Twenty miles south of Santia, a Lombard team collecting military supplies walked slowly among the low gentle hills.
The team consisted of nearly two hundred packhorses, mules and donkeys and more than a hundred oxcarts and carriages. There were more than three hundred laborers in front and behind, followed by seventy or eighty light cavalry and hundreds of infantrymen wearing light armor and holding spears, axes, swords and hammers. Just looking at the cautious marching formation that was a hundred steps apart, with sentries in front and protection on the sides, it was clear that it was a powerful team.
There are more than 180 infantry and cavalry soldiers. As a baggage team, there are quite a lot of cavalry and infantry accompanying them. There are no important items in the baggage team, only the food, tents and carpentry tools that are most urgently needed in the front.
The Lombard baggage train has been frightened recently.
The patchwork mercenaries outside the city of Santia were eager to go north, so the food and supplies did not accompany them. They thought that they could collect them from the recovered territories after arriving in the north, but they never expected that their opponents did not forget to "clear the fields" during the emergency evacuation. Within dozens of miles around Santia, all civilians were moved away from places where there were no Wells Legion garrison. All the food and supplies they could carry were taken away, and those that could not be taken away were burned.
The only completed city in the north was Lavati, but Lavati, which had been "recovered" at this time, actually sternly refused to allow the Lombard mercenaries to enter the city, and also refused to provide food and supplies to the Lombard army.
The Lombard court was restricted by Lavati's special autonomous city status. In order to prevent the city from decaying, it strictly prohibited mercenaries from entering the city.
At that time, a mercenary army of more than 200 people rushed to attack Lavati, but was beaten back by the newly reorganized citizen armed forces.
· Enjoying the treatment of enemy territory within the country, the Lombard mercenaries could only look at the armed citizens of Lavati and curse.
Unable to rely on battlefield supplies, thousands of Lombard mercenaries could only transport baggage northward from the southern controlled area. However, since the siege of Santia, six out of ten baggage convoys traveling north from the southern Lombardy controlled area would not be able to reach the mercenary camp.
This situation comes from a Welsh army that is elusive around Santia. The commander of this army is Baron Angus, the deputy commander of the Welsh Army.
When the Lombard mercenaries went north to besiege the city of Santia, Angus personally led the cavalry to cover the infantry while fighting and retreating. After the infantry retreated to the fortified city, Angus did not deploy the cavalry into the city, but sneaked into the surrounding area of Santia with more than 200 cavalry. Sometimes they break into pieces and form a team of thirty or fifty cavalry to sneak attack the food collection teams who have left the main group to search for food supplies. Sometimes the whole army gathers and attacks the flank camps of the mercenaries outside the city, making it impossible for the mercenaries who came from afar to camp safely.
Two days ago, the task force sent to lurk in the south sent back the news that a huge baggage convoy would arrive at the front line battlefield carrying food and supplies for thousands of people for more than a month, so Angus gathered the cavalry again and planned to attack the baggage.
Among the gentle hills, there is a hillside that is no more than a hundred feet tall, but it is indeed the highest point as far as the eye can see.
There are no tall trees on the hillside, but a few low miscellaneous trees have lush foliage, completely hiding the figures of Angus and the others who are sitting firmly on the saddle.
Beside Angus, Lusignan, the commander of the Welsh Legion Cavalry in light chainmail, raised his hand to the slowly approaching baggage train in the direction, and said to Angus in a low voice: "My lord , The secret sentry came back just now to report that the escort of the baggage train was extremely cautious. Before entering Xuqiu, they sent three cavalry squads to scout out. They wanted to search every rock and grass in Xuqiu. "
Angus held a branch in his mouth, chewed it twice from time to time, chewed his teeth and chuckled: "The Lombards are frightened by us, and now they will cower like a bird at the slightest disturbance."
“The Lombards thought we would set up an ambush in the hills, but we decided not to set up an ambush here.” Lusignan gently turned the horse’s head and looked at the plain north of the hills.
There is no cover on all sides of the plain. There are no crops in the farmland now, so it is almost impossible to encounter an enemy ambush. But just in this plain, there is a wide river, which originates from the Wells Valley and is called the Po River in Lombardy.
The Po River flows north-south as a whole, but this part of the river has a northeast-southwest appearance. The river is hundreds of feet wide with gentle flow, and a wooden bridge spans it, connecting the endless plains on the north and south banks.
At the moment, under the wooden bridge, a team of people from the Weapons Research Laboratory of the Wells Corps in civilian clothes were placing explosives under several important bridge piers. The long fuses wrapped with black powder were led to a hidden bush at the end of the bridge. A pit was dug in the grass. The same weeds as the surrounding ones were piled next to the pit, which should be used for cover. A short soldier was squatting here guarding the tinder, holding the bundled fuse in his hand.
On the wooden bridge less than a hundred feet, five explosive charges were placed, and at the other end of the wooden bridge there was also a soldier squatting in a pit under the pier.
Several people from the weapons research laboratory finished the installation task with sweat on their brows, and signaled to Reid, who was instructing the soldiers to carry out the detonation task, that it was completed.
Reid is a veteran of the Wells Corps, and is now the deputy captain of the Welsh Corps Cavalry Company. He is of the same rank as Jafar, but because of his inferior combat power, he has never been well-known. This time he was able to obtain the most important link in the ambush operation. Reid attached great importance to it. He followed the thin bundle of explosive fuses again and found out what was hidden on the bridge. The soldier in the grass said again, "Remember, when you hear two thunder explosions, you should light the fuse in your hand. Don't worry, the bridge collapse will not kill you, and after the bridge collapse, the place will be covered up, and the enemy will not find your trace easily."
The soldier was obviously a little nervous, and his face became more and more sallow.
"Man, Master Angus said that after completing this bridge bombing mission, you will be directly promoted to the cavalry squad leader, with a monthly salary of eighty-five pfennigs." Red used military promotion to appease the soldiers' emotions.
"Remember, light the fire only after two thunder blasts. Don't light it too early."
The soldiers in the pit nodded heavily. Red immediately called on a few of his men to put a wooden board on the pit and cover it with a fresh piece of weed skin. If you didn't crawl on the ground to identify it carefully, you wouldn't be able to see any traces of artificial loosening here.
On the other side of the wooden bridge, several Welsh Legion soldiers who were doing the same thing also completed their mission and signaled their retreat in sign language.
On the gentle hillside, Angus and the others saw the Lombard baggage guard sentries from the south walking slowly towards the hillside where they were staying.
"Lord Angus, the flag was just raised on the other side of the bridge. Chief Red and others have set up a trap. We can retreat." Lusignan reported to Angus.
“Withdraw.” Angus turned the horse’s head first.
"Captain, the enemy is coming here on horseback. Do you want to clean up the traces?" An accompanying cavalry asked Lusignan for instructions.
Lusignan glanced at the horse hoof prints and two pools of horse dung on the top of the slope, "No, let those Lombards be nervous in the hill. They can relax after leaving the hill and go to the bridge to kill them."