Herald of Steel

The legionarries making use of their defensive structures and the choked streets were able to absorb the hits being dished out by the Heeat family soldiers with relative ease.

The ditches filled with spiked stakes proved to be an annoying obstacle for Lord Parker's men, as they could not cross this gap to try and close the distance, so were forced to poke with their spear from behind this 'screen', which made their attacks less accurate and thus less effective.

Some of the more daredevil go getters did try to cross this 'spiked ridge' by throwing their shield over the gap to form a bridge and trying to cross it.

But such efforts were never coordinated properly due to the ambient darkness and thus ended bloodily for the experimenting side, ]with the ditch quickly filling up with the skewered and pierced bodies of so many of these ambitious people.

And even more horrifyingly, these men lying in there, with their bodies pierced and skewered by those wooden stakes were still not yet dead but kept on groaning and pleading for someone to rescue them, blood seeping out of the wounds as well as their other orifices such as the mouth

It was a very macabre sight.

And it was little wonder that many soldiers of the time were not quite right in their heads.

How many would be after seeing a sight like this?

But still, no matter how horrific the events on the battlefield turned, the men were still compelled to fight and kill each other, driven into this through their master's order or a sense of duty towards one's professions, for fame and glory or even some kind of perverted thrill.

But whatever reasons these people might have had to fight, the attacking side was still unable to break through the legionary's defenses, who were able to use the narrowness of the terrain to mitigate their number disadvantage, while their large shields shook off most attacks.

In fact, they were even able to serve some good kills in return, not much in the melee, but mainly through their volley of arrow fire launched from the ramparts.

The huge crossbows and even the lighter Instant bows proved quite lethal when fired from such close range, piercing deep into the targeted flesh

The officers were too quick to spot this success, and thus did not hesitate to add more men to the ramparts while shouting various encouraging orders,

"Fire! Fire until you cannot fire anymore. The enemy is right before you!"

"Stoot at the men! Look how many there are! Kill them all! Each head will get you 5 ropals!"

"Do not stop! Do not stop until your fingers start bleeding and you cannot lift your arm anymore."

This intense volume of arrow fire proved to be quite the irritating thorn on Lord Parker's side, much more so than the metal thorns they had encountered only now.

Especially because Lord Parker's men are not decked out like the typical phalangite- in heavy armor and a large shield.

Instead, most possessed only light leather armor and smaller, thinner shields, enough to cover from the chest to the knees, which was certainly not bad, but still found itself lacking when compared to the legionary's scrotum which protected from the chest to the feet.

Thus not only were many bolts able to hit many more unprotected parts, but they could even pierce harder and deeper due to the thinner armor, resulting in more casualties.

Now this adaptation taken by Lord Parker's men was a result of the terrain they usually fought in which were arid, desert like conditions where agility and nimble movements were preferred, as it was all mostly open ground and it was much easier to swing around and outflank one another.

So you had to be quick on your feel to be able to respond to such a threat.

However, although this tactic was perfect for that instance, the current situation favored the complete opposite.

Thus it was the legionaries with their large shields who found themselves in the driving seat at the moment, able to defend and hold the lines despite their numerical disadvantages, and even launch small scale counterattacks.

Hence, just as Alexander hoped, and just as Achillas feared, the lines held firm, and the entire thing turned into a slog.

So it was time that both sides played their other backup card.

"There! There is the signal! Go! Go! Quick! Do not waste a second," The one that moved first was of course Remus, who got the signal as soon as Alexander had foiled the assassination attempt.

Thus even as the Heeat family soldiers were only readying themselves, the man was already on his way to the harbor.

Remus personally led the 500 strong men on their quest to commit arson, the number chosen quite deliberately.

Out of the 6,000 men (5,000 soldiers, 1,000 servants) that came to Galiosos, around 4,500 were employed to defend the lines.

500 were sent to secure the mansion and its surroundings with Alexander, while 500 guarded their camps as well as the Royal Harbor, thus leaving Remus with only the remaining 500 to conduct the mission with.

Which was actually fine by him.

Because when conducting such an operation, bigger wasn't always better.

The goal should be to get there undetected, quickly do whatever you needed to do, in this case, arson and then safely retreat leaving none the wiser.

And for that, 500 men were more than enough.

At Remus's command, these men did not shout or let out hurrahs, but only silently nodded, intent on keeping their presence a secret as long as possible.

And they then started to move through the dark, grim streets with feathery steps, only the clink clanks of their armor giving their position away, the enormous full fledged battle going on right next to them and the clamor and din coming from it helping to drown out their leak.

So Remus was able to reach the dock relatively uneventfully and found that the Great Harbor was really like most other docks, with a really broad, really well made stone paved road, to which were attached enormous wooden piers and jetties that jetted out to the sea, acting as 'anchors' for the incoming ships.

And there were indeed the ships- moored oh so innocently right on the doorsteps, their huge wooden silhouettes with furled up sails casting a pitch black shadow onto the waters below,

Since today was a moonless light, Remus was unable to properly make out all the characteristics of the various ships there but was only offered faint glimpses of the various small braziers and lamps that were lit up inside the ships by their crews.

Which was admittedly strange.

Because you would think such a place would be much more heavily populated, even at this time of the night.

Simply due to the enormous value the place naturally had.

There were numerous stalls and shops with expensive merchandise inside, large warehouses filled to the brim with exotic goods as well as various necessary loading and unloading equipment like cranes and good quality ropes.

So you would think there would be regular patrol around here.

And you would certainly think that there would be various beggars, vagabonds, and tramps living there- working, begging, and sleeping there.

But now, Remus found the place to be mostly abandoned, much to his astonishment.

This was due to a variety of reasons.

For one, due to the ongoing conflict, there was generally less work in the docks as trade and commerce became much harder to conduct.

Much less ships entered the port and almost none left it.

Then it was also winter, where due to the rough seas, trade was always a bit slow.

And lastly, the night curfew that Alexander had imposed around the mansion had somehow trickled its effect all the way down here, with the vagabonds choosing to find refuge elsewhere, away from their usual spots out of fear of getting caught in the crossfire.

With the troublemakers gone, the peacekeepers too found themselves out of a job and so chose to remain indoors during these cold nights, thus leading to the current scenario.

All that remained to call itself a population in the docks now were the skeleton crew left behind to look at their own shops.

And this current situation suited Remus perfectly, as he felt relieved that he would not have to deal with any unwelcome interference from the guards or innocent civilians.

Thus in a suppressed but happy voice, he ordered,

"There is nobody here! Quick! Before anyone notices us,move! You all know what to do."

And the men needed no more encouragement.

They pulled out the flints they had to quickly light a fire, quickly transferring the flames to pre-prepared large, oil-soaked torches, and then started to set anything and everything they had in front of them on fire.

Meaning it was not only the ships but anything that was remotely flammable was put to the torch, as the men transferred the hot flames with their torches, threw small burning jars of flammable oil or tar onto them, or even used stacks of coal to start a new fire, such as on the decks of some ships.

It was like this that the fire that Alexander saw got so bad.

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