w

C112

After a day of travel, the group of mercenaries, Quintin family guards, and Lioness Knights blew a loud horn, making their presence known, as they arrived on the outskirts of Lioness Kingdom to its eastern border/southeast of Venta City. In front of them stood a ruined fort, however its battlements, broken walls and large stone debris weren't sleeping peacefully as it should be.

The fort had several tents inside and outside the fort. There was also a thin wooden palisade guarding its entrance and about a hundred people stood behind the spikes and about another fifty or so on the broken battlements. These people were wearing either hide or leather armor, the typical signature clothing of a marauder but some seemed to be normal looking peasants.

The combined three stood before the ruined fort, waiting for a messenger to go out and meet them. Emery stood beside the commander of the troops, Sir Bagdemagus and Kastan, while Morgana was standing behind him. Soon enough, the ruined fort spewed forth three people riding horses and one of them had his one of his arms raised.

Once the three people were within a distance where they could turn back with ease, the person who had his arm raised shouted with a booming voice, "Our leader wishes to speak!"

Sir Bagdemagus nodded and said, "Keane, Merlin, go and speak with them."

"Yes, sir," said Keane, the knight with one eye. "Okay," Emery said.

Emery and the one-eyed knight Keane rode to the center of the field and met with the other three. They were still quite a distance away but Emery could see that the person in the middle was a brawly man with long messy hair and better looking fur clothing. Emery's instinct was telling him that this person was evil.

"What is the meaning of this?" the man asked. He then looked at Emery and said, "You are not the leader, are you?"

Keane drew his sword, pointed it at the burly man, and said, "You are Padraig, Chief Marauder of the Crimson Fang! Disband your group and give up your weapons so that you may be judged by the law of our kingdom. If you do not, you shall suffer greater punishment."

"There must be a mistake! We are just simple farmers, go back with this pretentious boy for you have gotten the wrong people!"

"There are no mistakes! Surrender now or you shall face Sir Bagdemagus, the Knight of the Anvil, Guardian of the Lioness shall strike you down."

Emery committed to memory the face of this burly man with the long bushy hair who looked like shuddered for a moment hearing Sir Bagdemagus' name. So, he was Padraig, the leader of the Crimson Fang, the one who issued the raid to the ruined home, and the one who had the answers to his questions!

His grip on the horse's harness tightened. A fire burned within him for all he wanted to do right now was to kick the horse and mince this chief marauder with every fiber of his being. However, this wasn't the right timing, calm yourself, Emery. He said to himself.

The burly man then spat on the ground, he smiled and shouted toward the old knight, "So, you're the Knight of the Anvil! You and what army, huh? There are only a few of you! Come if you wish to die."

"So be it," said Keane the one-eyed knight. Once the marauders turned around, so did he, followed by Emery.

When they returned, Emery realized that the old knight didn't ask for anything. It looked like he had already expected things would turn out, and to confirm that the Sir Bagdemagus turned to Emery and said, "It would've been best if they surrendered. However, no one really does that. Still, proper etiquette and declaration must be done even if our opponents are criminals for we are knights."

As more time interactions Emery did with this Knight of the Anvil, the more he could see why people talked highly of him. However, there was still that nagging feeling at the pit of his stomach that was preventing him from fully trusting this knight. It looked like Granny truly did damage him by a lot. He shook away his thoughts and said, "What do you think of our chances of winning, Sir Bagdemagus? I think they still have more people inside the ruined fort than what they're letting us see."

The old knight crossed his arms for a moment and said, "Well, let me hear your thoughts first. You should've a better view than I did."

"So… right now we have counted one hundred people standing at the gate, but they also have archers and it's better to assume they have another reserve inside the ruined fort. Assuming everything, I'd say they'd have around two hundred people in total," answered Emery.

"Okay, what else?" the old knight said, nodding.

Emery turned to look at them once more. "Since they are marauders, they are not disciplined fighters like the knights or the Quintin Guards. As for their equipment… I think I can see… about half of them don't have the proper gear, while ours do."

"Alright, good inside. What do you think would be the best way to approach them?" asked Sir Bagdemagus.

"I… don't know, sir. I have no experience devising strategies for battles on this scale…" Emery said, his voice diminishing as it reached the end of the sentence.

"That's fine, I still want your input."

Emery then assessed the situation and hesitantly said, "They may have bigger numbers, but we have better mobility with the horses. So… I guess a pincer attack? Attack the hundred men from both sides then the melee troops attack in the middle and focus killing their leader?"

"Okay, not bad. But there are things you should have considered," said the old knight.

"Please enlighten me, sir," hastily said Emery.

"In every battle or a fight, you must focus on the objective. Our objective is to disband this marauder group not to kill every one of them. They are not an enemy army, and like you said there are peasants among them. So in a way, they are civilians, and most likely ours. Therefore if we surround them and push them to fight till the death, there will only be more casualties on both sides, we don't want that" said Sir Bagdemagus.

"Secondly, you failed to consider the archers on the battlements, our horses will be fired upon if they come too near, they also have that palisade which they can use to stop our horses from advancing effectively. Thirdly, they have a fort, albeit it is ruined, our knights on horses will not be able to get inside and they'll have to dismount. That gives the enemy more time to attack with archers and our people who will be on the front line will be sitting ducks against the rain of arrows.

"The best way to approach this is to push our way inside the fort as fast as possible. Once they feel their fort is not secure, their morale will go down dramatically and they'll try to route."

Sir Bagdemagus then summoned his two officers, Kastan included, and shouted, "We'll form two layers of battleline, in the front are our knights with heavy armor and shield while the rest will be right behind them! We shall push our way inside with overwhelming force, do you understand?"

"Yes, commander!" shouted the two officers and Kastan.

"Sir, with this plan, are you not worried that the leader will run away, possibly on horseback?" Emery asked.

"Of course he will try to run away. But the moment he does, our victory will have been secured. I do not believe these people are here because of loyalty to him, rather, they're here because of desperation or greed. After all, they are a group of ragged tag criminals and recent peasants. People with no loyalty or morale are the weakest of units in a battle. Still, remember, Padraig may be our target but our overarching goal is to dissuade and capture these people, hence they wouldn't be able to do criminal acts again. Cutting the head of a criminal organization only gets replaced by a worse candidate, they'll always return like a hydra," answered the old knight.

"I understand," was what Emery had said in response to Sir Bagdemagus. However, that was their objective, not his. His' had always been the same, and that was to enact revenge for his late father.

Since the order from the commander had been passed down to his officers, the officers ordered all the knights who were on horseback to dismount from their horses.

Thirty fully armed knights formed the first line and the Quintin guards who practiced formation with the mercenaries formed the second line.

Once everything had been settled, the horn for battle sounded in the battlefield and Sir Bagdemagus waved his sword and shouted, "Advance!"

To be continued