Herald of Steel

"The enemy might be trying to intimidate us into seeking a truce or even retreating by showing us this over- inflated number."

Regarding Perseus's presumed strategy, this was what that officer hypothesized.

And this thought was shared by Menes too, who commented with a nod, 

"Mmm, it's not a bad plan given their circumstance. If I was in their shoes I might have done the same."

"Too bad he met me." He snickered.

The scout officer hearing Menes's pleased tone thought the man was simply praising him, but in reality, the tall man was referring to how he knew of Perseus's true condition.

Those intelligence reports proved vital, being the sole reason he was able to accurately guess the tactic.

After all, otherwise, no one going to see a camp supposedly holding 40,000 men and come to the conclusion that half of them were fake.

That was impossible.

Menes even thought that the opposing general's true mistake here was making his army appear unnaturally large- 40,000 was a bit pushing it.

But had it been only 30,000, Menes might have bought it even with the intel leaks, thinking there was simply a discrepancy in the scouting numbers and that the intelligence reports simply underestimated Perseus's reserves.

Since Menes had found reasons to suspect that Perseus was distinguishing himself like a pufferfish, he decided to it out, ordering, 

"Send ten cavalry squadrons and 1,000 infantry and crossbowmen first thing in the morning to keep an eye on the camp. I want to know the true numbers as quickly as possible."

"Dawn? But sir the fog?" At Menes's instruction, the officer opined such with a bit of shock to his tone, trying to remind his boss that there was no point sending men up the steep ridge at that time since it would be too foggy to see anything.

Although the fog around the higher parts tended to dissipate by early to late morning, that was still two to three hours after dawn.

 "Yes dawn!" To the inquiry Menes snapped, not liking being questioned at every little thing, "If the men cannot see anything, then they will stay there till they can." 

Menes was impatient to know his enemy's number as soon as possible, for although it was very reasonable to think Perseus was faking his number, it was still a conjecture.

If the enemy really had somehow managed to get 40,000 men, then Menes would need to reevaluate his tactic.

Perhaps he would even retreat and ask Alexander for reinforcements.

After all the man was keeping around 8,000 men with him in Thesalie in case anyone tried to do something stupid, be it inside the city, or in its vicinity- like an overzealous noble attacking Zanzan.

But until Menes could know the enemy's number for certain, he would be unable to devise a potent strategy. 

"Be grateful I'm not sending your sorry ass right now to go sit up there in the cold. You are dismissed."

So with this Menes made his order absolute and the officer, understanding so, 

"Yes sir!" got in attention and giving a salute he exited the tent.

The following morning the ordered force of 1,100- composed of 100 cavalry, 900 infantry, and 100 crossbowmen quickly found themselves scaling the Sissilpond ridge.

They had set off the moment it had become clear enough to see, perhaps around 1 hour after dawn and though the group advanced, it was painfully slow.

'I knew this would happen' And the reason was plenty obvious as that officer who was named Antonid grumbled, squinting his eye to try and make the very ground in front of him.

The man was personally leading the two battalions worth of men under Menes's order and the fog was so thick that even his hands sometimes disappeared, his time spent mostly calming his jittering horse down, as the beast really did not like walking basically blind.

"There! Captain there! There is a group of men there." While Antonid was feeling peeved with Menes's order, as well as the fact he had to get up so early when he would have preferred to have stayed a bit longer, suddenly a bunch of cries emanated from the rows of men before him.

And as the man raised his head to look at what many of the men were pointing to, he did indeed spot several large masses of shadow scuttling in the fog right near the top of the hill. 

"Attack!" And immediately Antonid screamed such an order.

He did this almost instinctively, like his brain was telling him that since the enemy was there, he must go and kill them.

"Take the hill! Capture the top!" While his adjutant thought it was because his captain wanted to ambush the enemy and catch them unaware.

The enemy already had an advantage in height so it seemed imperative to the man that they attacked immediately to negate that.

And since the order had been given, even though Menes had asked them to only survey the surroundings, the men all energetically charged up.

The infantry led at the front, the crossbowmen followed in tow at the back while the cavalry protected their wings, intending to strike the iron while it was hot.

The men thought, 'Since we have found their enemy, what reason is there to wait? Let's go and kill them when they have not spotted us. The more we kill now, the less we will have to kill later.'

But that general rainbow aura of optimism lasted right up until the moment they made contact with the enemy.

"What? How! So many!"

This was the exact thought that flashed in every Zanzan man, along with intense regret over with over enthusiasm. 

Because although Perseus was in simpatico with Menes over sending scout parties to observe the enemy, he had sent a far larger force.

Antonid could not immediately tell the exact numbers through the fog, but it had to be at least three times his force if not four.

And the reason why Antonid never considered this possibility of biting more than he could chew was because, well- Basically he forgot, simple as that.

When he first saw the shadow, they did not look too large, and going red eyed by the mere scent of the enemy, he had not considered anything else, bullishly charging up the hill to hit the enemy where it hurt. 

Besides, subconsciously he had thought that the enemy would be smaller than them.

After all, that was the feeling he got from talking to Menes yesterday night. 

But that moment of hastiness was coming to bite in the ass now, as intense regret washed over him realizing his mistake.

But the man was not completely incorrigible, as understanding his mistake, he did not try to fix it himself.

Neither did he lose heart and run like a coward.

Instead, understanding he alone could never hope to win the fight, he instantly sent three riders charging down the hill, tasking them to immediately go find Menes and beg him for reinforcements.

While he and his men planned to hold on for dear life.

"Attack! The enemy is disorganized. Attack! Throw your pillas. Archers! Shoot!" Antonid's only saving grace here was the fact the enemy had still not seen them and were relatively spread out.

Meaning Antonid could rush forward and get in between the gaps, thus catching them off guard and flanking them.

And this mostly worked, as the nimble legionaries armed with their short swords were able to make quick sharp steps to cover the short distance without breaking their own formation before they began to engage the enemy in very close quarter combat.

So close in fact that it put the huge spear wielding phalangites at a disadvantage.

Many caught out of formation found their bulky weapon unwieldy and were ill matched against the fast sword jabs being thrown at them.

Hence Zanzan managed to score quite a few successful hits in its first round, causing many to perish.

"What?" What is happening?"

"How? How is the enemy here?"

"Quick! Get in line!"

"Run! There are too man... *ugghhh*!"

"Arrows! Sheil… *agghh*!"

To say Antonid had caught the enemy with their pants down would not be an understatement.

And the reason for their unpreparedness was surprising because of something that at any other time would have been an advantage. 

The Tibians held the high ground which in any other case would have been a good thing.

But this time, the situation became reversed.

Because of the morning fog.

By its very nature, the fog tended to first dissipate from the top and then the bottom, meaning although Antonid could vaguely make out the Tibian's silhouette as they became clearer, the Tibians could not see through the much denser layer below.

Also the Tibians at the top were looking around for the exact position of Menes's camp, so their eyes were trained at around the foot of the hill.

Whereas Antonid's men's destination was the top.

So in a reversal of the situation of any other time, the lower side spotted the upper side first. 

And then they engaged, creating great casualties but more so, greater panic with their stabs, thrusts, arrow volleys and javelin throws.

In hindsight, Antonid's move to attack appeared to have been the correct one.

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