41 Crushing the opposition
Normal chapter, I did not write anything that should be alerted.
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Apparently I'm going to do one more chapter of lothar,as I want to leave all of lothar's future problems set up since I'm not going to touch lothar's pov for another 20-30 chapters.
I apologize because in the end I didn't edit any chapter, I kept reading the book European Warfare, 1350-1750, because I wanted to verify if my idea of naval combat was wrong, but in the end they were very close to being realistic, without cannons the battles are more about damaging the enemy ships and boarding them.
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Lothar von ruppin POV
After finishing my divine duty of cleansing the false religions I concentrated on the next thing and that was to organize my men to continue the conflict, but first we must make an inventory of the loot.
Unfortunately, we do not have an administrative genius like the king who could organize all the administrative problems in a matter of minutes, but this was one more test that had to be overcome.
Leaving the governor's mansion, the most intense part of the sacking of a city had already passed, most of the civilians lay dead and were being gathered to be burned to avoid an outbreak of disease.
With the seizure of this city I have secured a temporary base of operations, since I don't know if I will be able to keep it for long, the council of lys might demand its surrender anyway, even though it has lost all strategic value because this city produces nothing now
walking through the streets, my soldiers go through the houses, taking out everything of monetary and strategic value.
Coins, jewelry mostly, but mainly metal items that could be re-melted to have material to work on repairs to our equipment.
I was glad that my soldiers maintained discipline during the looting.
After walking for a few moments, I was able to reach where the most precious loot of the city was being gathered with great care.
the young souls that had not yet been tainted by the false gods, before launching this attack I debated intensely with many of my knight theologians who recommended that the lives of the children should be spared, since being pure beings, their souls had not yet been corrupted by the false religion professed by their parents.
Including the children we have gathered from other peoples we have plundered, a large number of pure souls that if it were possible, I would send back home.
They could still be saved and I as a good soldier of God will not leave a request for help unanswered, it is still possible to correct their mistake and make them begin to profess the one true religion.
We had them gathered in the center of the city, and I had already decided that we would use the governor's mansion to take care of these poor souls that we had just saved from the corrupt hands of the monsters that were their parents.
''commander, we have gathered all those who met your requirements, children who look up to the age of 15'' said a Teutonic knight.
''very well, I hope you have been understanding with them, the poor souls are not to blame that their parents are demons disguised as humans'' I said with a serene tone.
''What do we do with the children?'', asked the knight.
''Take them to the governor's mansion and feed them and let them rest, they must still be in shock from seeing their fake loved ones die, it will be our duty to show you that those men would have only condemned their soul to hell if they professed that religion'' I said calmly
''as you command, sir'' said the knight as he headed off to take the children to their new home for the time being.
After making sure that the children were taken to the mansion, I headed for the walls where we had set up the tent where we were treating the wounded.
Walking quickly, I reached my destination and watched as the doctors worked as fast as they could to save as many lives as possible.
Entering the tent I saw many of my men wounded and painfully, dead, I felt a lot of guilt and remorse when I saw a dead Teutonic knight, he had an arrow in his visor, most probably the projectile caused an instant death.
Luckily, he died in the service of god and his soul will have its eternal rest, but I could not stop thinking if my tactics were correct, maybe I could have done better, I could have thought more and saved more lives.
In this campaign, every life counts the king was very specific that the reinforcements would not be many and if every battle is like this I will suffer for the lack of soldiers in the future.
Each of these knights is irreplaceable as they are recruited from the Prussian nobility when they are very young or kidnapped from other noble families in other countries but one thing I have realized is that the nobility of this place does not have the blessings of God, leaving us waiting for the few nobles we have to have children to recruit more.
''commander lothar you come for the report of the dead?'', said one of our doctors
''yes how many did we lose in this attack?'', I said with some annoyance
''12 dead, as you can see, a Teuton died,123 wounded, 8 of them serious, as they had an eye wound from projectiles, and we had to remove the eye, but the rest are minor injuries, projectiles in the weak parts of the armor and contusions from blunt weapons'' said the doctor reading a paper
''well thank you for the report, I still can't determine if they are acceptable casualties, it all depends on the king's reinforcements'' I said as I left the tent.
So many lives lost, so many good men who have died for having to eliminate these heathens
these numbers were a bucket of cold water, I must try not to take such aggressive actions again, but unfortunately the situation demanded it, we still don't know where tyrosh's army is, and being trapped in the middle of a siege against an enemy army would be a terrible scenario for this expedition.
Finally, I headed to the blacksmith of the city we had taken possession of, arriving to the street I could feel the heat of the building with the night already near I could see the bright light coming out of the building.
Inside the building the blacksmiths were working repairing equipment and melting the equipment of the captured to have materials to repair what we lost, luckily as the siege was short our losses are mainly the crossbow bolts that only had to be picked up again, the problem are the ones that were broken, as making more at this time is complicated, by the fact that we do not have craftsmen who know how to make bolts, so we depended on supplies
all the captured enemy equipment was here and more and more was arriving, the day of the blacksmiths would be very long, since tomorrow we will go out to hunt the army of tyrosh so that we will not be threatened in the future.
After verifying the reports of what was looted I ended the day and went to my tent to sleep, since tomorrow the conflict would continue, I only pray that the battle that awaits us will be easy, since I cannot lose many men against tyrosh the objective is Myr, but now it is necessary to ensure a place to receive supplies and reinforcements.
1 day later
reorganizing my forces, I prepared to march ahead of my men, we had received reports that tyrosh's army was only a few hours' march away and was heading towards our location and if the reports are correct, they were under forced marches.
It is time to take the initiative if we catch them now they will be tired and knowing the morale and discipline of the mercenaries it is very possible an easy victory, it seems that God heard my prayers.
With my personal escort, we ride for 2 hours until we found the Finns that were in the area.
It was very difficult to detect them, most of the landscape is flat land with knee-high dry grass and the Finns had already modified the clothes they use to camouflage themselves with the terrain.
If it wasn't for them standing up and catching my attention, I would have passed by without seeing them.
''soldier report'' I said looking at the bush.
''sir, we have been counting the enemy forces, and we have established that the tyrosh army is around 20000–25000 men, they have no standardization, most of them are very poorly armed, the only thing to highlight is their cavalry is well armed and armored, but luckily, they are barely more than 800, few in number'' said the Finnish man
''Have you been able to infiltrate the camp?'', I asked
''no, sir, sorry none of our men speak Latin, so it is extremely difficult to enter the camp without raising suspicions, so our attempt to enter the camp at night have not been fruitful'' said the Finn looking at the ground
''a shame it would have been a tactical victory if you managed to generate sabotage in their camp'' I said looking at the scenery
''do you recommend any place to engage them, I only see plains at the moment, something good for our armies, but I don't see feasible to control all orders without an elevated place to see how the combat is developing'' I said asking with a serious tone
''no sir, just plains all the way'' said the soldier
''well thank you for the report, gather your men, I need them to cut off their retreat, so they already know the tactic, try to capture the high command the others, just kill them'' I said as I turned my eyes to my knights
''At your orders, sir'' the Finn whistled, and his horses got up from the pasture and rode off, followed by his companions.
''Shit even his horses have camouflage, that's new'' said a knight.
''Thank God they are on our side'' I said with concern.
''can't we ask the king to send us more? It would be easier to perform ambush tactics with more of them'' said one of my officers
''the king uses it to hunt the rebels and spy on his enemies, so I doubt he wants to send us more than the ones we have'' I said looking at how the Finns disappeared in the horizon
we rode on again to find the enemy force
after another hour of riding, we found the enemy forces setting up camp
''Why are they setting up camp in the middle of the day,'' said one of my men.
''they are under forced marches, no one would be so ingenuous to fight after demanding so much from his men'' replied another of my men.
''an opportunity we can't miss, quickly go get our men to pick up the pace, we can still catch them off guard, they haven't deployed scouts yet'' I told my men.
For the next 2 hours, we watched as tents were erected from a position far enough away not to raise the camp alarms.
When my army was arriving, we saw that the movement of the enemy began by the cloud of dust that was being generated with the advance of my army.
Quickly, I made my men form up, concentrating that our right flank was more nourished with the most veteran men.
My plan is simple, one of the oldest techniques in the book, battle in oblique order, we will give everything in an attack on the right flank, cause a rapid collapse of the enemy army if possible without the center or the left flank even enter combat.
I had a meeting with all the officers giving them autonomy of decision and let them decide for themselves what tactic to use, because of the damned terrain it is only possible to see the development of one part of the combat at a time and I preferred to direct the cavalry personally to be alert to any opportunity to outflank our enemies.
The right flank was composed mainly of the only tercio that was completely Prussian and 2 tercios of inhabitants of the reach, if all goes well we should be able to put enough pressure to force a retreat and use our cavalry superiority.
We were already in perfect battle position while our enemies were still trying to form a line of battle.
That's when I gave the order to advance
the right flank was the first to advance, taking quite a distance from the rest of the army, I with the cavalry followed close behind.
After 10 minutes, the other parts of our force began to march,
the advance was slow, while our enemy was static, I had my eyes set on the enemy cavalry there were barely more than 700 of them, we were far outnumbering them, they were using normal spears, so our kopia will be overwhelming when we charge them.
When we were close enough for the infantry to start fighting, tyrosh's men began to use archers, making use of their superior range.
We continued to advance until the 3 tercios on the right flank began their harassment tactics with crossbows.
This was the moment to act, I ordered my knights to form a wedge, and we prepared to charge.
''by god and fatherland'' I said as I spurred my horse.
Quickly, we rode across the field, keeping in sight of tyrosh's cavalry who were beginning to charge as well.
I pointed my kopia at my opponent, at the moment of collision my kopia exploded into hundreds of pieces, I watched as splinters of wood spaced through the air and saw how the enemy knight was dismounted by my brutal attack.
Quickly, I moved my hand to my mace and that's when the horses collided, melee had begun, and we had all the advantage, many of the enemy vanguard had been dismounted by our charge
I led my horse in to approach in search of my first opponent.
When I was within range of the first heathen, I gave him three consecutive blows in the shoulder, causing him to fall from his horse.
I felt a blow to my back as I turned around, an enemy was striking me with his sword, but it barely scratched my armor.
When he tried to throw another blow I grabbed his wrist and using my strength I threw him to the ground, leaving him as easy prey for any of my men.
I continued fighting until after killing 3 more enemy knights I saw how the remains of the cavalry began to retreat
They had lost too many men in too short a time, I quickly turned to one of my cavalry officers
grabbing him by the shoulder to get his attention
''take your men and chase the enemy, I will be on the alert to charge the infantry'' I said to the cavalry master.
he nodded and began to gather his men to chase the enemy that was fleeing the battlefield.
Quickly, I went to see how the infantry was fighting, and the fight had not yet begun.
Reorganizing our formation, we waited patiently for the infantry to be distracted before we began our charge.
When the time came, we charged again, leaving the vanguard of most of the knights who had not used their kopia in the previous charge.
We broke through the enemy ranks with force, striking blows left and right, in a short time the desperate screams were almost all that I could hear.
Watching how slowly the enemy forces were beginning to lose cohesion and were trying to flee.
For the next 40 minutes, the combat continued, but the winner had already been decided with the right flank destroyed, we were crushing the rest without mercy.
Our plan had been executed perfectly, the center and right flank barely got into combat and the enemy right flank had collapsed so fast that our casualties were likely to be minimal.
I gave the order for the cavalry to pursue the rest of the survivors, to assist the Finns in trying to capture mercenary captains and tyrosh officers.
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