Blitzkrieg in The reach

''Veni, vidi, vici''.

Friedrich Wilhelm extracted from the book of Robert's rebellion by Maester Luwin 289 AC

Friedrich Wilhelm POV

Since the battles of the bells it has been 1 day, with of fast and swift march we managed to reach the territories The reach you can tell the difference when an army is organized and trained to march, black fish said it would take 3 days to arrive, currently we camped intending to establish the strategy with which to proceed

''Currently, the tyrell army is besieging the capital of the Stormlands, so we can expect minimal resistance in the castles, they are confident that Robert's rebellion is dead because of Jon Connington'' stated black fish.

''how quickly can the local lords mount a resistance'' asked lothar looking at the map in the center of the table

''they only left garrisons, Mace tyrell's army is almost as big as yours, besides the lords don't know that you have plans to attack, they should coordinate through ravens to mount a defense good enough to resist mace returning from the Stormlands'' black fish said pointing at the Stormlands

Can you explain to me how the ravens worked,'' I asked

''don't you guys use ravens to send messages? Having no answer, he continued

''the ravens are used to send messages between castles, it is important to shoot them down to avoid a leak of information, the less they know about us the better'' said black fish

''then the speed with which we act is critical, tell me Brynden where do the lords of the seven kingdoms keep the crows? I asked him looking at the map

''usually they are kept in the highest tower of the castle, so they have a better take off for flight.''

''anyone wants to offer their idea of how to proceed?''

Lothar asked to speak again ''we should divide our forces and attack several places at the same time, that way they won't be able to organize themselves and with the chaos, we generate we can quickly take the castles without risking a direct combat''.

Lothar's words are well received by the German high command because he is the highest-ranking officer after me.

I want to offer a different vision'' I said to my officers ''we recently captured many banners from the royalists, we could use them to try to enter the castles without a fight ensuring a quick conquest and avoid the problem of the ravens the quicker we take the castle the better'' everyone seemed to hesitate except the black fish who nodded as if it was a better plan.

Charles asked for the word''my lord that would not be in accordance with our vows of chivalry, it may be the best strategy, but not the most honorable''all my men nodded at his words.

I am surrounded by honorable fanatics.

''don't translate this'' I said looking at the man translating everything to black fish

''they are heathens, they don't follow our faith, chivalry vows only operate against Christians, this is not a war of honor, we are here to survive, don't forget we don't know where we are this is no time to get stuck with our chivalry ways we must, commit acts we would never consider before for the greater good'' I said looking to all my men

Uncertainty was noticeable in the tent, there is still no unanimous decision on how to act, and I did not want to use my authority as king for decision-making, but with a little more appeal to their duty I managed to convince them to implement my strategy because its success is not certain, if this goes well the castles will fall like flies in the worst-case scenario we have 5000 engineers who can arm artillery in 1 day and capture the castles in 1 or 2 days

''well it is decided, translate back to black fish'' the translator nodded

''we will divide into 4 attack forces 27500 men each 1,the first attack force will be led by lothar, his duty will be to take the northern territories of the reach, the second group led by Charles will take the castles bordering the western lands, the third group will be led by me and I will take all the castles of the Manderly river the fourth group will be led by Aleksanteri with the help of the black fish his mission will be to take all the castles that the other 3 forces do not consider a priority, I expect the highest levels of discipline from my soldiers, I do not want unnecessary killings, I do not want rapes and that the looting is done according to our customs only taking a part of their food and all the precious metals that they find, is it clear?''all nodded

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Cavalry Captain POV

''supplies?''.. ''ready my captain'''.

''weapons?''.. ''ready my captain'''.

''horses? ''... ready my captain''

''Well, let's get going, the high command expects us to take one castle a day, yes I know it sounds difficult, but we will act in disguise we will use the royalist banner to try and take the keeps with a minimum number of casualties, so everyone takes off your tabards, does anyone have a question about our plan?'', no one replied

''get on your horses and go ahead according to our sources we must take the Roxton's castle''.

After giving the pertinent orders to my subordinates, we rode for almost 2 hours until we could finally see the ''castle'' of lord Roxton.

''should we take that'', said one of my sergeants

''yes I know it's a fortified tower nothing more, it looks like it's all that lord can afford''.

''but with siege weapons that tower would fall in less than 1 hour why should we do this'', said a rather annoyed corporal

''it is not our responsibility to judge our king's orders, he has never been wrong, and he will not start now and if he thinks you should die marching blindfolded you will obey, or I will crucify you all before the day is out'' they all received my threat and continued without saying a word

Finally, we were near the gates of your wall, the reason why I was chosen to be the leader of these men is because I know how to speak English or common language as they say here, it was quite useful to have English prisoners in the Great Religious War, if everything goes well I could opt for a promotion for the merit of my contribution, maybe they will give me a knight title''.

When we arrived at the gate, I stopped daydreaming and prepared to speak, everything depended on this now.

''who is it, identify yourself'' said the guard at the gate ''I am Ser Boros a knight in the service of the king's hand lord Jon Connington, lord Connington, needs to use the ravens of Roxton house to send an urgent message to lord Paramount Mace Tyrell'' I said trying to use my best English.

''and what would this message be?'' said the guard quite relaxed

well he is relaxed he suspects nothing at the moment.

''The message is secret, it has been requested that it can only be seen by Lord Mace Tyrell'', the guard upon hearing my words came down from the gate

''wait I'll be right back I'm going to ask the castle Castellan''.

After waiting for what seemed like an eternity, the guard returned to the wall.

''open the door, ser, the Castellan is waiting inside, so he can send his message, sorry for the wait'' said the guard with great respect to my false noble title.

We went through the doors and when a large part of my company had passed we were approached by a man in a brown habit and a man in apparently expensive clothes

''hello, ser I am Maester Denis can you give me the message you need to send'' the man in a brown habit and with chains around his neck greeted me.

''oh sure'' I said dismounting from my horse ''the message is, this castle is now the property of the king in Prussia'' I said as I grabbed the man's chains and threw him violently to the ground.

Castellan's eyes almost popped out of their sockets when he saw how I attacked the Maester, I quickly used my mace and smashed the brains out of the nearest Roxton house guard.

''Attack now, for the king, for god and for Fatherland''!

The combat broke out quickly, we outnumbered the guards almost 2 to 1, and we had more men waiting outside the walls, my men were able to subdue the guards very easily because they were taken by surprise.

''loose'' said a crossbow sergeant, the crossbowmen fired their bolts killing several guards.

Taking advantage of the chaos I infiltrated the tower to reach the ravens and avoid the leakage of information, on the way I killed 4 guards with the help of my men, the servants were running and screaming like crazy and the few remaining guards were throwing their weapons to surrender, I quickly reached the top of the tower, only to find a beautiful woman with the heraldry of the roxton house with a feather in her hand and papyrus in the other with 2 children.

''stay away bandit, I won't let you defile me and hurt my children'' said the woman taking a dagger and pointing it at me

''put the dagger down and no one will get hurt''.

''I will not fall for your lies, you only plan to deceive me, so you can rape me and torture my children,'' she said approaching the large window next to her children

''woman stay away from the window, I have orders to not commit any harm to those who surrender'' I said this, but it seemed to have no effect on her, it only caused her to look at the window several times.

''oh no, she's going to do it'' I quickly jumped up to try to grab her, but she was quicker and jumped off the tall tower with her children with her

''mommy, please don't'' were the last words I heard before I fell to the floor, followed by the sound of something scattering on the floor

''god, she jumped with her children, she committed suicide with her children how can a mother do that'' said one of my sergeants.

Quickly, I stood up and looked at the ground, I could see how her body and her 2 poor children were blown away by the force of the impact

''my god, what am I going to tell my commander now'' I said looking at my subordinates who were as surprised as I was.

I pulled myself together and continued with my work, I was in charge of looting the valuables and taking the gold that Lord Roxton had, it was not much about 3000 gold coins or golden dragons, we gave the signal that the castle was under our control and when a garrison of the tercios arrived I gave my report to my superior, I continued with my work and headed to the next castle to take.

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3 hours later

Lothar von ruppin POV

Tumbleton a market town, it only took us 30 minutes to get it under our control, these heathens barely put up a fight, our divine king's plan works just as he planned, the heathens opened the gates to us and then surrendered when they saw they were vastly outnumbered, after securing the loot from the castle treasury, the not inconsiderable sum of 300000 golden dragons, I was now heading out to help with the looting efforts of the civilian population.

I still don't understand why we should spare the lives of these heathens and worse yet serve them as mercenaries, we could easily conquer these barbarians with no problem, god knows our faith is strong and our king invincible on the battlefield, but he doesn't seem to cooperate with the worship of god, how could the apple fall so far from the tree?, my king is too tolerant of these heathens

If it were not because it is my duty to serve him, I would have burned this city to ashes by now and worse still the man who should most remind the king of his religious duties, the grand master of the Teutonic order is more interested in teaching him tolerance than reminding him of the sacred duty of the Hohenzollern house of protectors of Protestantism.

The plundering went on as usual families outside their houses crying like women, for what they did not know how to defend like men, my soldiers entered their houses and took out all the valuable metal they had.

''get out of my sight you thieves, you will not touch my family'' said a heathen with a sword threatening professional Prussian soldiers.

My men responded accordingly, especially since they don't speak his language, they quickly tackled him and punched him repeatedly in the face, followed by several kicks in the stomach, a pretty light treatment for that filthy heathen.

When we arrived at the commercial area of this city I saw how my men seized all the merchants property, it almost made me happy to see the faces of despair of the merchants and how they could do nothing and worse still they will not be able to leave the city until further notice as a measure to prevent information from getting out about our presence

Finally, I arrived at the most disgusting place in the city, their sept where they worship their false gods, I received specific orders that the places of worship are not touched, the king wants to ''avoid'' a violent response from the heathens to our occupation, but anyway I'll see if I can fleece them something, the less gold is destined to proselytize their false gods the better.

When I arrived at the door of his sept I was greeted by several priests of his faith.

''Stand back this is the home of the gods, it cannot be desecrated with blood'' the sept said fearfully showing us the icon of their faith, a 7 pointed star.

I prepared myself and adjusted my bandages, my chest still hurt from the blows I received.

''So I see it, but I wonder priest, are you willing to collaborate to avoid the bloodbath?'' I said with my somber tone

''what do you mean''' said the priest

''how many coins is this Sept worth to you to avoid the problem of bloodshed''

''If I give you the coin of donations, will you spare the sept and the people?'', asked the priest.

''Of course it is up to you whether you want to be remembered as a smart septon who avoided the looting of the place of worship by just handing over the gold or be remembered as the greedy idiot who kept the donation coin and condemned the lives of everyone in his Sept and, obviously, yours''.I said with my somber tone

''Wait, here'' the septon ran out, almost falling twice because of the nervousness of his steps.

After the passage of 15 minutes the septon returned with the help of other members of his sept carrying several chests.

''This is all we can give, if we give him everything we will not be able to continue with our charity work with the poor'' said the septon with a voice full of fear.

''I checked the contents of the chests and was surprised at the amount of coins they have, it reminds me of a church we recently kicked his ass in Europe, almost 30000 golden dragons and 15000 silver coins and too many copper coins to count, this was a medium-sized Sept if we got to the biggest Sept I can't imagine how much gold they will have.

''this will be enough priest, calm down, you did the right thing, now if you will excuse me I have reports to write up and wheat to weigh''

Saying this I returned to the lord's keep where I spent the rest of the day preparing my king's beloved reports.