Crusader Kings: Prisoners of War.

Chapter 37 Trinity

From that day on, the two sides fought many times in succession. Generally speaking, the Romans had the upper hand, but they also suffered heavy losses.

In any case, Tia finally built a stable and secure camp on the surrounding mountains, with towers, walls and ravines. After the rebels launched several completely failed night attacks, they realized that the Romans were more vigilant than they thought, and they did not waste any more manpower.

It's not the right time yet, but Tia is making preparations.

She ordered her people to level all obstacles in front of the city walls, that is, all the surrounding gardens, olive groves, vineyards and ravines. Only with a broad view would she not be afraid of being ambushed again. She wanted to level all the land around the city.

This was a time-consuming job, but they had plenty of time, and this time they learned from previous experience, and only one or two large teams of thousands of people took off their armor and went to work, with someone fully armed standing by to watch. The ballistae and catapults were all placed in the open, a glaring deterrent.

With this kind of vigilance, the rest of the things went much more smoothly, the land preparation work was carried out in an orderly manner, and the defenders in the city could only watch helplessly.

While they were busy with this work, an accident happened in the city.

Some people were driven out of the city without weapons, but those on the walls raised their protective gear and waved vigorously at the Romans.

The Romans who were preparing the ground not far away realized that this might be their opportunity. A riot broke out in the city and this small section of the city wall was captured by the moderates.

Valerian, who served as Orville's adjutant, quickly suggested: "We should immediately organize people to go over and seize the city wall, so that their first line of defense will be lost."

The auxiliary troops recruited by Orville originally had about 3,000 people, and now 2,000 of them have been divided into various legions. After all, the Luo Xie Army is not an independent combat unit, they are more of an auxiliary to the regular army.

Tia gave him another battalion of Roman legionnaires and asked him to lead them as a guard to keep an eye on the civil engineers below and prevent them from getting hurt.

Orville shook his head: "Just let everyone stay at their posts. This is a trap. There is no need to go through it."

Valerian was puzzled: "Why are you so sure? This is an opportunity, we have to give it a try. Besides, aren't there moderate people in the city who are biased towards us? It may not be a trap."

"Put yourself in their shoes. If you were the defenders, would you allow an army that you knew was leaning towards the Romans to defend the city? They may be short-sighted and cruel, but they are definitely not brainless."

Although the city was extremely disorganized, they were basically mortal enemies of the Romans.

Ethnically, the Romans conquered them and made them pay various taxes, and the Roman governors persecuted the locals more than once.

In terms of class, the Romans and Greeks occupied a relatively more superior position. The local wealthy merchants and nobles were also supported by the Romans, who exploited the local civilians.

From a religious point of view, they could not tolerate this sacred city being occupied by the Romans. So in Orwell's opinion, the local people's resistance should not be called rebellion, but uprising. However, these uprising leaders did not have enough ideological awareness, and it turned into a farce in the end.

Regardless of how high their ideological awareness was, their hostility towards the Romans was unwavering. It would be strange if they surrendered the city so easily.

After thinking about it carefully, Valerian could understand Orville, so even though he still had some ideas, he still chose to obey the order and informed the Roman army not to act rashly.

The two teams digging below did not think so. They felt that Orville was a foreigner after all and ideologically did not want the Roman army to capture the city, so they took the initiative to lead their men towards the city wall.

As expected, the fugitives who were driven out attacked them with daggers hidden under their clothes, and the defenders on the city walls also threw stones and javelins at them. For a time, these Romans who disobeyed orders suffered heavy losses.

They turned around and ran towards the position. Fortunately, the Romans in charge of guarding had not yet panicked. They repelled the scattered pursuers, but the defenders on the city wall cheered, waving their weapons at the legions below and laughing at the stupidity of the Romans.
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After returning to the camp, Tia scolded the two captains at a collective meeting.

"Those people in the city are at the end of their rope. Every move they make is carefully thought out and judged. They are carefully planning their strategy and organizing each raid carefully, so they can succeed occasionally."

She stared at the officers who disobeyed orders angrily: "However, although we often win because of strict discipline and obedience to orders, you people actually do the opposite and suffer damage due to lack of discipline, which brings shame to the entire army. Have you been hollowed out by luxury and enjoyment in the Eastern Provinces, and your minds are only thinking about speculation and self?!"

The two captains lowered their heads and did not dare to refute. They really took it for granted and thought that Orville did not know how to fight, so they had a confrontational mentality.

Tia was not angry because "Orville" was ignored, but because the "superior's" orders were ignored, which is a taboo in the army and is absolutely intolerable.

She stared at the two captains and said in a stiff tone: "You two, take all the centurions to eat barley in the next week. Remember this and don't do it again. If it happens again, everyone remember that which unit disobeys orders will be killed by eleven strokes. I am very disappointed with your cowardice and lack of discipline.

No matter how small or despicable the enemy is, you can despise them, but you must also treat them as desperate people fighting for survival. They will find ways to survive. This is a battlefield, not a place for you to go out and gain experience!"

Barley was the food for Roman military livestock, and it was a symbolic punishment to make them realize their mistakes.

The eleven-draw killing method is to draw one lucky soldier out of every ten people and have him stoned to death or beaten to death with sticks by his colleagues in order to deter the morale of the army. It was a very severe and uncommon punishment in ancient times.

Seeing that Tiya was so angry, no one suspected that she was joking, because Tiya had already demonstrated with her actions that she was a brave warrior who led the charge, and such a person would certainly not tolerate any cowardice or disobedience from her subordinates.

Tia also calmed down a bit, sat back in her seat, sighed and said, "The on-duty brigade should stay alert and not let the other side get a chance. If there is any problem, please report it at any time. The rest of the brigade should have a good rest and gather their strength to prepare for future wars. That's all for today, let's disperse."

(End of this chapter)