Chapter 32: Advantageous battle preparations

Even before Eric had dealt with the bandits, he already planned to provoke Baron Jar into an open battle, and deliver a decisive strike ending their conflict once and for all, since he knows prolonged consecutive clashes might work against him. Moreover, with the current size of his army, he can't possibly siege Nieza in order to get to Baron Jar.

Furthermore, he knows that preparation is extremely important, and it is also advantageous for him to choose the location where to specifically do battle, which will increase his chance of winning.

Using the excuse of building a number of outposts in the forest west of Piran, the viscount brought soldiers, and even town folks and villagers to prepare for his plan. However, he was still careful to not leaked his plans, he didn't allow anyone to leave, or to go back home for the time being and even brought these men to the battlefield, though he announced that he will let them escape when the situation turned to the worse.

Thinking of his approach for the actual battle, Eric knows that most battles on an open field in Beltir will start with a cavalry charge, one of the mainly used battle tactics in the southwest region of Zevia, which had proven its effectiveness in history. He knows that he wouldn't win against baron's army in a normal way, which is why he planned to nullify the enemy's charge.

He instructed his men to construct a trap, the size of three football fields long. The middle pit area is dug four feet deep while the pit at the planks was dug two to three feet deep to minimize and concentrate the workload. Then they made mud using the excavated dirt and water from a nearby wide stream, after that they placed it back into the pit. They also planted wooden spikes in order to add damage to the unsuspecting enemies.

Baron's army didn't notice the pit since it had rained heavily numerous times during the week, which soaked the ground to some degree but shouldn't be enough to soften the ground to this extent.

When Eric and Drake strolled to the middle of the field to supposedly have a brief talk with the enemy leaders, they used a trail that wasn't dug up and separated the center mud field from the right field. Even though the trail is four feet wide, it still did not save any assaulting cavalry from falling into the pit at all.

....

On the mercenaries' side, Rig is a seventeen-year-old amateur level knight, with gray hair and dashing blue eyes, he is in charge of fifty men. He saw everything that had happened, how the heavy cavalry fell down simultaneously and is now being shot by crossbow bolts. Thinking that the cavalry might be done for and now their mercenary unit will probably have a tough time charging into an unbroken enemy line. He then instructed his men to slow down, while he tries to find the commander or one of the lieutenants to ask for further orders, and or come up with countermeasures. Since, unlike regular soldiers, mercenaries won't uselessly charge to certain deaths.

....

At the Baron's group's position, it looked like the cavalry had tripped or slipped on the ground altogether, like an unsuspecting pedestrian falling down an open man-hole. At the same time, the mercenaries are now somewhat reluctant to proceed and are just almost walking, clearly biding their time.

In a pit of rage, Baron Jar commanded all of his remaining men to attack, including Benny the only remaining knight, and supposedly the commander, only leaving a dozen and a half men to his guard.

....

Rig caught up and huddled with the mercenary commander and the lieutenants, but the older knight was reluctant to discontinue the charge, this is after they noticed the baron's remaining men closing in at their rear, and they had still need to get the remaining half of the payment for this job.

One of the lieutenants, a smart and experienced man proposed that the mercenaries continued to pretend to attack and only act when necessary. The band then split into two and moved to the side giving Baron's main army the center position while the two mercenary units got down the pit at the far side, but had almost stopped and just raised their shields and waited for an opportunity to attack or retreat, depending on the situation.

....

Eric smiled after seeing how the mercenaries responded, if they had decided otherwise, the viscount would have been forced to order his men to slowly moved back into the forest.

Sir. Benny knew that the enemy will likely just move back, scatter or even retreat into safety if they decide to circle around to reach them, which will prolong their campaign, contrary to what the baron wants. Even though wary of the tricks, the enemy might still have in their sleeves, Sir. Benny brought his almost three hundred men to the center mud field, they tried to climbed and stepped unto the bodies of their fallen and injured cavalry unit, with shields up, they carefully traverse the muddy pit, while around eighty archers are lined up at the back shooting arrows at their enemies giving them cover.

The senior knight scanned the enemy, the crossbowmen are now gone and hid at the back for safety, replaced by the original shield bearers and pikemen. Thinking that they don't have to worry about the crossbowmen anymore, the chief knight climbed to a small hill of bodies made up of corpses of his allies and their mounts. Standing more than a meter high, Benny now has a good view of the surroundings, he then started yelling orders to his men, giving clearer and more precise instructions.

After a while, Benny's men had started to emerge out of the pit, almost a hundred soldiers are now trying to form up in preparation to attack. While Benny is yelling on top of his lungs urging and threatening more of his men to hurry up out of the pit area, he then felt something scary and life-threatening, something horrifyingly sharp coming to him really fast, he instinctively lifts his left hand gripping a shield to cover his face and chest, and at the same time forced out an immense amount of aura and covered himself thoroughly.

Then after only a fraction of a second, he felt a slight prickling pain on his left arm, an arrowhead emerges and is stuck in his hand puncturing it and his shield, then another one on his shoulder. Benny's eyes widened, and as if time slowed down, his breathing and heartbeat became audible. In his mind, he thought, 'Oh goddess! An aura-coated arrow! Knight Master!'.

Knight Masters are not gods, they can still be killed, but if used properly can tip the scale of battles this size.

If the knight didn't react fast enough, the arrow would have penetrated and might even go through his shield and his arm, striking home at his neck and chest, ending his life. He was able to react on time because he had felt and experienced a similar feeling of that power of a knight master before. He was able to exchange a few blows with a knight master during a spar when he was younger and was still living in the capital. But still, to be able to react in the nick of time, the knight has incredible instinct.

....

"Nice save, old guy. Not bad", Eric murmured, while on his horse looking at the enemy knight at a distance.

"Let's go!", Eric firmly shouted to the twenty-four light cavalry around him. They are about to charge enemy soldiers who got out of the pit and are trying to assemble themselves.

"Yaaaahhhhh!!!!"

The light cavalry rammed the still forming enemies, disrupting their assembly and scattering them, even killing more than a dozen and injuring half of their numbers. The light cavalry then ran behind the shield bearers after the charge and is preparing for another one, while the enemy archers stopped shooting in order to not hit their allies.

....

It is almost two hours since the start of the battle, and by the looks of it, baron Jar's army now had only accumulated losses, while the battle is still far from over.

The baron stayed incredibly silent, but everyone around him can feel that he will surely burst out of anger any moment if things persist. 'What the hell is happening? This useless bunch of idiots!', hidden to everyone, Baron Jar has been cursing and already shouting in his mind.

At his side, Uren's face showed incredible worry, the idea of the baron's army being defeated is now creeping into his mind. He is already thinking of running away from this region of the kingdom to somewhere relatively safe for him until he can think of another plan.

Then suddenly an amateur knight in the baron's contingent yelled, "A group of riders approaching!". Everyone in the group got startled, they initially thought that the baron finally snapped, until they realized it isn't the case and looked towards the knight who yelled and is pointing to the north.

"Is that Sir Nelson?", a soldier on foot asked.

"No. That's the enemy cavalry!", another soldier responded shockingly and made a few steps back almost stumbling.

Fear and panic appeared on everyone's face, only the baron and five others have horses, the rest are on foot, and even if the baron decides to run with these five people, the enemy will most likely catch up to them since the approaching riders had already been galloping towards them at full speed, and will arrive in less than a minute.

"Where the hell is Nelson? That useless prick!", Baron Jar yelled with dread apparent in his voice.

Baron's group wasn't able to notice the approaching riders early, due to the fact that they felt safe, and assured, thinking that there are no other enemy units around that can threaten them at their position, and at the same time, they are also too focused on the battle in front of them.