The blizzard that had been going on for weeks had stopped, but Robb didn't feel any lighter - the Iron People under Euron's command were much tougher than expected.

The arrival of the Duke of Winterfell greatly boosted the morale of the nobles and commoners on the West Coast, and the army of the North began to rush to the battlefield as quickly as possible in the snow, and before the assembly was completed, they tried to launch several counterattacks, and really achieved some successes, which greatly weakened the arrogance of the invading enemy.

However, the smooth sailing development did not last long, and Euron's goal was not to conquer the city or grab the wealth at all, but to consume the combined strength of the bright and dark sides of the two sides of the battle on the continent of Westeros, and lay a good foundation for a possible general attack on the continent in the future. Soon, the Northerners, armed to defend their homeland, discovered that the Iron Folk had indeed taken the same step as Luce Bolton had predicted—instead of engaging the large forces, they had turned a frontal assault into guerrilla harassment!

......

It stands to reason that "guerrilla" requires extremely high mobility and familiarity with the terrain, and is often a strategy that can only be adopted by the home side, and the attackers do not have the soil and conditions to use this move. But fatally, there was no strong naval force in the north to contend with the longship fleet of the Iron Islands, and at the beginning of the war, it simply lost sea supremacy. The West Coast and the adjacent Sunset Sea became the home of the Iron Folk without any competition. They rode the wind and paddled away, and the north quickly fell into the embarrassing situation of "not going to lose, but never to win".

Robb didn't like Luce Bolton as much as he didn't like the skinning coat of arms of their house, the eerie name and atmosphere of their castle of Terror. But at the same time, the new ruler of the north has to admit that this guy who is always gloomy and cold can always make the right judgment. After a few rounds of deflated unbelief in evil, he reluctantly complied with the latter's advice, ordered the withdrawal of the inhabitants scattered along the coastline, and gathered them all into medium-sized winter towns, castles, and garrisoned villages, and turned the attack into defense, intending to overwhelm the enemy.

This trick worked, as evidenced by the fierce reaction of the enemy - the Iron Island army, which had guessed the intention of the Northerners, began to increase the frequency of sorties, trying to break the plan by intercepting and massacring the evacuated soldiers and civilians in the middle of the way, and creating terror.

Robb Stark's response to this was-for-tat: divide the army into several parts, rush back and forth, and increase the speed of the march to defend as many lives and property as possible of the transferred soldiers and civilians, so that the enemy's plans will be frustrated.

At this moment, he was leading more than a thousand elite soldiers from the north to gallop along the narrow path in the wolf forest, rushing to a village that sent a signal for help.

The snow made it difficult to march, and the pioneers in front carefully searched for covered paths, making traces to prevent the cavalry horses in the large army from stumbling...... The chill in the air silently burrowed into the cracks in the armor, and the white breath from the mouths of the soldiers who trotted to follow the commander flew backwards and upwards, quickly blending into the cold mist in the forest, as if intensifying the effect of "white expanse".

Rob Gui guards the northern border, so he naturally has a mount. A hurried march for a large army is a small step for the horse, because it is well trained, and the horse controls the jolt just right, giving the rider some room for thought.

Each of the northern families assigned juniors to serve as attendants and guards by the side of the feudal monarch, and these energetic young men were chattering about strategies to deal with the enemy.

Eddard, the third son of Earl Karstark, still insisted on his claim: "We must build a navy on the west coast! Winter can still be defended and the enemy's patience is exhausted, but in case the war is not over by the next spring...... When spring planting begins, the Iron Folk are still attacking by boat, can we still throw the seeds from the ground and retract back into the castle?"

Jon Amber Jr. did not disagree with the former's point of view: "We also had a navy on the west coast, but after Aegon landed, he unified Westeros and strictly forbade Iron Island to raid the mainland, and gradually disappeared...... It's like the Night's Watch. Now the only ships left in the north are Bear Island and White Harbor, but the little bit of the Mormont family is not enough to see in front of the Iron Fleet, and the Mandalay family's ships ...... God, they're going to come to help, and they'll have to go around half of Westeros, through Storm, Dorne, the Bend, and the Iron Isles, to get to the west coast. If nothing else, it is impossible for the Qingting Island fleet to let the fat eels go!"

"Then build another military port on the west coast, the wolf forest is full of fine shipbuilding timber, give us time, we can build a few ships of the iron fleet!"

"What's the use of having more ships, are there enough sailors in the North? Little Ed scoffed, "But it's easy to say, Raveneye will let you build a fleet under his nose?, and the coast south of Deepenburg is full of their range, and Bear Island ...... As long as Euron is not stupid, he will definitely send a ship to keep an eye on every port on Bear Island. We'll have to ask Mormont and Mandalay to borrow skilled craftsmen, and then we'll have to find a secret place to the north where we'll be able to find it, and we'll have to recruit enough men and troops to work and defend it—"

These words are by no means just small talk, but to a large extent for themselves. Robb knew in his heart, and was happy to listen to the thoughts and ideas of these young nobles, but as he heard the key details, Little Ed's voice stopped abruptly.

After a moment of silence, the speaker reopened his mouth in a nervous tone: "What sound do I seem to hear?"

Rober reined in his horse, and the group stopped, quickly realizing that little Ed was not delusional:

There was a dull tremor of the ground beneath his feet. The horses snorted in a tumultuous manner, the riders tugged at the reins, and the infantrymen stopped, all intently searching for the source of the sound.

The sound did not come from a single direction, but came from the woods on both sides of the road at the same time.

"Enemy attack!" Jon Amber Jr. was the first to react, and immediately shouted loudly: "Queue up! Prepare for battle!"

......

The fallen leaves on the forest ground absorbed the shock of the run, and the thick snow left behind by the previous blizzard further dampened the sound of the ambush approaching - by the time they noticed the anomaly, the enemy was already close at hand. Before the northern army could finish its formation, hundreds of soldiers in various costumes emerged from behind the snowdrifts on both sides of the road, and rushed out like a tidal wave, shouting and rushing towards the northern army.

Suddenly attacked, the ambushed side did not mess up.

The Iron Islands were only a few hundred thousand people, and they could gather 10,000 troops in the sky, while Euron attacked the three kingdoms of the west, the river and the north at the same time, and it was impossible to concentrate the troops at one point. Not to mention that as a half-hung pirate, most of the iron people are outdated, and they have to keep people to watch the ship. The ambush in front of him looked like a black man, but in fact he was not necessarily much more than his own.

Not to mention - the assembly of troops in the north this time completely complied with Robb's "as long as the elite" requirements, and the people who came were basically veterans who returned from the victory of the western battlefield half a year ago, and the one who followed the northern border to guard was the elite of the elite, with strong morale and well-trained, so that they would not panic because of an encounter.

With confidence in their own combat effectiveness and contempt for the enemy, the Northern Army not only did not feel timid and frightened by the sudden ambush, but from top to bottom, the opponent gave birth to the heroic spirit of "sending it to the door to seek death". Under the jerky command of the young nobles' heirs who surrounded Robb, the soldiers shouted Long live Winterfell and collided head-on with the incoming enemies.

Swords, guns, swords and sticks, body armor clashed, accompanied by the roar of life, sweat dripped, blood sprayed, and red flowers soon bloomed on the white snow, and quickly withered under the trampling, mixed with the dirt, and ground into a deep reddish brown by the soles of the boots.

There were slightly more Northerners in the middle of the road, but not endlessly, and the active attackers soon rushed out of both sides of the road, scuffling with the attacked side in the middle of the road.

In the field, the two sides were deadlocked. One hundred and ten meters away, a handful of people who arrived last found a mound more than ten meters above the flat ground, and under the leadership of the leader, they began to look down and observe the battlefield.

——

.。 m.