Chapter 421: Linking up with Potentia
As a warrior from the hegemon of the Greeks – Sparta, Phidias felt uncomfortable at the arrogance of Dionysius. Hence he stopped talking.
“Phidias, for the coming greatest battle in Greek history, I need your help, you the greatest warrior of Sparta, so that we can easily win this battle!”
Phidias couldn’t refuse Dionysius’ invitation as the phrase “the greatest battle in Greek history” alone was enough to attract him.
. . . . . . . . . . . . .
On the same day, Davos ordered Litom, the senior centurion of the first brigade of the third legion, to lead three heavy infantry brigades, a total of 3,000 men and a thousand Eleans to garrison Poseidonia and guard the nearly 10,000 prisoners. For this reason, Davos also sent someone to Pyxous and informed Androlis to arrange personnel to escort the prisoners to Lucania.
He then led the rest of the first, second, and third legions, totalling about 24,000 men, and moved eastward along the Silarus river.
Their march was not smooth. Besides the road difficulty to traverse, they would also occasionally encounter some Samnites.
After receiving the report from the scouts, Davos initially thought that the Samnites wanted to use the complex mountain terrain to harass the army, so he sent out the light infantry and light-armoured soldiers of the three legions to protect their two flanks.
But after the soldiers rushed up, they found that the enemy’s resistance was weak and captured them easily.
After getting captured, the first thing the Samnites did was to open their mouth to ask for food. Unable to understand them, the soldiers called someone who could understand the Samnite’s language. After asking them, they soon found out the Samnite’s reason for being here, so they immediately reported it to Davos.
Only then did Davos learn that the Samnite army outside Potentia was defeated in a night attack, which gave him a great surprise.
After all, Davos only ordered Izam to send many of his men disguised as defeated Samnite warriors to sneak into the Samnite camp at night and spread rumours to shake the enemy’s morale. Of course, if possible, they would also burn the Samnite’s supplies allowing their next battle against the Samnites to be easier. Therefore, he wrote a letter to Potentia in the hopes to get some help…naturally, he doesn’t have much hope for this to succeed.
Hence he didn’t expect that the Samnites would lose just like that! This made Davos, who had a clear understanding of the history of the Samnites being the powerful enemies of early Rome in his previous life, unable to believe it.
But soon after, the army met the scouts who came back from the city of Potentia. After confirming the news of the Samnite’s defeat, Davos learned that Phryntor played an important role in last night’s action by planning the night attack and taking the initiative to contact Polet in the city of Potentia…
After hearing the night attack, Davos couldn’t help but admire him, making him repeatedly praise the senior centurion of the reconnaissance brigade, “Izam, you have an amazing subordinate!”
Izam replied with seriousness, “He is better than me!”
“Whenever a country faces a crisis, a lot of heroes would rise up!” Davos sighed as he remembered the name of Phryntors in his heart.
Looking at these hungry Samnites walking unsteadily, Davos thought that it was normal for them to not even have half of their combat strength after a night of chaos and shock, with their camp burned and washed by heavy rain as they fled while exhausted, hungry and scared. The war in Potentia has basically ended! After making a judgment, Davos felt a lot more relaxed. Then he immediately ordered the legion’s light-armoured and light infantry to meet the Samnites and attack them decisively and expand their victory!
At the same time, he immediately sent his men to Potentia to make Pamot prepare a camp for the army in advance. The Theonian legion would usually stop moving and start building camps in the afternoon while they march towards the battlefield. But today, Davos and the others would march boldly and strive to reach the city of Potentia in one day.
In the evening, the vanguards arrived outside the city of Potentia, where they were surprised to see that under the dark sky, two “flaming dragons” lined up from the city of Potentia to the mountain path in the west, a full 1 kilometre long. It was the people of Potenta raising their torches to greet the Theonian army and light their way…
After learning about the situation, Davos immediately rushed to the front and met Pamot with a group of tribal chieftains, “Esteemed lord Davos, every Potentian warmly welcome you and the army you lead!” At the prompt of Polet, Pamot greeted Davos respectfully, and the chieftains behind also gave their greetings in a hurry.
But instead of riding his horse and accepting the respect of his allies safely, Davos quickly jumped off his horse, greeted them quickly and said with a slightly apologetic and excited tone, “I apologise that I led my army so late, disturbing your rest! I didn’t expect everyone to greet us in such a warm way despite your own safety when the territory of Potentia is still not safe… Thank you! On behalf of all the officers and soldiers of the legion, I would like to express my heartfelt thanks to the people and chieftains of Potentia!”
“Lord Davos, you are wrong! It should be us, the Potentians, that would like to thank you and your Theonian soldiers.” Pamot felt that Davos could feel his pains and felt that his hard work was not in vain. Still, he didn’t show it, and instead, he said emotionally, “Compared with Theonia’s great kindness in saving Potentia, this little thing that we do is nothing!”
“We are allies.” Said Davos with a gentle smile, “And Allies should help each other like brothers!”
“You are right! You are right!” Pamot nodded repeatedly. He wanted to say more but was interrupted by Polet, who was beside him, “Lord Davos, will our discussion affect your soldier’s marching?”
After getting reminded, Davos looked back and saw that the army had stopped moving. So he hurriedly said, “Chieftain, I apologise! Please follow me to the side.”
“Oh, it is our oversight.” Pamot scrambled to lead the crowd to get out of the way of the army’s march.
“Tolmides!” Davos turned around and shouted.
“Milord!”
“Have the herald pass the order to let the drummers and buglers play the victory march and celebrate this moment of victory with our allies!” Davos shouted.
“Understood!” Tolmides immediately turned around.
The Theonian legion paid extreme attention to the smooth flow of military orders by strictly stipulating that the military would use salpinxes and drums to convey orders. Thus in a legion, there are a dozen buglers and drummers. And since this army consists of two and a half legions with about 24,000 men, there are naturally hundreds of drummers and buglers. So after getting Tolmides’ order, the buglers and drummers retreated to the roadside.
As members of the legion who do not participate in the battle, they not only convey military orders during battles, but they also play music to cheer up the soldiers and for them to forget their fatigue during the marching.
For this reason, the buglers and drummers would gather up to practice their instruments outside their usual phalanx training with the soldiers during peacetime. Naturally, they are also present at the union’s major celebrations, allowing them to earn respect even though they did not directly participate in battles.
At this time, some buglers changed their instruments to a flute at their waist, while some drummers changed into small bronze cymbals as they all performed their respective duties and began playing music.
The 《Victory March》 is a kind of music that Davos hums out of the familiar marching melody from his previous life. He then asks the musicians of the union to compose and adapt it. Although it does not have the varied melody and momentum brought by symphonic music like in his previous life, it was still a rare kind of music in this era.
When they played the lively and cheerful melody with vigorous rhythm in the silent night, the music soon rang out throughout Potentia…
When the Potentians heard it, they felt relieved as they seemed to put aside their grief over the loss of their loved ones and the worry over the destruction of their homes for a while as they enjoyed the satisfaction and happiness of defeating a mighty enemy and achieving victory.
And the exhausted Theonian soldiers also cheered up, straightened their chests as they welcomed their allies’ gaze.
“Legion, advance!”
At the forefront of the marching are the 300 guards of Davos, led by Rodom (Martius was still recovering in Thurii). Rodom raised the military flag that represents Davos the Grand Legatus with both hands. At the top of the flag is the golden statue of Hades wearing a crown and sitting firmly on a throne while holding a bident in one hand and a ball in the other, showing the dignity of a king compared to the gloomy and terrifying statue of Hades on the top of a legion’s flag. The black flag under the statue has the name of Davos embroidered with golden silk thread.
The flag bearer of the first legion followed the 300 guards; then, following behind them were the light infantry and the light-armoured soldiers rather than the heavy infantry. This was because, on the mountain path, the fast-moving light-armoured soldiers and light infantry brigade could quickly react once they encountered an enemy. In fact, most of the Samnites captured on the road were due to them.
The first legion was followed by the logistic camp, then the second legion, then the hundreds of Samnites captured along the way, then the third legion, and finally some light infantry, light-armoured and cavalry brigade. They arranged the cavalry last because they could not ride their horses on some sections of the mountain path and had to walk with their horses. And if the thousands of horses were to crap and urinate, it would seriously affect the marching speed of the troops behind. And the light infantry and light-armoured brigade behind is to prevent the Samnites to attack their rear.
The Theonian army, with its clear flag and neatly organised troops, was like a seemingly long dragon passing through this ‘Fiery Road’ of enthusiastic and cheering Potentians with a neater pace and high morale. Despite their black helmets and armour, which gave the people a lot of pressure, the smiles on their faces made the Potentians feel relieved.