The battle with the bandits was won by the right time, place and people with excellent equipment, well-trained soldiers, excellent commanders and cooperation, and luck on their side. Total victory. Judging from the fact that no one was seriously injured or killed, their record was brilliant. However, even with such favorable conditions, this battle was not without cost.
"Ah hiss - ah hiss -" The barbarian women took out the multi-purpose spirits they carried with them and poured it on the exposed arms of the Kazuto warriors. After the strong adrenaline during the battle subsided, the excitement brought by the strong alcohol disinfection of the ground-breaking wounds made these warriors who usually followed the rules couldn't help but gasp.
"If you're a man, just be patient." Many Yi women scolded them, but for a while the arrogant warriors were unable to refute. The Yi people who were born as mountain people and hunters are tough by nature. They have made a living by hunting for a long time in the wilderness. They may not know how to use bows and spears in collective formations, and they cannot explain the reason for their sword skills, but they can compete with wild bears and wild boars. The fight will not be any easier than fighting against others.
In the wilderness, injuries are commonplace. Agile wild animals do not choose easy paths for the sake of humans - bushes full of thorns or mountain roads full of sharp gravels. This is a life-and-death situation. They know which roads can be avoided. Hunters, and their thick fur and tough paws allow them to walk directly on these difficult terrains.
The hunter has to make a decision in a moment whether to face the difficulty or not. If he hesitates because of these small scratches, the prey will be lost in the blink of an eye. He would return empty-handed, leaving his family disappointed and hungry.
Scratches, scratches, fractures caused by falls, and various injuries are the norm for mountain people. Their skin is very tough despite being exposed to wind and rain, unlike the Kazuto samurai who are fair and lack scars.
The hunting groups of the Yi people are usually composed of at least two people, so that there is care between the two parties. If a person encounters a crisis in the vast mountains and has no one to help him, he is basically sentenced to death.
It is also true that they are not only good at dealing with their own wounds, but they are also very good at helping their companions deal with their injuries.
The bandits were not helpless and could only expose their backs for them to chase and chop down the peasants. This was completely different from the almost one-sided massacre in the swamp village. Even among the well-trained and well-equipped Kazuto samurai, many people were still injured even when they had all their advantages.
It only takes a few seconds to launch a final counterattack before completely dying. If a spear or knife happens to hit a weak point in the armor's defense, damage will occur.
The arrows that the bandits fired back from time to time also accidentally hit the shoulder straps of the breastplates and other weakly protected areas, and pierced the shoulders of the warriors. Fortunately, it was blocked by the tortoise shell metal underneath, which was similar to Rigal's plate armor, with a thin iron piece in the shape of a tortoise carapace hidden in the middle of the cloth. It did not damage the bones or major blood vessels, only some skin injuries.
Kazuto's armor's weak points were concentrated in his throat and abdomen. After samurai warriors added a visor to the throat area, the drooping throat armor would cover it, and since the sword was carried on the abdomen, it was equivalent to protection. Just for the sake of vision, breathing or shouting orders to subordinates, many warriors choose not to wear face armor when going into battle.
And removing these weaknesses that can be compensated: the key protective parts such as the head and torso, and the wrapping area of the human armor are actually comparable to Rigar's plate armor.
Their real weakness lies in their limb armor.
In order to pursue lightweight, Kazuto's limb armors are mostly made of curved iron bars sewn onto cloth.
The arm part is called the "cage hand". Simply understood, it is a sleeve made of cloth, with two ties at the top that can be tied up after going around the armpit. The entire sleeve is fixed with a series of iron bars, iron sheets, and locking rings using sewing methods.
But the mail armor of the Moon Kingdom is also very different from Rigal.
The mail of the Rigars was riveted, and the iron rings pulled out through the hole plates were punched and fixed with rivets after being hammered flat. There are no openings in the chain, and it is a veritable "iron armor".
But Kazuto's mail armor is not only a bent iron ring. The open part will deform and fall off if left alone with a little force. It also uses the "cross braiding method", that is, the lock rings are arranged in a cross shape. Yes, it’s not the way the people of Rigal treat it like it’s made of cloth.
This is naturally a compromise made in a series of aspects such as load capacity and production time. What this approach caused was that it was difficult for Kazuto's arm armor to bounce away from all attacks like Rigar's, and was basically unscathed unless faced with heavy blunt weapons.
Their role is only to turn serious injuries into minor injuries, and turn amputation that would have been crippled into fractures and dislocations that can be healed.
Therefore, after passing through, the most scarred parts of the warriors were naturally the parts of their limbs that were weakly protected and targeted by bandits.
There are a total of 7 cage hands that were cut or punctured and need to be repaired. Their owners naturally have some long or short cuts on their arms. There were holes in the body armor of the warriors, and the tether of the shoulder armor was broken and needed to be reattached. There were also cases where the helmet was so deformed by being hit that it pressed against the side of their face.
The cage hands need to be re-sutured to resume use, and there are also wounds that need to be sutured with needles and threads after disinfection.
They clearly had the advantage and even luck was on their side, but facing an opponent who would try their best to resist, there were still many wounded on their side.
The wounds were long and narrow, and many of them grimaced in pain. But even though the scene seemed a bit big, the injuries were still minor.
The definition of what distinguishes minor from serious injuries is very simple.
Even if the body has been slashed several times, as long as the main blood vessels are not cut, the tendons are not cut, and the bones are not broken, and the person can stand up, bandage them and continue fighting and moving forward, the injuries are still considered minor injuries.
And if a limb is amputated or beaten until the person is disabled and unable to take care of himself, this is considered a serious injury.
The price is low.
The price is low, but——
Lao Qiao was silent, Yajiro was silent, and even more so were Okami and Narumi next to him.
The samurai class of Kazuto existed for a long time, and samurai with no actual combat experience also appeared one generation after another.
In this long-term peaceful country, the only situations where actual combat can be experienced include killing bandits and pirates, or border conflicts with disobedient minorities.
What they learned was useful. Although many people were shaking with nervousness in the first battle, the long-term training did bear fruit.
But compared with the pure joy, this result is somewhat unsatisfactory.
Including Narumi.
They actually expected better and more brilliant results.
Breaking through in one breath, the bandits fled. No one here was injured, and they won a complete victory.
Admittedly, anyone who says this will notice the excessively beautiful idealism in it. But they do believe so, thinking that they can do it and achieve such results.
But it still doesn't work.
This was not even a complete head-on conflict. At first, both sides just fired arrows at each other through wooden shields to harass each other. The bandits, who were caught off guard by seizing the opportunity, only resisted when they were about to die. A dozen wounded people appeared.
All advantages are on your side.
The equipment is superior to ours, and the personnel are trained in an excellent environment and are full of energy. Tactically, their side was slightly better, and luck was on their side. The bandit commander's final act of chaos confirmed their victory.
However, even under such circumstances, many people were still injured, the armor was damaged, the arrows were consumed, and the knives were damaged by collisions or curled due to improper use.
Just because this is the opponent who can counterattack.
Narumi was afraid of imagining the worse situation. He knew that such hindsight would not help, but he couldn't help but start thinking about that possibility.
What if any of these advantages were taken away?
The conversation he had with Henry after paying attention to those loud noises made him understand how good the commander on the other side of the trail was, and how difficult the mountain ghost on the other side was to deal with.
Although Yajiro put on an expression like "You're bragging" and didn't want to believe it, Narumi thought that the other party was not lying.
The first is that there is no need for him to brag about his military exploits, and the second is that the opponent did kill him from that side.
And what would happen if the people in charge on both sides were switched and the one guarding the side was a more capable commander?
Immediately he saw through Henry's approach of disturbing the morale of the army, and immediately ordered the archers to counterattack; no, before that, the barbarians would definitely not be given a chance to get close. The moment they appeared, those behind them would be alert and attack.
The Yi people would not have the possibility of disrupting the bandits to create an opportunity for the samurai to attack, and they did not have the strength to directly cause real damage. If the bandits can stabilize the morale of the army, they can use arrow rain attacks to disperse the barbarians, making them unable to mount an effective counterattack.
Even so, it is true that the pincer attack can still be completed according to the original plan, so that the bandits have to allocate a certain amount of strength to deal with the enemies behind. If an excellent commander sees through the pincer attack, use the giant shield to lift the spear to deal with the samurai. ——
Even if the troops are dispersed, the warriors still have to chew hard bones.
"At that time, can I give an order to let my subordinates charge despite knowing the danger?" After imagining that difficult situation several times in his mind, Narumi asked himself such a question.
"Don't do what you are doing, I know what you are doing." Henry next to him said this to the samurai captain who was deep in thought.
“Don’t get hung up on ‘what ifs,’ open your eyes to the hard facts.”
"These guys are hissing and they still have the energy to cry out in pain. The people whose armor is broken also have the energy to complain and repair it."
"Your decision-making saved their lives and allowed us to move forward."
"Right now, let's take a good rest and enjoy the first victory." The sage patted Narumi's shoulder and walked towards the inside of the cave where the group took a rest.
"Your Excellency Heng, have you ever been in such a position?" The senior warrior asked him.
"Ah, a long time ago, yes." Henry stopped.
"As expected." Narumi sighed: "I don't think the average Nanman swordsman knows that much."
"But a long time ago?"
"What is your current position and identity, Mr. Heng?" He asked this question, which naturally included the intention of questioning Henry's purpose in coming to Crescent Continent.
"Now." The sage turned back half of his body: "As you can see."
"He's just a foreigner from the southern barbarian country who is a little good at swordsmanship."
"I have to talk about my identity." He shrugged: "He is a sage."
"Sage?" Narumi frowned, he didn't understand this word.
"There is also a clock in the Moon Country, right?" Henry said suddenly.
"Yes, there are most of them in temples. They will be built in higher places such as halfway up the mountain. Whenever a certain hour comes, someone will ring the bell to let the world know the time." He said this to himself, and then suddenly understood. Henry's intention.
"Probably similar to the person who rings the bell, a sage." He shrugged again, then turned around and walked towards Mira, Galeva and others, never looking back.
"The one who rings the bell..." The senior warrior behind him turned back and looked outside the cave. Lao Qiao led the team responsible for collecting the corpses of the bandits and hurried in.
"It's going to rain again, it's so cold!" the bearded country man shouted loudly, and then as if he heard his words, huge raindrops began to fall in mid-air.
In just a moment, there were actually some snowflakes in the rain.
"It's snowing at this time, how strange it is! Spring has already started a long time ago!" Old Qiao muttered, and the wet wood in the fire for heating and cooking made a crackling sound.
Some white smoke rose.
