I am not a deposed emperor of Han Dynasty

Chapter 530: The Roman tortoise shell formation encountered Han Empire artillery and staged a line-up to kill!

In this battle, the armies of both sides were equally matched in numbers.

The Roman Republic sent out 100,000 soldiers, 60,000 heavy infantry, 20,000 light infantry, 10,000 cavalry, and 10,000 auxiliaries.

The Han Empire dispatched a total of 80,000 soldiers, 10,000 heavy infantry, 20,000 light infantry, 40,000 cavalry, and 10,000 auxiliary troops.

The commander of the Roman army was the forty-year-old Pompey. He joined the army at the age of seventeen and traveled to Sicily and North Africa to open up territory for the Roman Republic.

His greatest military achievement was assisting Claes in suppressing the Spartacus uprising, and with this achievement, he became the consul of the Roman Republic.

At this time, Pompey was the leader among the top three giants of the Roman Republic, but he also faced huge tests and challenges.

With the more prestigious Crassus in front of him and the more powerful Caesar behind him, Pompey must find ways to consolidate his position.

In the past few years, he has been desperate to wage war against Anxi and use his military exploits to consolidate his position.

Therefore, after Pompey learned that the Han Empire army in the Far East had declared war on Parthia, he knew that his opportunity had come.

He found a way to persuade the Senate and sent thirty of the most elite legions of the Roman Republic to his command, launching a war against Parthia.

Invincible along the way, Pompey became more and more proud day by day, and finally he sent an envoy to the Han Empire to claim the entire territory of the Parthian Empire.

As the self-proclaimed "Patron of the Parthian Empire", he ordered the Han army to withdraw from the entire Parthian Empire.

As for Han Zeng, the hussar general of the Han Dynasty, his life trajectory is somewhat similar to Pompey.

He has also been in the army since he was a child, and his thirty-year military career has made him an experienced and capable general.

The purpose of leading the troops on this expedition was to destroy the Parthian Empire. Now that victory was within easy reach, how could it be given up to others.

With such a big difference, there is no room for negotiation between the two sides.

This battle on the right bank of the Tigris was impossible to avoid.

In the autumn of the eleventh year of reform, both sides were searching for opportunities in constant trials.

Although there were victories and defeats for each other, no one side could achieve a decisive victory.

The confrontation lasted for a whole month. The two sides finally lost their composure and mobilized their best troops to prepare for the final decisive battle.

In terms of numbers, the army of the Roman Republic was slightly superior, but in terms of infantry weapons, the Han army, which had popularized iron weapons on a large scale, was stronger.

The Roman army used heavy infantry as the core of the legion; while the Han army used cavalry as the main force this time.

The terrain on the east bank of the Tigris River is flat but very long and narrow, which is not suitable for cavalry movements. This is why Pompey chose to fight the Han army here.

Pompey believed that under the tight formation of Roman heavy infantry, the light cavalry of the Han Empire would not do much.

On the first day of November, the main forces of both sides took up positions on the east bank of the Tigris River.

In the afternoon, the elite heavy infantry of the Roman army took the lead in dispatching.

In the sound of military music, the Roman army held up the eagle flag and charged at the Han infantry one mile away.

Soldiers on both sides filled the entire Euphrates River You'an, and hundreds of eagle flags and Han flags were hunting in the wind...

Pompey and his soldiers, looking at the Han cavalry further away, felt that they were sure of victory, and they marched briskly and decisively.

However, when the lines of both sides were still a hundred steps away, the Roman soldiers at the forefront saw the Han army array on the opposite side suddenly open up.

Immediately afterwards, more than fifty "huge iron tools" that had never been seen before were revealed from the military formation.

Before Pompey and the Roman soldiers could figure out what this was, they saw flames and thick smoke erupting from the iron pipe, followed by a deafening sound. When the Romans laughed at the sorcery used by the Orientals, black dots flew towards them.

These black spots didn't fly very high. They landed on the ground not far from the iron tool, bouncing and rolling towards the Roman formation.

Only then did the sharp-eyed Romans see clearly that the things flying over turned out to be iron balls.

The rolling speed of these iron balls is not fast, even a little staggering, and there is no comparison with the crossbows in the Roman auxiliary legions.

There was even a centurion who ordered his soldiers to march out of the military formation, preparing to intercept the rolling iron ball so that they could take it back to claim credit from the great consul.

However, when the iron ball encountered these daring men, a scene happened that the Romans would never forget.

These seemingly harmless iron balls use an unstoppable force to tear apart those who touch them.

And rolled decisively into the Roman formation.

Amid the sound of cannons that had not dissipated, patches of blood mist rose from the Roman formation.

Under the blood mist, there were the soldiers’ broken limbs, internal organs, brains and spinal cord.

The slow round cannonballs carried huge kinetic energy and plowed bloody troughs among the Romans, taking away the lives of hundreds of Roman veterans in the blink of an eye.

The miserable scream finally broke out in the Roman military formation.

The tortoise shells that the Romans were proud of became their talisman!

One cannonball could penetrate several phalanxes and blow apart dozens or hundreds of Roman veterans.

It is unreasonable to call it an explosion, because there is no gunpowder in the round cannonball, but the huge kinetic energy is still unstoppable in the face of flesh and blood.

The cannons equipped by the Han army at this time had no rifling, no sighting equipment, and extremely poor air tightness. They were incomparable with the ancient cannons in the original timeline.

No matter in terms of range, accuracy, or lethality, this cannon is not excellent.

However, the Roman phalanx was too densely arranged, and the Han army waited until they advanced to a very close distance before firing.

At this range, black powder-powered shells had sufficient lethality.

After several rounds of volleys, the Roman military formation was crumbling, and the Han army immediately replaced it with shotguns, once again giving the Romans a taste of the fear from the east.

Dozens of cannons sprayed out shotgun shells that covered the entire Roman line. The armor was torn apart easily, and the Romans fell down in rows...

Compared with death, the fear brought by mysterious weapons that have never been seen is more terrifying.

A quarter of an hour later, under the attack of cannons, the Roman army sweeping across Europe could no longer hold up, and the soldiers fled away crying and wailing.

But the dense formation harmed them again. Like headless flies, tens of thousands of people abandoned their armor in the narrow river valley, trampled on each other, and wailed incessantly.

In panic and panic, the Romans even began to kill each other.

At this time, the Han cavalry formed a formation behind the infantry, and with the sound of bells and drums, they charged at the Romans from between the separated infantry.

The Romans had no intention of resisting and could only retreat and flee.

Because the river valley was too crowded, nearly 10,000 Roman veterans were pushed into the Tigris River by their own people.

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(End of this chapter)