Chapter 32: The Bloody Carpet of Kampnavia

Before the third line of defense, our power ful opponents finally became careful. They did not rush to attack, but put away their contempt for us and reorganized their formation. Thank goodness, this also gave us some time to catch our breath. Their wounded were carried back to the ships for treatment, and fresh troops were brought in. All of this did not go smoothly, because they were constantly harassed by our arrows. Although the distance was not short and their heavy defense meant our harassment did not have any real effect, it still caused them no small amount of trouble.

What surprised the Winston a little was a long red carpet spread out in front of the third line of defense. It had been laid specially by the citizens to welcome the brave female thief Kelsey when she returned to the city after victory. Of course, the Winston did not know what this carpet was for. I don’t know how they would have acted if they had known that this carpet represented their own painful shame.

This red carpet was about a hundred steps long, stretching from the third line of defense straight to the city gate. Under normal circumstances, walking from one end to the other would take no longer than putting on a piece of clothing.

The Winston never imagined that they would walk on this carpet, which looked so short, for such a long time.

When the noon sun stood still in the sky and cast the first hint of early-spring warmth down onto the ground, the Heavy Infantry charged again. This time they slowed down, held their shields up high in front of their chests, and approached the barricades step by step.

What welcomed them were still waves of pikes.

The Winston approached slowly, hiding as much of their bodies as possible behind their huge shields, trying hard to reduce their own casualties. Even so, they still left dozens of tall corpses on the ground.

Their strategy was successful. The iron tide surged forward slowly but firmly with an unstoppable momentum. They tore down the obstacles with far fewer casualties than before and pushed our soldiers back.

This showed that our opponent had become clearer about what he wanted. He did not need to trade casualties with us on this narrow path. What he wanted was only to push our defenses at the foot of the city back close to the city gate, and to control the open grass field beneath the city wall. Only by occupying the open ground as quickly as possible could he quickly display his numerical advantage, directly attack, and capture the city wall.

Rodrick was retreating, steadily but helplessly. The soldiers on the third line did not suffer heavy casualties, but they did not inflict heavy losses on the enemy either. They might have been able to freeze the enemy’s wild and furious attack under cold and dangerous concentrated blows, but they could not resist this slow and restrained trampling.

It was not long before the fourth line of defense also broke. On the path that the Winston Heavy Infantry had crushed over, tragic corpses lay everywhere, some in iron armor, some in gray uniforms.

The carpet greedily drank the dripping blood, leaving a deep, dark red color. The blood of the soldiers from both countries mixed together and could not be told apart, as if to say: only when people die can the barriers between them disappear, and they can coexist harmoniously and peacefully.

The last line of defense was right behind them. The Spearmen in the back rows had almost retreated into the city. The archers were shooting at the enemy face-to-face from a distance of only two people apart, and now their threat was fully shown. At such a close distance, almost any defense was ignored. Arrows pierced through heavy armor, dug into soft human bodies, and brought eternal sleep to the dead. On the city wall, crossbow bolts flew in terrifying arcs toward the human tide, bringing great support to their comrades below.

But none of this was enough to stop the iron will and footsteps of these soldiers. For every small step forward, they paid the price of life and blood, but their steps forward never stopped. Even if they could only move forward half a foot, they still struggled to advance. Standing in place was forbidden, let alone retreating.

One step, two steps, three steps… At the foot of the city, the last line of defense was right before their eyes. Rodrick and his men had no way left to retreat. At the docks, the Winston had already begun to gather more troops. As soon as the heavy vanguard pushed Rodrick and his men through the city gate, they would cross the road in the shortest time, charge onto the plaza, and begin a large-scale siege.

Just at that moment, things changed.

As a series of short horn blasts sounded from within the city, behind the whole line of Winston Heavy Infantry soldiers, corpse after corpse wearing Delanmaya gray infantry armor suddenly came back to life. They pulled out the daggers and short swords hidden on their bodies, got close from behind to the Winston soldiers who had already passed them, and time after time mercilessly drove their weapons into the enemies’ backs. Their movements were so fast, and they pressed so close to the Winston, that the enemy’s large, heavy weapons became completely useless and could not be used at all. In the eyes of these unfortunate Winston soldiers, the first thing they saw was a shy, thin young face—Roll’s face.

…

“What if we only rely on frontal defense…” At the meeting before the battle, Roll suddenly spoke. But as he spoke, he saw everyone around him staring at him. His face went red, and he could not continue.

“Nonsense. If we don’t defend from the front, are we supposed to defend from the back?” Someone lost patience and shouted loudly.

“That might be a good idea. We should strengthen the defense of the south wall to keep the Winston from going around the whole continent in one day and attacking from behind.” Some people sneered in low voices.

“Quiet…” Fred stopped the older officers’ ridicule and looked at Roll as he asked. But to be honest, even we probably did not really expect shy Roll to come up with any idea.

Roll not only came up with an idea—this young man who was usually timid and cautious came up with an idea that startled everyone.

He said, “In the chaos of battle, pretend to be corpses… lie in ambush. Once the enemy passes the defense line, we can attack from behind them…”

“Impossible. Absolutely impossible. What if their follow-up troops charge up at that time? The soldiers in ambush would all be finished.”

“No…” Roll retorted loudly. Suddenly feeling that his voice had become too high, he hesitated and looked around, then gritted his teeth and continued:

“We don’t start the ambush from the first line of defense, but from here…” He pointed at the middle section of the road leading to the docks. “If we start the ambush from here, the archers on the city wall can provide enough cover. If they send Light Infantry to help, the crossbows will cause them heavy losses. And…”

“And what?” For the first time, I listened to Roll so seriously. I should say, I felt ashamed. Since the day I met Roll, we had always seemed to ignore his existence and subconsciously treated him as someone who needed protection and care. We did not know that this quiet young man was no longer the recruit who had been scared into screaming by Carlson on his first day in the army. Under his cowardly exterior beat a brave and even cunning heart.

“Also, I think everyone has ignored one thing. Apart from this road, there are other ways to reach the city wall. As long as one can swim, everyone can leave the battlefield through the water on both sides of this road. Most Winston cannot swim. That is our advantage.”

Just like that, the one who had kept silent from the very beginning pointed out everyone’s oversight at the end and came up with a plan that looked extremely dangerous but had to be admitted to be extremely tempting.

“Then who will lead this ambush?” Fred asked.

…

No one answered. This was truly too bold an idea. If one person was exposed, everyone might die horribly on the battlefield without achieving anything. These officers before him had already accepted the idea of dying on the battlefield, but what they feared was that their deaths would be meaningless.

“No one? What a pity. Indeed, this is a bold idea, but it is hard to carry out.” Fred glanced sideways at Roll, who was blushing and keeping his head down in silence, and said with slight regret.

“Wait… I… It was my idea. I’ll go!” Roll suddenly raised his head and met our eyes. Although his words were still flustered, in his eyes I saw a strange glow that I had never seen before.

Roll and his mysterious squad performed excellently. They mixed in among the soldiers behind the third barricade. When the enemy got close, they lay down early on both sides of the road, lying together with the corpses. They disguised themselves so well that even we, who knew the secret, could not tell who were the real dead. For this dangerous task, Roll had specifically chosen fifty men. He did not want the clever and capable, nor the exceptionally smart. He only looked for the most silent, honest, and even dull soldiers. He chose the right people. Once they received the order to “die,” these most rigid-minded soldiers no longer treated themselves as living men. They let blade after blade leave wounds on their bodies, and let the enemies’ heavy bodies trample on them. They only knew one thing: if they had not heard the horn of “resurrection,” they were corpses and absolutely could not move.

Their luck was very good, or rather, all of our luck was very good. Just as Fred had expected, the Winston were still afraid of the great power of the crossbows. They did not swarm up, but skillfully sent Heavy Infantry first to clear the road. The chaotic battle also left our enemies no time to care about the dead bodies by the roadside. When the horn sounded, the “resurrected” soldiers were almost slaughtering the stunned enemies at will. In an instant, they threw chaos and panic into an army that had been as solid as iron.

The screams from behind disturbed the soldiers in the front rows, but the dense formation made them completely unable to know what had happened. A bad feeling made their sword-swinging hands hesitate, and more deaths frightened most of the people in the middle of the ranks. The originally neat formation finally began to fall apart. Our chance had come.

“The enemy is surrounded! Charge!” Rodrick shouted at the right moment. His face, pale from excessive blood loss, was as heroic and solemn as a marble statue.

The shout “For the glory of our families!” rang out again among the pike formations. The soldiers were strongly encouraged and burst out with even greater power, as if magic had been injected into them. It stopped. The iron tide that had been slowly moving from the very beginning stopped. No, it was not just stopping; they began to retreat. This was perhaps the first retreat of this proud and powerful army since it was founded. When the will to fight was lost, exhaustion quickly seized the soldiers’ bodies. After all, they had been fighting bravely in heavy armor for an entire morning. Even if they really were men made of iron, they could not fight endlessly while carrying heavy weight.

Never look down on a silent person, because you never know when he will suddenly explode. Never look down on a shy person either. No one is used to being looked down on. Once they have a chance, they will win your attention in a shocking way, and also win your deep respect.

Those dull soldiers who were usually teased, ignored, and made victims of jokes—whether kind or malicious—once they had to kill, they would hesitate less and waver less than ordinary people. Some scholars say this is caused by their deep inferiority complex. I don’t know if it is true. What my eyes told me was that they were dangerous.

Every soldier who joined the ambush carried two weapons: a very short sword and an even shorter dagger. Against enemies with their backs turned to them, the power of these two weapons was terrifying. Every strike sank deeply to the hilt in the most fatal position. Blood, like water squeezed by hand from a bag, sprayed onto people’s bodies, faces, and weapons. In an instant, within that small area, neither the shining iron-armored soldiers nor the gray-clothed ambushers could be seen. Everyone was red: red dead men, red living men, red madness, red slaughter…

The Winston were shocked by the ambushers’ treachery, and even more by the ambushers’ cruelty. In the chaotic crowd, I saw Roll. His behavior could no longer be judged by common sense of battle. Time after time, he gave the nearest enemy a deadly embrace. This embrace made it impossible for the enemy’s longsword to threaten him, and the killing that was almost flesh against flesh left trembling fear in the hearts of the enemies who were still alive.

Ferocious. That was my feeling about Roll at this moment. It was actually ferocious. The Roll on the battlefield had completely shed his shy appearance and turned into a beast, killing lives in the most primitive and cruel way.

The Winston commander finally could no longer ignore the casualties of his vanguard charging troops, so he sent a squad of Light Infantry to rescue them. They did not have the same heavy armor as their vanguard. Under the well-prepared rain of arrows, they fell in large numbers before even getting close. When they paid a huge price and finally rushed to the front of the ambush squad, ready to surround and annihilate them together with their already disordered allies:

“Go!” Roll shouted the order, and at the same time grabbed a fully armed enemy and rolled with him into the water beside the road.

The assassins who had brought the Winston great damage and incalculable psychological shock behind enemy lines all jumped into the water one after another. Most of them, like their commander, took an opponent with them when they retreated. Words like brave, tenacious, bold, and outstanding could no longer describe their way of fighting. This was a vicious release. This was a brutal slaughter.

The undisciplined charge of the reinforcing Light Infantry completely messed up the steps of their allies, who were struggling to hold on. The formation that had already started to waver was completely destroyed by their own side’s blind actions. The iron-armored soldiers began to retreat. Their fighting nerves had reached the limits of human endurance, and the enemy’s unexpectedly fierce courage dragged down their strong will. They abandoned their seriously wounded companions, abandoned the glory of warriors, abandoned the victory charge that had been so close, and completely collapsed. At this moment, their collapse unintentionally spread an infectious emotion, and that emotion was called fear.

The Pikemen who had stubbornly held the line raised their pikes and shouted with joy to express their pride. They had every right to be proud. Just now, they had stopped an enemy almost five times their own number, and at a relatively small loss had inflicted extremely heavy losses on the enemy. Even more worthy of pride was that what they had defeated head-on was the invincible iron army that had once swept the whole continent, the glorious and mighty army that had left fear and fame in dozens of countries.

Also worthy of pride were the ambushers who followed Roll to create bloody chaos behind enemy lines. Their battlefield was the most dangerous place in the entire battlefield, and their numbers were almost negligible in front of the mighty enemy. It was them—these silent soldiers who usually showed no sign of being special—who burst out with the most dazzling brilliance of their lives at the most critical moment. In the eyes of some conservative commanders, their actions were almost looking for death, but this group of iron-blooded fighters caused the enemy’s collapse at a very small cost: fifty men—eight gave their lives, six were seriously wounded.

On the battlefield, those who fear death the least are often the farthest from death.

On the first morning of the battle at the foot of Kampnavia, after leaving behind nearly a thousand corpses, the Winston had only managed to clear the road leading to the city gate. Blood flowed freely over the brick road, bright and horrible, flowing in the direction of that red carpet leading into the city.

That was a carpet once used to celebrate victory, but now, it led to the gates of death.

The Bloody Carpet of Kampnavia became famous from this battle onward.