If you love, love deeply; If you don't love it, throw it away; Don't be ambiguous, hurt others and hurt yourself. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ

- Plato (one of the greatest philosophers and thinkers of Western culture)

Oscar's strategic choice, although not consulted with his generals, would be carefully negotiated with Mary every time; Only after the two have reached a consensus will Oscar implement these strategies.

With Mary's reminders and careful analysis, Oscar's decision-making efficiency has obviously improved a lot, and even Luquis and Quintus are rarely able to pick on Oscar's decision-making; It seems that the female god of war is still a female god of war after all, and her strength is extraordinary!

With the passage of time, the military camp of the Augustan army was also strengthened little by little, and the army in the barracks also began to train in full swing like Hannibal's army; It's just that the Augustus family's training momentum is much greater.

There were 12,000 hoplites and 4,000 light infantry under Quintus, and the momentum of the hoplites was still very great; Coupled with the assistance and cooperation of the light infantry, the entire barracks is like a battlefield with a brave attack and a solid defense.

Compared to the comings and goings of the Quintus barracks, the training in the Luquis barracks was much simpler and crude; The Samonai Legion, led by Antio himself, was originally an assault army composed of bloody gladiators, and its training did not focus on cooperation, but more on the cultivation of individual combat effectiveness of soldiers.

Therefore, the sparring between the soldiers of the Samonai Legion was completely a real sword battle; It's also normal to have training injuries. In other legions, training bloodshed was rare, and in the Samonai regiment it was commonplace; A few people were not injured one day, a few people were bleeding, and that was not normal.

With the example of the Samonai Legion, which was also in the same barracks, Luculus's Guards Infantry Corps would certainly not be subservient; Moreover, the weapons and combat effectiveness of the soldiers of the Guards Infantry Legion are much stronger than those of the soldiers of the Samonai Legion, and the training of real swords and guns is naturally not small.

The two legions are in the same barracks, and they compete with each other day and night, and it is inevitable that they will have the idea of competing with each other; After discussing with Antio and Luculus, the two of them held a hundred-man level competition behind Luquis's back.

This so-called competition is to compete who is more elite and whose combat effectiveness is stronger among the soldiers of the two legions; In order to avoid accidental injury, and for the sake of fairness, all of the 100-man combatants are to be equipped with wooden weapons and equipment to ensure safety.

In fact, the wooden armament was not at all suitable for these two warlike soldiers; In the ensuing competition, the wooden weapons were damaged by the soldiers of the two legions. As a result, the well-said and serious drill and battle turned into the final bare-handed group fight.

Regardless, however, Antio and Luculus maintained considerable restraint, limiting the scale of the engagement to a hundred-man team; And it is strictly forbidden to have any form of ruthless and **** hands, which ensures the orderly conduct of the competition.

The two tossed this so-called competition with great interest, and Licinius on the side was itching, but there was nothing he could do; The Guards Cavalry Corps under Licinius, the 2,000 javelinmen had to be divided into three groups of training every day, and there was no time for these trainings.

The remaining 2,000 ironclad cavalry and 1,000 long shield cavalry were hidden as secret trump cards, and naturally it was impossible to train in the barracks with great fanfare; In this way, Licinius could only stare dryly except to watch the two legions practice and compete.

Even Licinius saw the competition between the Samonai Legion and the Guards Infantry Legion, how could Luquis not know? However, such a healthy competition is not necessarily a bad thing for the Samonai Legion and the Guards Infantry Legion; In Luquis's opinion, proper competition is definitely the best tool to promote the combat effectiveness of the legion.

Therefore, after Luquis learned of this incident, he did not blame Antio and Luculus, nor did he interfere in this matter, but still secretly observed the competition between the two armies; After confirming that Antio and Luculus were very measured, Lucquis put the matter down completely.

However, in order to avoid some unnecessary misunderstandings, Lucis still informed Oscar in detail about the competition between Antio and Luculus. After Oscar learned about this, he didn't say much, but directly sent someone to send several truckloads of big fish and meat and ale; And instructed the two generals that competition is okay, but it is necessary to grasp the proportions and brothers work together to break the gold!

Antio and Luculus aren't stupid either, and they certainly understand what Oscar means; In the evening of the same day, a grand bonfire was held in Luquis's barracks, where the soldiers of the Samonai Legion, the Guards Infantry Legion and the Guards Cavalry Regiment gathered to eat and drink, and all the negative effects of the competition between the legions were eliminated.

While the Luquis army camp was celebrating greatly, Quintus's army was in full swing and took on the task of preventing Hannibal's army from sneaking up and protecting Luquis's army from celebrating; Of course, Oscar was not one to favor one over the other, and the roles of the two armies were reversed the next night, with Quintus' army celebrating thoroughly in the barracks, while Luquis's army was in charge of guarding and protecting.

The armies of the two sides watched as time passed day by day in this confrontation, on the seventh day of the arrival of the army of the House of Augustus on the plain of Zama, that is, on the tenth day of the arrival of Hannibal's army on the plain of Zama; Hannibal sent an envoy to Oscar's tent of the Chinese army, and handed Oscar a handwritten invitation from Hannibal, inviting Oscar to meet before the battle tomorrow at noon.

The habit of the two armies not fighting each other is not only the battlefield rules of the East, but also applies to the Western world, and there are stricter rules to abide by than those in the East. After receiving the messenger himself, Oscar released the messenger back.

With the invitation in his hand, Oscar knew that the real decisive battle was about to break out; Otherwise, Hannibal would not have invited himself to the pre-battle talks tomorrow at noon. If nothing else, the decisive battle should break out on the day after tomorrow's talks, that is, the day after tomorrow!

Since the war is coming, the Oscars have to start preparing for it; In addition to the pre-decisive meeting with Hannibal, Oscar also needs to arrange his army well, and he also needs to discuss with his generals the specific decisive battle tactics that should be implemented next.

After summoning Mary to his tent, two of Oscar's guards also rode out of the camp and ran to the camp of Quintus and Luquis; Only five minutes later, Quintus and Luquis arrived at Oscar's tent with their generals.

After all the generals had arrived and sat down, Oscar raised his head and looked at the generals present and said in a quiet voice:

"Generals, I have just received an invitation from Hannibal's envoy to invite me to a pre-battle meeting tomorrow at noon. If nothing else, the day after tomorrow should be the date of our decisive battle with Hannibal's army.

Judging from the information obtained before, the grain and grass in Hannibal's army can only last for more than twenty days at most; So, this decisive battle is something that Hannibal must fight in the near future. Otherwise, Hannibal's army would soon be left with no food to spare; With Hannibal's wisdom, he couldn't have put himself in such a predicament, so the decisive battle was really about to begin. ”

After Oscar said this, Licini couldn't help but wonder:

"Leader, why should we fight Hannibal's army when it only has enough food and grass for twenty days? As long as we maintain this posture, we will continue to drag Hannibal's army; In this way, Hannibal's army will soon collapse due to lack of food, so why should we fight them? ”

Licinius's doubts suddenly broke up the solemn atmosphere in the military tent, and the faces of the generals all involuntarily showed a smile, and Oscar himself shook his head helplessly; Before Licinius could say anything, Lucquis explained:

"General Licinius, our army and Hannibal's army are not engaged in siege warfare, we are not the defending side, and they are not the besieging party; The garrison of our army is only three military camps, and it is okay to resist the sneak attack of Hannibal's army, but it is impossible to defend Hannibal's army from attacking with all its strength according to the barracks.

More importantly, if we do not take the initiative to attack Hannibal's army, it does not mean that Hannibal will always stand still; Since Hannibal's army is running out of food and grass, in five days at most, Hannibal will still attack our military camp with all his might.

At that time, our army was confined to the barracks, unable to use its full strength to engage Hannibal's army; On the contrary, Hannibal's army can do whatever it wants, deploy all its forces outside the barracks, and carry out an all-round attack on us, which will put us in a state of passive beating. ”

With Luquis's careful explanation, Licinius also understood the inevitability of the decisive battle, so he naturally scratched his head in embarrassment and stopped talking; After the end of Licinius's episode, the conversation in the military tent continued to return to the matter of the decisive battle.

This time, Oscar did not take the initiative to say anything, but analyzed the advantages of Hannibal's army in front of him; I saw that Oscar continued to say solemnly:

"Now the great army under Hannibal is numerically superior, but qualitatively inferior to ours; Coupled with the drag of the Greek legions, Hannibal's army was not as strong as we thought, but its advantages could not be ignored.

In my opinion, the greatest advantage of Hannibal's army is nothing more than three points: first, Hannibal has more troops than we do; Second, Hannibal has eighty war elephants under his command, which will be a weapon for Hannibal to deal with our hoplites in a decisive battle; Thirdly, Hannibal also has an extremely elite 4,000 shield cavalry under his command, which is also a factor we must consider! (To be continued.) )