quickly and then land and explode, although the cannonballs exported by Datang are filled with black powder, but this has been purified black powder mixed with a small amount of white explosives after the explosion of thick smoke, soon the whole battlefield began to become dark because of the pervasive artillery fire. Elidogan was short of troops, but he had just captured the supplies and supplies hoarded in Byzantium, and there was no shortage of shells, so he almost demanded that the artillery fire as many shells as possible at any cost. Even in order to cover the artillery from being destroyed by the enemy, the gun emplacements of these guns were heavily reinforced with many bunkers, and this artillery battle lasted all morning, and this artillery bombardment did play a big role after the Great Musketeers changed their tactics.

However, Elidoan's method did not last long, Amdullah adjusted his deployment in the battle that afternoon, changed the original all-out attack to a key breakthrough, and let the artillery continue to concentrate fire on Elidoan's gun position, relying on this method to knock out the opponent's artillery little by little, and even did not hesitate to fight with the opponent to attrition, so as to provide cover for the infantry siege. Therefore, the battle in the afternoon was much more advanced than in the morning. Several successive explosions were effective, and the infantry fire distance was shortened, which also brought effective damage to the defenders of the city, forcing Elidogan to mobilize the Athenian infantry corps to enter the front line to assist the musketeers in the defense. It's just that the Athenian infantry regiment is still very powerful in melee combat, but it is not its specialty to control muskets to kill enemies. The soldiers hadn't even seen these amazing-looking weapons before, so Elidogan's approach didn't work as well as it should, and even letting the infantry reload the musketeers would be clumsy.

"Send someone to inform the Navy to get ready." Eridoan stood on the top of the castle tower overlooking the entire battlefield, and the Great Food Army rushed up one after another, eroding the outlying positions he had arranged, and then attacked the city walls non-stop, strangling his limited forces little by little in this seemingly endless offensive and defensive battle. Originally, the musket team in his hand was only more than 10,000 people left in the 30,000-strong legion, and after this whole day of fighting, there were less than 7,000 left, even if some Athenian infantry were more talented in the afternoon battle and could fill the musket team, but the number was definitely not more than 10,000. But Amdullah's musketeers were only more than 70,000 men, plus more than 10,000 cavalry, and he had completely lost the battle so far. However, Elidogan was not out of the question, and sent someone to inform Joseph during the truce between the two sides in the dark night, and sent half of the sailors of his naval fleet to secretly go ashore and enter the city, and suddenly entered the battlefield in the battle the next day, completely defeating the great musketeers who had broken into the city walls and were ready to fight in the streets. You must know that Elidoan has sent 5,000 sailors ashore, and they are not inferior to the soldiers of the musket team who are already very familiar with muskets. And these 5,000 sailors did play a great role at the critical moment, directly thwarting Amdullah's plan to attack the city in a short time, and also took advantage of the situation to launch a wave of counterattacks to force him out of the city again. After the artillery was partially destroyed by the enemy, Elidogan also learned from Amdullah to organize some of the brave men to fight back, targeting the large food soldiers who were gathering into piles, and exploding directly in the crowd with explosive packs, so as to weaken the momentum of the opponent's attack. After this method worked, Elidoan concocted the same method, directly ordering some soldiers to throw explosive packs and even cannonballs on the high ground of the city tower that had not yet collapsed. In this way, the incessant explosions greatly eased the emergency situation of the defense. But before Elidoan could breathe a sigh of relief, Amdullah's side also came up with a countermeasure, and after there was no way to change the siege location of the soldiers, he organized some marksmen to lurk around the battlefield, specializing in sniping those soldiers who stood on a high place and threw explosive bags. Because the snipers are scattered and lurking all over the battlefield, Elidogan can't detect it at all, and although the breech gun has a slow rate of fire, it is no problem to use it as a sniper rifle after Datang's manufacturing technology has become increasingly sophisticated. So in a very short time, the soldiers who threw the explosives were killed on the spot. Although Elidoan then allowed the soldiers to hide their figures, it was much less effective, and the snipers who were lurking in the shadows were able to slowly look for opportunities to kill them. In the end, Elidoan directly withdrew these people.

But without the explosive pack's close blast support, the musketeers' defense became more and more difficult. It is difficult for a good woman to cook without rice, and although Elidoan has an empty stomach for scheming, the dwindling number of troops makes it impossible for him to use it at all. Even if he transferred five thousand sailors to the front line to participate in the battle, he could barely stop the other side's pace. In this situation, if the opponent regrouped his forces and attacked with all his might the next day, then Elidoan would definitely be defeated, and he would not have the troops to defend the next day. Even if you put the other party into the city to fight in the streets, you won't be much better.

"Doesn't there be any news from Luther?" Eridoan arrived on Josel's warship that night, and Eridogan, who had not closed his eyes for three days and three nights, lost his former demeanor, stared at Josel and said, "Has he secretly returned to the Holy See for so long and not brought back reinforcements?" If no reinforcements arrive tomorrow, the empire will be in the abyss of total destruction. ”

"The general can rest assured that Luther and the archbishop have a good relationship and will definitely be able to return on time. I have gathered the last 5,000 sailors here, and the general will bring them back, and I think they will be able to hold out for a day. Tomorrow is the agreed deadline, Luther will come, and God is on our side. "Josel also knew that Eridoan's side was on the verge of life and death, but it was extremely difficult for Luther to go, and it was extremely difficult to bring the last crusader in the hands of the Holy See, and in its opinion, even if the crusaders arrived, I am afraid that it would not change the overall situation, after all, although the crusaders were enough in number, what role could the crusaders, who were almost unable to even get together their weapons in a big war of this level, play in front of the Great Food Army? However, Joseph did not dare to say these words to Eridoan, but only drew out all his last sailors and let them take them away. In this way, there are even only about a dozen people left on each warship of the Great Qin Navy fleet, and they can only maintain the most basic operations. And this also buried a huge hidden danger for the future.

With this last sailor support, Eridoan was able to hold out on the fourth day, but Luther still had no news, and no new ships had arrived on the sea. It also sent Eridoan's heart to the bottom of the sea. He held out in Byzantium for four days, and his army, including the naval sailors who were transferred, was now less than 20,000 people who could still move. Such a force simply cannot block the opponent's attack tomorrow.

"We must retreat, or the navy will be cut off here. An empire could do without Byzantium, but not without a navy. Eridoan sighed and began to secretly mobilize his troops to evacuate Byzantium at night, and then rely on the naval fleet to leave here. It's just that there have been reinforcements from Eridogan for two consecutive days, which also made Amdullah guess the other party's movements, so almost at the same time that Eridogan secretly withdrew, the cavalry led by Ulam also began to secretly sort. And in order to achieve the effect of the surprise attack, not only did the war horse be camouflaged enough, but even Ulam secretly approached to investigate. In this way, on this Byzantine dock port, the two sides once again collided violently.