Chapter 207: The Power of a Superpower 1
Chapter 207: The Power of a Superpower 1
Marcus received a request for help from the Suren Kingdom and quickly divided his legion to march.
The Scythian cavalry that attacked the Karen Kingdom had only about 40,000 men, while the cavalry that invaded the Suren Kingdom did not reach 30,000.
However, Marcus thought that more troops were needed for the Suren Kingdom.
The Karen Kingdom had already formed a defensive line, so it was possible to defend with only four legions.
Therefore, the best decision was to turn all the remaining nine legions to the Suren Kingdom.
As expected, when Marcus arrived, the damage to the Suren Kingdom was quite severe.
In just a few days, the villages on the border were burned, and the cities with weak walls were also unable to escape the plunder.
Not only that, but the enemy’s cavalry was surrounding the capital at an incredible speed and staging a show of force.
It was a precarious situation where the defense of the capital could have been breached if Marcus had been a little late.
But as soon as the Roman army arrived, the enemy’s cavalry I'm mediately turned tail and ran away.
“It seems that the enemy has no intention of fighting us.”
Even after chasing them for several days, the enemies only circled around without launching any offensive.
And when they thought that the Roman army’s pursuit was slackening, they I'm mediately attacked the areas with weak defense.
Surenas, who had analyzed the enemy’s movements for the past few days, came to a definite conclusion.
“The enemy is not very attached to occupation or plunder. Their goal is to make sure that our army’s attention is not diverted elsewhere by holding our ankles.”
“I expected that, but I can’t help being annoyed.”
They rushed to rescue a city that was being attacked today, but the enemies had already disappeared long ago.
Antonius and Publius, who had led the cavalry first and rushed in, returned with their faces flushed from being fooled.
“The enemies were using stirrups unlike the Scythians we met before. And according to the soldiers who encountered them, they looked a little different too.”
“They seemed to have more mobility and better tactical movements than this side, even though they were fewer in number. It won’t be easy to repel them.”
“So they weren’t Scythians who attacked Suren Kingdom… They must have planned to drag this out from the start.”
The total number of cavalry that attacked Karen and Suren Kingdoms was about 60,000.
It was an enormous force, but it would be impossible to win against Marcus’s legion if they faced them head-on.
So they split into two sides and avoided direct confrontation and only hit and run.
It was also a deliberate strategy to show only 40,000 cavalry at first.
The only question was how they knew so much about the eastern Roman army’s strength.
Marcus was confident that he could smash 60,000 cavalry, but he wondered why the Huns thought so.
‘60,000 cavalry is an amazing force in this era. And the Huns’ cavalry were using stirrups. But they still judged that they had no chance of winning from the start?’
It didn’t make sense.
Even if they were cautious commanders, anyone with 60,000 cavalry would at least try to fight once.
Especially since the Huns’ cavalry had conquered and pacified all regions from the east with their unstoppable momentum.
Even if they received an order to stall for time, it would be more profitable to annihilate them if they found out that the enemy’s legion was weaker than expected.
But the Huns seemed to know how strong Marcus’s legion was and avoided fighting from the start.
He remembered how the Scythians had pretended to fight but ran away as soon as the battle began.
This meant that they had obtained information through some kind of channel beforehand.
‘Did they hear about Parthia’s defeat? Or maybe they heard something from the Scythian tribes who participated as mercenaries back then.’
No matter how much Marcus was, he couldn’t imagine that Huntae Sunwoo, who led the Huns, had participated in the battlefield with Parthia.
Anyway, he had to assume that everything from being friendly to Roman merchants, securing and stabilizing the Silk Road, and attacking Karen first to lure him in was all part of a strategic plan.
This meant that the enemy’s leader was a strategist who could not be compared with anyone he had fought so far.
And as long as the enemies avoided fighting with Rome like this, Marcus had no good idea either.
No matter how many cavalry he deployed, most of his army was still infantry.
And with infantry alone, he couldn’t catch up with cavalry who only ran away no matter what.
He tried using cavalry separately as well, but it didn’t make much difference.
Once he tried sending only 5,000 light cavalry to lure them in, but this also failed.
The Hun cavalry ran away reflexively as soon as they saw the Roman army, regardless of whether they were few or many.
And he heard that it was not much different in the Karen Kingdom either.
The Scythian cavalry that invaded again only poked around the weak areas, but did not show any further movement.
Marcus decided to stop chasing them for a while, thinking that there was nothing good about being dragged around like this.
And he called the legion commanders and the cavalry leader to make sure they understood the situation and asked for their opinions.
“It is a proven fact that we can’t get any results by just chasing the enemy. As Marcus said, if the enemy had no intention of fighting us from the start, we need to completely revise our strategy.”
“So what kind of revision do you suggest?”
“Hmm… How about forming an encirclement like we did before and forcing the enemy to fight?”
“No, that won’t work. It’s not easy to form a perfect encirclement in the first place.”
Publius’s suggestion was theoretically correct, but it only worked when the enemy had no easy way to retreat.
As the Scythians had proven, blocking three sides was useless if they ran away through the back.
And with the current mobility of the Roman army, it was almost impossible to catch up with the Huns from behind.
“Then how about we take the initiative and strike first?”
Antonius, who was angry from the futile pursuit, proposed an aggressive opinion.
“What’s the point of striking first when they only run away?”
“First, we push them out of the Karen Kingdom and then keep chasing them without giving them a chance to breathe. Then they will naturally have a hard time sustaining themselves.”
“They have completely taken over the Silk Road and came to the Karen Kingdom through there. They probably have a lot of bases and resources nearby for supply. That’s why they didn’t care much about plundering. Even if we chase them away for a while, they will come back soon and bother us.”
It was like punching the air if they went out and the other side didn’t respond.
Even if they pushed into the Huns’ base, the nomads had no hesitation in abandoning their territory and fleeing unlike the settled people.
No one came up with a clever idea, so Surenas shook his head and sighed.
“In the end, the only method we can use right now is to push them out and block the border thoroughly.”
“That’s the best we can do… But that’s probably what they want us to do.”
“Yes. It seems that we won’t be able to withdraw our troops if we have to defend both Karen and Suren borders.”
“This is a headache.”
Marcus and the other commanders naturally frowned.
They had fought many wars so far, but this was the first time they faced someone who had no intention of fighting from the start.
They couldn’t ignore them because they would come back right away.
It was possible to block their invasion by pushing them out and deploying troops on the border and fortifying it, as Surenas suggested, but that would take too much time and manpower.
And the Huns would be happy to have completed their mission even if they were pushed back like that.
Their goal was to keep Marcus’s legion in the east.
So all they had to do was show a threatening appearance by coming and going near the border so that Marcus couldn’t pull out his legion again.
It was humiliating and against his temperament to follow their plan when he could see their trick.
But no matter how hard he thought with his commanders, he couldn’t think of a good strategy.
Then, Surenas, who was looking at the map, suddenly stood up from his seat.
He looked straight into Marcus’s eyes and opened his mouth.
“How about we try this?”
Marcus and the other commanders’ eyes sparkled at Surenas’s explanation that followed.
※※※
After that, the Roman army spread their troops widely and slowly pressured the Hun army to push them back.
The Huns obediently retreated without wanting to fight, and soon joined with the Scythian tribe that had been pushed out of Karen Kingdom.
It was almost as if they had lost in battle and been chased away, but their faces were bright.
Kaidu, the tribal chief who received 20,000 cavalry from Bayatur, held a banquet with Maues, the chief of Scythians, to celebrate their successful operation in his tent.
“Hahaha, you did a great job too. You moved very well according to the plan we made at first.”
“It was thanks to Bayatur’s excellent strategy and Kaidu chief’s appropriate command. I’m grateful for your grace and loyalty. Please lead us in the future.”
Maues bowed his head humbly and brought his cup of clear liquor to his mouth.
He had tasted grape wine from Rome a few times, but this was his first time tasting liquor from Han Dynasty.
It was a completely different kind of taste from grape wine, but it didn’t have a bad aftertaste.
More than anything, he was excited to think that his achievements would be reported to Bayatur.
‘I made the right choice.’
Maues did not choose to oppose Bayatur like other tribes when Huns first came down.
As a result, while other tribes that resisted Huns suffered near-annihilation, Maues’s tribe was able to avoid disaster.
Not only that, he also succeeded in gathering all the remaining forces of Scythians who survived and incorporating them into his own power.
The Scythians were a good source of troops for Bayatur, who wanted to replenish his cavalry.
He thought it wouldn’t be bad to use a tribal chief who didn’t resist as a tool to control the Scythians and give him a little reward.
Maues also accepted his role willingly, knowing this.
It was from the thought that he would rather be the tail of a dragon than the head of a snake, swimming in a wider water.
And his judgment had not been wrong so far.
He had also made a name for himself in this war, so if he behaved well, he could rise to a high position among the Huns in the future.
Maybe he could even get a position comparable to the four generals who were favored by Bayatur, beyond the Kai Du in front of him.
‘When that time comes, you won’t be able to treat our tribe like you do now.’
Mawes, who hid his true intentions thoroughly, pretended to smile and poured wine into Kai Du’s empty cup.
“By the way, Kai Du, will Marcus stay here forever?”
“Probably he has no choice. Isn’t it said that the general of the Eastern Empire, Surenas, is the uncle of the king of the Suren Kingdom that we are threatening?
Abandoning his loyalty and retreating would be a huge political burden that could lead to rebellion, as Cheontae Seonwoo said. So they will probably try to form a defensive line on the border of the Suren Kingdom, as they have fortified the northern part of the Karen Kingdom. All we have to do is to interfere with them moderately and delay their completion time.”
“As far as I know, the east that Marcus is in charge of is currently the most prosperous place in Rome. If Marcus wants, he can form an army of the same size as the soldiers he has now.”
“That means he can only send half of what he could originally send as reinforcements. Anyway, we have completed our mission.”
No matter how they examined it from different angles, they did not think Marcus could do anything more in this situation.
In the end, the two praised their lord’s brilliant plan, as everything went as Cheontae Seonwoo had expected.
But that was only for a moment.
When the atmosphere was getting warm, a messenger arrived at Ger and reported something unbelievable.
“Chief! We have received a contact from the troops that went out as scouts. The Roman army is suddenly retreating!”
The mood of the drinking table turned cold.
Kai Du slowly put down his cup and rubbed his ears with an incredulous expression.
“Is this because I drank too much for the first time in a long time and I’m hearing things… What did you say? What are the Romans doing?”
“That’s… We received a report from the scouts that the Roman army is retreating.”
“What!”
Kai Du and Mawes slowly looked at each other’s faces.
Their faces hardened like plaster statues at the report that defied common sense.