Tyranny of Steel

Eckhard gazed upon the destruction with a sense of overwhelming disdain. Since he had begun his defense of the Teutonic State, the Eastern Coalition had thrown wave after wave of men at his defenses only for them to be continuously shredded apart by the overwhelming volume of fire that the Austrians unleashed upon them.

By now, the leaders of the Eastern Coalition had learned a valuable lesson. A frontal assault against the Austrian army was the equivalent of suicide. Since they could not capture the fortifications or the cities that once belonged to the Teutonic State, they had begun to raid the local villages. 

The village lying before Eckhard was one of the victims of these assaults. The fields were burnt to a crisp, the buildings were razed to the ground, and the people were slaughtered or enslaved. Such mindless destruction weighed heavily on the conscience of the old Field Marshal.  As he was reflecting on this, an officer beneath his command approached him to comment on the situation.

"Marshal, we must retaliate for this offense... The fact that they have raided these villages after we have proclaimed them beneath our protection is an insult to our Kingdom and its Monarch!" 

A single sigh escaped the lips of the veteran Field Marsha while he contemplated the best way to deal with these new tactics. While his army held onto the Cities and Castles with great skill, they could only do so much to protect the many villages of the region. 

After several moments of silence, he nodded his head in response to his Officer's remark; with a grim expression on his aging face, Eckhard gave forth the order that would be infamous throughout the rest of history. 

"If they wish to raze our villages to the ground, then we will do the same. Prepare to march on Krakow; let us show these Polish fools what happens when they march on Austria!"

Terror was a weapon constantly wielded by the Austrian Crown since Berengar had first crowned himself King. Under the control of Austria's current monarch, retaliation was dealt with via the tenfold doctrine.

This was a military strategy that operated under the belief that if civilian casualties had occurred to Austria and the people within its territories, the Austrian Royal Army would retaliate with a response that claimed the lives of at least ten times what they had suffered. 

In the eyes of Eckhard, this was utter madness, but Berengar was a man of extreme action; he greatly despised civilian casualties; however, if his civilians were to be targetted, then he would do the same to his enemies. After all, there was a saying from his past life that he greatly admired.

"An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth."

Without any universal standard of international law regarding warfare, Berengar would respond in greater intensity to anything unleashed against him and his people. Eckhard was aware of this and knew that if he did not fulfill his obligation to his King, he would be punished severely. 

To allow a massacre of Austria's citizens to occur without following up with swift and severe retaliation was a failure of one's duty regarding military command. Thus, Eckhard had designed a plot in his mind to march his army through the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and to attack their capital city.

With the artillery beneath his command, he could bring the City of Krakow to ruin in a matter of hours, and that is exactly what he planned to do. Thus over the course of the upcoming weeks, Eckhard had consolidated his forces on the Teutonic Region's borders and began a march across the Polish landscape, raiding any town they came across and ensuring that its people suffered the same horrific fate as those within the Teutonic Region. 

Thousands of lives were claimed on this horrific march until finally, the Austro-Bohemian Forces were gathered at the gates of Krakow; it did not take long for the hundreds of artillery pieces to set up their positions.  Once everything was in order, Eckhard commanded his soldiers to unleash hell upon the unsuspecting city.

"Open fire!"

This order was relayed across the army's lines until finally, a thunderous barrage echoed in the air. Hundreds of shells fell upon the city, detonating within its confines. The Fiery explosions could be seen from miles away as the Artillery crews rapidly unloaded their spent shells before placing a new round within its horizontal sliding block. 

The moment the next shell was in place, the Officer would pull on the lanyard and unleash another round onto the city. While the barrage continued, Eckhard turned his gaze away from it; he could not bear to watch the destruction and suffering his orders had caused to the people of Poland. 

If only the Eastern-Coalition had not resorted to raiding tactics, then he would be able to conduct this war with a hint of civility. However, with an amoral Tyrant like Berengar at the helm of their Kingdom, it was inevitable that such senseless slaughter would occur. 

The age of Chivalry was long dead at this point, and Eckhard hat witnessed its demise. However, as the years passed, the weapons in his hands became more advanced and more destructive to the point where his army could shell an entire city into oblivion in a matter of hours. 

Despite their horrific actions, much of the Austrian army gazed upon the fiery death and the screams of the innocent with a stoic expression; to them, this attack was justified. They had agreed to conduct warfare under the terms that no civilian shall be unnecessarily harmed. However, their enemies did not play by these rules, and as a result, they were now forced to inflict pain and suffering upon them in a far greater manner. 

The more cruel members of the Austrian army smiled upon the collapse of the city's structures; to them, this was the ultimate symbol of Austrian Power and authority. If anything, Poland-Lithuania should have surrendered to the terms that were initially presented to them. Had they done so this senseless slaughter could have been easily avoided.

Perhaps this event would never have occurred if they had not resorted to raiding Teutonic Villages. Yet, the Eastern Coalition had massacred innocents and, in doing so, justified Austrian retaliation. If there was one lesson that could be learned from this massacre, it was that the enemies of Austria should never target their civilians, even if it were in a region that was only recently annexed. 

The Echo of the guns continued to fire well into the evening; by now, the city's walls were brought to ruin, so were its structures. The destruction of Krakow was thoroughly completed; in fact, it was in worse shape than Berengar had left Venice. Nothing remained but a smoldering ruin of a once-proud city. 

Cities could be rebuilt, and people could be replaced, but this was a stain on the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth that was not easily removed, with much of its forces depleted in Iberia and the Teutonic Region as well as their Capital City in ruins. The leaders of the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth would find themselves in a difficult position in the upcoming days. 

As for Eckhard, he immediately rounded up his army and marched them onto Warsaw, his retaliation was complete, but the war against the Eastern Coalition was still very much alive. He had promised his King that he would seize much of what was now Northern Poland and the Baltic in an attempt to unite the German people who dwelled within its lands. 

The veteran Field Marshal would not rest until this objective was complete. Thus, he sat on horseback and drank from his canteen, filled with alcohol as the Austrian army marched onto its following location. Retribution had been served, and hopefully, now he could fight a more conventional war against the enemy. 

As for the Defense of the Teutonic Region, that responsibility now fell to Alexej Kaspar and his Bohemian soldiers. After all, they were now equipped and trained in use in the same weapons and tactics that Austria utilized. 

While Eckhard began his conquest of the East, Berengar was still within Vinland, where his scouts searched for valuable resources to continue the settlement's development and potentially ship back to the fatherland. 

Whether or not the Austrian King would join this war in the future had remained to be seen. However, when Berengar finally learned of the Massacre of Krakow, he would be pretty pleased that Eckhard had chosen such a vital target as the location of Austria's wrath. 

Ultimately the Field Marshal would be awarded another honor for his actions on this day, one that would cause him much regret every time he gazed upon it. However, orders were orders, and he could not very well disobey his King, even if he felt that the methods used were unnecessarily cruel.

The Massacre of Krakow would forever serve in history as a reminder of how far advanced Austria was over its neighbors and the level of cruelty they were willing to engage in to accomplish their goals.