Herald of Steel

The brutal melee at the center raged on for hours with both sides cracking from the bloody engagement.

And as time passed these cracks spread and bloomed, with both sides taking huge casualties, until finally one side could not take it anyway.

The cracks on Menes's side had become too large to ignore.

So he at last sent word to Melodias, asking him to charge up the right side of the hill and swing around to flank Perseus, thus relieving the pressure off him.

"The enemy is weakened. Use your legionaries to hit them on the side and destroy these bulky formations." The instructions read.

And as Menes was giving this order, at the same time, sensing the same weakness in the Zanzan lines, Perseus sent word to Petricuno, informing him that the enemy was truly and well pinned down with little strength to struggle or run.

"Now is the time to hit him where it hurts and win us a great victory," The scout read out those exact words said by Perseus to Petricuno. 

Thus by following the most logical path, both generals inadvertently played the exact card they had hidden at the same time.

This had happened also because due to the fog and heat of battle, neither side got a chance to get an exact number of the troops the other side had deployed, and so both thought that this was all they had.

Otherwise why would they endure for so long under such brutal condition?

Upon receiving Menes's word, Melodias, who already had everyone formed up, quickly blew the trumpet and shouted in large expletives, "Charge! Quick! Our sides needs help! Charge!"

By now most of the fog had dissipated and for the past few while, Melodias had been able to celery observe the fight on the top from the foot of the hill, and the scene filled him with great tension in his heart.

How could he see not how the tide of the battle was becoming more and more against them? 

He had even sent multiple heralds to Menes if he should start coming up, but the black general rejected it, asking him to be patient for a bit longer.

"Not yet. I can still hold on. Let me tire the enemy out a bit more." He claimed.

Until finally he gave the order for Melodias to move.

And the clear weather meant the latter was able to quickly ascend up the hill, eager to assist his ally in battle.

While his counterpart on the opposite side, Petricuno was not so nimble.

The heavy phalangites wielding the much bigger and heavier sarissa were hardly Olympic sprinters, and the nature of their formation meant that for these units to be most effective, they needed to be bunched together. 

So when a bunch of heavily armored men wielding deadly 4 to 5 meters spears were bunched up together and asked to move up a steep slope, well it was not wrong to say they moved at a snail's pace.

"Come on men! Faster! The enemy is gonna break any time. Do you want those lowly Tibian peasants to get all the glory?"

"Hurry! Move quickly. Or else the fight is going to be over."

"Spread apart! Spread apart!"

"There is no enemy. Spread apart and moving quickly."

And seeing the crawling speed, the ever impatient Petricuno ordered this.

He could never accept 'Alexander' being defeated without him even getting a single stab in.

That was the whole reason he was here.

This mercenary leader had learned quite a bit of Alexander's accomplishments in the past three years and each of the latter's achievements had set his heart burning with green flames. 

He simply could not believe in three mere years the man had obtained powers beyond Petricuno's imagination.

Whereas he had managed to get a meager position as an ordinary citizen in a city state, he became a person surpassing in power even when compared to the most powerful senators of Cantagena. 

Now, becoming a citizen of a city state like Cantagena was no small feat in itself.

It was the ultimate dream of many stateless people of this time, kind of similar to how many people dreamed of receiving a US or Canadian Green Card, though the former was a lot harder.

The superpower Cantagena had an enormous demand for its citizenship, but only limited space within its walls, not to mention the inherent racism. 

So what Petricuno managed to do was certainly very impressive.

But when compared to Alexander's position as a Pasha, one who currently controlled around 100,000 sq km, the status of an ordinary citizen really could not hold any candle.

And what wounded the mercenary leader most was perhaps the fact that he knew he too could have become a lord if he had only swallowed his pride and taken that offer.

He too could have been like Menes, Melodias, and Menicus, lords with huge plots of land, a beautiful house to live in, fine food and drink to eat every day, and sexy servants to attend to all his whims and desires.

But he missed that opportunity, letting it slip right through his fingers.

All because he was too proud, too vain, too stupid to see the opportunity.

And given that that door had closed, Petricuno's heart turned crooked.

'If I cannot have it, then no one can.' The mercenary leader venomously ground his teeth as he swore.

And that is why he was really here to help Tibias.

To pull down Alexander from his high pedestal and show that he and him were not so different.

And for that to happen, Petricuno needed to join the fight currently raging on.

It would be of no use if 'Alexander' broke before he could come.

Then he would not be able to gloat.

Thus eschewing his own advice of keeping his phalanx units bunched up so that they do not scatter and open up gaps between themselves, in order to speed up the march, he did the opposite, allowing each formation to advance up the slope without having to worry about bumping into the unit next to them.

And this order did produce the intended result- the marching speed almost doubled.

But it was still not as quick as Melodias's who by now had already reached the top.

Up until now, both sides had been unaware of the other's presence as a slight fog still lingered along some parts of the hill, and the current ongoing battle and its clamor and din captured all the eyes. 

So just imagine Melodias's surprise when he was about to turn to hit Perseus's right flanks when suddenly he laid his eyes upon what was coming up the other side of the hill.

Around twenty thousand, 20,000 heavily armored men wielding spears the size of which he had never seen before!

'What is that?' And for a moment, Melodias's heart became dry as a desert as all strength seemed to have left him. 

Even a child could tell that if these men managed to join the fight, they were done for.

The only lucky break here for Melodias was that Petricuno was spread out, just like that time against Manuk, and Melodias decided to clutch at that chance with both hands and if he could even both feet.

His heart even danced joyfully at this sight, as a torrential flood of euphoria filled his shrunken heart, ballooning it to double its original size.

'You idiots. You still haven't figured out why we brought you here to fight? On this hilly ridge. Where the ground is so uneven. Hahaha.' 

And then when he thought about it for a bit, Melodias found that it was indeed natural for the bulky phalanx units to be spread out and disorganized. 

So he hastily ordered, 

"Quick! Charge downhill!"

"*Trumpet*, *Trumpet.*"

"The enemy is still disorganized. Charge downhill when we still have the chance." 

"*Trumpet*, *Trumpet.*"

And naturally, since Melodias could see the enemy, many officers could too.

Hence the 9,000 men and horses were instantly told to halt turning left to hit Perseus and instead redirected to charge thundering down the slope.

"Ahhh….."

"Advance!"

"Ready your pillas."

"Kill them all!"

Moments after Melodias's trumpet rang, many similar such signals waved past the nearly two legion worth of men and the orderly formation began a deadly swoop down the steep slopes of the hill, determined to catch the enemy off guards, as they shouted various threatening words and let out huge roars to pump themselves up for battle.

And then once the infantry started to advance down the slop and finally got close enough, they threw their pilla just like they practiced and pounced into the enemy, eager to destroy them.

But they did not attack head first.

Because that would have been suicidal.

When Petricuno's men noticed the blue wave of torrent slip down the slopes bee lining for them, these trained men did not simply panic and run, but instead instinctively halted and lowered their huge weapons, forming a very formidable spear wall.

If the legionaries were stupid enough to attack head on, these sarissas could very well become gigantic shish kebab sticks, with two or even three men at the end of each stick.

So it was fortunately for Melodias that his men had that survival instinct. 

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