Remember; Life is only in front of you, it is only a very short moment; As for the past and the future, the former is a thing of the past, while the latter may never be. Therefore, man's life is short, and the corner of the earth where man stays is narrow.

- Marcus Aurelius (the only philosopher-emperor in Western history)

It was not difficult to defend Quselle, and Himika and his brother Himicus were not the most feared generals of their enemies, nor were they the famous Carthaginian generals; But at least he was a good general of the Carthaginian kingdom. Defending a military town with 9,000 troops with sufficient supplies and water supplies; The Numidian army would not have been enough to shake the defenders if it had not launched a series of strong attacks with more than three times the number of troops.

Even the 50,000-strong army of Numidia attacked Qusayr with all its might, with the easy and difficult terrain of Qusayr and the fortification of the military fortress; Without paying the price of 20,000 or 30,000 men, the Numidians did not want to take Cusser. Therefore, Vimini concluded that it was impossible for the Numidian army to actually launch a strong attack on Quselle; At most, it is just to send a detachment of divisions to surround Qusel.

The main army of Numidia must still attack Tapsus, and the number of troops that can be sent out to surround Qusel will not exceed 10,000 at most; Otherwise, it will affect the attack on Tapsus, and it will be more than worth the loss. It is indeed enough to surround Qusayr with a Numidian army of less than 10,000, but there are only a thousand days of thieves in the world, but there is no one who has a thousand days to guard against thieves; There will always be times when the besieging army will slacken.

Vermina's order was for the Himika brothers to launch a surprise attack to kill and wound the enemy when the enemy army was lax; However, Vimini also explicitly ordered that the army sent by Himika must not exceed three thousand, and it is best to use only one thousand elite round shield cavalry for sneak attacks. If a rare good opportunity is encountered, the sneak attack army cannot exceed three thousand; In this way, they were able to avoid falling for the enemy's tricks, which led to the annihilation of the defenders of Qusser.

In addition to the 9,000 troops commanded by the Himika brothers to garrison Qusayr, the remaining 17,000 troops were all assembled in Tapsus; Hannibal's generals, Mahabar and Abidos, were also at the disposal of Vimina in the city of Tapsus. Because archers were far more useful than javelinmen and slingers in defending the city, Vimyna, after receiving the bows and arrows from Hannibal, ordered the craftsmen concentrated in Tapsus to make more bows and arrows.

The original 3,000 slingers and 2,000 javelinmen also gave up the slings and javelins under the orders of Vermina and began to learn how to use bows and arrows; In fact, it is not difficult to bend the bow and shoot the arrow, just pull the bow and shoot the arrow. It's really time for the enemy to attack the city. A salvo of bows and arrows of 5,000 men could hit the enemy even if they were no longer accurate; Therefore, Victoria's requirements for these people are not high, as long as they can shoot arrows to eighty meters.

Because of the arrow that shoots to a distance of eighty meters. Within sixty meters there will be enough damage; Coupled with the fact that these archers were all troops standing on the walls of the city to defend, the fifteen meters above the ground height of the walls of Tapsus was enough to extend the range of these archers to more than a hundred meters, and the attack power would be even more powerful. In order to increase the lethality of these archers, Vermina also ordered the craftsmen to create 25,000 iron arrows; These iron arrows are the killer weapon of the archers.

These arrows made of pure iron are more lethal than ordinary wood-tipped arrows, and even hoplites using shields and armor will suffer heavy casualties from these iron arrows; But. These arrows are also only suitable for defending cities, as they are simply too heavy. Even Vimini himself, with all his might, could only shoot an iron arrow twenty meters away; Not to mention the ordinary archers, it would be nice to be able to shoot an iron arrow twenty meters with the help of the city walls.

However, when the besieging force came near the wall, it only took 5,000 archers to shoot 5,000 iron arrows out of the wall; Then the enemy army under the walls will suffer a devastating blow, and it is impossible for anyone to survive the rain of arrows! After arranging the training of the defending troops, Victoria's Secret began to discuss the specific battle plan with Mahabar and Abydos.

Everything was in order in Tapsus, and Tulguta marched with his army after Jugurdah led five thousand of his elite to Qusel; Because of Vimina's initiative to shrink his forces, all the cities from the border area to Tapsus were not defended by any defenders, and the Numidian army successfully took over this series of cities. Until the soldiers came to the city of Tapsus.

After the scouts reported that the Numidian army was only two hours away from Tapsus, Victoria began to arrange her own defensive forces on the walls; In order to be able to resist the first wave of the Numidian army without any delay, and to hide the true strength of the defenders of Tapsus, Vermini sent 5,000 archers, 3,000 Punic infantry, and 2,000 Iberian infantry to defend the city.

The remaining 5,000 Libyan spearmen continued to rest in the barracks in the city; But the two thousand shield cavalry Vermyna, who were on guard near the gates of the city under the command of Abydos, had other arrangements. The defenders on the walls were not personally commanded by Vimina himself, but by Mahabar as the commander of the defenders on the walls; Victoria's Secret watched everything in the tower.

Although the number of more than 40,000 Numidian troops coming slowly is not unusual, the momentum is still extraordinary; Infantry clusters marching neatly, cavalry clusters rolling up countless smoke and dust, trumpeters blowing loud horns, generals riding in front. The army of Numidia is coming towards the city of Tapsus with an indomitable momentum, and the people who arrive before they hear are not good!

Of the ten thousand defenders on the walls, with the exception of the two thousand Iberian infantry, who had followed Hannibal for a long time, completely ignored this momentum; The other 8,000 troops fared far behind. The 3,000 Punic infantry is the elite of the recruits. Although he was afraid, he was not as obvious as he appeared, but his face was pale; The remaining 5,000 archers were almost all trembling with their legs.

Of course, the battle-hardened Mahabal knew what to do to boost morale at this moment; I saw Mahabal shouting at the two thousand Iberian infantry who were not moving: "Soldiers, tell your comrades-in-arms how many great battles you have experienced; Tell them how you have won battle after battle with less, and tell them how far the enemy is compared to the well-armed Roman army. Tell me, are you afraid of this kind of army? ”

Mahaba's words caused a burst of laughter from the Iberian infantry present, and one centurion even stood up to Mahabar and replied, "Your Excellency, General." I don't know why my comrades-in-arms fear the rotten army beneath the walls; In my opinion, they are just a little worm, and we don't need to step on them with one hand, just one foot! Of course, it cannot be said that their existence is worthless; At the very least, I still have to rely on them to get the exploits and rewards! ”

The centurion's strong self-confidence infected the Iberian infantry around him. They all cried out for their exploits and rewards; At this moment, the heralds of Vermina also came to announce the latest order: after the defense is successful, each person will be rewarded with ten gold coins, regardless of rank! The belligerence of the Iberian infantry and the stimulus of money made the Punic infantry and archers forget their fears and begin to stir up; They also followed the shouts of the Iberian infantry.

Naturally, the movement on the city walls could not escape the eyes of Tulguta and Ahmed. Although the two did not understand why the morale of the defenders on the city walls was so high; But they didn't intend to take Tapsus easily, all of which was just expected. Ignoring the changes in the walls, Zuguta methodically ordered the javelinmen to keep watch around the army, and divided half of the javelinmen to surround the entire city of Tapsus.

Because the first wave of the offensive was only a tentative offensive, in the rest of the army. The three legions of recruits will be responsible for attacking the walls; Ahmed's army will remain in the middle of the ranks. The ladders and battering cones, which had already been built, were also pushed out at this time; The fortified walls of Tapsus were far from being comparable to those of Leptis the Great, so the Numidian army prepared not only enough ladders, but also siege cones to attack the gates.

As for the siege towers, the manufacturing process was too complicated, the wood requirements were too high, and the movement was too slow, so the Zuguta did not waste energy to build; With the order of Tsuguta, the trumpeters of the Chinese army sounded the horn of the attack. The 5,000 desert infantry of the Gaia Legion also set off towards Tapsus with a ladder under Gaia's orders, and the 1,000 light infantry of the Niptasan Legion pushed the siege cone and slowly marched towards the gate of Tapsus; Behind them were a full four thousand archers!

Because the battle was certainly far more tragic and bloody than the attack on Leptis, Tulguta and Ahmet also strictly ordered Gaia and the others not to lead their own troops to attack; Otherwise. It may be that the battle has just begun, and the Numidian commanders are about to be killed and wounded. Five thousand desert infantry, carrying ladders, marched swiftly towards the walls of Tapsus; After entering the 100-meter radius of the city wall, the 5,000 archers of the city wall also began to fire arrows under the orders of Mahabal.

Needless to say, these makeshift archers don't have to be real archers in combat; The rain of 5,000 arrows did not knock out one-twentieth of the enemy, which is a terrible achievement. The desert infantry also sensed the weakness of the defenders' bow attacks, so they hurried to continue their accelerated run towards the city walls; The next five consecutive rounds of arrow rain totaled 30,000 arrows, but they only killed and wounded less than 1,000 enemy soldiers; The enemy archers a hundred meters away from the city walls were even more unscathed.

Soon, the desert infantry set up ladders on the walls of Tapsus, and four thousand Numidian archers entered less than sixty meters from the walls and began to shoot arrows at the walls; Originally, the distance should have been eighty meters, but Gaia saw the weakness of the archers on the walls. Temporarily ordered them to advance to sixty meters and start archery. The first rain of 4,000 genuine archers brought down more than 200 archers on the city walls, and Mahabal had to order all the archers to retreat, leaving the Iberian infantry to defend them.

The battle-hardened Iberian infantry took up their shields and shuttled through the rain of arrows from the enemy, pushing down the ladders from the towers one by one; At this time, Tulguta and Ahmed, who were in command of the battle in the rear, also noticed the weakness of the archers on the walls. Since the defending archers could not play a greater role. Then the army of Numidia must not waste such a good opportunity in vain; Tulguta immediately ordered the remaining 6,000 light infantry of the Niptassan Legion to rush forward and assist the desert infantry in ascending the walls.

At this time, a thousand lightly armed infantry pushed the advancing siege cones fifty meters from the city gates; However, after the first desert infantry had climbed the walls, the Numidian archers had stopped firing and retreated to the rear in order to avoid accidental injury. The desert infantry who climbed the walls were not faced with weak archers, but with the most elite Iberian infantry under Hannibal's command; How could these recruits be those elite opponents? The battle between two thousand Iberian infantry and desert infantry was nothing short of a massacre.

The Iberian infantrymen, with shields in their left hand and weapons in their right, easily strangled the desert infantrymen who climbed the walls in groups of two or three; So much so that every desert infantry who climbed the city wall did not survive for a minute at most, and became the ghost of the Iberian infantry. However, they were never able to inflict enough casualties on the Iberian infantry. (To be continued.) )