Chapter 32: Punishment After Victory

After nightfall, Kadam did not dare to fight, and he had to change his original policy, which was to capture Gawain's main force and fight a decisive battle. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 info

Because now he has captured, but he can't eat it, but is likely to be eaten by Gawain, he realizes that frontal combat is not the opponent of Gawain's strong formation, so he wants to maneuver and use the advantage of cavalry to find new fighters.

But there were still six or seven thousand infantry and chariots left south of the Villeka River, and they were fighting with Giovanni!

So that night Kadam led his cavalry in the direction of Fort Vilon, preparing to return to meet his own infantry.

Gawain did not camp either, and after observing Kaddam's movements, "all the infantry marched close to the Veleka River, with the vehicles on the outside and the cavalry on the outermost, and rushed towards the Viklon pursuit!" ”

At nightfall, the torches lit up the sky and the rivers, the wheels rolled, and each cavalryman, led by two horses, followed the Emperor's orders and pushed desperately towards Vykronburg.

They were not at all prepared to give Kadam and the opposing cavalry a chance to recuperate.

At this moment, south of the Vilka River, the Bulgarian rebels (mainly Slavic infantry) were fighting to the death against the 18,000 allied troops led by Giovanni in five connected semicircular chariot formations.

They were to provide cover for the main general Kadam's attack, and they could not allow Giovanni to cross the river defense and join up with Gawain.

The brave Slavic soldiers, mostly from the North, were armed behind their vehicles, and a pedal stone thrower called "Bagelaire" was their long-range heavy weapon, which Gawain's soldiers had seen in their battles with the Sicilian Pagan Janissaries on the Holy Mountain of Athos - they made a fixed "gate" pole out of ironwood, and then drilled holes in its beams, inserted into the swingarm throwing rod and the end of the springbag, under which the gunners used pedals to drive the driving pulleys, Hang the triangular (the most stable) heavy iron ingot, then step on it and smash it down, driving the throwing rod to throw a stone pellet of 30 kilograms, with a range of 650 Anna feet!

When the enemy approached, Bagelaire could also throw a hundred-kilogram fire hammer, a distance of 200 Anna feet, to incinerate and disrupt the enemy's formation, making them fearful.

In addition to these pedal stone throwers, the Slavic infantry also erected a dense number of "self-shooters" on the carriage boards, which were actually heavy crossbows, which, together with their bows and throwing axes, resisted the onslaught of Giovanni's troops.

Giovanni's main force was the frontier army that was good at chariots, so it adopted the "chariot to car" combat method, but the frontier people of New Rome were equipped with chariots covered with armor shields and cannonballs, which was their superiority over the Slavs on the opposite side - the whole field was confronted by many chariots, galloping back and forth, the frontier people of New Rome and the Paulineites drove the chariots, charged from the left and right flanks to outflank, and then fired heavy artillery guns, and the Kurdish cavalry from the east roamed to maintain the safe balance of the array; The Slavs, on the other hand, kept shooting crossbow arrows and stones from their barricades, fiercely resisting to the end.

Soon at the intersection of the two sides, small-scale and brutal ambushes and raids continued, sometimes the Roman border militia squads were accidentally ambushed and killed, and sometimes the Slavic warriors were killed by the firecrackers...... But slowly Giovanni gained the upper hand, after all, he was backed by the great imperial capital, and it was very easy to get supplies and ammunition - Barcelissa invested a lot of manpower, repaired roads, and kept coming to deliver supplies.

In the early morning of December 3, the returning Kadam cavalry suddenly attacked the left flank of Giovanni's siege line, and Atami and all the Paulicians stationed there calmly and tenaciously leaned on the barricades and trenches, inflicting great casualties on the intruding Kadam cavalry.

But on the other hand, Kaddam's goal was partially achieved: the three Slavic soldiers in the east took the opportunity to hastily unbuckle the chains of the barricades and rumbled north under the cover of Kaddam's cavalry.

After repelling the enemy's cavalry charge, he hurriedly ordered all the Paulites, under the cover of thirty chariots, to attack forward in time, cutting off the other party's way of escape—the two Slavic chariots blocked by Atami, almost no one broke through, and all the more than 2,000 Thracian people who had been captured and coerced by seventy or eighty carts, 1,800 soldiers, and the plundered and coerced people of more than 2,000 surrendered and were captured.

Giovanni hurriedly ordered the Kurdish cavalry to give chase, and they caught up with some of the Slavs who had not escaped on the banks of the Veleka River, about 400 people, all of whom were cut down by the Kurdish cavalry, and their corpses were floating all over the river.

Fifteen gigans east of Vylonburg, Giovanni's army, which had crossed the Villeca, joined the Emperor's army.

The castle of Viklon had long since been abandoned by Kaddam, and all the remaining rebels fled further north.

The entire Evros-Veleka front has been successfully restored to its pre-war position, the enemy has been defeated, the safety of the imperial capital has been restored, and Anna can prepare for a new triumphal ceremony.

"But the main force of the enemy's cavalry still exists, and we cannot give up the pursuit! Even if it's the cold season, after getting supplies, let me continue the attack to the north! "Who would have thought that His Majesty the Emperor had no intention of stopping in the slightest, and besides, he had a terrible punishment to carry out after entering Vylon Fort and announcing the order of "only three days of rest".

In the fort, the generals, officers, and soldiers who had disobeyed orders in various battles were punished - the Imperial Tomb Forbidden Army was originally adapted from the old department of Alexios' outer palace guards, and in the previous battles, they charged in front of themselves, fearing the enemy and retreating behind, and were beheaded nine flag officers in succession; Mikhail had no way to do it, and Marinus annexed friendly troops without authorization, demoted them by three ranks, removed them from military positions, and escorted them back to the imperial capital for confinement and reflection; Other officers and soldiers of the Dorila Aim Border People's Army and the Imperial Tomb Forbidden Army were fined three days and three months of money to see the after-effects, and Gao Wen sent a teaching team to master these two teams in the name of supervision and training, and continued to fight with the army; And Giovanni, Diognis, Atamy, Nexus and others fought for their merits, and each had different rich rewards.

The "Alemanni Brigade", which had been defeated in the previous reckless battle, was regrouped, and there were still about 2,000 people left, and Gawain also took the opportunity to purge them, and the original officers were either deposed or expelled, and all of them were replaced by their own people, "Stay in Vycronnburg to recuperate until the end of winter." ”

Finally, the Emperor decreed, "Fort Vikron, at the crossroads of the four rivers Evros, Elda, Dengje, and Veleka, is a crossroads, and will continue to serve as an advance station for our army to attack northward and sweep away the rebel divisions of Mosya." ”