"Let's get moving!" General Edgar shouted as the Joint Armies of Bodek and Taris started to march to their allocated point. Merah City's General Ana did the same too, but because her point of attack was nearer, she delayed her march a little later so that it would not be a mess. (Since three different armies were moving simultaneously would cause quite a big chaos.)
Once the two City Armies had been dispatched, it was finally time for General Yaega to take a quick breather as he reorganised his troops for the eventual fight. Everything was smooth sailing as usual and it still bothered Yaega that it had been way too quiet.
But despite his bad aching hunch, he still stuck to the war master plan and already sent his other troops to reinforce Bodek and Merah City's Armies. In the meantime, Church Agent Ravis had decided to stay in the temporary headquarters Taris Army had erected. When asked why he did not join the fight, he merely stated that he was here to oversee the completion of the Joint Army's task to defeat the soldiers in Demopolis.
Yaega knew that there was something up in Ravis' sleeve which he was not revealing and ordered two of his trusted aides Cak and Imin to keep an eye on him. While his aides protested that they should be on the battlefield with their general, Yaega emphasised that there could be a battle brewing behind the scenes and he would do anything needed to keep his men alive if necessary.
His aides reluctantly agreed as Yaega went off to the battlefield. As they were merely the distraction and possibly the frontline fodder, Yaega only had three full battalions consisting of a heavy armoured cavalry, a light armoured cavalry and a battalion for siege support.
Because of the ridiculous lack of mobility in the siege support battalion, they had already gone ahead when the other two armies had been dispatched as Yaega knew that both his heavy and light armoured cavalry could reach in time. Still, despite its name, the Siege Support Battalion was actually one of the best Taris City could offer. Cutting edge siege weapons such as magically powered catapults and trebuchets were part of the battalion.
Not only that, the city's best defenders wearing magical rune armours had been deployed to protect the mages that powered the siege weapons. This way, even when the sieges weapon teams had completed their objective in destroying a wall and creating a path for the army, the mages could easily abandon their siege weapons and join the fray against the Demopolis Home Guards.
They even have seasoned spearmen, archers and backup mages in case Demopolis was able to send aerial units or their own cavalry against the Siege Support Battalion. It was a battalion that supposedly was able to revolutionise the way how battles were fought given its versatility. Many cities remained sceptical of Yaega's new tactics since most battalions were focused on one function for easy commanding but the Taris General believed that a well sought victory against Demopolis was all that was needed for the Siege Support Battalion to spread the general's ideology for the entire army. That was also the reason why he did not need such a big number against the centre.
Ideally, once the Siege Support Battalion had done its job, Yaega and his cavalries should be able to rush and possibly create a pincer movement against the Demopolis defenders in the north east and northwest corners.
But when the Taris General was about to arrive at the staging point for the assault, he noticed an injured soldier running towards him carrying a dead body right behind the horse.
Yaega immediately stopped his entire battalion as he wanted to meet the injured soldier to know about the situation. Despite its name, the siege support battalions actually have one of the best soldiers protecting their siege weapons since they were vital in supporting the assault on Demopolis' walls.
"Soldier! What happened?" Yaega kicked his Horned Bear to move forward to meet with the injured soldier.
"The information the scouts gave was wrong! The Demopolis stronghold is-" Before the soldier could even finish his sentence, his throat had been pierced by an unsuspecting arrow and his head immediately exploded right in front of Yaega.
"AMBUSHHHHH!!" One of the officers shouted and the battalion officers echoed to the rest of the group to pick their shields up. Yeaga realised this particular forested area they were in was not the best place to protect oneself from an ambush. Even as his knights raised up his shields to protect themselves from arrows, they did not know where it was coming from. Some of the arrows sunk into their horses and horned bears, causing a few of the hors.e.m.e.n and armoured knights to fall from their mounts.
"CHARGE! CHARGE! Do not retaliate!" Yaega knew that the longer they stayed in the forested area, the more vulnerable his soldiers were. His cavalry was not suited to fight in a forested area, and much less defend themselves in the situation where the ambushers could cripple the entire force. Thus, it would be better to get out of the forested area and into the open area near the Demopolis walls. At that point, he might have a better grasp of the current situation of what his fallen headless soldier had said.
However, that also meant that he might have casualties before the official fight but he knew something like that was going to happen when he felt that their preparation phase went way too smoothly. Yet, he did not expect to have a coordinated ambush in the outskirts without triggering the magic alarms that his scouts had placed.
Wait, did that mean his scouts had betrayed him? But how?
Those questions were lingering in his mind as he tried to race out of the forest only to see a scene which he could not believe his eyes. A bright new shining wall staring right in front of him, with soldiers lining the outer walls of Demopolis, all ready to release their projectiles against the invading army.
To make things worse, the Siege Support Battalion had been utterly destroyed. Large shielded defenders who were supposed to protect the siege weapons from incoming projectiles were riddled with holes in their bodies. Siege Weapons which were protected by anti siege magical spells were burning right in front of his eyes.
The mages were also laid dead right beside the siege weapons and there were… zombies gnawing at the mages' corpses until they saw the incoming cavalry coming towards them. They instantly stood up and dashed towards the light cavalry and the battalion knew they had nowhere to go but only forward. This was not what Yeaga had envisioned and had no idea why his ideal battalion formations had gone so wrong.
But like his soldiers, right now the only way out is moving forward.
"Move! Move! Move!" Yaega shouted as he sheathed his sword and grabbed his lance that was hanging on the side of his horned bear. At that point, he suddenly heard a series of loud bangs emanating from the soldiers on top of the Demopolis' Wall which caused each and every cavalryman to raise their shields up instinctively. Yet, no arrows were seen flying towards them.
But a quick glance to the back made Taris General surprised that his heavily armoured horned bears battalion, which could handle dozens of arrows at once, had fallen to the ground. As if to finish the job, the very same explosives arrows from the forested area emerge from behind and annihilate any bears that were merely wounded.
To Yaega, the current open battle area that they were in was a kill zone with no retreat.
It was a massacre.
