Eagle Byzantium

When Gawain calmly read out the names on the "criminal list" in one breath, Brenus, who was standing by the flag, was really mixed with emotions.

Although Brenus's ability was limited, he was not stupid.

He knew what the mystery was in Gawain's list. In addition to the expected ones, there were two particularly subtle characters in it. One was Patriarch Masdas, who was also declared the "mastermind", and the other was the stablemaster Mikhail Nistas, whose attitude and position were ambiguous.

But Brenus didn't say anything. He led 4,000 newly incorporated "Lydian Border Army" and was responsible for the task of attacking the east wall. Because of the limited time, these soldiers almost adopted the traditional organization and equipment, without caravans and artillery. Anyway, Gawain just wanted him to take charge of the flank attack.

If Gawain hadn't returned, I'm afraid that these 4,000 people would not have asked him to command, and 80% of them would have been handed over to that Branus.

"Generals, take your positions. The two cannons beside me will fire at intervals at precise moments. With this as a signal, we must charge forward and launch a fierce attack on the walls of Prusa, destroy its walls, capture its half-moon earth ramparts, and rush into its belly. Generals, may we drink the wine of victory on the shore of the Marimara Sea to celebrate the capture of the bandit chieftain, Taitsius!" After the speech and the announcement of the list, Gawain put his hands down and issued an order to prepare for the general attack.

The commanders of the five brigades and nearly 10,000 border residents all accepted it, and then walked down the big turtle fortress with flags and went to their respective positions in the trenches, car forts and artillery positions.

After a while, Anna, dressed in a gorgeous dress, walked out of the scarlet tent. The order for this general attack was issued by her personally, because the city of Prusa was going to fall into her pink hands.

In the morning light, Anna held a beautiful new round astrolabe, facing the rugged battlefield below. It was actually a "mechanical clock. Improved" specially made for the tyrant Caesar. After all, Gawain and Anna were more concerned about the changes and passage of time than their contemporaries. They were more eager for the accuracy of time during military alerts and study days.

At the end of the astrolabe in Anna's hand, there was a slowly falling pendant hanging at a uniform speed. There was a ring container filled with mercury inside to control it. Then the pendant accurately drove the pointer on the astrolabe to rotate in the twelve constellation areas through the mechanism. When it finally arrived in the Cancer Palace, "Gawain, it's time to start." Anna said this with her eyelashes trembling excitedly.

Under the tumorous rampart of Prusa, Atretis, who was holding his helmet in the trench, felt the soil around him shift horizontally, and then heard two very long and sharp artillery bombardments. All the soldiers behind him opened their mouths wide and wrinkled their nostrils to adapt to the terrifying roar - all the soldiers besieging and guarding the city clearly saw that two red giant-like shells were fired from the big turtle rampart one after another, and then shook the ground on the southeast corner tower of Prusa!

This is the signal for the general attack.

"Lord, help me to strive!"

"Hallelujah, Hallelujah!"

"The Three Saints guide us!"

"The sword of the god Shamkhshat has descended!"

"Strike to the Sea of ​​Marimara and capture Taitisius alive!"

Almost at the same time, under the two besieged walls of Prusa, thousands of Tarsus religious soldiers raised the flags of their respective teams and issued the above earth-shaking roars, almost mixed with various beliefs, but the pace was so unified.

"Charge, charge, fill it up!" Atretis stood up behind the dog-foot wooden fence and waved his arms. Many miners, civilians and lightly armed soldiers climbed over their breastworks in rows. Except for some round shields, they had almost no weapons, but each of them carried two objects on his back, one was a bundle of hay, and the other was a bundle of branches, which were taken down like raindrops and thrown into the wide trench of the Prusa wall. Some people pulled up the dog-foot wood and threw it down to pave the way to the half-moon fort.

After a short silence, various shooting sounds exploded like thunder and began to flash on the high earthen ramparts. They were the brave soldiers who held on there and continued to fight to the death at their respective posts. Fire guns, fire arrows, crossbows, and large pieces of fire balls rained down.

Many miners' shields were shot like hedgehogs in an instant, and more people were shot in the body, burning their limbs, and fell into the trench screaming. But the people behind continued to press forward along the trenches, braving the rain of bullets, with deafening whistles, flutes, and trumpets.

The shooting soldiers and archers of Ogus and Komaloy who were covering the two horizontal trenches stood up one after another. The long guns and bows were like a dense forest that suddenly emerged from the ground. "Bang, bang, bang, bang" the rain of smoke, one by one, cracked the entire siege position little by little, and countless arrows were thrown up and shot from all directions into the tumor-shaped ramparts and other earth ramparts on the city wall.

Atretis soon saw that many guards with arrows or gunshot wounds on their bodies rolled down the slope of the earth ramparts. In addition to the bundles of straw and firewood in the wide trench, there were also piles of corpses of soldiers from both sides.

"Kaon, Kaon!" The heart-wrenching cry rang out.

This was the command to fire the mortars, and "Kaon" was the original name for cannons in Greek, and later became the more familiar "Cannon" after Latinization.

Atretis and the officers and soldiers beside him were so scared that they quickly lay back behind the breastwork.

Immediately, the entire horizon was trembling.

The three heavy mortars were first pushed open by the gunners with push rods to open the bulletproof suspension plate, and the huge muzzle was aimed at the target. Then the double Khitan snow powder bag was stuffed into the chamber. At this time, the Khitan snow had been improved and formed into granular gunpowder using the wet screening method. The ignition and explosion were more powerful and faster, greatly reducing the risk of exploding the chamber.

Check the correct version in the 16-9 book forum!

Then the projectile, which was much heavier than the light artillery, was pushed in by the push rod. The first round was cast iron and covered with a cork support to better fit the "clearance" (the gap between the shell and the muzzle). This shell and the wooden support alone were worth the annual salary of ten soldiers.

"Shoot!"

"Ah!" Even Anna, who was supervising the battle from a distance on the Great Turtle Fort, was shocked - on the position of more than 200 feet, the butt of the heavy mortar smashed out a large cloud of dust, and the air waves and fireworks ejected from the mouth rose sharply, followed by the rolling cast iron shells spinning, and the broken wooden brackets drifted in the air.

Then she saw that on the large tumor-shaped earthen rampart of the defenders, the fortifications, personnel and weapons were smashed into powder by the mortar shells falling in an arc, and large pieces of wood and earth collapsed, flooding the wide trench below like a violent flood.

This was the vision obtained by farsightedness, and Atretis, who was nearby, felt that it was his ears that were pulling his flesh around, and the feeling of nausea and suffocation kept surging along his chest. At this time, most people could no longer hear the sound of the charge horn because they were all in a state of temporary deafness.

So he waved the flame-tongue flag in his hand.