Herald of Steel

Chapter 706 Lord Ponticus's Counter-Attack (Part-3)

As Thesalie arranged its forces at the foot of the city, Alexander, being as quickly as possible informed of this, also at once ordered his own army to form up outside the camp into proper battle formation to reply to this threat.

And so the camp was very quickly set abuzz with activity, where soldiers ran to and fro carrying weapons and armor, slaves and servants performed all kinds of errands and officers barked orders to get his unit organized.

While the commander of the whole thing, Alexander who oversaw all of this was neither panicked nor fearful at this sudden turn of events, his heart unconcerned by this sudden, what seemed to be imminent night battle.

"Heh! So they finally could not wait!" 

Instead, he smirked mockingly.

To him, it seemed that whoever the commander of the city was had finally lost his nerve, and seeing he was about to attack the next morning, had decided to hastily launch this attack at this odd hour. 

And the decision to leave the safety of their walls and engage him in direct combat was too foolish in Alexander's opinion. 

In fact, the enemy doing this was almost like a wet dream come true for him. 

Because it meant that now he would not have to fight these tens of thousands of soldiers on the narrow walls where his numerical superiority would have been neutralized.

Nor would he have to push through that huge mass of soldiers to clear the walls.

Previously, Alexander had already accepted that the casualties from those fights would be heartbreaking for him. 

But now, if they fought on the open field, Alexander could avoid all those losses.

He was even very confident that he would be able to win the battle. 

Because not only did he have a larger force, but he also had the terrain advantage, as his legionnaires were able to make much better use of the rough terrain than the opposing phalangites.

So in his eyes, it was certainly a mistake for the enemy to come out to meet him in the open like this.

But it was not like Alexander thought the commander to be a complete idiot.

No.

Because he could also understand where the enemy commander was coming from.

Alexander guessed the man probably felt that if they stayed inside their walls and only just passively fended off the attacks without effectively striking back, they would be at one point eventually overwhelmed.

And that type of thinking was indeed correct in some sense.

After all, against Alexander's siege towers, they had no real answer.

Setting them on fire before they could reach the walls was too hard and it was durable enough that rocks from the catapults would not be able to destroy them on time.

And even if they knew where the soldiers from the towers were going to make the landing, they could not bunch up to repel them through sheer numbers because then they would present themselves as the perfect target for the archers on the walls, who would turn them into porcupines.

It had to be remembered that those 1,000 lb crossbows were no joke, being able to easily pierce even the thickest shields the Tibians carried.

And even a hit to the nonvital areas give a grievous wound, with a good chance of making it infectious.

While a good, proper hit to a major area would cause an instant death.

It could even knock a man off his feet.

So after facing four months of the terrifying weapon, the Tibian defenders had learned to grow very wary of the weapon's power.

As for the scorpion, well that one's lethality did not need to be even said.

The huge darts would rip through wooden shields like paper and literally send a man flying if hit directly, skewering through him.

There was even one incident during this siege when the weapon did the almost miraculous feat of going through two men simultaneously, making both die with a look of utter incredulation on their faces.

And these weapons loved nothing more than to see clustered up men, where they could reap lives like harvesting wheat.

It was due to all these difficulties in holding the wall that Alexander believed the enemy had come out to face him in the open in this 'last-stand' kind of fashion.

As Tibias formed itself in front of their city, Alexander's men too continued to do the same in front of their camp, with both sides keeping an ever-vigilant eye on the other, in case one side decided to charge to try and take advantage of the other still disorderly lines.

"My lord, should we call back our men manning the walls and siege towers," And as this was happening, Menes came to Alexander with this proposal.

There were currently about 3,500 to 4,000 men there, manning the walls, catapults, and siege towers, and though they were on the eastern side, while the enemy was just of them, Menes still felt it would be prudent for this detached force to rejoin with the main group.

Hearing the request, Alexander thought about it for a bit.

From the direction of his camp, these soldiers were straight north of him.

While the enemy was north-west. 

So if the enemy were to march south down towards him, their flanks would be exposed to this nearly one legion worth of troops present to their east.

They would never be able to ignore that threat.

So to neutralize that, they would have to send a detachment force to engage the legion, thus weakening their main force.

This would be a very good outcome for Alexander.

But that was the good version.

The bad version was if Tibias decided to detach a much disproportionately bigger force to attack those soldiers and if Alexander was unable to come to help in time, then they risked being overrun and destroyed.

However, this was really Alexander being too pessimistic.

Because such an outcome was very unlikely given all the fortifications around the siege works, as well as the presence of thousands of crossbowmen and other weapons on the wall that would be able to rain down huge volumes of firepower on any attacking force.

Hence with a bit of thought, Alexander declared,

"No, let them be there. The siege towers and the walls cannot be left undefended, They need to be protected." 

"And I suspect the enemy's real target might very well be those. Why else would they be launching this attack at such a god-forsaken time?"

"We cannot let them succeed." 

Alexander clenched his teeth in determination.

And then turning to Menes, gave the order regarding those soldiers,

"Tell the three battalions on the ground to stop protecting their individual towers and join together to form a solid, coherent defensive line."

"If they are too scattered, the enemy will be able to pick them off one at a time." 

"Then order men on the walls to also remain alert and support those on the ground in case of an attack."

"And lastly send three more battalions to reinforce them. That should boost morale."

With this order, the forces there would be brought up to a full-fledged legion and be much better prepared to deal with any attacks, at least until Alexander could send adequate help.

"Yes!" And Menes had no problem with this order, as he saluted, before riding off to relay the order.

"Wait!" Or he was about to when he when Alexander suddenly demanded his attention.

And as Menes turned back curiously, he heard Alexander add, "Send Remus to take overall charge of the legion there."

"And have him take 300 cavalry. Just in case the enemy tries to do a sneak attack on the towers while we are occupied."

It took a lot of time, money and men to make those towers and naturally Alexander was really protective of them, even sending a tenth of his cavalry to act as a kind of rapid reaction force. 

Once Alexander was finished, Menes quickly rode off to arrange for the execution of the order, while soon Grahtos took that place in front of Alexander, informing, 

"My lord, our scouts are back. They say that the enemy right now numbers around 15,000 to 20,000."

"But given they have not finished forming up and many more are still pouring out of the gates, the number could be expected to rise to as much as 30,000." 

The tone here was neutral because when they planned for this attack, they had obviously checked the city's garrison strength, which was reported to be 30,000.

Now of course that original number had been eroded by a few thousand due to the past four months of fighting.

But the scouts only gave a rough estimate, not an exact, down to the penny number. 

Besides, it was not impossible for them to recruit a few thousand city dwellers as replacements, now was it?

"......*Nod*, Good. Keep an eye on them. And inform me if they seem ready to charge." 

Upon hearing the report Alexander only stoically signaled that he had gotten the message.

It seemed that other than leaving the barest number of defenders on the wall, Thesalie was going all in.

And it suited him just fine.

So for the next two hours, both sides readied them for the imminent clash which likely would decide the fate of the city.

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