My XX deal with Sister Nero

But now, the Parthian attack was blocked, and someone was needed to clear the stones around the Roman army's main camp. So... why didn't Tiridates send cavalry to drive out the Roman cavalry, drive the Roman cavalry to the Roman army's main camp, and let them open a path for themselves?

In this way, not only could the Parthian horse archers continue to use the Parthian circle to hunt down Roman infantry on the periphery, but the Parthian armored cavalry could even use the path opened by the Roman cavalry to charge all the way and see if it was possible to carve a gap in the Roman tortoise shell formation and deplete the Roman army's manpower as much as possible.

Soon, under Tiridates' order, tens of thousands of cavalrymen turned their guns and rushed towards the back of the hillside where the Roman cavalry was located not far away.

Like the Roman infantry, the main means of attack of the Roman cavalry was also the javelin. Generally speaking, the Roman cavalry would throw a round of javelins when approaching the enemy. If the enemy was small in number, the cavalry would take the remaining javelin and charge directly into the enemy's face. If the enemy was large in number, the cavalry would throw a second round of javelins and then use daggers to fight the enemy at close range.

So, to be honest, the range of the Roman cavalry's javelin was not as good as the range of the Parthian archers' bows. That was why, when the Parthian cavalry rushed towards the Roman cavalry in several directions in a semi-encirclement posture, this cavalry unit of only 4,000 people could only retreat to the side as much as possible before the enemy completely surrounded them.

But...can Tiridates make the Roman cavalry escape?

Soon, the 4,000 Roman cavalry found themselves completely surrounded. No matter which direction they ran, they would see Parthian horse archers within a few hundred meters. Finally, driven by the Parthian cavalry, this group of Roman cavalry gradually moved closer to the main camp of the Roman Empire.

"General Bruce, my Roman cavalry is moving towards this side. What should we do?" Soon, Bruce and Tony in the formation received a report and learned that the Parthians were driving the Roman cavalry towards this side.

"It seems... they want to use my Roman cavalry to clear the way and let them clean up the stones we spilled on the ground." Standing beside Tony, Bruce looked at the cavalry being driven over from a distance without saying a word, and said in a deep voice.

"It doesn't matter. I didn't expect this stone to have much effect." Tony shrugged. To be honest, stones have limited lethality to horses. Horse hooves are made of stratum corneum and do not contain any nerves or blood vessels. To put it simply, even if the stone is very sharp, no matter how it cuts the horse's hoof, the warhorse will not feel anything. As for why the war horses stood up in pain from the stones... it was because some stones were splashed while the warhorses were running and hit the horses' legs or abdomen. These stones had been processed by the Romans to be sharp. Although they would not hurt the warhorses, they were still quite painful.

Chapter 461: Cavalry, charge!

Tony never expected that these stones could last for a long time. After all, stones...this thing is too easy to break.

Pull out a group of slaves who are not afraid of death, let them kick away the stones on the ground, and then the "formation" will be broken. It's such a simple thing.

So from the very beginning, Tony did not expect these stones to cause much damage to the Parthian archers. He guessed that the Parthians would definitely have a way to break the deadlock, but he did not guess that the Parthians would actually go around to their rear and drive the Roman cavalry over here, allowing the Roman cavalry to break the deadlock.

"These guys..." Tony's face turned cold as he watched the Roman cavalry being driven towards the main camp. These Parthians were simply... simply shameless!

Fortunately, his own cavalry's horses were equipped with horseshoes, so their hooves would not be scratched on the stone ground. Tony only had 4,000 cavalrymen at hand, and they could not withstand any non-combat casualties.

"Let's see what they plan to do first." Tony took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down. He stared at the driven Roman cavalry. He wanted to know how the Parthians would break his formation!

If the Roman cavalry is asked to clear the stones on the periphery so that the archers can continue to perform the Parthian circle formation, then Tony will have no choice but to use the human-powered catapults to carry out a covering attack and cooperate with the archers to destroy the enemy's manpower as much as possible. But if the enemy intends to rush in... then it's simple, prepare the Broken Army Crossbow and beat him up.

The so-called Pojun Crossbow is actually the Eastern bed crossbow. Compared with the Roman Empire's Scorpion Crossbow, the bed crossbow has a simpler production process and its power is similar to that of the Scorpion Crossbow, so... they each have their own merits.

It’s just that the Eastern crossbow is a heavy crossbow, while the standard equipment of the Roman Empire legions is generally light crossbows. Moreover, according to the rules set by Augustus at the time, the Roman legions were generally required to be equipped with fifty scorpion crossbows, the purpose of which was to suppress the barbarian cavalry through firepower.

Especially the Parthian cavalry!

And Tony is even more ruthless.

After the first expedition to Parthia, he returned to Rome and ordered the development of the Army-Breaking Crossbow and its oversized version, the City-Breaking Crossbow. Then he used these weapons to form a so-called artillery regiment, mixing the previous hand cannon team with the newly formed artillery team. The firepower density of this 5,000-man artillery regiment... Well, according to Tony's estimation, no country would be able to surpass it within a thousand years.

Tony was not afraid of the Parthian armored cavalry's sudden charge, or rather, not only was he not afraid, but he also hoped that the other side would make a sudden charge, because only in this way could he focus his fire on the other side's armored cavalry and try to completely cripple these 20,000 armored cavalry!

Soon, after driving the 4,000 Roman cavalry to the side of the "stone formation" arranged by Tony, these Parthian archers desperately shot arrows at the Roman legion's main camp to suppress the Roman heavy infantry, while driving the Roman cavalry to rush straight towards the Roman army's main camp.

"Are you trying to clear the way for the armored cavalry behind you?" Tony saw through the enemy's plan with his clairvoyance, and suddenly said to Bruce beside him, "Pass the order, the artillery regiment moves, aiming at the direction where the enemy archers are rushing under the cover of the infantry. When our cavalry gets close to the infantry main formation, shoot two rattle arrows to let them disperse to both sides according to the rules set before. Then the archers shoot arrows to prevent the enemy archers from getting too close... well, although the enemy archers shouldn't get too close to us."

Tony was right. The Parthian archers would not approach the Roman main camp easily.

After all, most of the Parthian horse archers did not have any protective gear. Those who were a little richer might wear leather armor, but the vast majority of them only wore a cloth garment on their upper body, and at most a leather hat. Do you think that with such limited defense, they would dare to approach the Roman main camp and accept the baptism of javelins and bows and arrows?

When two rattle arrows were fired, the Roman cavalry close to the Roman main camp split into two groups and bypassed their own camp. The Parthian cavalry standing in the distance quickly turned their horses' heads and retreated again with loud shouts.

The road is clear and you can drive at any time.

"Next, the Romans should use their scorpion crossbows to focus fire on our armored cavalry. Based on the calculation that one legion has fifty light crossbows, Prince Odney has twenty legions with him this time, with a total of one thousand crossbows. This number is indeed not small. Judging from their reloading speed, they can only focus fire for two rounds at most. At best, they can only cause casualties to our cavalry. If we add their archers and javelins, until we get close, they can only leave more than two thousand but less than three thousand of our warriors. Then... order the armored cavalry to make a retreat gesture and lure the Romans into our hinterland as much as possible to stretch their supply lines first. If we surround them here... they can easily escape."

Standing on a hillside not far away, Tiridati gave the order with a calm expression.

"Yes, General!" the deputy general responded, and then ordered his guards to convey Tiridates' intention to the general in charge of commanding the armored cavalry.

If you want to pretend, you have to spend some money, such as... losing some cavalry.

After receiving the order, the commander roughly understood General Tiridates' thinking. On the one hand, he wanted to make His Royal Highness Prince Odenius develop a mentality of arrogance and think that the Parthian army was nothing special. On the other hand, he wanted to lure the enemy as deep into his territory as possible. In addition to lengthening the enemy's supply lines and increasing variables, it could also prevent His Royal Highness the Prince from running back to the Roman Empire when the enemy was encircled at the last critical moment.

"I understand. Go back and tell the general that I will act according to your wishes." The armored cavalry commander nodded, then led his armored cavalry and rode slowly towards the direction of the Roman legion.

Step by step, under the leadership of this commander, the speed of these 20,000 armored cavalrymen gradually increased, first walking slowly, then trotting, until finally, at the urging of their masters, these 20,000 war horses turned their four hooves and rushed towards the direction of the Roman legion!

The sound of hooves is like thunder!

Feeling the ground shaking and looking at the 20,000 armored cavalrymen and their horses rushing towards him, even Tony, who had been mentally prepared, couldn't help but turn pale.

There were over ten thousand people, endless. Looking at the overwhelming armored cavalry in front of him, Tony subconsciously took a half step back and unconsciously grabbed the hand of a guard.

PS: Why do I feel like I’m losing money on my PY trading?

Chapter 462: Spectators outside the battlefield

As mentioned before, the guards around Tony were basically Nero's original guards. When Tony went to the town of Odni, Nero took into consideration that his brother had no guards, so he specially selected forty-eight cavalry guards from his own guards to form Tony's personal guards. Because these forty-eight personal guards used to guard Nero, they... are almost all cute young ladies.

"Don't be afraid, Your Highness." Seeing that Tony's face was a little pale, the guard first put the dagger in his hand back into the sheath, then freed his right hand and gently touched Tony's little paw, and said gently.

"...Yeah." Tony coughed awkwardly and subconsciously withdrew his claws.

What should I do? It's so embarrassing. Although I'm just a child, Tony has always maintained a cool and handsome image in front of his guards, calm and composed, and able to plan strategies. But now... my image has become that of a coward.

"Ahem, um, General Bruce, pass the order down, tell the closest legions to concentrate the scorpion crossbows first, suppress the enemy with as much firepower as possible, and then push the artillery regiment over when they have completed their surprise attack and distanced themselves from us, and destroy the enemy's armored cavalry as much as possible!" After calming himself down a little, Tony took a deep breath and gave the order calmly.

"Yes, Your Highness." Faced with this very routine order, Bruce waved his hand gently, signaling a deputy general to do as Your Highness wished.

To be honest, apart from the artillery and the stones, Tony's current layout is very conventional, so up to now, Bruce has not only not raised any objections, but can even make certain supplementary arrangements based on the tactics proposed by Tony, such as now. In addition to mobilizing the slow-moving artillery, under Bruce's command, the Roman Empire's archers began to move and rushed towards the direction of the armored cavalry.

Soon, the armored cavalry came within the attack range of the Roman legions.

"Shoot!" With the order from the centurions, the archers drew their bows and drew their arrows. The arrows flew out of the air and fell into the formation of the Parthian armored cavalry like a rainstorm. The dozens of light crossbows that were hastily gathered also roared, and the crossbow arrows as thick as three fingers pierced the armored cavalry that were rushing over.

In an instant, the Roman legionaries on the opposite side were thrown to the ground and screaming.

"The opponent's... defense is really strong." Although it seemed that the Parthian side was in a very miserable situation, in fact, there were not many casualties who fell off their horses in this round of attacks. At most, there were only a hundred people. So it is undeniable that the armored cavalry of the Parthian Empire... has a really strong defense.

Compared to the crossbow, the loading speed of the bow is faster, but... the Roman Empire's bow and arrow are still lacking in armor-piercing ability for the Parthian armored cavalry.

Those with armor-piercing capabilities could not keep up, and those who could keep up did not have the ability to penetrate armor. Seeing the Parthian armored cavalry getting closer and closer, a legion commander standing at the front raised his right hand and shouted, "Hold your guns, prepare to resist the impact!"

With an order, the Roman soldiers standing in the third row held the javelins in one hand and placed them on the shoulders of the Roman soldiers in the second row. The tips of the javelins poked out through the gaps in the shields of the Roman soldiers in the first row and aimed at the Parthian armored cavalry rushing towards this side.

"Boom!" With a loud bang, the Parthian armored cavalry and the Roman Empire's heavy infantry finally collided violently.

"Do you think the Parthian Empire can defeat the Roman Empire?"

On a hillside about two kilometers away from the plain, a middle-aged man in a black robe asked as he watched the Parthian armored cavalry charging.

"Without our intervention, the Parthian Empire would have a hard time holding on, right? After all, according to intelligence, the Parthian Empire is now almost attacked from all sides. Even if they can win this battle, they will not be able to win the entire war, don't you think? Flas?" A middle-aged man wearing a turban and with a typical Middle Eastern face said, standing next to the middle-aged man in black robe.

"You are right." The middle-aged man in a black robe nodded and said indifferently: "Although the master has not clearly stated his attitude, according to what that guy said, this prince... may be a variable."

"So, are we going to take action?" The middle-aged man wearing a white turban glanced at the man in black robe standing next to him and spoke.

"I think... it would be better not to have a direct conflict with that prince for the time being. After all... His Royal Highness the Prince seems to have a close relationship with another powerful enemy. If we provoke that guy again... we can reach an agreement with the Parthian Empire to help them deal with the other army and let them deal with this Prince themselves." The man in black robe replied expressionlessly.

"That makes sense. That guy... is too strong. He even killed Orias..." Thinking of the death of a demon pillar at the hands of that man, the middle-aged man in a white turban couldn't help but shudder. In terms of strength, he didn't think he could be stronger than Orias.

"Let's wait and see who will win this war." The middle-aged man in black robe looked at the battlefield in the distance expressionlessly and said in a deep voice.

After suffering less than 200 casualties, the 20,000 armored cavalrymen slammed into the Roman heavy infantry like a steel torrent. Tony, who was in the center of the army, clearly saw that many Roman soldiers were thrown seven or eight meters into the air by the powerful force and then fell heavily to the ground.

"Damn it..." Tony looked at the Parthian armored cavalry who were charging forward with a gloomy face. He knew that the Roman Legion had also experienced many storms. Although the combat effectiveness of the legions under his command was not as good as that of the Germanic Legion and the British Legion, they had all been to the front line and had fought with the Parthians before. Facing the charge of the armored cavalry, after a short period of chaos, these Roman soldiers stabilized their bodies, some raised their shields, some held their guns, and at the same time, the light crossbows hidden in the army formation took advantage of the gradual slowdown of the Parthian cavalry and began to reap the lives of the Parthian armored cavalry in the form of point shooting.

"It's almost time." The Parthian general who was harvesting the lives of Roman soldiers under the protection of his guards in the army formation had an idea. He turned his head and looked at the soldiers behind him and shouted: "Retreat! Everyone retreat!"

"Retreat!" The Parthian cavalry, who had already learned what to do next, turned their horses around and retreated outside the Roman army.

Chapter 463 What is an International Superstar? [Tactical Facing Back]

Tony was confused now and didn't know how to explain the scene in front of him.

When the Parthian armored cavalry charged into the Roman formation, his first reaction was that it was over. Twenty thousand cavalrymen might seem outnumbered by a hundred thousand Roman infantrymen, but considering the enemy's defense and impact power, it would be no problem for them to break through the entire Roman formation.

Even Tony was ready to use his Noble Phantasm himself.

But what was unexpected was that the enemy retreated shortly after entering the Roman army.

Withdrawn?

At first Tony thought that the other party was trying to create distance before charging again. As for cavalry, repeated charging is a basic tactic of cavalry, so Tony thought at the time that it was to create distance. However, Tony really didn't expect that this group of armored cavalry would just... run away!

And you can run if you want, but what's the point of running while shouting "Romans are awesome"? !

Please, although Parthia suffered casualties in the early stage due to the problem of stones, the Roman legion also suffered heavy casualties due to the cavalry charge later, even more than you Parthia, right? ! How can I be so awesome?

Just when Tony was confused and hadn't figured out the situation, Mary suddenly touched Tony's arm gently, pointed at the Parthian archers who had been wandering in the distance and said, "Your Highness, look, the archers over there seem to have retreated as well."

Ok?

Looking in the direction of Mary's finger, sure enough, on the hillside not far away, the Parthian Empire's archers seemed to have received some orders. They turned their horses' heads and left the battlefield.

What the hell is this?!

Why did they suddenly retreat in the middle of a fight?

Tony was a little confused and didn't know what to do for a moment.

"Send out scouts to check the surroundings and determine the whereabouts of the enemy first." At this time, Bruce showed the calmness that a general should have. He called a personal guard and asked him to send out scouts to determine whether there was an ambush around.

It is undeniable that there was nothing wrong with Tiridates' strategic deployment, and even his tactics were not too wrong. The only mistake was... he overestimated the acting skills of his own people.

What is an international superstar? [Tactical retreat] refers to the Parthian cavalry with realistic acting skills.

According to the script, these Parthian cavalry should have retreated in panic, but the problem was that they... couldn't retreat.

The armored cavalry's impact force was too strong. They might not be able to completely defeat the Roman legion with a single attack, but if they were allowed to attack repeatedly, they would definitely be able to eliminate the Roman legion.

Besides... cavalry itself needs to charge repeatedly!

Now they just charged once and then ran away? Before they left, they shouted about how powerful the Romans were?

No, was it because when you were charging together just now, someone accidentally pooped in your mouth?

How can you say such nonsense?

Soon, the scouts sent out by Bruce reported back that there were no ambushes around.

The absence of an ambush means that the enemy is truly retreating, a real retreat without any watering down.

So now, the question is...

Why did they retreat? Why did they suddenly retreat when they were fighting so well?

Tony couldn't figure it out, and neither could Bruce. Of course, what they couldn't understand even more was why these guys were crazily praising how great the Roman Empire was when they were retreating?

Did dad eat too much?

"...Order the troops to rest in place, count the casualties, then cremate the dead on the spot and transport them back to the country for burial." Standing on the plain and pondering for a moment, Tony finally took a deep breath and slowly gave the order.

"Yes, Your Highness." Although a similar order had already been issued, Bruce did not raise this point at this time, but responded in accordance with Tony's meaning.

Anyway... Your Highness did not make a wrong order, you just realized it a little late.

Soon, the battle damage statistics were compiled. In this battle, the Parthian side left behind nearly two thousand corpses, and the Roman Empire suffered even worse. Facing the bows and arrows of the horse archers and the charges of the armored cavalry, the Roman Empire suffered more than three thousand casualties. It can be said that basically half of the twenty legions were wiped out, and this was just a round of cavalry attack launched by the other side.

The soldiers' bodies were cremated on the spot. After the survivors rested for half an hour, Tony assigned a team of 100 men to transport the soldiers' ashes back to the Roman Empire.

Now that they were still close to the border, Tony could still transport the soldiers' ashes back to the country for burial, but as the war progressed, Tony's army would surely go deeper into the Parthian Empire. What would he do then? Would he also have to transport the ashes back?

All I can say is try my best. After all... this is war, a cruel war.

After resting for half an hour, under Tony's command, the Roman Empire army set out again and marched towards the city of Edessa.

the other side.

On the hillside not far away, Tiridati almost jumped off his horse's back when he saw the armored cavalrymen galloping on their horses!

According to his deployment, the horse archers would first shoot arrows around the Roman legions, and then the armored cavalry would charge. The Roman Empire and the Parthian Empire had been fighting for many years, and both sides were familiar with each other's tactics. The Roman Empire knew how the Parthian cavalry would charge, and the Parthian Empire also knew that the Romans would use crossbows for defense. In this situation, the armored cavalry charged twice, and after paying a certain amount of casualties as a price, they withdrew in a very panic. At the same time, the horse archers in the distance fired a sparse stream of arrows and then withdrew.

This is the script that Tilida wants!

But what the hell are these bastards acting in?!

The armored cavalry retreated in the middle of a charge. It would be fine if you shouted about how powerful the Romans were, but you retreated in such an orderly manner, didn't you? How can a retreat be so orderly?

And the archers in the distance, are you poisonous? Seeing the armored cavalry retreat, you just do nothing and retreat with them???

Can you act with your heart!!!

Forget it, the show has already begun, and I can't let them go back and lose again, right? Oh well... just let it be.

With his personal guards, Tiridati could only return to the city of Edessa in a depressed mood.