With the loud sound of the military horn in the early morning, Captain Cleon yawned sleepily, got up from the bed in the barracks, and at the same time reached out and touched the beautiful little manservant who was still asleep next to him, and kissed him on the face, and then Shi Shiran got out of bed and got dressed.

- Like most traditional Greek warriors, Cleon, the mercenary leader, is a standard who likes to sleep with young boys.

Captain Cleon couldn't help but feel refreshed as he stepped out of his tent, breathed in the fresh air that smelled of the sea, and glanced at the towering lighthouse of Alexandria in the distance. Looking back and seeing that his subordinates had already gotten up early and were holding wooden swords and sticks on the training ground for combat exercises, Captain Cleon suddenly felt an itch in his hands, so he also found a wooden sword from the weapon rack and shouted and left the field.

In short, in the eyes of Captain Cleon, the experience of being hired by Queen Cleopatra on an expedition to Egypt was really lighthearted.

Neither in the fortress of Pelusim, nor in the city of Nokratis, nor in Alexandria, they did not fight any tough battles with heavy casualties. Every time he encountered the enemy, he was torn to pieces by the "divine messengers" invited by the Queen of Egypt with various earth-shattering and terrifying spells. All they need to do as mercenaries is to clean up the battlefield, clean up the mess, and suppress the mobs who are trying to take advantage of the chaos to loot. Captain Cleon set out from Syria with more than 220 men in the summer, and has now lost only eight men, two of whom have accidentally fallen behind while crossing the desert...... And the loot and commissions they harvested were quite generous, enough to cover their total income for the previous three years.

What made Captain Cleon even more excited. After recovering Alexandria, Queen Cleopatra actually canonized all the mercenary chiefs after consulting them. Integrate this group of mercenaries, who can only be regarded as second-rate at best, into a regular army!

From now on, he is no longer the leader of the mercenaries with a low status and no fixed residence, and I don't know if there will be tomorrow after today. Rather, it is a captain of the Alexandria City Infantry Brigade, also known as the Chengguan Brigade, who can receive monthly salaries, enjoy benefits, and have citizenship!

Well, the name of this position may seem a bit strange, but it is also a serious official position. Why bother too much about such inconsequential matters? In Cleon's opinion, if he tried harder, he would even want to get a noble title in Egypt. I'm afraid it's also promising.

Although in the eyes of some young people who do not know the world, the mercenary who is free and wanders the world seems to be a chic and exciting and desirable profession. And it can often be linked to the beautiful words "legend", "adventure" and "fortune". But in fact. The ancient Greek mercenaries who were really engaged in this line of work knew how difficult it was to eat their own bowl of rice -- it was naturally impossible to count on the three insurances and one housing fund in drought and flood, and it was common for the corpses of those killed in battle to be stripped naked and no one to bury them. In times of peace, mercenaries often cannot find a job and can only sit on the sidelines. During the war years, there were often black-hearted employers who maliciously owed wages, leaving mercenaries with scars and blood, but in the end they got nothing.

In fact. Just being a mercenary has to be accompanied by death at all times, for normal people. It's already very scary. Many people boast of their bravery in the tavern, slaying dragons and tigers, but as soon as they go into battle, they will immediately show their timidity. Those who really do mercenary work, before every time they go into battle and participate in the war, they must have the consciousness of dying in battle, instead of thinking only about bounties and loot.

Since he already had the consciousness of dying in battle before he went into battle every time he went into battle, and there was no life insurance and reliable banks in those days, it was the most instinctive idea of every mercenary to indulge in pleasure before he died. Therefore, mercenaries always can't save money in their hands, and once they have money, they will eat, drink and have fun to their heart's content, gamble indiscriminately, and live a "chic" life of drinking and getting drunk today.

When they are old or disabled, and they can no longer fight in battle, they will find that they have neither real estate to survive nor children to rely on, and even their money bags are empty.

Therefore, just as the gangsters in later generations generally want to wash their hands after their fame and achievements, those mercenary leaders in the ancient West who really pulled up a team and had some reputation, status and savings are actually most likely eager to wash their careers as soon as possible, get rid of this unreliable business, and no longer continue to wander and suffer day by day, but let themselves have a decent identity and a stable home.

Therefore, after learning that Queen Cleopatra intended to grant them official positions and estates, and to incorporate them into the regular army of the Ptolemaic dynasty of Egypt, almost all of the high-ranking mercenary leaders gladly accepted it, except for a few dozen low-level mercenaries who were not accustomed to being restrained, and Queen Cleopatra did not care about herself, and after settling their salaries, she let them leave on their own.

By the way, the salaries paid by the queen of Egypt to the dismissed mercenaries were not gold and silver coins, but extremely precious and rare oriental silk! According to Queen Cleopatra, the salaries of their regular army will also be distributed in silk, spices and refined cloth, and the price will be discounted! This is a good thing that no amount of money can buy in many remote places!

Then, shortly after arriving in Alexandria, the mercenaries ran out of food and straw, and the mercenary leaders, or the captains and squadron leaders of the newly canonized Egyptian city management teams, asked the queen for supplies. As a result, when the grain provided by the Queen of Egypt arrived, Captain Cleon and his companions were all stunned - the staple food turned out to be the finest snow-white flour, unadulterated with even the slightest trace of sand and wood chips; The amount of salt served with the meal is also unbelievably large, and it is as transparent and shiny as crystal, making it feel luxurious just by looking at it. In addition, vegetables such as cucumbers and garlic are produced locally in Egypt. There are also salted fish and salted meat, which are really hearty.

Occasionally, small biscuits, cream cakes, and sweet cubes called "sugar" were given out as prizes (at that time, only Indians made cane sugar). Other Westerners and Easterners don't know about the existence of sugar), so that these poor mercenaries, who have a hard time eating sweets once in their lives, feel like they are celebrating a holiday every day. As for the strong soju generously given by the Egyptian queen Bixia on an unknown festival (Spring Festival) recently, these mercenaries, who claim to have seen a lot of the world, are all addicted to drinking one by one.

Thinking of this, Captain Cleon couldn't help but lick his lips. He put down the wooden sword in his hand, made a "pause" gesture to the vice-captain who was fighting him, and then took out a crystal clear flat glass wine bottle from his arms. poured a small sip of the remaining half bottle of Red Star Erguotou from the holiday feast into his mouth, and immediately felt a hot mellow fragrance in his mouth, and in the blink of an eye, he had a slightly drunk and comfortable feeling.

Alas. If you didn't come to Egypt with Queen Cleopatra. Where can there be such a fairy-like enjoyment!

-- In this era, the jishu of the ancients was still very backward, and there were no distilled spirits with a higher degree of alcohol, and there were no shochu, dry red, or dry white. And the means of filtration are not good, the amount of impurities in the wine is amazing, it is simply not "drinking", but "eating" the wine!

For example, the so-called beer brewed by the ancient Egyptians. In fact, the sake lees are not even filtered, and it looks like wheat porridge or mud. To put it nicely, it's a sweet wine brewed without sugar. The wines that the Greeks and Romans loved were not much better, the residue of the skin and flesh was never removed, and it was poured out like duckweed in the glass. Because there are too many impurities in the wine, most people have to simply strain it when drinking it, and sift out the large pieces of dregs, so as not to plug their teeth when drinking...... Therefore, after drinking the colorless and transparent and extremely strong soju of Red Star Erguotou, the mercenaries naturally felt as if they had tasted some rare treasure

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Of course, Captain Cleon is well aware that although the treatment of carrying work on the side of the Queen of Egypt is good, the hostess's ability to cause trouble is not ordinarily high - there is no need to mention the past events that led to the civil war in Egypt after falling out with her brother and husband at first. After returning to Egypt, because he saw the capital Alexandria occupied by the Romans, in a fit of rage, he summoned a huge meteor burning with flames to kill Caesar and Pompey, who were fighting, which was equivalent to offending the plebeian faction represented by Caesar and the aristocratic republican faction represented by Pompey in one go.

Next, Cato the Younger, the leader of the Roman republicans, came to Alexandria, and after some mediation, he finally left with the ashes of Caesar and Pompey, as well as a large amount of food, and it seemed that there was finally some room for maneuvering between the queen of Egypt and the Roman republicans. However, before everyone could breathe a sigh of relief, now the Egyptian queen was actually going to fight with little Pompey again!! It really never stops!!

However, for the new round of war that was about to break out, whether it was Cleon or other mercenaries, or the citizens of Alexandria who had witnessed the "miracle", they all thought that they were full of confidence - if they were ordinary people, such enemies would naturally be looking for death. But this Queen Cleopatra is obviously not an ordinary person! But she was blessed by the Egyptian cat god Baster and the god of death Anubis, and sent a divine envoy from heaven to help her in the war! Although the legions of the Romans were powerful, how could they be compared to the liliang of the "divine envoys"?

In Captain Cleon's opinion, as long as the Queen of Egypt said that these "oracles" were moved, and then a grand festival was held, and a bunch of fiery meteors were summoned from the land of the gods, and they were smashed on the top of little Pompey's head, no matter how many legions the Romans had, they could only be bombarded into slag! As for his own people, as long as they are responsible for cleaning the battlefield and mending the swords for the rest of the Romans, it is definitely easy and pleasant, and it is very safe.

Moreover, after wearing the wonderful equipment rewarded by the "oracles", Captain Cleon thought that even without the help of the "oracles" of the fire meteors, they would now have the strength to fight against the Roman legions......

Well, to thank you for your generosity. Shouldn't I also bow to the cat god Buster and the god of death Anubis, and then hang their amulets around my neck? What about the idol of Ares, the god of war, who was never used very much?

Looking at the light "armor" and transparent shield that the little valet brought to him, Captain Cleon couldn't help but fall into deep thought......

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In fact, in order to increase the combat effectiveness of this gang of third-rate motley armies in a short period of time. Wang Qiu and others also racked their brains and took great pains.

Like most people's way of thinking, the original idea of the Travelers was to equip them with modern firearms to torture the Romans.

The problem is that it seems a little unsafe to do so – the mercenaries have been recruited from Syria for less than a year and have no family with them, so the level of loyalty to the queen is questionable. In terms of reliability, it is estimated that it is far inferior to the group of Indian warriors that Senior Wendeji raised in Central America before. If one is not careful. This results in a number of modern firearms and ammunition being lost on the battlefield and then falling into the hands of the enemy, or simply a few guys defecting with guns. Finally, turn around and snipe the Queen of Egypt or the other time-travelers, then the fun will be great!

Moreover, the tactical skills of cold weapons and hot weapons are completely different things, and I don't know how much time it will take to train from scratch. And there doesn't seem to be much time left for Queen Bixia of Cleopatra to regroup her army - no. How many days have passed. Little Pompey is here!

Therefore, in order to adapt measures to local conditions and conform to reality, at the suggestion of Ms. Xiao Se, the chief captain of the Chengguan Dogtooth International Column, the redress policy given by the traversers to the Egyptian army is to improve its cold weapon combat capability, rather than trying to upgrade them to the era of hot weapons in one step.

First of all, in order to improve the resistance of these ancient Western muscular men, Wang Qiu got them 6,000 sets of stab-proof uniforms for the chengguan team.

The stab-proof suit doesn't sound too famous. However, the protection ability is comparable to the top iron armor of ancient times, which can prevent the tip of a knife with a kinetic energy of 24 joules from penetrating. An ordinary spear can't get into it at all. The Roman dagger in BC was even more immovable, because of the styrofoam compartment, it also had a very good protection against blunt objects, and even if it was hammered, it would probably not break the bones. Moreover, this stab-proof suit also has fire-resistant effects, and even better is that the total weight is only about one kilogram, which is extremely light and flexible compared with the ancient iron armor that weighs more than ten kilograms or dozens of kilograms at every turn.

In ancient times, the meaning of armor was extraordinary, at least it could give soldiers a great sense of security. Don't watch martial arts movies, those soldiers in iron armor are often beaten to pulp by the cloth heroes - this is just a novelist's fiction. On a real ancient battlefield, it was often only a few hundred armored warriors gathered to charge in one charge. In ancient China, many dynasties forbade people were forbidden to hold swords and guns, but almost every dynasty strictly forbade people to keep armor, which shows the importance of armor to cold weapon warfare.

However, in the mainstream combat mode of the Greco-Roman era, when fighting at close range, soldiers on both sides often huddled together, used shields to block each other's frontal attacks, and then relied on short swords to find opportunities to assassinate the enemy, so only stab-proof clothing without shields is obviously not possible - throughout ancient and modern China and foreign countries, as long as it is a regular army (only the rebel army with a hoe and kitchen knife does not count), the shield is a necessary weapon.

So, next, Wang Qiu and others got a batch of modern police riot shields to equip Queen Cleopatra's urban management brigade.

This transparent anti-riot shield is made of high-quality polycarbonate PC material, which has the characteristics of high transparency, light weight and strong impact resistance. It can resist the attack of throwables and swords in addition to guns, strong protection, reliable installation and fixation, easy to operate, far stronger and more durable than ancient leather shields and wooden shields, and lighter than metal shields, each shield weighs only two kilograms, and is a common equipment used in modern Shijie to suppress street riots.

At the beginning of obtaining this kind of "armor", which was lighter than leather robes, and a shield as transparent as glass, Captain Cleon and other mercenary leaders were quite suspicious, thinking that these were all fancy things that were useless. In order to dispel their suspicions and contempt, Wang Qiu took out a set of high-grade stab-proof suits and a PC material anti-riot shield, which were fixed on the dummy as samples for the mercenaries to conduct destructive experiments.

So, within the next day, the mercenary leaders took their eighteen weapons and took turns to fight. According to Wang Qiu's records, the suit was stabbed 27 times with spears, 15 times with short swords, 12 with javelins, 17 times with bows and arrows, and 10 times with tomahawks, but none of them were completely penetrated, not even arrows. The transparent shield had been shot 30 times with a bow and arrow, 20 times with a warhammer, 22 with a stone, 20 with a javelin, and no less than 50 times with a warrior's "fine" iron shield, again with almost no visible damage - this riot shield was designed to be able to block even the fragments of a grenade explosion, let alone a cold weapon.

In view of the results of the above experiments, these experienced warriors have to admit that this kind of armor and fully transparent shield, which is light to the touch, can indeed be said to be indestructible. In addition, the use of transparent shields has the added benefit of not having to worry about being obscured by your own shield during combat, but you can observe everything on the battlefield in a more comprehensive way, so as to make contingency measures. It's a pity that the shape is too simple and not magnificent at all. It would be even better if you could make it a little more flashy and draw some hideous beast patterns.

Wang Qiu also gave each of them a motorcycle helmet to strengthen the head protection of these fighters. (To be continued.) For mobile phone users, please go to read. )