Rome Must Fall Chapter 55: Deception
Thinking of this, Furius was full of energy and excitedly ordered again: Let the soldiers speed up their march!
After hearing this, a centurion couldn't help but remind him: "Sir, the weather is hot today. We must prevent the soldiers from suffering from heatstroke due to excessive marching!"
Forius glared at him and argued: "It is precisely because of the hot weather that we have to speed up and try to reach Naples earlier. Then I will try to get the Neapolitans to provide Vesuvius. The wine produced quenches the soldiers' thirst."
Forius also asked his men to pass on his explanation. The soldiers no longer complained, but cheered.
Seeing this, Furius raised the corners of his mouth proudly and looked up at the fiery red sun in the sky: The military camp commander Cassinius was Valerius’s former comrade-in-arms. As a veteran, in such a The marching speed should be slowed down in the hot weather... In this way, when I set off from Naples tomorrow to attack the slave camp, Cassinius's troops will be more than half a day's journey away. By the time I defeat those Slaves, they may not be able to arrive...
While Forius was thinking about it, a Roman cavalry in front held up a spear tied with feathers (this meant that he was a temporary messenger and wanted to convey an urgent message), galloping towards him, and the soldiers got out of the way.
"Sir, more than 5,000 slaves are approaching us!" Tanqi reported nervously to Furius.
"Five thousand slaves..." After hearing this, Forius not only did not feel nervous, but was very excited: "These lowly slaves did not stay in their own camp and dared to attack me! They are coming It’s just right, it saved us a lot of energy!”
"Sir, their number may be far more than 5,000, and they also have cavalry. They drove us away, so we were unable to explore more deeply." Tanqi reminded.
"Cavalry?!" Furius was stunned for a moment and quickly asked: "How are these slaves equipped?"
"Most of them have no armor or even weapons. They carry farm tools and sticks. Only a few of them have the same equipment as ours and should have been obtained in the last battle."
Forius became more confident and then asked: "How far are these slaves from us?"
"Uh...it was about six miles when I left."
Forius stopped asking questions and turned to the herald: "Order the soldiers to stop advancing immediately, put on their armor, pick up their swords and shields, and line up southward to prepare to meet the enemy!"
The herald also heard the report of the detective cavalry just now, and did not raise any objections such as "The enemy is coming fiercely, we should retreat for the time being". Instead, he believed that Forius's decision was a matter of course: How could the citizens of Rome do this? Shrink before a bunch of lowly slaves, who are nothing more than a rabble no matter how many they come!
With this mentality, he galloped beside the marching column and shouted loudly repeatedly.
The soldiers stopped advancing, perhaps because they heard that the incoming enemy was a slave. They acted relatively calmly and calmly put down the fulka sticks on their shoulders and took off the straps tied to their heads. He picked up his luggage, took out his square shield from the cloth cover, put on the helmet hanging on his chest, and then began to line up under the command of the team officers. The army slaves packed up the soldiers' luggage, took the carriage with the army, and hid behind the array... The whole process was orderly, which was the result of two months of hard training.
Forius was satisfied with the performance of the soldiers. Now he commanded 4 brigades with about 2,000 people, which was not enough to form a traditional military formation, so he asked the soldiers to leave Ania Avenue and On the west side of the road, they were arranged in a tight horizontal formation facing south.
Not long after the Roman soldiers lined up, they saw the enemy appearing in the distance: these enemies had no prominent military flags, no bright armor, no sharp weapons, and no neat queues. They were ragged and incompetent. The queue, pushing and shoving, noisily rushed along Agna Avenue towards the north...
"Is this our enemy? Even my old man can defeat them in battle." A soldier's ridicule caused a burst of laughter from the surrounding soldiers.
The Roman soldiers seemed very relaxed, and Furius was equally relaxed. He hoped that these stupid slaves would just rush over, and then he would lead his army to give them a heavy blow...
But then he saw a dozen slave cavalry rushing to the front of the enemy from the avenue, shouting something at them. After a while, the enemy stopped advancing and actually started to try to form an array... …
Forius felt a little uneasy, and there was an impulse in his heart to let the soldiers attack while the enemy was in chaos. But he quickly held back. After all, the two armies were about one mile apart. Our aggressive attack might scare these slaves away before they reached the enemy's position. The soldiers were wearing heavy armor, so it would be difficult to catch up. When the time comes for these thinly-clad slaves, he will have to lead an army to attack the slave camp, so he might as well just wait for the enemy to come over and die.
Furius made up his mind and continued to stand in front of the formation on horseback, patiently watching the enemy's strength...
Then, he saw that the enemies in front of him became orderly after a period of chaos: the enemies in front simply formed an array and then continued to move to both sides, while the enemies in the rear continued to surge up. , it is like a growing bamboo, with an original point gradually turning into a line, and the length of this line has exceeded the square array and continues to extend...
Furius felt more and more uneasy, and then his eyes widened: heavily armed soldiers appeared in the center of the enemy's formation, and there were more and more of them, shining with light under the scorching sun...
Damn Tan Ma! Are you blind? Most of the enemies are poorly equipped! Their armored soldiers far outnumber us! ... Furius cursed in his heart and almost wanted to give an order to retreat, but his reason told him: retreating in front of the formation is a taboo. Even if they are a few hundred meters apart, these heavily armored soldiers under him cannot run very far. , they may be overtaken by the almost unarmed slaves on both sides of the enemy formation, which will inevitably lead to defeat. If he is defeated without engaging the enemy, he will not only be held accountable by the Senate when he returns to Rome, but will also be cast aside by the people. His life will be over!
Thinking of this, Forius turned around resolutely and looked at the timid and restless soldiers~IndoMTL.com~ He raised his right arm high and shouted loudly: "Soldiers, you are noble Roman citizens, And they are just slaves for you to drive. No matter how many they are, they can't defeat us who are blessed by Jupiter and have excellent military traditions! Soldiers, for the glory of Rome, fight to the death! Fight to the death!..."
Inspired by Forius's inflammatory words, the soldiers' courage was inspired, and they also shouted: "Fight to the death!! Fight to the death!!!..."
At this moment, Spartacus stood in the center of the rebel array, looking at the Roman array in front, feeling very happy: The Romans did not run away, this is great!
You must know that in order to create a misunderstanding for the Romans, he specially arranged for the fifth and fourth cohorts to be the vanguard (most of the soldiers in these two cohorts did not have armor and weapons, especially the fifth cohort), and also asked the Austrians to Kemal led the cavalry to drive away the Roman cavalry... Now it seems that the plan was successful! ...Spartacus excitedly raised his dagger and pointed forward forcefully: "Attack!"
This time he did not need to act first with the soldiers around him to lead the entire army. After hearing his shout, several trumpeters beside him immediately blew the brass trumpets in their hands: "Woo!... …”
Cross, Enomui, Altonix, and Attumus, who were each standing at the front of their own team, heard the call to attack, and they all turned around and shouted: "Brothers, follow me forward! ”
The entire military formation began to move forward. In front of it was the Roman army that dominated the Mediterranean. The soldiers who were originally slaves were inevitably nervous, and the palms of their weapons were sweating. But in this huge military formation, Their ears were filled with the excited shouts of their comrades, and in front of them were the strong and vigorous figures of the gladiators. Their fear gradually faded, their desire for revenge rose sharply, and their steps became faster and faster...