697 Take no Prisoners Part 2 (1/2)

The sound of the war drums picked up some urgency as the officers of each regiment nervously gave their orders. The foot soldiers behind the formation of wagons suddenly dispersed outwards while the soldiers on both sides of the shield formation advanced with their huge shields. Behind them were the foot soldiers armed with cross spears. The heavy-armored infantry has already rested enough and their magic armors could be used again.

They were as quick as lightning and could attack at the same speed as knights within a distance of five-hundred yards. Their halberts and short spears could destroy all kinds of heavy armors. These one-thousand heavy-armored foot soldiers were the elites of the sixth battalion.

Saleen has equipped these one-thousand soldiers with magic armors and weapons that could destroy heavy armors. These soldiers did not need to care about logistics. For every five soldiers, one of them would be issued with the skin of a purple-gold sea urchin to contain all their necessities and grain.

Saleen intended to use this one-thousandstrong regiment as a test to see if his plans for his armies were on the right track. Although knights were powerful military units, no army has ever relied on knights to build a country.

Usually the keys to victory lied in a powerful army of foot soldiers and mages. The knights would not be in the same category unless Saleen could successfully manufacture enough flying puppets to contain an individual's flying equipment.

Only then would one be considered a real knight, a flying knight!

Flying knights were a unit created in the elf dimension. Back then, almost all humans could fly so there was no need to research into any flying equipment or magic beasts that could save humans from walking. Now, humans could create flying equipment but a lot was required and many materials could no longer be found on other dimensions. For example, thundercloud wood grew only on the trees in giant dimension. It was the most suitable material for flying equipment because it would not be affected by lightning even if the flyer flew amongst the clouds.

The ancient humans merely used such wood to make boats.

After retrieving many sunken ships, Saleen had wanted to use the thundercloud wood to create shields but subsequently discovered metallic steel rocks. Although the latter was heavier, it could be refined more easily. As long as there were enough supplies, he would be able to equip his armies on a large scale.

Thereafter, Saleen decided to use thundercloud wood to build combat vessels. After all, he could not possibly depend only on winged skull for his naval forces. However, Eleanor had then passed Saleen a pile of diagrams and one of them mentioned about flying puppets that could carry humans.

Saleen was only left with thundercloud wood to create the body of the flying puppet.

With thundercloud wood, Saleen focused more on the infantry. These magic heavy-armored infantry would be used for experimentation.

The heavy-armored infantry of the sixth battalion had regained their strengths. The shield formation on both sides opened up and knocked back the Phoenix rebel army that had been charging towards them.

The shield formation was meant to defend against the knights' charging. In all Qin armies, the knights' warhorses were all clad with armors with a long metal ram on their chest area. When it made contact with foot soldiers, the latter would be crushed.

The giant shields that were two meters tall pushed forward in a line. The Phoenix foot soldiers had nowhere to attack. Both parties were squeezed together. The knights of the sixth battalion and the group of envoys remained still. The best way to utilize knights was to defeat the enemy at one go rather than to be tangled up with thousands of foot soldiers.

The foot soldiers of the sixth battalion that were armed with shields bravely advanced forward while those armed with six yard long spears followed closely behind. Such a long weapon could only be wielded by soldiers with a certain level of proficiency. The Phoenix soldiers were being forced close together and the gaps between each soldier became narrower. This was when the soldiers holding shields dispersed to reveal the long spears behind them.

The Phoenix soldiers that had been wielding war axes and heavy hammers at their opponents were instantly pierced into a stick of bloody calabash.

The Phoenix soldiers had long spears of their own but they were only four meters long. After the spear soldiers had been pushed aside by the shield soldiers, the foot soldiers armed with heavy weapons charged to the front, hoping to smash through the shield formation. Unfortunately, they did not expect the change in the sixth battalion's formation and suffered heavy losses.

The shield soldiers would not be able to hang on to the giant shield for long if they did not change their formation.

The Phoenicians were also made up of a mixture of military units. When they saw how much damage the long spears inflicted, the foot soldiers armed with heavy swords quickly rushed forward to cut them off. A normal long spear was made of wood and only the tip was made of metal. However, the first two meters of the sixth battalion's long spears were wrapped with a layer of metal wirings so they could not be chopped off so easily.

Such long spears were dispensable to the sixth battalion since the materials used were not valuable. After killing hundreds of Phoenix soldiers, the enemy began to chop off these long spears, rendering them useless.

At this point, one-thousand archers rushed to the front and shot at the enemy's formation.

The shield formation did not vanish completely. Instead, every six shields would form a circle and crossbow arrows were shot out from within. The sixth battalion's handheld crossbows could attack only at a range of two to three meters, which were shorter than bows, but they could shoot consecutively.

These handheld crossbows were unable to inflict a lot of damage but they managed to break down the Phoenicians' attacks successfully. Both sides were tangled up with each other and not before long, the shield soldiers have broken up the Phoenix foot soldiers into small clusters.