"And so it was. ”

The information brought back from the Cumans confirmed Egil's judgment that there had indeed been trade between the other side and the Méng ancients. But it looks like that's all. This reassured Egil a little. And on the journey to Moscow, information from the East also came little by little. Temujin was already old, and there were many contradictions between his eldest son, Jochi, and his second son, Chagatai. The Han people in Jiangnan were in a hurry, but the opponent Timurid Empire was quite strong.

In the end, it was Li Longji of Tang who was kicked in the head by a donkey. In order to fight against Timur, he actually sought skin with the tiger and decided to form an alliance with the méng ancients. He even took out the state's most secret gunpowder weapons for trading. In exchange for more than 20,000 méng ancient horses - cheated.

After seeing the explosive power of the black powder weapon, Temujin was anxious. An order: Who can find the gunpowder prescription for me, reward 10,000 cattle and sheep, seal thousands of households, and enter the cowardly Xue Zhongjun!

Such a heavy reward made the entire Méng Ancient Empire boil up and down. In fact, there were some of the black powder manufacturing techniques that mastered them -- not counting the messy gunpowder weapons -- in the Northern Dynasties.

So, in such an atmosphere, a certain branch of Taoism living in Zhongnan Mountain unveiled the emperor's list and offered the gunpowder prescription. And there were also some lowly craftsmen in the Southern Dynasties, and I don't know where they heard about it. Secretly stole a lot of drawings about iron artillery, rocket cars, iron watermelon shells, etc., and fled to the north. In this way, how could the huge Méng Ancient Empire, saltpeter, sulfur, charcoal, etc., not be found? Equipped with these gunpowder weapons and obtaining the latest counterweight catapults from the Western Regions, the Méng Ancient Iron Riders were like a tiger. A total of 300,000 elite Méng ancient cavalry, as well as nearly 800,000 auxiliary troops of the rest of the northern peoples, under the leadership of Temujin, marched towards the Timurid Empire.

"The goal is to withdraw from the !! of Marhan," Genghis Khan roared, riding on horseback, looking at his tribe and the million-strong army that had submitted to him.

Immediately after, it was like a drop of water on the calm water. The ripples expand rapidly by the order of magnitude geometric. The soldiers raised their blades aloft and repeated the Khan's orders aloud wave after wave like a sea of steel.

"Withdraw Marhan! Withdraw Marham!!Withdraw Marham!!""-Wait a minute! You mean, a total of millions of troops?!" At this moment, in Smolensk, two or three hundred kilometers from Moscow, in the barracks on the outskirts of the city that had been unceremoniously called up temporarily, Egil leapt to his feet, and looked ugly at Nemulis, who had brought this information.

“............... , indeed, although very shocking. But that's just the fact - the number of opposing armies is quite huge. Of course, you don't need to be too alarmed, Your Majesty, after all, their army is still a temporary conscription and nomadic in the traditional sense. Combat power can't compare to the Empire's profession, it's not right-" "I don't need you to teach me a ... Egil roared at Nemulis in a fit of rage, the Norman Emperor was always so impatient with his intelligence director.

Of course, this has something to do with the intelligence director's behavior of always bringing bad news.

"But the Lord. I don't think we need to worry too much about this. It is true that they are strong in combat, large in number, and have a very reliable leader. But he was almost sixty years old.

Coupled with his simple and crude strategy, his heirs are full of contradictions. It is conceivable that after his death, his empire would be torn apart by various civil strife and uprisings. "I said - these are not necessary to teach !!" Hearing that the fellow was still saying such things, Egil finally lost his senses, grabbed the enamel huā bottle next to him, and smashed it at Nemulis's head. So, as usual, the intelligence director fled in his arms under the wrath of Emperor Egil.

"What a bastard. Egil shook his head: "According to the population distribution of this world, the population in Europe today should be three to four times that of the original world. In other words, most of the population in Asia has also undergone such adjustments...... The area ruled by the Méng ancients today is much larger than the original world. So pulling out millions of troops at once—it's still unacceptable, bastard!!" And so, on the twentieth day of February 1005, the night of that day, in the midst of Egil's slightly frantic whining and the even, whispered inhalation of the little nun Mary, was spent halfway thereafter, and then in the second half of the night, the whole stretch stretched for nearly five kilometres, surrounded by the large wagons of the Inagi army, as a temporary system of city defense. ...,

At the same time, heavy troops, as well as the inhabitants of the vicinity of Smolensk who had been forcibly driven here to do day labor, dug a number of traps and trenches around the area, and in addition to this, some cleverly arranged traps with sharp stakes cut on them were scattered in the most important places.

Of course, if they had enough time - Egil did not intend to stay in Smolensk for too long.

As a strategically located city very close to Moscow and also very close to the Norman Empire, Egil did not want to abandon him - he had ordered Ivan, the garrison general of the northern, Neo-Scandinavian region, to lead his army and take over the garrison of the city.

If circumstances permitted, Egil also wanted the Grand Duchy of Moscow to give the city to its empire as a reward. Even the reason was well thought of: "This place is so close to Moscow that it is the most suitable place to be used as a base for advance and as a garrison." The people of Moscow came to their aid in time when they were in danger. "Of course, if you insist that this can also be considered surveillance and threats, I can't help it.

If there were only these dead, immobile defenses, Egil wouldn't have felt as easily as he did to think he was safe. No idiot would have the audacity to attack his camp - a thousand men in all - a patrol of 100 men drawn from the various 1,000 men patrolled the innermost part of the camp's defenses, closest to the camp itself, and would give early warning of a night attack by a large enemy force. Or catch some scumbags with bad intentions and torture them to relieve the fatigue and weakness caused by the vigil.

So, in the middle of the night, just as Egil yawned and put his arm around Sonya's shoulders as he prepared to sleep, an alarm horn suddenly sounded. At this moment, we can imagine the dissatisfaction in the heart of Emperor Egil.

"If any idiot is bored and blows the horn without permission, I will definitely shave his beard and punish him for stripping naked and dancing around the whole camp!" Egil said this terrifying remark as he patted Sonya on the shoulder, with the latter's help he quickly put on a xiōng armor and a cloak to protect him from the cold, and then tied the flint hand and command knife to his waist. Almost at the same time, Sonia shoved an unknown number of throwing knives into all corners of her clothes at an even faster pace, while holding the token of promise that Egil had given her—an unusually sharp dagger that had been exchanged from the system.

Armed with his arms, Egil walked over to Maria and patted the little nun's head, which had been awakened by the noise. He said, "I'll save it in a while." After that, he walked out with Sonya. Because of the rush of time, the rest of the arm armor, wrist armor, and shin armor were not equipped by Egil.

The Norman troops, who had already conducted many emergency drills, were orderly and quickly walked to their predetermined posts under the guidance of their own centurions. The soldiers climbed onto the shelves of the carriages of the large horse-drawn wagons, and the cool midnight breeze blew along with bags of hard black bread (but no wood chips and no wheat husks) and air-dried meat. At the same time, the light of this torch looked at the shadowy enemy in the distance.

"Robin Hood, come over here, take a closer look at what it is?!" Egir squinted his eyes and looked closely. But I still can't see what is on the other side, it looks like a large herd of wild horses... But the Mustang never makes human-like sounds - if you look closely, you can tell that they speak a dialect similar to Slavic.

As a result, Viscount Robin Hood, the longbowman commander, who was known as the best eyesight in the entire Norman Empire, quickly ran to Egil's side when he heard this. After saying "Lord", he squinted his eyes and looked over. Then he said: "It's centaurs, my lord! The other side is a huge group of centaurs! They seem to want to attack our camp, but some of them fell into the trap outside the camp and broke their tuǐ, and some of them fell into the trap and died, but they were pulled out by the other party with a noose.

"I see. ... Egil nodded. I've heard about the range of movement of centaurs for a long time,

A large part of the range of activities of the Cumans overlapped with each other. Now it does seem that way, although the light is blind, and it is not clear to see. But on Egil's side, there were at least two thousand centaurs on the offensive - and if there were that number in other directions... That's a big deal. When fighting against the combined forces of Moscow, Novgorod and Sweden, the other side only threw in a few hundred centaur soldiers, which caused a lot of casualties to the Norman army. And now, the number of centaurs on the opposing side far exceeds that battle.

And it is not certain that this is all the centaur armies of the enemy......

Thinking of this, Egil snorted coldly, and then quickly ordered: "Crossbowmen, longbowmen, give these four-strip hybrid beasts a little bit of Yan Sè!"