ancient greece mediterranean ruler

Chapter 888 Siege of Selinus
Muklu hesitated for a moment and said: "... Commander, do you want to tell Governor Sipulos?"

Leotizides said lightly: "It's too far away and there's not enough time. Your Majesty should have put the Sicilian fleet under my command. That would have saved a lot of trouble. Go and carry out the order quickly."

Soon, Miltias's response was not what Muklu expected. Not only did he reject Leotizides' proposal to let him cruise, he also asked Muklu to send a message and tactfully reminded Leotizides. Des: The Sicilian fleet is not under his command, so let him not worry about naval affairs.

Leotizides rarely got angry in the mansion, but there was nothing he could do.

In the afternoon, the scouts returned to Selinus and brought bad news: they found many Carthaginian soldiers and ships gathered on many beaches along the coast from Mazara to Lilibi.

The Carthaginian army is landing!Leotizides made the judgment easily.

"Send someone to tell Miltias and let him figure it out." Leotizides curled his lips slightly and said with a mocking tone. It seems that Miltias' previous response made him very worried.

"Gather the Eighth Legion and reserve troops immediately and follow me to attack the coast of Mazara!" Finally, Leotizides gave the order.

"Yes!"

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In order to understand and supervise the boarding of the entire army at the ports of Carthage and Utica, Mago was almost at the forefront of the last batch of troops entering the port of Lilibi.

As soon as he landed on the pier, he was warmly welcomed by officials of all sizes, including Imisele, the lord of Lilibi, and Admika, the acting commander-in-chief of the Carthaginian army. They all welcomed him into the city lord like a star. Mansion.

Mago had just sat down, and before he had time to speak, news came that "tens of thousands of Dionian troops had left Selinus City and were marching westward."

Most of the people present felt nervous, but Mago resolutely ordered: "Gather the troops immediately and go to intercept!"

Lilibi is a military fortress. There are several military camps in the city. More than 1 Numibian soldiers were stationed before (the army originally led by Monte Adeno). Yesterday, they were stationed by the army led by Hasdrubal. There were about 2 Iberian soldiers. Marco ordered his men to gather them quickly. For the sake of caution, he also took with him the 6000 Iberian soldiers who had just landed in the city.

Leotizides led the army in the wind and rain, and normal marching became somewhat difficult, so it took nearly three hours to approach the city of Mazara.

At this time, he received a report from the reconnaissance cavalry: a Carthaginian army was approaching them from Lilybae, numbering no less than 3 people.

Since the Battle of Minoa and the Dionysian army captured Selinus, Leotizides has thought of various ways to lure the enemies huddled in Lilibi, Segesta, Mazara and other cities out of the city. Fighting in order to achieve another success, but never succeeded.

Now that the Carthaginian army had finally left the city, Leotyzides hesitated.Although the Battle of Miloa exposed the low morale and low combat effectiveness of the Carthaginian army at that time, this did not make Leotizides become arrogant. Through intelligence, he knew that Ibis had captured Serdium. Leah's army should not be underestimated. The Carthaginian army that is now coming from Liliber must also be its main force, and the number of its soldiers far exceeds the number of the team he led.

During the time when the Dionian army was stationed in Selinus, since there had been no fighting, many friendly city-state soldiers had returned to their homes to prepare for the upcoming harvest season, and the third After the second fleet arrived in Sicily, Miltias once protested to Leotizides: without authorization, he adapted the outstanding crew members of the Dionysian navy into light infantry to serve as auxiliaries for the legions in battle (referring to the lucky ones in the storm). Some of the tens of thousands of Sicilian fleet sailors who survived).

He also reported the matter to the Ministry of Military Affairs. In the end, Leotizides had to let these crew members return to the naval base on the Catania plain. Therefore, the number of troops currently led by Leotizides was just over 3000. There are still more than [-] friendly soldiers left in Selinus, which is all the troops he now has in western Sicily.

He originally thought that the Carthaginian army's landing in such bad weather would inevitably cause temporary chaos, but he did not expect that the Carthaginians would attack so quickly.

His eyes scanned the heavily armed legionnaires beside him, their rain-stained faces showing exhaustion.After only a moment of hesitation, Leotyzides, who was not always blindly impulsive in combat, gave up the idea of ​​fighting the approaching Carthaginian army, ordered the army to stop advancing and return to Selinus immediately.

The soldiers who made a wasted trip and were soaked in the rain complained about this.

Leotizides didn't care about this. What he cared about was whether the Sicilian fleet could gain anything.

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After being reminded by his adjutant Muklu, Miltias did not fully believe Muklu's words in view of his bad relationship with Leotizides, so he did not lead the fleet to sea immediately, but sent a fleet of The ship went to patrol the western waters.

After receiving the confirmation, he hurriedly led the fleet out of the port.After this back and forth, and the fact that the fleet was sailing against the wind, by the time it rounded the cape and arrived at the waters near Mazara, it was already dusk. The sea, which was originally bustling with ships and extremely lively, had basically returned to calm, and the Carthaginian army The landing has ended, and the transportation of baggage and horses that followed has been mostly completed.

The Carthaginian clippers, which had been observing the movements of the Dionian fleet, quickly notified the ships still on the way. Some of them immediately returned to Carthage, and some stepped up their efforts to rush into the beaches and ports of Sicily, so the Dionian fleet was in this area. After searching around the sea for a while, they only rammed, sunk and captured a dozen cargo ships. Although they also saw many Carthage ships docked on the beach from time to time, they did not dare to approach and attack because there were many ships on these beaches. For many Carthaginian soldiers, it was obviously foolish for the navy to give up its own advantages to fight a land battle. Moreover, because of the dark sky and strong wind and waves, two warships accidentally ran aground and sank.

Therefore, Miltias had to order a return flight, and he was in a depressed mood during the journey: He had to bear a great responsibility for the Carthaginian army to successfully land in Sicily, and neither His Majesty Davos nor the Ministry of Military Affairs would be responsible for it. Turn a blind eye to this...

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Over the next few days, the battle in western Sicily took on an eerie calm.

As for Carthage, Mago was busy reorganizing the chaotic army after the landing and transporting the supplies scattered on the coast back to Lilibi. At the same time, he also took time to meet with officials from Carthage and envoys from the allies to learn more about Sicily. Due to the situation, he even summoned Arconis, the leader of Sikel who had been ignored by Monte Adeno.

On the Dionia side, Leotizides no longer sent troops to destroy his opponents' fields and villages, but ordered his soldiers to reinforce the city defenses.

In fact, he has been doing this since he captured Selinus, because he knew very well that the Battle of Minoa would not be enough to break Carthage's muscles, but would instead lead to a more violent attack from Carthage. Counterattack, the south coast of Sicily is the main offensive route of the Carthaginian army. Selinus, located at the starting point of this route, is very important. As long as it is held fast, the Carthaginian army can move further to Dio on the south coast. The attack on the territory of Nia's friendly city-states creates great obstacles, which helps to complete the strategic purpose given by King Davos.

At the same time, Leotizides also sent a messenger back to Catanai to inform Sipulus of the new war situation. He also sought reinforcements from friendly city-states such as Minoa, Agrigento, and Gela again to Strengthens Selinus's defenses.

Leotizides hoped that the battle would happen as late as possible, but Mago couldn't wait. After all, he made a promise in the Senate to drive the Dionians out of Sicily within a year.So three days later, the mighty Carthaginian army surrounded Selinus.

Mago ordered the army to start building the camp, and also had engineers and carpenters build siege engines.

After the camp began to take shape, he began to send thousands of light infantry formed by the Sicilian allies to gradually clear the traps and obstacles outside the city of Selinus.

Of course, Leotizides would not allow the enemy to approach the trench so easily. Therefore, he not only ordered the defenders at the top of the city to carry out fierce long-range attacks on any enemy who entered the attack range of the city, but also organized hundreds of troops from time to time. Thousands of light armored soldiers, taking advantage of the enemy's unpreparedness, went out of the city to attack the enemy who was busy clearing obstacles.

Leotizides' proactive defensive tactics inflicted considerable damage on the Carthaginian soldiers who were clearing the obstacles below the city. However, over the past few days, Carthage's encirclement of Selinus was still gradually shrinking.

For Mago, who has an army of about 12, some casualties are just a step away and have no impact on him. However, with their strong military power as a backing, the Carthaginians have been cleaning up outside Selinus. Uninterrupted.

As the Carthaginian army advanced in an orderly manner under the city and strengthened its defenses against the defenders' surprise attacks, the Dionysian army also reduced the number of surprise attacks out of the city after suffering one or two small losses.

Soon, the Carthaginians placed dozens of ballistae in front of the city and continuously bombarded the walls of Selinus with stone bullets.

Since the Dionian Army has city wall attack and defense training in its usual military training, of course they also have their own research on how to defend against the siege weapon-ballistae.In addition to having the ballistas deployed on the city walls and inside the city carry out precise strikes on the enemy's ballistae, Leotizides also asked the soldiers to collect a large number of fishing nets from the fishermen in the port, hang them from the city head, and cover the walls. to cushion the impact of stone bullets.

　Thanks to the black car driver Pikachu for the reward!Your support is my motivation to write! !

　　
　
(End of this chapter)