Herald of Steel

The tactic that Remus decided to employ was certainly a risky one. If it failed, it would be disastrous for him.

However just like Alexander said, they needed to take some risks to win this campaign.

So once it was confirmed that the enemy had no cavalry, the young man decided to roll the die.

As for the consequences if he failed, well there was no need for Scorpyo to punish him.

Remus intended to go down with his 'ship'. That was also another reason why he was leading from the front and putting himself in so much risk.

And as of right now, that gamble seemed to be paying off, with Scorpyo making considering progress at driving the enemy formation back and making the lines crack and buckle.

And aside from the legionaries's brave assaults, a large part of that success was also due to how Lord Macht had arranged his troops.

He had initially placed the Margraves troops in the very front echelons of his formations, intending to use them as meat shields to soak up the initial blows and soften the enemy up.

It was only once the legionaries had their momentum blunted and became tired that the Heeat family elites were scheduled to reveal themselves

And on paper, there was nothing wrong with this plan.

The only trouble for Lord Macht was that Remus had unknowingly managed to come up with the perfect counter.

Facing the legionaries's heavy, concentrated attack, the weaker Margraves troops found themselves to be expendable and so quickly started to suffer from very low morale.

They soon lost the will to fight and thus began to get pushed back.

And when the Heeat officers tried to stop this by berating them, the hidden bitterness in these men only bloomed further, greatly aggravating the whole collapse.

It seemed Lord Macht's integration of the Margraves into the army still had a lot to be desired. The logic behind the act was no doubt sound- using a victory to smooth over the grievances was good. It was just that both sides had too great a friction up until now and neither had the time yet to hash these grievances out.

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The grassroots Margraves troops had been forcefully stripped of their original command and overnight placed under the command of these 'stranger' commanders who they knew nothing of, thus causing them to highly doubt the men's competence.

After all, they had never seen these men before today.

So how could they be sure that these men were not simply pushing all of them towards their doom?

How could they believe that these foreign men had the best intentions towards them? At least the officers' actions till now seemed to point to the opposite of that.

It also did not help matters that these officers were very different from them.

They dressed differently, they talked with a very different accent, and even their chain of command was very different from theirs.

For instance, the Heeat officers, instead of taking into account the rough terrain of the island, preferred to employ the same tactic here as they used in the open plains of Lynica.

All these combined naturally made the Margraves' troops very distrustful of their commanders, even if they had no personal grievances with them.

And then combine that with how they were used on the front echelons like cannon fooders, and barked at with detestable these words for even the smallest of mistakes, it was little wonder they gave in under the attacking legionaries's attack like soft putty.

"Damn it! Hold you, bastards! Hold!"

"The general will have your necks! All of your…."

Seeing this the enraged shouts of the Heeat officers tried everything in their power to stop this collapse but soon, Scorpyo managed to open up a great deal of distance between his column and the rest of the army.

"Forget them! Cycle our men to the front!"

Finally understanding that there was little point in threatening the Margraves, the Heeat officers decided to change tactics and wanted to 'disband' these weaker front echelons troops in favor of their trump cards.

However, the tragedy was, that this type of drastic change in the formation was easier said than done.

The packed nature of the formations as well as their bulky equipment would have made it challenging even in the best of times.

Now, the good news here was that the Heeat family troops were not as heavily armored as say their Thesian counterpart.

The flat, openness of their home territory made it a requirement that they had some mobility.

So their bronze armors were designed to be thinner, their shields considerably smaller and their spears a bit shorter, making them much more mobile.

But even then, moving around so many men in the middle of a battlefield was always very difficult, even if they were not being pushed around like a trolley like they were now.

And if that was not hard enough, they actually wanted to completely overhaul the whole frontline during all this.

It had to be known that during ongoing battles, only small sections of the frontline could be switched at a time, lest the whole frontline became hollow momentarily.

If that were to happen, an experienced and skilled enough enemy commander could take advantage of the fact that troops from either side were moving to and fro to initiate a well timed push, and catch both sides unprepared.

Caught out of formation in such a chaotic way, a collapse of the army would be then inevitable.

A complete change like the one being requested here would hence require an utter halt to the battle.

And it was naturally something that Scorpyo would never be foolish to give the enemy, and thus, as the veteran commander kept up the pressure, the lines composed of the elite Heeat units found themselves being dragged through the mud along with their incompetent 'allies'.

The officers tried to cycle some units in, but given they had to constantly take two steps back for each step forward, their tactic quickly fell apart.

There was simply no space or time to send enough good men to challenge the relentless legionaries.

And the Heeat officers present cried in their hearts seeing, feeling very much aggrieved. What truly pained them here and the fact they had the tools to stop this collapse but were unable to deploy them.

Thus some of them even cursed the Margrave troops to die sooner, thus giving their elite troops the chance to replace them.

While others quickly turned to their runners and shouted, "Quick! Go to Lord Macht! Ask him to send some units to attack the enemy's rear!"

This order came about as a result of the unfolding circumstances on the battlefield.

Scorpyo had pushed ahead so far along the frontline that a huge distance existed between himself and Remus and Lord Macht. So much so that his flanks and rear were fully exposed to counterattacks by the remaining enemy troops.

And the more experienced Heeat officers wanted to precisely target this weak spot.

However, once again this was easier said than done. Because if they could see this so could Remus.

He had already predicted this.

Hence while Scorpyo pushed in the front, the clever daredevil had his men slowly retreat back, baiting the enormous enemy to give chase.

This produced a variety of desirable effects for the legionaries.

For one- the men in red did not need to face the full blurt of the huge enemy. Instead of doggedly digging in and taking the relentless bashing using such thinned lines, they were allowed to trade space for time, thus increasing their survivability. This gave Scorpyo the opportunity to finish his task and come to their rescue.

Two- it distracted the enemy from focusing on things happening elsewhere on the battlefield, like smoke used to conceal the real fire. The retreat of the legionaries naturally made the 'winning' Heeat formations ecstatic, and so they chased with great gusto. Many had by now even gone red eyed, chasing after the 'fleeing' enemy like possessed demons.

No one doubted this was a trap because in their mind this was exactly what was supposed to happen. The number on both sides involved had predicted just this.

As for these victorious formations turning around to see the deleterious state of their 'rightmost' comrades, well that was impossible. In the battlefield of this time period, one's cone of vision was set to only one mode- forward. And turning one's turning would only get you the sight of the shoulder and head of the man next to you.

As for one's hearing, that might as well not be present most of the time- the intense clamor or din doing around all around made any transfer of long distance useful information by air an utter impossibility. So the units could not shout for help.

Thus as Remus stepped closer and closer to the shore, Lord Macht was more than happy to keep up the pressure and hound his prey.

And this was also where the third benefit came into play- the sheer distance!

With Remus having run away so far, even if Lord Macht got a whiff of the trap, it would take a long time for him to respond.

After all, he would have to have his formations make a complete U-turn, certainly not an easy or fast thing to do.

All this meant that by the time Lord Macht got the message, the battle over there was almost over.

The legionnaires were now not only attacking from the front but some had even swung around the side and attacked the flanks!