Now that he had temporary military power from his father, Rurik naturally had to direct the battle of the 300 men at hand according to his own will.
As a new military commander, shouldn't he try some new tricks?
For example, some new tactics were used that the Ross tribe had never seen before, and through these tactics, everyone involved in the operation was shocked.
Regardless of whether Rurik admits it or not, the prophecy has been fulfilled, and all the warriors present believe that this is a major test of Rurik's ability to serve as the new leader.
This battle is really a battle for the new leader to establish his power in the future! It can be said that even a small-scale victory can gain more support from the tribe than the invention of multiple devices.
Rurik knew this. What my Ross brothers want is victory in the battle.
He had no scruples in publicly questioning the traditional tactics of the Russians charging in headfirst and overwhelming the enemy with momentum and sheer power.
The only thing he could think of that could bring about changes in the military operations of the Ross tribe was the "pincer offensive" that was tried repeatedly by later generations of military strategists, and Rurik thought even better. This time, he wanted to experiment with a tactic of encircling three buildings. The ultimate goal was to complete the annihilation of the enemy.
Rurik sat on the snow and used some branches he picked up to outline the positions of himself and the enemy, and conduct "sand table deductions."
Otto and the warriors he had on hand sat around each other on the ground, and everyone understood Rurik's tactical arrangements to a certain extent.
Facing the complicated tactics his son was determined to implement, Otto frowned. "Rurik, is this okay?"
"It's definitely possible. As long as everyone cooperates properly."
"You...but you actually asked your mercenaries to fight the fleeing enemies? Besides, they will really flee in the direction you designed. Can you see the future clearly in this regard?"
Rurik thought his father's question was a bit funny. Then he thought about it. It was probably just because of all the previous tactics of the Ross tribe. There was no "pincer offensive", and there was no such thing as a "pincer offensive" that was more complicated and more vicious. The "surrounding three buildings and one" tactic.
"Dad, take your main force and sneak over as I ask. If you can defeat these...these Tavastians are the best. If they escape, my mercenaries will shoot them."
Otto originally thought that his son's plan was very clever, and only his son could come up with this kind of plan. He also felt that Rurik seemed to put himself in a more dangerous position.
After all, Otto is the big leader and he can take back military power at any time.
Otto basically agreed with Rurik's decision. In addition to claiming that the main force who would lead the outflank attack would try to complete the battle as quickly as possible and kill all the enemies, Otto also gave Rurik fifty warriors, including twenty more. A hunter with a short wooden bow.
In this way, Rurik could lay out as many as seventy ambushes on the road to intercept the escape route.
After the battle plan was laid out, more than 300 Russian warriors formed three battle groups. The two groups led by Otto were responsible for "Surrounding Three", and Rurik's seventy people were responsible for "Que One".
The warriors crossed the glacier, which was actually 700 meters wide, and took the time to rest in the woods on the other side of the river until dawn, when the short daylight was about to come.
Rurik rested for a while wrapped in a piece of leather, as did almost all the warriors of the tribe.
Only the soldiers on guard duty kept their eyes wide open to pay attention to the changes in the stars.
The stars had reached their correct positions and the sky was starting to turn blue.
The sentries began to wake up the sleeping tribesmen one by one. After a while, one soldier after another lifted up the leather and stood up.
Otto wiped his face with snow, then took out a bronze helmet from his sled and put it on his head. He also put on a thin layer of mail coat, and then put on a fur coat to keep out the cold. A leather belt was tied around his waist, and a shield was slung on his back.
He held his steel sword high, supervising the movements of his clansmen, and roared to urge them to prepare for battle immediately.
Rurik's little hand held a leather helmet, and he looked at it thoughtfully.
"Master, put it on quickly! We are going to fight soon." Jevro, who was already wearing leather armor, urged.
"Oh, I'm in a bit of a trance."
"Are you scared?" Yevluo smiled slightly: "Don't worry, everyone will be nervous in the first battle. Once you have experienced it more, you will feel relieved."
At this moment, Rurik felt that his Jevlo was a battle-hardened veteran. Yes, this person's more than ten years were probably spent licking blood while wearing a knife.
Rurik was very concerned about Jevlo's thoughts, and he asked: "If...the enemy is the Tavastians, what will you do?"
"Destroy them all, of course."
"Then let's fight." Rurik made a determined decision. He originally felt that his situation was too magical. After all, reality is reality, and the first battle of his life is coming.
He pulled off the hemp rope that tied his hair, rarely loosened his beautiful ponytail, and then buckled the leather helmet, which seemed to have little defense, on his head.
Rurik did not wear high-grade armor such as chain mail, and he did not even wear leather armor. It's not that Rurik thinks defense is unimportant, but that the armor is too heavy for his small body.
Besides, the troops under his command have unique combat methods. Theoretically, everyone should try their best to avoid close contact with the enemy. Just use the long-range weapons at hand to shoot the enemy before close contact.
In this way, the mobility of light armor is much higher than that of heavy armor.
In turn, most of the people led by Otto had to wear more leather armor, even if they were covered with a piece of deerskin.
Because Jevlo's intelligence clearly pointed out that the unknown enemy faced by the Russians was likely to fire a large number of arrows. Those arrows were destined to be mostly bone arrows, and maybe two layers of leather could offset the arrows' attack. As long as they can survive the enemy's arrows, the Russian warriors will have an absolute advantage.
In this way, when the sky turned blue at dawn, the Russians unloaded their sleds and only brought with them the weapons for combat. There are only twenty people who appear to be relatively weak, shouldering the important task of "looking after the house".
But Rurik's men were different.
The obviously weak commander Rurik was sitting on the sled, with a crossbow beside him and more than twenty arrows behind him.
In this battle, Rurik's seventy men, who were responsible for intercepting "Que Yi", actually brought all the arrows in their reserve. The total number of arrows of all kinds amounts to fifteen hundred!
Rurik could not judge the enemy's strength well based on the number of bonfires alone. The so-called preparedness meant that he was ready to shoot out all the arrows.
The Russian troops divided into three groups and began to act.
On a macro level, surrounding the unknown and abrupt hills, the Russian army took the lead in launching a pincer offensive in the true sense, aiming at the large number of bonfires on the hills.
The general direction of the three Russian armies was eastward. Otto personally led more than 70 people to detour to the north side of the hill, and another confidant led 90 people to detour to the south side of the hill.
They were not gathered together in a tight formation, but in a loose formation, forming a net for catching fish.
Otto developed his imagination and came up with this trick based on the operation mode of the tribe's trawler. This trick is to imagine the enemy as a fish.
It's best if the enemy is willing to face him head-on, so that his son won't be able to take action. Otto firmly believes in the power of his own people.
If the enemy flees, the son's reputation will be fulfilled.
Probably, that's it.
Otto was somewhat worried, but the arrow could not be turned back. His troops in the north had already connected with their brothers in the south.
Dark shadows moved forward in all the woods near the hill. At this moment, the sky was gradually getting brighter.
Being at a relatively high position, the howling north wind makes it even more desolate.
Otto saw that the position was almost there, and he estimated that not only was the entire network completed, but now was a good time to close it.
Are you going to make a surprise attack? Pooh! I'm afraid the enemy has discovered that something is wrong.
Stepping on the snow-covered slope, Otto drew out his sword. With the buzzing sound of the sword, he roared: "Russians! Attack!"
Upon receiving this order, those who were still advancing slowly accelerated their running speed, and at the same time, they used swords or axes to knock on their wooden shields to increase their momentum.
"Ah?! Is there already a fight?!"
Pausing for a moment, Rurik, who had already established a "blocking position" on the hillside, couldn't help but panic when he heard the shouts from his fellow tribesmen.
Yevluo could comfort him: "Master, don't worry about anything. I will protect you."
"Protect me? Am I still a woman?"
Jevro deliberately teased, "Oh, my master. If you keep your hair loose and wear a one-piece linen suit, you will indeed look a bit feminine."
"Dressing up as a woman? It's fun, if it makes the brothers happy. But I'm a man, and I have to prove myself in this battle." Rurik immediately pulled out his dagger, pointing the blade directly at the top of the hill not far away. bonfire. "Brothers, load the crossbows and wait for my order to fire."
Rurik has already begun preparations.
His twenty crossbowmen were divided into two rows, each row was relatively far apart. They formed a line array about twenty meters long, with the first row half-kneeling and the second row standing.
The thirty bow-wielding hunters in the team formed a relatively tight group. After all, the current short wooden bows of the Russians really shouldn't expect it to give arrows the range. Besides, many of the long arrows hunters have are sharpened small animal leg bones, set on long branches. Such bad arrows can easily kill small animals, but they are powerless against enemies with leather armor.
Rurik hoped that the archers would throw arrows to create chaos, and the crossbowmen were the main force in blocking the attack!
His idea was perfect before he came into contact with the enemy, but Jevro was not at ease. At this moment, Yevluo seemed to have become a military staff officer, and asked all the soldiers to stick their swords and short spears in the snow. Once the enemy broke through the arrow array, they would draw their weapons and fight. Especially the twenty warriors left. They are all standard sword and shield bearers. They are the first to launch a melee attack due to the short time lag before the crossbowmen are transformed into melee infantry.
Yevlo himself was also mentally prepared. Even if he was injured, he must protect Rurik. This is not only to follow one's own professionalism, but also to be grateful for being reused.
Preparations on Rurik's side have been made, and the battle has begun on the top of the hill that he cannot see.
The people who lit the bonfire were not the legendary Tavastians at all.
But it was also the first time that the Russians learned such a term from Jevlo's mouth.
Otto can't control that much. Under the current situation, if he is one of his own, he is the enemy. The enemy is the enemy, and it will be enough to leave two people alive to find out their identities. All the Rus warriors can perfectly distinguish themselves from the enemy. The reason is that they wear bronze leather helmets on each other.
As for the enemy? It seemed that they had never noticed from the beginning that they were being targeted by a powerful enemy in their camp.
Otto scoffed at the enemy's slow reaction speed.
"We gave you the opportunity to prepare, and it's like you just woke up from a dream."
When the battle began, Otto himself fought with a sword, and the young warriors under his command had already charged bravely.
A short foreigner wearing a cotton hat was stabbed down by the bright white steel sword of the Rus.
And those aliens who had just come out of the tent wearing a leather coat because they heard the terrifying roar, just picked up their stone spears and even crudely made hammers, and saw a large group of tall and strong people. people rushed over.
More than a dozen foreigners took the lead in starting an instinctive counterattack. It was so fast that the Russians attacked so quickly that the foreigners had no time to use short wooden bows and shoot arrows to fight back.
They also fired some arrows. Just as the Russians estimated at the beginning, arrows made of bones would only serve as a source of harassment unless they blinded the eyes of the Russians.
Seeing that the arrows were of little use, the alien warriors tried to stab and attack the armored Ross warriors with stone spears. The obsidian spearhead could make deep scratches on the Ross wooden shield, and the damage was basically the same. The young and strong Ross warrior wielded the steel sword he spent a lot of money to buy, and cut off a head with just one critical strike.
There were also foreigners who attacked with hammers, but they were all a head shorter than the Russians. They were knocked hard by the Russian soldiers and fell to the snow, and were immediately stabbed to death with swords.
The so-called battle is really about reducing ten skills with one force. When it comes to battle, Otto will choose veterans who have killed Gotland soldiers.
What happened on the hill was basically a one-sided battle. In terms of stature, physical fitness, weapons and equipment, and even the number and organization of the two sides, the two sides were not at the same order of magnitude.
Otto thought the enemy was very strong, but the reality was that the Russians were bullying them.
A middle-aged man wearing a hat sewn with a large amount of squirrel skin was the leader of the aliens who lit the bonfire.
The battle declared his defeat from the very beginning. The leader felt that he had to move his head, but he survived in a desperate situation. Well-equipped attackers, why didn't they come from the west?
Indeed, from the leader's perspective, fleeing to the west is the only way out. Because there, there are invincible guards.
After speaking in a language that the Russians did not understand, the remaining foreigners covered in leather began to carry their own weapons, mainly short spears and hammers. A few people picked up the bow temporarily, but they ran out of arrows, so they simply took off the bow string and used the bow as a stick.
They began to run toward the west, toward the bottom of the mountain.
The leader led more than thirty people on the so-called safe escape road.
It seems that as long as he escapes fast enough and abandons the treasure he caught before, the attacker will definitely come to snatch the treasure, and won't he be safe? Is treasure more important or life more important? The leader and his men have to choose to save their lives.
However, Rurik and his seventy special warriors have already set up a battle formation and are waiting for the enemy!
The leader never dreamed that not only would his men not survive the desperate situation, but that many of them would die suddenly for no apparent reason.
The suddenness of his death is truly incredible.
