Chapter 404: Crossing the River to Attack Boyi

"Yes, Master."

"Tullius, I know you are in a bad situation now. I'm afraid you have spent all your money on these properties." Caesar spoke gently, but with a will that could not be refused: "Do you still have the financial resources to make sophisticated weapons and armor for my soldiers? If my new legion cannot be equipped within the specified time, it will inevitably affect my next plan. Then what's the point of asking you to come!

You must be able to do things and do things that satisfy me. This is what I ask of you as a patron. If things are done well, wealth will naturally come. Do you understand?!"

"Governor, I understand!" Tullius held the gift list and said loudly with a flushed face: "Please rest assured, I will definitely do my best to urge the subordinate iron workshops to do their best to create enough and sophisticated weapons and armor in the shortest time, and equip all the new legion soldiers. I will never let you down!"

"If you do it, all the weapons and equipment of the provincial armies in my jurisdiction will be provided by you in the future." Caesar's next sentence made Tullius fall into ecstasy.

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Tullius’s visit made Caesar more determined to conquer the East and conquer Nyx and Dacia first. To this end, he accelerated the recruitment and training of new legions, and also explored the situation of the Nyx tribe through various channels.

However, due to the strict control of the Nyx tribe, Caesar did not get more information about it. He only knew that this tribe was different from other barbarian tribes in the north.

This tribe not only fought like Rome, but also had a similar daily life to Rome. They could build roads, bridges, dams, temples that ordinary barbarian tribes did not have at all...

In addition to paper money, they can also make high-quality pottery, cloth, furniture, wood carvings, ironware... quite popular among the surrounding tribes.

This tribe was tough on the outside and had strong military capabilities. It was able to defeat the strong with the weak and annex the Pannoni and repel the Boii. In just over a decade, its territory expanded more than ten times...

These were enough to attract Caesar's attention, but he was not too worried, because he felt that no matter how strong the Nixes were, as long as he paid attention to them and concentrated the military forces of the three provinces, he could easily crush them.

However, he considered that the eastward attack would require crossing the mountains and logistics transportation would be difficult. In order to avoid alerting the Nixes and increasing the difficulty of the attack, he never revealed to his subordinates his intention to conquer the barbarians in the east of the northern Italian province, and stopped large-scale actions to inquire about the situation of the Nixes tribe.

Military preparations for the three provinces were in full swing, but they only lasted for three months. A piece of news from the north interrupted Caesar's pre-planned plan: a Gallic tribe adjacent to the northwestern border of the northern Italian province, the Helvetii, wanted to migrate to the west coast of Gaul as a whole due to the threat of the northern Germanic people, looking for new, wider and more fertile land to settle down, and their migration route would directly pass through the Roman province of West France, which would pose a threat to the area under Caesar's jurisdiction.

Caesar had gone to great lengths to get the position of governor of the three northern provinces. If the jurisdiction was trampled by the barbarians, it would inevitably be condemned by public opinion. At that time, the conservatives in the Roman Senate would seize the opportunity to demand the withdrawal of his appointment, and all efforts would be in vain. Therefore, Caesar would never allow such a thing to happen.

He sent envoys to the Helvetii tribe, strongly urging them to stop migrating.

But for the better survival of the ethnic group, the Helvetii not only ignored the dissuasion, but also started migrating in advance.

After the messenger reported back to Caesar, he was angry at the Helvetii’s willful behavior. Although he was also shocked by the huge scale of the Helvetii’s migration (more than 350,000 people in total), he did not feel timid. He resolutely led the three legions stationed in Aquileia and the two newly formed legions to quickly move north (there was another legion in the province of Westphalia), preparing to use force to stop the migration of the Helvetii…

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In the summer of the same year, at the urging of Maximus, the Nix tribe assembled four legions and launched an attack on the Boii.

He first sent two fleets under his command, more than 400 ships carrying 8,000 soldiers and more than 500 wooden wagons to quickly reach the north bank of the Drau River.

After the soldiers landed, they quickly built this special wagon that could be connected end to end and had iron spikes on both sides into an outer circular defense line on the beach.

Because the Nix tribe had the advantage on the water, it was difficult for the Boii to attack the Nix territory on the south bank of the Drao River. After several failed attacks, the Boii sent envoys to Nix to seek peace, but Maximus refused. Therefore, the Boii were afraid of being retaliated by the Nix and remained vigilant.

The landing place of the Nix army happened to be the territory of the most powerful tribe of Boi and the new King of Boi. He noticed that the Nix were gathering troops very early, so he also mobilized the army accordingly.

Although the landing place of the Nix army was unexpected, the Boii reacted quickly, and the troops of various tribes arrived one after another.

King Boi first assembled more than 20,000 warriors and hurried to the battlefield, ordering other troops to arrive later.

He originally planned to let his 3,000 cavalrymen attack the enemy troops on the shore first, disrupt their formation, and then press the whole army to drive the enemy down the river in one fell swoop.

Who knew that when they arrived at the river bank, they found that the Nix people had used countless wooden carts to densely arrange on the beach in a short time, forming a simple camp.

So, King Boyi changed his strategy and let the infantry launch an attack from the front, and the cavalry patrolled on the periphery. Once they found a gap in the enemy's wooden cart defense line, they would immediately rush in and cooperate with the front infantry to kill the enemy.

King Boyi also learned from the previous failure of the battle on the south bank, and asked the soldiers to advance with shields and be careful to defend against the enemy's long-range attacks.

One-third of the 8,000 soldiers who landed in Nix were indeed crossbowmen, but what King Boyi didn't know was that these soldiers not only carried arm crossbows for individual use, but also carried dozens of bed crossbows.

As early as a year ago, Maximus had repeatedly discussed with the Ministry of War and made plans for this attack. He also personally drew the drawings of the bed crossbow. After a period of exploration and mastering its craftsmanship, the weapons workshop began to manufacture in large quantities.

The main body of the bed crossbow designed by Maximus is composed of three large bows (two facing forward and one facing backward) arranged side by side, with a thick and strong rope as the bowstring to connect the three bows together, and an auxiliary winch to pull the bowstring. In addition, it is equipped with a wheeled bed frame, so that the bed crossbow can be fired stably and is easy to move.

These bed crossbows are arranged in the gaps between the carriages, and the bowstrings are already pulled, and special crossbow arrows like spears are placed.

When the Boyi shield array approached to 500 meters, the crossbows were released and fired (the three-bow crossbows made by the Nix tribe had a range of nearly a thousand meters. The reason for firing at a distance of 500 meters was, first, to improve accuracy, and second, to prevent the Boyi from being too far away, so that the Boyi would have enough time to stop the army's attack and reconsider the battle strategy.

One after another, the thick crossbow arrows flew out with sharp and loud whistles, and made a deafening sound when they hit the shields held by the Boyi warriors, instantly turning the wooden shields into pieces, and then penetrated the warriors' bodies, and hit the warriors behind with the remaining force...

The Boyi warriors hit by the crossbows had blood holes the size of bowls on their bodies, and they fell down suddenly without even having time to wail... It was so terrifying The tragic scene made the surrounding warriors scream uncontrollably.

Round after round of crossbow arrows were fired like the scythe of the god of death, ruthlessly harvesting the lives of the Boyi warriors.

The frightened Boyi warriors avoided the crossbow arrows as if they were avoiding the plague god, making the originally complete and continuous array scattered, with a gap and a dense strange scene, and also forcing them to launch a charge early, hoping to get close to the Nix army as soon as possible to engage in close combat, so as to avoid being shot by arrows again.

At the same time, the Nix crossbowmen used special wooden ladders to put on the box car, climbed to the top of it, and pulled the trigger towards the Boyi warriors who were less than a hundred meters away from them and were rushing like a tide.

For a while, arrows were like locusts.

The Boyi warriors were eager to rush It was difficult to defend themselves with shields, and in order to avoid the crossbows, the team was too dense, so countless people were shot and wailed.

Finally approaching the wooden cart defense line of the Nixes, the Boyi warriors wanted to break through the gap in the wood workshop, but one-third of the 8,000 Nixes soldiers who landed were specially trained spearmen. The dense spears stabbed out from the gap in the wood workshop to stop the Boyi warriors from advancing.

The crossbow had moved to the back of the spearmen and continued to draw the bow and arrow. Once it was ready, it would notify the spearmen in front to make way.

The crossbow could shoot crossbow arrows at a very close distance, which could penetrate several people in succession and open up a bloody path in the crowded enemy army. Its power was amazing.

There are also The Boyi warriors wanted to push the wagons that blocked their way, but the dense iron spikes on the wagon walls made them hesitate, and the Nix crossbowmen on the top of the wagons were shooting from a high position at close range, with a high kill rate, which made them very cautious and greatly reduced the impact on the wagons.

Before the Boyi warriors got into a tough fight, the Boyi cavalry wandering around the battlefield had already discovered the loopholes in the Nix army's defense line - there were gaps of more than 20 meters on both sides of the defense line from the river bank, there were no wooden carts as barriers, and the enemy's terrible long-range attack weapons were not found there.

After discussion, the leaders of the Boyi cavalry decided to split their troops into two groups, attacking the gaps on both sides of the enemy's defense line along the river bank, and cooperate with the infantry attacking from the front to surround and annihilate the enemy.