Chapter 11
CHAPTER 11: Ondal or Agrippa
The Ottoman cavalry was annihilated.
The battle was effectively over at that moment.
Since the cavalry was annihilated, the enemy artillery was a deer with a broken leg in front of a lion. Also, an army whose cavalry and artillery were both annihilated could not win even if the God of War descended.
The Ottomans were defeated. Kahraman Pasha was killed in action. The remaining survivors fled desperately towards the Akkerman fortress.
In the meantime, the Polish cavalry reduced the number of fleeing Ottoman troops as much as possible.
When the battle, which would later be called the Battle of Iași, was completely over, only about 13,000 out of 60,000 Ottoman troops could return alive to Akkerman.
On the other hand, the Polish army stopped at suffering 6,500 casualties. It was an overwhelming victory comparable to the Battle of Slankamen.
Poland gained tremendous benefits from this war. Compared to the Siege of Vienna, which was merely a nominal victory gaining nothing, it was a much more valuable and nutritious victory.
With this battle, Poland could swallow the Principality of Moldavia whole.
The Habsburg Emperor had no choice but to recognize Poland's sovereignty over the Principality of Moldavia. There was also support from the Pope.
"This land will become the core territory of the Sobieski family."
That October, Jakub became the Duke of Moldavia as Jan III wanted.
This was a tremendous opportunity for the Sobieski family as well.
The current Principality of Moldavia was in a state where the aristocratic class was completely smashed. The pro-Ottoman nobles either died on the battlefield or were in a position to pack up and leave. Most pro-Polish nobles were also purged by Cantemir. Unless there was an heir, they could swallow the territories of nobles who were gone.
It was literally like an empty house. Jakub could grow his power significantly by granting fiefs to nobles who suited his taste in this land.
October, Iași.
A victory banquet was held at the palace of the Duke of Moldavia.
It wasn't a French-style banquet large and fancy enough to satisfy high-ranking nobles. Anyway, when they return to Warsaw, the high-ranking nobles would plan to hold a large banquet among themselves again. This was a place to praise young officers for their hard work right now. Doubling as a distribution of rewards.
Jeong-hun was wearing the Royal Hussar officer uniform and touching his neck as if awkward. Although a few weeks had passed, his comrades still found it hard to talk to him.
Now it wasn't because they disliked him for being an alien or anything else. It was the opposite. It was because the things he showed were too surreal. If not for Jeong-hun, at least one-third of the Winged Hussars standing here right now would have been lying on the cold ground.
"How long has it been since we had proper alcohol and meat?"
Except for Bojan and Radosław.
Although their wounds hadn't fully healed yet and they had splints on their arms and bandages wrapped around them, they looked reasonably fine. Since they survived and even got promoted, maybe it was rather good.
"Hey, this meat melts in the mouth."
"Drink wine without spilling it."
But they, who had their heads buried in alcohol and meat devouring them like crabs hiding their eyes, soon had to lift their heads.
Noble women were entering on the other side of the banquet hall.
The Winged Hussar officers who were staring blankly at that sight exclaimed a beat late.
"W... What a beauty!"
Yeah, since you've been in the army all this time, it might look that way. Jeong-hun smirked seeing the surrounding comrades who couldn't come to their senses. Look at him. He's completely mesmerized.
"May I ask the name of the Lady?"
The Winged Hussar officers approached the women swaying like mollusks. It was such a soft gesture that one couldn't even imagine they were human weapons who slaughtered Ottoman troops brutally just a while ago.
The daughters of the fallen Moldavian Principality Boyars also welcomed them. They also had their own purposes.
The remaining Moldavian nobles are pro-Polish nobles. To save the family whose father or brother died, it was good to form a connection with promising noble children of Poland. Officers with young and sturdy bodies also had excellent sexual attractiveness. The two groups matched well quickly.
Bojan is the most popular. Women approached him first for now. That guy's beauty had to be acknowledged. Jeong-hun still remembered the modest female-disguised version of Bojan stuck in his brain. It was disgusting enough that he wanted to erase it quickly, but it didn't erase well.
But, Jeong-hun didn't know. That the one who took the biggest competition right now was him.
The noble women had already conceived strategies before coming to this banquet hall. Even their objective position and the opponent's potential. All the so-called confident women were approaching one person, Jeong-hun.
A lady with brown hair whose freckles were impressive approached and bowed her head.
"Lord Park. Excuse me, but may we have a conversation in a quiet place together? The fountain in the garden is truly beautiful..."
Not to be outdone, a woman next to her with glossy black hair and big attractive eyes interrupted the conversation.
"Lord (Pan) Park, the Lion of Iași! Is the rumor I heard true?"
Although politeness towards the person who spoke first couldn't be found, right now they didn't have politeness to spare for competitors.
If cutting down enemies holding a Saber is men's battle, the battle of flowers was done with mouths.
And following the declaration of war by those two, the remaining three women watching for an opportunity narrowed the distance instantly and wielded their tongues.
"Lord Park...!"
It's dizzying. Jeong-hun felt pressure more than when surrounded by Sipahis. His popularity was higher than he thought.
Me? Why?
No matter how much big merit he kept establishing, eventually Jeong-hun was nothing more than a mere officer. The Battle of Iași was the same. He was nothing more than about a knight on the huge chessboard played by Jan III and the Ottoman Pasha. But why on earth him being like that?
But Jeong-hun still had little information about this era. Understanding of people's behavior patterns was also little.
War is cruel and terrible. But paradoxically, it was also a spectacle. This world where there is almost nothing proper to play with. If it is certain that our side wins, is there anything as fun as war?
The people of Iași also watched the pitched battle. Since their lives were at stake, they watched harder than anyone else.
Would the people not know how the war situation is turning? Even if they are ignorant about strategy and tactics, they knew at least that someone was doing well. Just like knowing the name of a person who scored a splendid goal even without knowing a single rule of soccer.
In the past, the chansons de geste of romantic knights spread from mouth to mouth of storytellers and bards. Songs were about all. But now is an era long past even the era of movable metal type entered. Even if knights are disappearing from war, isn't romance rather spreading more through books? No, rather because of that, it spread enthusiastically like wildfire.
Winged Hussar Park was, seeing from such a part, the last romance.
He was young. No, a kid. If Jeong-hun and Ela are the same age, and Ela turned seventeen in this era, Jeong-hun is also seventeen.
Full seventeen. It meant he was a second-year high school student in former Korea. Although what was inside was nearing thirty now, others couldn't see that inside.
Of course, in this era where life expectancy was much shorter, late teens were sufficient adults. They gave birth to children, and went to war too. But objectively being young is unchanged.
Jeong-hun's skin was so young that sometimes pimples came up slightly.
Not an old monarch, nor an old general. Praise for Jan III? Originally such praise is too obvious to be fun. With all due respect, Your Majesty is old, aren't you?
Young but the body is strong. The modifier 'strong' was insufficient. Shall we describe that sight with only such a word? Other Winged Hussars, and even the Ottoman army, are as strong as their tremendous notoriety. Jeong-hun was literally at the level appearing in history.
Come to think of it, since this Battle of Iași would also be a scene of history, it was clear it would remain as history. Laws are far, and fists are close in the early modern period.
Strength is the best virtue a man possesses. As such, he couldn't help but appear more attractive to women.
Of course, there were two downsides too. But they were trivial.
One is that he is an unfamiliar Tatar. In Central Europe or Western Europe, it would definitely be a downside. Although it's cruel to say, people with different appearances were always not welcomed.
However, not here.
The gateway where Europe and the Ottomans communicate with each other, near the Principality of Moldavia, aliens were common. Era of devastation. This vicinity where aliens and aliens clash countless times had fights over religion and profit as the biggest rather than fights over race.
Tatars were generally considered vassals of the Ottomans, but regardless of Poland or Tsardom of Rus, they served anyone well if paid well. Even in the old Moldavian court, there were vassals of Budjak Tatar origin. To Moldavian nobles, it was enough if they were just fellow Christians, though Orthodox would be better.
Second is that his origin is humble. Whether Winged Hussar Park is a noble or a commoner is not known. But whatever it was, it didn't matter.
Anyway, the daughters of fallen nobles of the Principality of Moldavia weren't daring to aim for influential great nobles of central Poland. They have a separate world they live in. They can't even rub against them with political marriage. They pursued the best goal within a realistic line.
A humble but proven officer can succeed by his own efforts as much as he wants in chaotic times. From the family's perspective, they might rather be able to control him. So Jeong-hun was one of the best groom candidates.
But Jeong-hun handed over the women to his comrades with the excuse of using the restroom and avoided the seat.
He is a man too, so is there a reason to dislike women? But he also knew that what was contained in their eyes wasn't pure goodwill. Furthermore, he has a girlfriend.
He avoided the garden crowded with Winged Hussar officers and ladies and walked a little along a quiet path. Then, he stopped at a small riverside flowing along Iași and sat down on the grass.
I miss you.
Jeong-hun threw pebbles into the river blankly.
"What are you doing?"
At that moment, a sound was heard from behind his back.
"Your Majesty."
It was Jan III.
"Did you come without guards?"
"You are here."
Jan III, who snorted, sat down on the ground with a thud. Jeong-hun, who didn't think the King would do that, looked at him with a surprised face.
"What, do you think there is always a chair for a monarch on the battlefield?"
Jeong-hun also agreed with those words. He also sat down slightly apart.
The two had no words for a while. They looked blankly at the river reflecting in the moonlight.
Suddenly looking, a log as small as an adult's leg was floating down.
The gazes of the two were fixed there.
The log got stuck between stones protruding in the stream with a thud. While watching thinking 'so be it', a while later, a log bigger than that was floating down now. Coincidentally, the log behind also headed to the same path as the log that came first.
The sound of logs colliding with each other pierced through the sound of water and entered the ears. While the log behind got stuck in the stone, the log in front bounced off and headed downstream again in the flow of the river.
"The one behind pushes out the one in front."
It seems similar sayings exist anywhere in the world. Jeong-hun nodded.
Jan III looked at Jeong-hun.
"Who are you?"
"......"
It is identical to the question the King asked seeing him intruding into his garden for the first time. The first question was an interrogation of anger. But the question this time was different. His question now was close to pure curiosity. Anger was not felt.
The King was finally seeing Jeong-hun as human to human.
"...I, my parents came here following the Silk Road from far away Joseon."
If Ela didn't reveal the secret, Jeong-hun would do so too. Instead, Jeong-hun wrote an answer he could reveal, and people could accept. He had discussed his past history with Ela a few times too.
"Joseon, you say. Joseon..."
The King chewed over the young man's answer. And asked.
"Are guys like you common in Joseon?"
At the King's words holding a little anxiety, Jeong-hun held back a hearty laugh.
"...No, Your Majesty."
"Right? There is no way."
Jan III smirked first.
"I acknowledge. You are an amazing guy."
Jan III said so. At that moment, he was Jan Sobieski who overcame adversity rather than the King of Poland. Who served as Officer of Poland, General of Poland, and Grand Hetman of Poland.
Is there anyone who understands the Winged Hussars as well as Jan III?
Although his son was the Field Hetman, and his friend was the Grand Crown Hetman, actually the Battle of Iași was no different from what Jan III designed.
War is divided into early, middle, and late stages. Jan assumed those situations and planned major tactics and strategies.
But all plans are bound to go wrong due to trivial matters. Unless he is a prophet, he cannot know the future. Even a rare famous general could lose by one trivial mistake. Since the opponent isn't a fool either.
So Jan III felt slightly dizzy when the Winged Hussars were pushed back in the early and middle stages. The fight between anvil and anvil is actually a boring tussle. The initiative of the war was slowly passing to the artillery, and what could kill that artillery effectively was the cavalry, and therefore it was safe to say that the cavalry was still the factor deciding the direction of the battlefield.
So the fight at that time actually contained the ending of the Battle of Iași.
The Winged Hussars are human weapons who fight incredibly well. But the enemy was formidable too.
It's the Ottomans. That Ottoman Empire. That monster that cornered Europe, and could only be dealt with if many nations formed an alliance.
Jan III also felt dizzy seeing more Sipahis came than intelligence said. Silistra Eyalet was a quite powerful Eyalet even among Ottoman Eyalets. They might have borrowed Sipahis from other Eyalets. Maybe they scraped them together from Kostantiniyye which sensed a crisis.
And the enemy commander planned quite sharp tactics. It was that strategy of giving flesh to take the bone. No matter what, the Winged Hussars wouldn't have been annihilated, but they could have been hurt greatly. If that happened, the tactics of the middle stage they designed also went awry.
But this guy made up for all of that. Not only made up, but conversely annihilated the enemy. Jeong-hun bought time for Jan III to deploy the reserve Dragoon unit in the rear quickly, and even lured them into the Dragoon's firing line.
Afterward, he chased and killed the enemies whose morale was broken through a pincer attack. Most Sipahis lay on the ground, and enemy light cavalry were no longer threatening.
The battle of the middle and late stages was merely a formality.
Jan III knew. Because it was him, he knew. This guy is a tremendous item.
(End of Chapter)
— Translated by Prime Works —