Imperial year 557 [26 years after Richard IV withdrew his troops]
United Provinces Republic [Also known as Piedmont Republic]
guitucheng
It was a midsummer afternoon, cloudless. The scorching sun turned the entire city into a steamer, all living things lost their vitality, and even the annoying cicadas stopped.
"If you persist a little longer, you will win." Winters, a third-year officer cadet at the Army Academy, told himself. He was biting his lips, trying desperately to suppress his instinct to breathe through his mouth.
[Winters Montagne/Winters Montagne]
He tried his best to maintain abdominal breathing and actively controlled the rhythm to make every breath as long as possible. The air with body temperature is exhaled from the nasal cavity, hits the inner wall of the full-wrap helmet, and returns with a smell of sweat.
With the current temperature, it should be time to take a bath and enjoy the shade under the trees. But in this scorching hot weather where even sitting still would make him sweat all over his body, Winters covered his whole body tightly.
He wore a set of cotton armor next to his body, and a set of training armor on the outside of the armor. The training armor he used was from the Sovereignty War more than thirty years ago. The cavalry armor ripped from the corpse of a noble.
Because the War Department wanted to save as much teaching money as possible, the cadets had to use these second-hand goods.
Of course, the armor Winters used was not the armor of high-ranking nobles. Those gorgeously decorated luxury armors were taken home by the generals as decorations. The students use the armor of those knights who are actually fighting on the front line.
These low-level nobles sold their ancestral property in exchange for war horses and armor. They brought their family's lances and swords with them and followed their lords to Forthland to make a fortune. Thinking that the enemy is just a group of traders, farmers and craftsmen.
But it was the traders, farmers and craftsmen who had the last laugh, and the knights could only bury their bones in a foreign land. No one remembers who they were, and only this set of armor with bullet holes and scratches has been handed down to prove that they once existed.
These armors have a plain appearance with little decoration. But the materials used are solid, because it is related to the user's wealth and life. People from the Army Ordnance Bureau took away all the accessories below the skirt of these armors and reissued them to the cavalry units as brand new leg armors.
A batch of left shoulder armors were also removed from other captured armors, and the original right shoulder armors of these armors were replaced - because the right shoulder part of these armors left a gap under the armpit for the convenience of holding the lance, and the ordnance The Bureau didn't want to go to the trouble of making another batch of right shoulder armors separately. "There's no difference between the shoulder armor and the front anyway!"
The Ordnance Bureau then registered this batch of second-hand assembled goods as "newly made high-quality three-quarter armor" and sent them to the Army Officer Academy for use by the trainees. Many of the holes in the armor made by muskets were not repaired.
However, a few gun holes are not a big problem. After all, the officers and cadets will not wear these armors to go to the battlefield. What tortures the officers and cadets is not the bullet holes in these armors, nor the weight of these armors, but the excellent thermal conductivity of iron armor.
In winter, it will quickly take away your body temperature, and in summer, it will efficiently transfer external heat to the inside of the armor.
Winters was now as wet as if he had just taken a shower. The cotton armor under the armor had absorbed sweat and stuck tightly to his back. Sweat remained on his forehead and flowed into his eyes from time to time. It made his eyes hurt. He couldn't rub his eyes even though he was wearing a helmet, so he could only endure it.
Every time he puts on these training armors that are older than him in the summer, Winters will sincerely thank the Bureau of Ordnance for not patching up the holes in these armors. After all, the ventilation performance is better with these gaps. .
In fact, whenever there is a swordsmanship class, training armor with lots of holes is a hot commodity among students. The officer responsible for handling this batch of armor twenty years ago probably would not have thought that his laziness would actually do good things.
These armors have been used from the day the Army Academy was founded to today, for more than twenty years, and will continue to torture Winters' juniors for the foreseeable future.
But now, Winters has no extra thought to pity his juniors. He just wants to take off these burdens and sit on the stone bench on the sidelines to drink cold water.
After more than thirty rounds of fighting, he only felt that the muscles in his shoulders were as hot as red-hot iron, and more like a door shaft that had not been oiled for decades and was stiff.
Winters' big arm muscles were unconsciously causing his whole arm to tremble, and his two hands could hardly hold the hilt of the sword - yes, the sword in his hand was what he had to wear in the scorching summer. The reason for the armor.
Both originate from gray wolves, and are also biologically classified as domestic dog subspecies. The morphological differences of dogs can be so great that it makes you wonder, "Are they really not reproductively isolated?" The same goes for swords.
Along with changes in tactical techniques and metal processing techniques over thousands of years, the sword category has derived hundreds of subspecies with different shapes. The sword held in Winters' hand was written in the family tree a few pages later than those of the elders.
The sword is 1.3 meters long. This length can be described in another way: for an adult human male with a height of 1.8 meters, when he presses the tip of the sword to the ground, the position of the weight ball at the tail of the sword is under his armpit. Four fingers.
The sword's blade length reaches 95 centimeters, and there is no sword. In addition to being long, another feature of this sword is the stick-shaped sword grid that is perpendicular to the sword body. The size of this sword grid is also far larger than that of an ordinary sword. The length is close to the forearm of an adult male. This large sword grid is The soul of this weapon, many techniques cannot be performed without this sword grid.
Compared to the length of the sword, its weight is surprisingly low. The sword Winters is using weighs only 1.4 kilograms, which is the weight of several potatoes.
Praise be to the advancement of metal processing technology that allows swordsmiths to create such lightweight but strong and tough sword blades.
The handle of this sword is very long and needs to be held by both hands to exert its best power. However, because the category of "two-handed sword" has been reserved by the predecessors, it is generally not called a two-handed sword. Although it can be used with one hand, it is obviously not suitable for adoption by families with "half-hand and half-sword".
In most cases, the officer cadets only call it "sword". If other types of swords appear in the conversation and the meaning of the word is confused, the officer cadets will call it "the sword we practice"; or simply because it is better than ordinary swords. Both are long and are called "long swords".
Don't underestimate the 1.4 kilograms. Even if you swing it vigorously, even 1.4 kilograms can easily crush the skull or disembowel an unarmored enemy. This is why Winters has to train in half a suit of cavalry armor despite the risk of heat stroke in the hot summer.
Winters, as well as Winters' opponents, all have real swords without an edge.
Winters is almost cooked by his own sweat. He just wants to win this match as soon as possible, and win against the opponent he has not defeated in six years. Now is the closest he has come to victory.
Through the grid viewing window on his helmet, Winters glanced at the scoreboard on the sidelines. He had 17 points and his opponent had 12 points. He had never led the opponent by more than 5 points.
The rules of the swordsmanship class at the Army Academy are whoever scores 20 points first wins, and Winters is now holding the match point. He repeatedly told himself: "Calm down, calm down, only three points."
His brain was thinking rapidly: "I hold the match point. If he wants to catch up with the score, he must take the initiative to attack. I can wait for a flaw." With his mind made up, Winters entered the competition venue from the waiting area.
He took a half-step with his right foot, planted his lower body into a T-step, and kept his back straight. The right hand is in front and the left hand is behind the sword hilt. His hands are lowered to the height of the navel, and the sword tip is pointed upward towards the opponent's throat.
The swordsmanship Winters and his classmates learned in the swordsmanship class originated from the founding marshal Ned Smith. One of the important contents of this swordsmanship is "stance." The stance Winters is now using is called the "Plow", which is both offensive and defensive. And he prefers to keep his strong side hand and strong side leg in front at the same time.
He knew in his heart that his physical strength had reached the bottom, and his current stiff posture must be funny to the onlookers, but he couldn't care less about the embarrassment. He comforted himself: "This is a bad game, and the opponent is also very tired. , as long as you can win.”
Time always passes faster in my mind. There are a lot of things going on in my mind, but in the real world only a few seconds actually pass. Winters' opponent was approaching Winters in a similar posture to Winters. As Winters expected, he had match point, and his opponent decided to play more aggressively and proactively, otherwise a sneak attack from Winters might end the game.
Winters' opponent also kept the tip of his sword pointed at Winters' head, but strode towards Winters' right side in an attempt to occupy Winters' side position. Naturally, Winters would not let him get his wish, and followed suit. Adjust your steps.
The two people walked in circles for a few steps, and the distance between them became closer and closer, and the tips of the swords in their hands began to collide. Winters didn't even dare to blink now. When the sword tips of the two people using the plow style began to collide, it meant that they entered the opponent's attack range at the same time.
Winters' opponent confidently controlled the long sword and collided with Winters' long sword, as if provoking. The sword blades made a crisp collision sound. This small bump did not produce an advantage, but it was an effective psychological tactic, using this aggressive posture to put psychological pressure on the opponent.
Winters himself didn't realize that when he decided to play defensive counterattack, his momentum had already dropped. What he thought was a sound and reasonable decision was actually an external manifestation of a lack of self-confidence.
Because Winters clearly knew that the opponent's physical strength was stronger than his own, and he couldn't figure out how he could lead by 5 points, so he wanted to be stable. If his opponent was leading by 5 points now, he would have attacked him head-on.
Seeing Winters strictly guarding the center line, his opponent began to adjust the direction of attack. His opponent pivoted the sword around the weighted ball, turning the tip that was originally pointing to Winters' right side to the left side.
Winters immediately realized that the opponent was about to attack. His opponent was a "power king" and could often use his super physical strength to force the opponent's long sword away from the center line.
Then his opponent will take a quick step forward, jam the enemy's sword with the sword grid, and stab his chest with a high thrust from top to bottom. This is the opponent's specialty.
Winters reacted subconsciously. When he saw his opponent's sword turned to his right, he also changed his posture and swung to the right in advance. This will be a head-on collision, and whoever can gain the upper hand in the ensuing swordfight will score.
But the tip of the opponent's sword drew a circle in the air and returned to its original position. This turned out to be a fake move. Winters felt a chill in his heart and had only one thought in his mind: "Not good!"
There is never any "three hundred rounds of battle."
With unarmored swordsmanship, one move can determine the outcome.
If you take a fake move, it's all over.
But although Winters' brain stopped working, his sword instincts remained. Instinct replaced thinking and reacted, and he changed his sword swing from right to left, trying to adjust his posture back.
But it was too late, as the opponent launched an attack from Winters' left side. He did not directly attack Winters' torso, but first used his strong sword blade to knock Winters' weak sword blade hard, knocking Winters' long sword out of position. At the same time, his spring-like left leg exploded with strong thrust, and his right foot strode forward.
The long sword in his hand quickly circled back to its top position and launched a vicious top-down slash. The sword drew an arc in the air at such a speed that it made the sound of wind. This time, his long sword was aimed at Winters' neck.
Without any mercy, the sword hit Winters' neck armor on the left side of his collarbone firmly, and the whistle sounded! Winters' opponent was not careless at all. He quickly withdrew his long sword and used a horizontal sword posture to block Winters' possible counterattack direction, not giving Winters any chance to "attack back".
The rear attack is the form recognized by the military academy. Once this happens, both sides will be deemed to have perished together, and neither side will score points. Winters' opponents will never leave such a chance to Winters.
However, Winters' opponent was actually overly worried. After receiving such a "bolt from the blue" with all his strength, Winters had no chance of fighting back. He was already in so much pain that he was almost suffocating.
Although his neck and breastplates distributed the force throughout his torso, the hit on his collarbone still hurt like a toe pinched by a door.
The severe pain paralyzed Winters' whole body, and he could hardly move for a while. His central nervous system responded to this intense stimulation, rapidly releasing large amounts of adrenaline and endorphins in his body.
So after the brief period of severe pain, Winters felt himself relieved. He endured the pain and pointed to the left side of his neck, indicating that he had been hit here. The referee gave the decision "3 points" without hesitation, and the scorer changed the score to 17:15.
There was a burst of applause in the training room. This applause was not a humiliation to Winters. This was the tradition of the officer academy. Everyone would applaud for a beautiful battle.
In fact, even Winters wanted to applaud the opponent's attack. It's really beautiful: simple and effective fake moves, clean chops, watertight playback, the whole set of moves is simply too handsome.
Although nine hundred words were used to describe this round, it actually took less than two seconds from the time the sword tips of the two collided to the time Winters was hit.
The winner was determined in just one breath. Many students watching on the sidelines didn't see clearly what was going on. They saw Winters hit him so hard that the person who was hit couldn't stand still.
In addition to the pain, Winters's mind was filled with frustration, and his face was burning with pain. Because he took a fake move.
Marshal Ned's swordsmanship theory emphasizes the first move, encourages simple and direct attacks, praises the rush attack that suppresses the opponent, opposes flashy sword moves, and criticizes all unnecessary feints.
This is because this swordsmanship theory believes that a qualified swordsman will never be easily deceived by feints. When facing a skilled swordsman, using feints indiscriminately is equivalent to giving the opponent an opportunity to take action. After taking the fake move, Winters seemed more embarrassed than standing still and being beaten.
"Are you okay? Let's take a break and fight again?" Winters' opponent did not return to the waiting area in the corner of the competition venue. Seeing that Winters was not feeling well, he said to Winters with concern. His voice came out of one helmet and into the other, sounding muffled.
Winters has now passed the worst stage of pain. He tentatively moved his shoulder a few times to make sure that the bones were fine.
So the young man's passionate and aggressive nature defeated the pain. Although he wanted to sit on the sidelines and rest for a while, he really couldn't let go of the pride of an adult male animal. He moved his shoulders and gritted his teeth and said, "It's okay. continue".
"Why don't we let them fight first? We'll fight later." His opponent was still worried.
It was even more impossible for Winters to agree to him. He read it again: "It's okay, continue." After saying that, Winters walked back to the waiting area.
His opponent sighed and walked back to his waiting area.
The whistle sounded again, a new round began, and the two men walked to the center of the field again. Winters is holding back his anger now. He just wants to slap the two big mouths of himself thirty seconds ago. His defense will be passive. If he is passive, he will take feints. After taking the feints, he will be critically hit. It’s so embarrassing, we must attack! attack! attack! Just one stab to the head and you win.
So in this round, as soon as the two sides exchanged swords, Winters launched a sneak attack. He came up with a long stride and high level stab straight to the opponent's front door. The principle of this thrust is to raise the sword body after crossing the sword, and use the sword grid to block the enemy's attack route while threatening the opponent's head.
Not to mention, this salty fish thrust really startled Winters' opponent, and he was confused for a moment: "This guy was so steady in the last round, why did he suddenly become reckless?" ?”
But the instinctive reaction of a top swordsman overcame the panic caused by this salty fish thrust. When Winters stepped forward, he quickly took a step back, and then when the sword blades crossed, he transferred his strong sword blade to the tip of Winters' sword, and pressed Winters' sword blade down with force. He twisted the long sword and used it to block Winters' possible slashing path towards him, keeping the tip of the sword pointed at Winters' abdomen. The next moment Winters himself collided.
Whistle! It was another wonderful performance. This round was less than two seconds. Winters' opponent easily hit Winters' torso and scored two points. Scattered applause rang out in the training room again.
Winters pointed to the spot where he was poked on his practice armor and ran back to the waiting area impatiently. The score was now tied at 17:17. The referee and Winters' opponent looked at each other. The classmate who served as the referee shook his head helplessly. They all saw that Winters' mentality had collapsed.
But the game had to continue. When the two stood back to the starting position, Winters' opponent began to seriously think about a question: "Should I just let him win this time?"
It’s another round, and this time Winters is in “angry style” as he enters the ring. Angry stance is a charging stance in which the swordsman brings the hilt of the sword to his shoulder. Just as retracting your fist allows you to punch it out more powerfully, the same goes for swordsmanship. The angry slash has amazing power and a long slashing stroke, but the disadvantage is that the intention and direction of the attack are too obvious.
At this moment, Winters' mind has been occupied by a thought: "I am indeed not as good as him in the hard power competition, but I still have a match point. The chance of winning is to rely on the attack and score three points by surprise." This It was the reason Winters, who had a broken mentality, convinced himself that there was indeed some truth to it.
When everyone thinks that someone has lost his mind, he actually has some fallacious reasoning to convince himself, and it may be really convincing.
There is nothing wrong with the idea of a sneak attack, but the problem that Winters is not aware of now is: his intention to attack is now so obvious that people cannot pretend not to see it, and there is no longer the possibility of grabbing a three-pointer by surprise. The so-called The tactics of grabbing points are naturally just deceiving oneself and others.
But the next second, Winters saw that the other party was also in the angry posture like him. He could see what the other party was thinking at a glance: the angry posture was the posture they practiced when they first met at the officer preparatory school. , in the six years of swordsmanship classes, the two of them always practiced a few routines of the Angry Style first.
He can choose to score three points with a flat thrust, because a straight thrust is always faster than a powerful slash. His rival and friend now clearly wanted him to win for once. But Winters didn't want to win now. He wasn't angry. He realized that his attitude just now sounded like he couldn't afford to lose.
This is the last time the two people compete in a swordsmanship class, and it may even be the last time they compete. Because the so-called graduation means that the partners who have been together day and night realize the possibility that they will never meet again in the future. It didn't matter whether he won or lost, he thought about it.
So neither of them played any tricks in this round. This time, Winters' opponent used his stronger strength to force open the center line and hit the target with a straight thrust.
This was an expected result. Winters comforted himself silently: "I'm taller than you, stronger than you, and have practiced more than you. Is there any reason not to win? Isn't it normal to lose? 17 points is enough. Blow."
After being hit, Winters walked towards his opponent with his sword. When the whistle sounded, Winters suddenly realized that something was wrong. It turned out to be 2 points. The opponent did not attack the head, but hit the chest. The current score is 17 :19, the opponent has to score one more point to end the game.
Winters felt a mouthful of old blood welling up in his throat because he originally wanted to end the game gracefully with a warm hug. As a result, now that he found himself playing another round, his embarrassment was comparable to crying at the funeral next door.
Fortunately, I haven't hugged him yet, otherwise it would be embarrassing. He felt that it was a waste of his abundant emotions just now. His emotions were just right at first, but after another round of brewing, he no longer felt that way.
So Winters cursed in his helmet at a volume that only he could hear, and walked back to the waiting area with his sword on his shoulder. It was a new round, and he started again in the angry style.
The opponent slashed diagonally, and Winters blocked with his sword;
The opponent drew his sword and switched sides, and Winters also changed his direction to block;
The opponent drew his sword again and switched sides, and he subconsciously continued to block with his sword.
About a second passed, and this round still looked like a lightning-fast move. Although Winters relied on instinctive reactions to fight the sword, he had already vaguely felt that something was wrong.
So when Winters realized that the distance between the other party and him was rapidly shortening, he fell into a great panic. He understood everything at once, and he was so anxious that he yelled: "[Vicious expletive]! You want to... [more vicious expletive]..."
But it was too late, his personal attack was not well conveyed to his opponent at all. All the other party could hear was an inaudible wail coming from his helmet.
Winters' opponent switched to holding the sword with one hand to control Winters' sword blade. He grabbed Winters' shoulder with the other hand and used a trap under his feet. He performed a simple leg throw and a Tarzan press. After knocking poor Winters down with his body armor and his body, thunderous applause erupted in the training room.
Yes, since it is a swordsmanship competition, of course you cannot score points in boxing, let alone wrestling. But after knocking the opponent down and controlling it, and then using the sword blade to damage the target, it is effective! Score one point.
Wrestling is also part of swordsmanship, don't play if you don't feel comfortable with it.
The whistle blew and the referee loudly announced: "Victor, Axel of Orange!"
Winters was lying on the ground with only one thought in his mind: "I was such a [expletive] for not stabbing him with the sword just now."
