"His name is Nightingale, and since the day he joined the Order, his name has been just a vague code name in a long time and space, and they will live this life incognito, or die loyally and honorably in their mission, without any room for negotiation."

Khloe said these words calmly, as if he was saying something that had nothing to do with him, and his tone did not contain any emotional waves, but I knew that the wound in his heart must have shed more hot blood than I did for the loss of his former comrades.

As the sun slowly moved from the middle of the sky to the west, the heralds of the bull came to the hiding spot in the dense forest behind the castle and reported to me that everything was ready, and at the same time the main forces of the enemy were already visible to the naked eye.

I nodded and let him go down, and was carried by a few men to the commanding heights of the hillside, and overlooked at the castle not far away, with its smoke rising and the enemy army peeking out of the forest, their banners hunting in the wind, their spears as dense as jungles, the archers as numerous as carp crossing the river, and the knights on horseback lazily controlling their mounts, as if they were on a country march.

"The enemy army has mobilized so many soldiers, this is the first time I have seen it, it is not an army with knights as the main combat force, those spearmen are rigorous and neat formations and orderly scheduling of advance and retreat, showing that these unarmored soldiers are not cannon fodder to gather numbers, and their combat effectiveness will definitely not be weaker than the conscription militia we have seen in Italy, it is indeed a hard bone to gnaw, once the enemy sees through my strategy and launches a strong attack, we have no chance of turning the tables at all."

I squinted my eyes and carefully counted the number of enemy pikemen and the archers that matched them, roughly estimating the number of about the same, and my heart was a little suspenseful.

"These people do not have the kind of murderous aura that has endured life and death for a long time, and they completely rely on mutual cooperation and well-trained training to make up for the disadvantage in the quality and equipment of the soldiers, even if we do not lose so many cavalry, and fight with them on the plains, rashly attacking will be blocked by the spear array and unable to move, and then be wiped out by the archers who are waiting for their work in pieces."

"They are brand new opponents, more rigorous, more organized, and stronger, inheriting the fine traditions of the ancient Roman legions, and after several Viking invasions, they stubbornly fight for living space between the two great powers, so strong that people cannot be taken lightly, and they are indeed the most difficult to tame bobcats on the pillow side of the empire, as great as His Majesty Emperor Otto I, and they have not been able to completely bring them to their knees." Kohler, who was born as an archer, has better eyes, and it is hard to imagine the unfairness of God's creation to be able to see the facial expressions of the other party from such a distance.

While we were talking, the enemy, who had completed the search of the shanty houses scattered around the castle, stopped moving, knocked down several houses that were obstructing the firing range, cleared an open field in front of the castle, and began to arrange troops in an orderly manner.

At the same time, the simple wooden castle built on a small mound was wide open, and there was not a single one of our warriors guarding it, except for a soldier standing tall in the wind on the city walls, holding in his hand the flag of the flying dragon emblem, symbolizing the Count of Nijmegen, and silently staring at the black phalanx in front of him, as if he did not pay any attention to all this.

"My lord, this plan of yours has never been heard of since the creation of the world, it is too risky, if the enemy chooses to attack, we will lose the last shelter to resist, after seeing the enemy's army, I really regret not persuading you to give up this crazy plan in the first place!" Kohler was visibly nervous, fine beads of sweat appeared on his forehead, and his hands rubbed uneasily.

Seeing his anxious appearance, I didn't want to tease, but finally I gave up after thinking about it, pretending to be deep and changing into a face of indispensable underbeating, and said mysteriously: "You are wrong, this strategy has been used by many people, and all of them have succeeded, never doubt God's justice, he will not be so partial, and it is self-defeating to retreat in a castle where there is no danger to defend, believe me!" ”

Khloe stared at me for a long time as if he didn't know me, grimaced in a rare way, shook his head and continued to pay attention to the enemy's movements.

After the formation of the enemy army was arranged, he sent a herald on horseback to come to the battle letter, but he hesitated in front of the open city gate, and he looked at the banner bearer on the city wall with no squint, seemed to stay in place and think for a moment, and then turned his horse's head and returned to his own position.

This time it was the turn of the enemy commander, who had already seen the strange behavior of the castle, to be confused, he and a few knights with status around him got together and met each other, discussed it slightly, and then sent a herald to shoot the feather arrows tied to the war book with a bow to the city, and then shouted loudly, but because the distance was too far for me to hear clearly, it was probably because I was afraid that the flag bearer on the city wall would ignore him, and had to repeat the contents of the war book.

"Oh no, the enemy is attacking!"

Kohler's eyes widened and he looked at me in a bit of panic: "The soldiers in ambush in the castle can't deal with the enemy who is swarming up, God, this is clearly a one-sided slaughter!" ”

"No, if you want to attack, why bother to come over and write a war letter again and again, indicating that the enemy can't figure out the truth in the empty city plan, and wants to probe our details in this way."

"Taking a step back, even if the enemy really chooses to attack, in the narrow space of the castle, it is difficult to completely spread all the troops, and can only be invested little by little, which is a taboo tactic in terms of tactics, just suitable for the defenders to rely on the favorable terrain to slowly chew and swallow, note, they did not carry any siege equipment at all, and the castle prepared fire extinguishing tools in advance according to my instructions, and the enemy could not destroy the castle."

I patted Kohler on the back of his hand and explained to him as I ordered the Ravenna pikemen, who were the mobile force, to form a line and quietly descend the hill from the other direction under the leadership of Hans, detouring behind the enemy.

Kohler watched Hans's army go away, took off the bow from his back, skillfully tightened the bowstring, and the ten sharpshooters of his cronies also silently followed his movements, and began to make the final preparations before the battle, I habitually rolled my eyes, waited for a moment, and finally saw the two phalanx of spearmen in front slowly change into battle formations, and step towards the castle to attack.

"Let's guess who's the yellow finch behind the praying mantis......"

I glanced at the motionless bull standing at the head of the city, and muttered to myself.

The enemy's spearmen relied closely on their comrades, leaving no gaps between them, forming a compact phalanx, with the soldiers standing in the first row mainly responsible for holding heavy shields to protect themselves from possible bow and arrow attacks, the soldiers in the second row put their spears of exaggerated length on their shoulders, and the two rows of soldiers in the back and on the sides were also arranged in this way.

The entire phalanx was impermeable, like a hedgehog covered in a turtle's shell, no matter which direction it attacked, it was difficult to pose a threat to it, but it was easy to be pierced into a blood gourd in the stab against them, and died a miserable death.

In each phalanx of spears was a spear with a pennant at the tip, presumably the commander of the entire phalanx, holding up the weapon in his hand and giving orders, so that everyone could clearly understand what they were going to do next.

I saw that the two spear phalanxes were intertwined with each other's horns, slowly advancing with neat steps, and it was really hard to believe that this was just an army composed of some propertied citizens or wealthy peasants, and the tacit understanding between them was not something that could be cultivated in a year or two, and the military traditions in their region were really deep-rooted, otherwise they would never have become the hot mouth fat that all empires dreamed of, but it was difficult to swallow, and they stared at it for many years but couldn't say it.

The two phalanxes finally stopped not far from the city gate, and the flag-holding soldiers standing on the city wall finally lowered their heads and looked at them with disdain, and then threw away the big flag in their hands, turned around and jumped into the castle and disappeared.

"Do you think they're going to go to town?"

I gently wiped the corners of my mouth with my hand, as if I wanted to wipe away the smug smile that had just floated up, and suddenly became interested, and asked Kohler, who was nervously watching the situation on the battlefield, "If it were you, would you choose to attack?" ”

Kohler propped his bow on the ground, subconsciously stroked the arrow hanging in the quiver box on his waist as if he was sick, and thought about my question very seriously, as if he was not sure of his answer:

"If I were the one who commanded the attack, I would definitely choose to assault with the whole army, because this small castle seems to be not as strong as the bars in the big towns, and everyone can destroy it with a single breath, and besides, the city gate is open, and there is not even a figure in it, so a fool will hesitate when such a good opportunity is placed in front of him, I have not read, I don't have much battlefield experience, and I don't have so many flowery intestines in my stomach, and I don't have a dead tendon to the end."

Hearing Kohler's answer, the smug smile on my face became even stronger, the pride of the world's treacherous soldiers like gods, who would take me, came up again, and in the Middle Ages, he sang empty city plans to this group of stupid big people who only knew how to fight and kill, and they would not even appear in the crossing.

"Your answer is probably the answer in the heart of the enemy commander, he will definitely choose to attack, but he suffers from no siege weapons, there is no way to bring down the city wall, to ensure that his offensive is foolproof, so he can only put troops through the narrow city gate little by little, as long as the enemy who enters the castle is cut off, so that they can't take care of each other, only with a very small number of people can contain a large number of enemies, and then take advantage of their panic to outflank the retreat with surprise soldiers, think about it, what will be the final result of the war?"

I deliberately sold a pass, hoping that Kohler would understand the mystery and pat the ass just right, but what I was waiting for was an incomprehensible answer.

(End of chapter)