In a town outside the mountain pass, the Lombardy "Northern Expeditionary Army" garrisoned the camp. There were a lot of people shouting, mules and horses neighing, and it was chaos.
Hands dressed in various colors of clothing stood on the carriage, carrying barrels of wine, bags of flour, and bundles of newly feathered arrows. The blacksmiths were busy smoothing swords, knocking out dents in armor, and shoeing war horses and cargo mules. Soldiers tossed their mail armor into buckets of sand and rolled it along the uneven ground of the barracks square to rub it clean.
In the small town church, both nobles and soldiers crowded in to pray. They hoped that the Holy Lord would bless them to return safely, and it would be best to attack the enemy in one fell swoop. In the filthy military camp square next to the church, tents of various sizes and shapes were dismantled one after another. The entourage carried buckets to put out the campfires, while the soldiers took out grindstones and carefully sharpened their knives for the last time before setting off for the expedition. The horses neighed and panted, the lord officers gave orders, the soldiers cursed each other, and the camp prostitutes who had been tortured all night quarreled and bickered. The noise was like a rising tide.
These are ordinary scenes. What really caught the eye was the dozen or so carts of kerosene pots that had been loaded outside the military camp and the hundreds of craftsmen and multiple laborers gathered beside the carriage. It is estimated that Wadbury captured all the craftsmen in the northern part of the Principality of Lombardy and their apprentices here.
Looking at this posture, Wadbury planned to use kerosene to burn Nanguan Army Fort to the ground, or he planned to let the craftsmen and laborers build a road in front of Nanguan Army Fort that led directly to the wall stacks.
There is no doubt that the wealthy Lombards really have this strength...
Under the bushes on a hill more than 200 steps away from the town, their clothes were torn into rags by the thorn bushes. The two sentinels from the advance company had been lurking here for two days.
Wardbury had fought against the Welsh Army, and he knew that the Welsh Army was not a good person, so the military camp was very tightly defended. There were almost no sneaking channels within half a mile of the military camp. However, these two guys got into the thorn bushes and climbed close to the enemy camp. Almost no one paid attention to this thorny barren hill.
Swallowing the chewed sweet grass roots in his mouth, he narrowed his eyes and glanced at the military camp not far away again. The sentry shouted quietly to his companions beside him, but there was no answer.
Then he moved his feet and kicked lightly, and the sleeping partner beside him was awakened, "Is there anything abnormal?"
"Sleep again! If you sleep again, all the enemy troops will be gone."
The sleeping sentry was on duty in the middle of the night last night, and he just fell asleep. Being kicked awake, he suppressed his anger, rubbed his eyes and looked at the enemy camp under the barren hills, and quickly took out a carbon rod and a booklet from his arms, "Quickly, record the enemy's situation!" The temperature across the continent has passed its highest point, but the dense forests are still shrouded in heat.
After lurking for five days, the soldiers and task force soldiers were fine, but the members of the weapons laboratory were a little unable to bear it. Although these guys were in the military, they only occasionally participated in simple physical training and weapon use on weekdays, so their bodies were naturally weaker.
Humbling to find a cave in the past few days, starting a fire in the wild can easily expose the target, so every day they can only use clean water to soak the compressed hard bread crumbs scraped into wheat paste to wrap their bellies.
Jack, the team leader of the Weapons Research Laboratory, had just dug a hole under a big tree to solve the fifth problem this morning. He wiped his buttocks with soft leaves, picked up his pants and bent down to bury the hole.
"Sir Jack, you have diarrhea again? Hurry up, Sir Ron asked you to come over quickly." A soldier found Jack who was running away.
Jack patted the stick buried in the pit into the soldier's hand and hurriedly walked towards the center of the dense forest camp.
..."...three hundred infantry, one hundred crossbowmen and nearly three hundred craftsmen and laborers. I don't know how the Lombards plan to attack the city this time. It seems that they still plan to use siege equipment."
"I guess they plan to burn Nanguan with kerosene, and maybe they are also planning to let those craftsmen work. The soldiers built another wall at Nanguan, and then climbed along the wall to cross Nanguan..."
"We just sent out flying pigeons three days ago to send a message. Did your lords think of a way to lure the enemy so quickly? This is too fast."
"I guess the Lombards themselves can't sit still."
"Anyway, we will immediately report the enemy's movements to Nanguan so that they can make early plans..."
"Sir Ron, sirs." Jack walked to the tree-shaded clearing in the center of the camp and saluted the commanders who were having a military meeting.
Ron was holding a wooden stick in his hand and was drawing a map of the enemy's distribution on the ground. He raised his head and glanced at Jack, "Can you hold on?"
Jack tried his best to stand up and let himself see. Come on and be stronger, "Sir Ron, I'm fine."
Ron didn't hesitate and said bluntly: "Perhaps the Lombards couldn't sit still anymore. They left the rest station early this morning and headed north to the Nanguan Army Fort again."
「估摸着这一两天就得经过山口军堡进入峡谷。我们准备商议作战计划，这次你和你手里的家伙是主力，所以把你叫来参加军议。」
............
八月末，月夜，风高。
Shankou Military Fort, called Rock Castle by the Lombards.
Live up to its name, this military fortress built on mountains and rivers is indeed very strong.
A stone structure, twenty feet high, the military fort is equipped with walls, watchtowers, and arrow towers. At the same time, there is also a high wooden wall made of double-layered logs across the river from the military fort to the cliff on the other side.
There are about fifty troops stationed in the military fort, mostly archers and armored infantry. Although there are not many defenders, they are holding on to the strong city. In addition, there are sufficient reserves of arrows, stones, rolling wood and kerosene in the fort. This is the Lombardy version of "Nanguan Army Fort".
Hand on the hillside a hundred steps away from the Shankou Military Fort, Ron led several adjutants and Jack to this place.
The military fort is heavily defended and it is impossible to get so close during the day, so they can only conduct low-range reconnaissance under the cover of night.
logue 23 feet high and 8 feet thick. The front of the castle we are going to attack has two gates made of iron-inlaid oak and an iron portcullis. The first oak door is easy to penetrate with city-breaking cannons, but the second iron gate requires a lot of effort.」
The person who introduced the situation of the military fort in a low voice was the deputy captain of the task force, Oliver. He personally led the soldiers of the task force to investigate the military fort in the past two days.
This is Ron's second time to investigate this place, and the specific defense deployment of this military fort is still in his mind.
"No, we are not going to attack the front." Ron corrected the direction of the attack.
Everyone is limited by their fixed thinking. Since they are coming from the north, they naturally want to attack the north gate.
"The north side of the fort was used to defend against our Welsh Army, so both the city wall and the gate are extremely strong."
"But the Lombards were too hasty in garrisoning the fort at that time. They focused on the north front, while the southern wall was built with broken stones. The most important thing is that the southern wall was only an oak door."
Stanley was the first to wake up. He whispered excitedly: "The enemy never dreamed that there would be a lightly-armed team running around behind the Rock Castle to attack the city."