For all people, thoughts and actions originate from a source, and that source is feeling.

- Epictetus (famous Roman philosopher)

Seeing the bewildered expressions on Clyde and the barbarian warriors in the square, Flavis burst out laughing again; Then, he shouted to Cecil not far away: "General Cecil, you come to tell our Eighth Legion Commander His Excellency Clyde and his soldiers what is the treatment of our Julius Family Legion!" ”

Cecil also immediately replied in a loud voice: "The treatment of our Julius family's legion is that all the food and clothing of the legion are provided by the family, and the weapons and equipment are provided by the family; In addition, the family will issue a military salary of 70,000 gold coins for each legion every year, and each soldier of the legion can get a military salary of ten gold coins every year! ”

Because of the smuggling caravans, the people of the barbarian tribes of Salzburg still did not understand the concept of gold coins; For example, a bottle of wine worth only one gold coin, those black-hearted merchants can sell it for more than ten gold coins in the Salzburg tribe. And the animal skins worth ten gold coins will be squeezed by those black-hearted merchants to the point of three gold coins each.

Flavies also saw the confusion of these people; So, he picked up an empty wine bottle from the ground, pointed to it and explained: "This bottle of wine is only worth one gold coin in the territory of our Julius family, and ten gold coins can buy ten bottles of such wine!" I know that there have been many shady merchants who have deceived you before; But we don't have Julius!

From now on, the goods you need to sell, we, the Julius family, will arrange a special caravan to buy at the most reasonable price; We will also sell you the goods at the most reasonable price. Of course, our Julius family will also very much encourage the people in your tribe to form their own caravans, and then go to other provinces of our family to sell goods and buy what they want; As long as you want! ”

With Flavis' careful explanation, the warriors present and Clyde naturally knew the true value of the ten gold coins, and also understood how black-hearted the black-hearted merchants before were; Therefore, after having Flavis's assurance, everyone cheered and praised Flavis with the warmest cheers, completely forgetting the wanton abuse not long ago.

Now that the Salzburg tribes have chosen to surrender, there is no need for Flavis to continue to tie them up; Flavies directly ordered Cecil to untie the ropes for these warriors, and just as Cecil wanted to raise an objection, Flavies had already untied the rope on Clyde's body and helped Clyde up, who was still sitting on the ground.

Without the rope restraint, Clyde pulled out a small axe directly from behind him, and Cecil, who saw it, shouted that it was not good, and immediately ordered the soldiers under his command to stop untying the barbarian warriors, and the soldiers behind Flavis also immediately drew the short sword at their waist and wanted to rush up to subdue Clyde; But they were all stopped by Fravis.

Flavies just watched Clyde, who drew his little axe, to see what he wanted to do; Clyde did not disappoint Flavies, who was first overwhelmed by the actions of Cecil and the soldiers behind Flavies, and only after Flavis stopped them, did Clyde continue to go about his business.

After Clyde took out the small axe on his waist, he made a cut in his palm, and as the blood flowed out, Clyde knelt down on one knee in front of Flavis and swore an oath: "I, Clyde, the leader of the Salzburg tribe, hereby swear that the Julius family will live up to our Salzburg tribe in this life, and I, Clyde, will always be loyal to the Julius family and His Excellency Flavis!" ”

Flavies stared at Clyde's blood oath of allegiance for a long time; Then suddenly, he pulled Caesar behind him, pointed at Caesar, and said, "Clyde, I can assure you that the Julius family will not fail you Salzburg tribe for the rest of your life; But I need you to give your allegiance to my little Caesar, who is the future of House Julius who can protect your tribe! ”

Clyde didn't understand why Flavis wanted to launch such a little child so ceremoniously, but Clyde still swore unswervingly: "Then I, Clyde, will always be loyal to Lord Flavies, and always loyal to Lord Caesar!" After this bloody oath, Cecil also untied all the warriors of the Salzburg tribe.

Looking at the peaceful square again, Flavies and Clyde joined forces to announce another grand celebration today; In addition to yesterday's drinks and food, Flavis also took out all the supplies in his army and gave them to the warriors of the Salzburg tribe, who also gave the invaluable animal skins at home to the soldiers under Flavies's command.

Perhaps what both parties give to each other is not precious to themselves, but it is a precious gift to the other party; Coupled with the back-and-forth of drinking and drinking, the relationship between the two sides quickly warmed up. And Flavis and Cecil had already been doused by Clyde at the beginning, and only Varus, the general who needed to be garrisoned, was still drunk.

After the two flowers bloomed and one on each branch, and that day they parted near the Northeast Pass in the Alps, Flavis continued his march along the Northeast Pass with two main battle legions towards Salzburg, while Rabinus marched with his Fifth Army and three auxiliary legions to Illyria in the east.

Because all the cavalry units in the three auxiliary legions were transferred by Flavis, the three auxiliary legions under Rabinus only had 6,000 light infantry. The only cavalry unit may be the Cavalry Hundred, which is part of the Fifth Legion; However, it was only a hundred-man squad of one hundred and twenty cavalrymen, and it was not at all useful.

It was impossible for Rabinus to send a large number of cavalry troops to open the way, as Flavis did, so that his army would not be discovered; And the size of the army of more than 12,000 people is not small, and it is definitely impossible not to be discovered. How to launch a surprise attack on the Illyrian kingdom, then, became a problem that Rabinus had to solve.

The so-called attack is naturally to attack the enemy before the enemy has discovered his own army; Rabinus felt that since he had no way to ensure that his army would not be discovered by the enemy, it was better to launch an attack on the enemy as quickly as possible.

As long as the army under his command can kill Selgistica, the capital of the Illyrian kingdom, faster than the enemy's messenger; So, what does it matter whether the enemy finds out his army under his command or not? After deciding on this method, Flavies began to make arrangements for his army.

The Fifth Army, which consisted entirely of hoplites, was certainly not allowed to take on this task, and they could just move forward step by step; Of the three remaining auxiliary legions, there were three thousand light infantry and three thousand archers, a mixed force of Gauls and Romans. The Romans in the auxiliary legions, who were far less physically than the Gauls, were also vetoed by Rabinus.

In order to strengthen the combat capability of these Gallic light infantry, Rabinus directly ordered the other 3,200 light infantry to hand over all their weapons and equipment. In this way, every Gallic light infantry had a set of light infantry weapons and equipment, plus archers' work and arrows.

Of course, in order not to affect the speed of the march, Rabinus did not let the Gallic infantry carry more arrows, but only let them each carry a pot of arrows for backup; In addition to this, Rabinus did not even let the Gallic infantrymen bring food, but asked each of them to carry some dry food enough to eat for three days on his back.

As for what to eat after three days, Rabinus's idea was simple; From the border region to Selgistica, the capital of the Kingdom of Illyria, it was nearly ten days in between, and there would be no villages and towns? With an army of 2,800 soldiers, wouldn't it be easy to grab some food that was enough to fill the stomach?!

So, having handed over all the officers and men of the Fifth Legion and more than 3,000 unarmed auxiliary legions to his lieutenant, Rabinus set out with 2,800 Gallic infantry and 120 cavalry at a ready. The Gallic infantrymen were far superior to the Romans, and they traveled more than twice as long as the regular Roman legions in a day!

However, this is not a fair comparison; Since the combined armament of the Gallic infantry was less than one-third of the weight of the heavy infantry of the Roman legions, such a comparison must be unreasonable. Rabinus did not intend to compare the two, but was only impressed by the speed of the Gallic infantry.

The march was more than twice as fast as that of the Roman legions, but not necessarily faster for those who told the news; Therefore, Rabinus did not waste a good time in the evening, and still took his Gallic army to hurry at night. After such a frenzied attack lasted only two days and two nights, some Gallic warriors could not withstand such a frenzied rush and died suddenly.

By this time, the Gallic army of Rabinus was less than half of Selgistica; This army of less than 3,000 men has traveled for five or six days in two days and two nights, which can be regarded as an extreme. It is also impossible for Rabinus to take Sergistika with a completely unrested and exhausted army, coupled with the appearance of the sudden death of the warrior; Rabinus changed his madness.

The new way of marching was to march frantically in the morning, and after lunch the army hid in the woods and took time to rest for the afternoon; After nightfall, the army had dinner and continued its march until noon the next day. This way of marching is still crazy, but it is already enjoyable compared to the previous sleepless streak; There was no sudden death among the soldiers. (To be continued.) )