Rome Must Fall

But Kabdus is still cautious. If Amlotas's tribe is wiped out by the Nyx or suffers great losses, it will help him avoid a big problem. Even if he will be criticized by other leaders for this, as long as he is finally eliminated If he defeated the Nix people, regained the lost territory, and rescued the tribesmen who had been captured, then the tribesmen in the entire territory would cheer for him, and by then his prestige would be as high as that of Andres!

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Maximus led three fully-equipped infantry legions and the newly formed Fourth Legion of less than 4,000 men, as well as crossbowmen and other auxiliary troops, totaling more than 24,000 people, to heavily surround Amrotas's stockade. , but the fleet was not used to blockade the river side of the stockade and the river port, just to allow the people in the stockade to continuously send messengers to urge Pannoni's coalition forces to come to the rescue as soon as possible.

For this reason, Maximus ordered all the troops to begin tentative attacks on the stockade, and at the same time built camps in the harvested fields near the stockade, as if they would never give up until the stockade was destroyed.

However, after waiting for one day, the enemy did not come; after waiting for two days, the enemy still did not come; finally, news of the spies came.

Maximus, who received the news, immediately convened a military meeting.

The meeting was attended by the three chief officers of the Ministry of War - Frontinus, Quintus and Lepilus, and the four legion commanders - Pheasalus, Toreligo, Carminus and Aulus. In addition, there was Pecot, deputy commander of the Fourth Army.

"Everyone, I just received the exact news that Pannoni's coalition forces have been stationed at Linkou Village for the past few days and have not moved at all!"

Maximus' words surprised some people, while others were thoughtful.

"No wonder the Pannoni haven't appeared until today. It turns out they haven't moved at all!" Tolerugo suddenly said.

"Did the Pannoni see through our plan, so they allowed us to attack this stronghold?" Pheasalus asked.

"It's also possible that the Pannoni want to wait for us to attack the stronghold with all our strength before coming to the rescue. We have carefully explored this stronghold in the past two days. It is not that easy to conquer. If we want to capture it, we may have to There will be some casualties," Frontinus said with some concern.

"Aren't the Pannoni going to attack us in a big way? Now it seems that they are waiting for us to attack?" Aulus was a little confused.

"Chief, have our spies found out the situation of this Pannoni army?" Quintus asked.

Maximus responded: "According to the information found, this Pannonian army is composed of warriors from the two tribes of Segstica and Desitiatai. The Desitiatai army is composed of their The main camp of Segostika, led by the great leader Temagis, arrived four days ago;

The Segostika army is led by their new chief, Kabdus. The two tribes have about 15,000 troops. They set out three days ago and have been stationed there since arriving at Linkou Village... …”

"The actions taken by the Pannoni army and us on the same day this time show that our previous judgment was correct. The Pannoni people are indeed going to declare war on us after the armistice agreement ends!" Frontinus analyzed: "It's just that there are only two big tribes here with armies, and they only have 15,000 people. I don't think the Pannonians will be so arrogant that they want to defeat us with this small number of troops, so -"

Frontinus looked at his colleagues: "Quintus, your judgment is correct. The Pannonians are indeed divided into two groups, and the main force should be in the east. After all, they still have five tribes whose troops are not here. ”

Quintus did not show the slightest hint of self-importance. He walked to the wooden table and looked down at the map of the surrounding situation of the Nyx tribe placed on it (this was based on the information Maximus had continuously explored over the past year about the Pannoni, Al The intelligence of the Dee and Yabod people was drawn by myself, which is not very accurate), then he stretched out his finger and gestured: "From this picture, the armies of the other five large tribes of the Pannoni people gathered together. It will save time and facilitate food transportation, after all, the Sava, Drau and Danube rivers connect the territories of these tribes. "

"If this is the case, the Pannoni have two large tribes with an army of 15,000 people here, then they have 5 large tribes in the east, which is more than 40,000 people!" Pheasalus reminded with some surprise.

"I'm afraid it's more than that. Don't forget that Segestika has suffered heavy losses from us. It is impossible to have enough soldiers, otherwise it would not take the initiative to cease war with us." Pecot reminded.

"Whether there are 40,000 or 50,000 people over there, we have expected it, and we are confident of defeating them!" Torrelugo cheered loudly.

"Chief, what's the situation in the east? Hasn't our sentinel rushed back to report?" Fesalus asked a little anxiously.

Maximus shook his head: "Not yet. After all, there are mountains to the east and the distance is longer... But if we calculate the time, it should be here soon."

"Chief, we missed one thing." Quintus suddenly showed a look of regret: "I remember that the new leader of Segestica, Kabdus, once led his army into our ambush, and finally lost His village became our Westney.

I heard that he is not as courageous as Andres, and he has suffered such losses. Now he does not have as many troops as us. This should be the reason why he has been staying in Linkou Village. He does not dare to come to the rescue at all! "

"Even if we break through this stronghold, they won't come?" Tolerugo asked.

"...Yes." Quintus hesitated for a moment, then said firmly.

"In this case, we can't waste time here anymore! We should lead the army back to the south immediately and concentrate all our efforts to defeat the main enemy force coming from the east!" Tolerugo suggested directly.

"But if we leave, the enemies here may not stand still, but will quickly advance, invade our territory, and surround Westene!" Pheasalus was worried.

"It will take at least a day for the Pannoni army to get here from Linkou Village, and it will also take a day for them to reach Westney from here..." Aulus said confidently: "As long as we can quickly defeat the enemies coming from the east, If we rush back, we will have enough time to prevent the Pannoni army here from attacking our Westene."

"Do you think the Pannonians will only attack the Westenian stronghold!" Pheasalus reminded: "They will also burn our houses outside the city! Destroy the land we have just sown! -"

"There will always be losses in war, but as long as our losses are far less than the enemy's, then it is worth it!" Aulus was a little disapproving. After all, he had experienced many such things in his decades of war career.

"But they may also destroy the wooden bridges, waterwheels, and water mills that we have spent great efforts to build... They may even send a troop to march along the north bank and destroy our important workshops! Is this all worth it? !" Pheasalus asked in an aggravated tone.

Aulus was speechless for a moment. Of course, he knew very well how important these buildings were to the tribe compared to some fields and houses, and how much manpower and time the tribe spent to build them.

"You all should stop arguing," Maximus finally said.

He just listened to what Quintus said and realized that he had made a mistake. He did not carefully break down the situation of Pannoni's army commander. As a result, he formulated such a plan, but the other party did not take the bait. Of course, this also had nothing to do with Pannoni's army. In order to save food, the major tribes in Nigeria almost rushed to the gathering place and set off immediately, which made it impossible for him to know the opponent's troop configuration and general situation in time.

Maximus blamed himself a little, but he would not show it. Instead, he was racking his brains to think of a way out of the current predicament, and soon he had an idea.

He looked at the generals with confidence and said: "If we are sure that the enemy in the east has sent troops and the direction of their advance, then we must lead the army to intercept and defeat them, and at the same time we do not want the enemy here to leave before we leave. Immediately march forward and invade our territory. I have a way, and that is to deceive!”

"cheat?!"

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The method proposed by Maximus convinced everyone, and everyone came up with ideas and improved it. After the meeting, the entire army began to act according to the newly formulated plan.

To reduce the number of people who made tentative attacks on the enemy's stronghold, most of the soldiers devoted themselves to the construction of camps. The newly built camps formed a siege to the stronghold on land...

At the same time, Nix's fleet raided the docks in the village, burned the ships at the docks, and blocked the waterways. At the same time, they also sent a team of a thousand people to station on the south bank of the pontoon not far from the village, posing as if they were ready to intercept Panno at any time. The posture of the Nigerian reinforcements.

By noon, the spies lurking in the western mountains and borders of Broch's territory and the sentries stationed in several sentry towers in the southern mountains of Nix's territory successively sent back news: In addition to Andizetti, Pannoni's other four The big tribes Broch, Maziyi, Peruste and Disone gathered an army of more than 40,000 people, commanded by the chiefs of their respective tribes. They marched from the west of Broch's territory - the Kupa River Departing from the confluence with the Sava River, it marched westward along the Kupa River. About half a day later, its leading troops left the Kupa River and continued westward along a tributary of the Kupa River...

Judging from the march of this Pannonian army, they are not planning to continue westward along the Kupa River, and eventually enter the plains of the middle reaches of the Kupa River, join the Pannoni army here, and then attack Nyx together. tribe; they did not want to take the route that Pecott led his team through the mountains before, but really wanted to cross the hills and go straight to the east bank of the Korana River.