Mediterranean Hegemon of Ancient Greece

Archer, get ready! Purlo immediately ordered the Greeks to enter the range. The height difference of several tens of meters not only extended the range of the archers, but also increased the lethality of the arrows, and at the same time increased the range of the opponent's archers. The shortening, which came and went, gave the Maple coalition's long-range firepower a great advantage, which was the advantage of being condescending.

But just as the Puchetti people were drawing their bows and arrows, countless black dots roared from the bottom of the mountain and hit the poorly equipped Puchetti people, causing the archers to scream in pain.

The Greeks had slingers! Tremoney froze in his heart.

At this moment, it is a pity for Davos that the two corps and two light infantry brigades - Epithenis and Tspit's subordinates have more than 400 slingers, which are not enough to suppress the five-mile-long enemy, and only Can disrupt the rhythm of its shooting.

The arrows still fell like raindrops. The soldiers put the round shield on the top of their heads and moved forward slowly. The terrain restricted them from being able to use the trump card of heavy infantry - charging, and they could only endure the arrows pecking at the round shield. The copper skin makes a noise of dang dang dang.

By the time they began to climb the hill, more javelins slammed into the round shields and began to injure some of the soldiers.

The wounded soldiers fell to the ground, huddled together, shielding their bodies with round shields, waiting for rescue by the medical team.

In the middle of the entire front were the heavy infantry of Igratia, and they were stationed at the point where the Dionians attacked - the lowest place.

Quick! Quick!... Amyntas kept urging the soldiers. He didn't want to lose to the younger generation of mercenaries, Matonis, so he went against the rules of the Dionysian military law and ran ahead of the others. Being at the forefront of the brigade, the soldiers who were already a little tired after a long march were screaming like chicken blood, and followed closely behind.

When braved the rain of arrows and rushed to more than 20 meters away from the enemy, the entire brigade suddenly stopped advancing.

Defense! Timoglass ordered loudly, he thought the enemy was about to start charging.

The soldiers stretched their lances from behind the round shields, forming a forbidding formation, even though the gentle slope here was only a few meters high, but it was high enough to cost the Greeks dearly!

However, what the Messapis waited for was not the charge of the Greeks, but nearly a thousand flying javelins. Under the terrified eyes of the Messapis, they pierced the phalanx with a whistling sound. , set off a scream.

Timorglass had no idea that Dionia's heavy infantry could throw a javelin at all. He couldn't be surprised. He shouted angrily, Raise your shield! Raise your shield for defense!  …

After Amintas quickly took out the second javelin, he shouted: Flee with me! After speaking, holding the shield in the left and the gun in the right, he was the first to charge towards the enemy.

The soldiers followed.

Timoglass was surprised to find that when the Greek heavy infantry was charging, the formation would spread out, but the enemy on the opposite could still maintain a general formation, pressing down like a thick iron wall quickly, letting He had a feeling of suffocation.

Defense! Quickly defend! He shouted in a hoarse voice.

However, the attack of the javelin made the soldiers still not recover from the panic, and Amintas' brigade arrived in an instant, set foot on a gentle slope a few meters high, took a few big steps, and with the momentum, opened the left side holding the round shield. Arms pushed forward, Bang!... After the continuous metal crash, the Mesapi soldiers in the front row who were unable to defend together due to the confusion of the formation were forced to retreat unconsciously to relieve the impact.

This retreat made the dense Messapi soldiers unable to take care of their comrades who fell to the ground after being stabbed by the javelin behind them, and tripped over. Behind them were comrades-in-arms who were screaming in panic, and in front were stabbing spears stabbing like venomous snakes. They messed up their hands and feet for a while and continued to retreat, leaving most of the soldiers of Amintas' brigade standing on the slope.

……………………

As the captain of the seventh brigade of the Second Army, Tspit has a characteristic. Before the battle, he must pray first.

Not only did he do it himself, but he also asked his subordinates to do it together. He used to pray to Ares, the god of war,

After following Davos, his goal was changed to Dionia's protector, Hades, the Hades. After singing the Hades hymn reverently, he stood up and said, The slingers continue to attack the enemy here. The archers follow closely behind the heavy infantry, and once they are within range, they will fire arrows at the enemy on the hillside. Follow me with the light shields!

The captain of the Light Shield Squadron, Satirus, hurriedly persuaded: Captain, you should take command of the command. Just leave it to me, brothers, to lead the attack.

Tspit's eyes widened: Now is a good opportunity to prove our light shield soldiers, how can I hide behind! In recent months, such a view has emerged in the army: The Dionysian Legion's long-range attack has archers and Slingers, short-range firepower attacks include heavy infantry throwing javelins, and the role of light shield soldiers has become dispensable. It is better to cancel this type of arms and replace it with light armored soldiers similar to the mountain reconnaissance team.

Epithenis and Tspit, who were born in the light shield, were of course strongly opposed to this view, and have always expressed their views to Davos: the light shield must not be replaced, it is irreplaceable!

Now is the time to prove the value of the Light Shields themselves.

Nearly 500 light shield soldiers, led by Epithenis and Tspit, scattered in pairs or groups of three, passing through the gaps in the fish-scale formation of the heavy infantry.

Leotizides' detachment was at the forefront of the line, and he himself was in the middle of the first column of the phalanx. On that day, he beat his comrades and was locked up for a long time. He would have been beaten by a military stick. The military judge, considering that the war was about to start, postponed the punishment until after the war and allowed him to take the blame and make merit.

At this time, Leotizides had already started to climb the slope. Although he was not wearing a helmet, he was carrying more than 40 kilograms of equipment. When climbing up, he had to carry weapons in both hands. It was not easy to stabilize his body. thing. Fortunately, it was already early autumn, warm and dry, the hillside was overgrown with grass, it had not rained for more than ten days, the soil was soft, and if you stepped on it hard, it was a small pit. , slowly upward.

The Messapien attacked them even more violently. The javelin, which was more than 30 meters high, was thrown directly and hit the round shield with strong force. Most of them could pierce the copper skin, and the remaining force hit Leotti. Des was also forced to lean back, and he quickly plunged the end of the stab gun into the soil to stabilize his body.

Out of the corner of his field of vision, he saw that some soldiers had become unsteady due to the impact, slipped, and brought down their comrades behind them. Fortunately, Dionia's peculiar offensive formation was like sawtooth, not continuous or dense, so it did not affect the orderly advancement of the entire front.

From the moment Leotidides entered boot camp, he became interested in Dionia's unique formation, which he found to be more complicated to set up than the traditional Greek phalanx, but it worked very efficiently and Applicable to all kinds of terrain, he privately analyzed it and thought it was more ingenious than the Spartan left-handed tactics he had been trained in as a child. Later, after he knew that it was Archon Davers who invented this unique formation alone, he had the urge to talk to Davos about his views and opinions on this formation, but unfortunately it was just an illusion, Because Davos is the highest authority in Dionia, his current identity is not the crown prince of Sparta, but just a free citizen of Dionia, so he can only watch Dave from a distance in the boot camp. Speaks on the platform of the training ground.

At this time, the Puchetti's javelin struck again.

Leotidides put aside his distracting thoughts, lowered his body and steadied his heels, opened his eyes wide, looked at the direction of the javelin's flight, tilted the round shield slightly, and the javelin's spear tip drew a string of sparks on the round shield, Most of the momentum was removed, reducing the impact on him.

Just as Leotidides breathed a sigh of relief, he heard the comrade on the right screaming Oops, and his body was about to fall back as he swayed. He quickly let go of the stab gun, stretched out his right hand like lightning, and grabbed the man's arm.

That person was Heitbarus, he hesitated for a moment, and immediately shouted sincerely: Thank you, Prosous!

Leotides nodded vigorously at him. Despite the contradictions between them, the battlefield is the melting pot for tempering the friendship of men.

At this time, he looked up and saw someone running to the front of the array.

It's a light shield! Leotidides blinked, he understood this type of unit. During the Peloponnesian War, Sparta employed Thracian light shields many times to assist heavy infantry. However, in the battle sequence of the Dionian Legion, the light shield soldiers were regarded as an important force, and their status was not lower than that of the infantry.

I saw these light shield soldiers holding leather shields in the left and long-handled hunting knives in the right, wearing thin cloth robes, and quickly approaching the enemies on the hills in the form of skirmishers. deftly avoid.

Why can they be so fast and agile? Because they are holding a long-handled reverse-blade knife (actually a scythe), this strange weapon with a blade that is similar to a semi-circle is plunged into the soil, which can easily provide a strong boost for them to climb.

Tspit quickly approached the enemy, and five or six spears stabbed him at the same time.

Tspit was very calm, his body squatted down sharply, the softer leather armor allowed him to almost stick to the ground along the slope, and the leather shield raised up to protect the top of his head, blocking the piercing spear.

The Puchetti on the top of the mountain found it a bit difficult for them to stab an enemy that was almost on the ground at such a low angle, because the terrain sloped down too much, and it was easy to get unsteady and roll down the mountain with force, so They had to move forward.

Saying that it was too late, Cipit kicked his legs back hard, and the whole person collided. He quickly stretched out a reverse-blade knife to hook one of the Puchetti warrior's feet, and pulled down hard.