The following six weeks continued similarly. After a light breakfast came physical fitness, then weapons training. Cain introduced horse riding using a saddle and fighting from horse-back with bows and spears in the second week.
After a basic lunch they reversed their training, then before the evening meal they spent an hour or two with the sand table. On the first morning of the seventh week, Alexander came rushing out to see Cain.
"Joseph, we are going to war. My father has given me command of two phalanxes to break me in, or so he said last night while he was drinking. We will be fighting the Athenians, they have marshalled a large mercenary army, who march as we speak on our winter palace, at Pellane.
"Will you come with us and bring your Amazons? I’m sure father will see the advantage of having aggressive mounted troops," Alexander asked. Cain agreed, saying,
"Do you realise the whole battle could be nothing but a huge trap? If the Athenian mercenaries have the chance to gain the best location on the field, it will leave your fathers forces and you rather exposed."
"It will take over two weeks to cover the distance to where my father expects to fight the Athenians," Alexander told Cain. "My father's spies believe there are over thirteen thousand Athenian mercenaries along with fifteen hundred Athenians. To combat those numbers my father has called up all his nearest troops and half of the levies, who will be leaving in two days' time to come here. Once they have arrived we march toward Thessele
Cain used the travel-post at their villa, going to see his concubines, to raise a force to supplement King Philip and Prince Alexander. Their forces would be led by the VETS, and would use their travel-posts to arrive on the field of battle when called for.
Chapter 41
Underhand Planning
Cain looked at the world map and zoomed into the area so he could see and measure the distances between Serrena and Pellane then Pellane and Thessele. There was a forty-mile difference, between the King's palaces and Thessele and the palace at Pellane. While they were in Bounty planning the upcoming battle, Cain told his women he didn’t trust Jason,
"I think he will try to skew the odds and have more troops than King Philip will bring. I don't think Philip's spies have gathered all the information available nor are they looking wider afield for troop movements. To counter this lack of information I think our allies in Pyrgadikian, Mantabele and Petrabele should be used. They will be able to provide four phalanxes, or twenty small smash and grab squads of twenty-five men. Our Amazons will provide a mix of cavalry and mobile archery support, but I’ve been thinking what we need are both a mobile style of artillery unit and a semi-mobile-fixed artillery.
"On one our meetings a few weeks ago, Nithey let me know that he has developed a clay grenade which explodes upon breaking. We can use those and make a rough style barrel launcher, which will throw grenades singularly or in clusters of up to ten, a distance of two to three hundred yards."
Toni asked, "How could they, you make round barrels?" Cain replied and said, "We don't need round barrels, we can use square tubes and they will work as good as a round one, as clay pot grenades are not a uniform size.
"We don’t need rifling or a tight seal for a propellant, they will be thrown by tension gathered in strong sinews; much like a bowstring. We could make a mobile catapult, along the grounds of the one we made in the twenty-twenty-seven zone."
Sophie suggested they plant, under cover of darkness, clusters of grenades in the ground, similar to our battle against the Barbarians and Gekards. Although she suggested the idea, Sophie didn’t know how to ignite them. Lesley asked, "Do you think we could find more Urus, as they would be a good armoured column."
After their discussions, Cain hit the workshop and began to design a piece of mobile artillery which a team of three could use, he knew they had designs for wheeled catapults which would throw clusters of the new grenades. Bethany began to work opposite Cain and developed then made an arrow-making machine, which she then enchanted. The new machine would imprint either fire or explosive enchantments on pre-made individual arrows. :The good thing,: Bethany thought, :about my work is it can be used by any person, not necessarily one with magical skills. They would be able to produce thousands of arrows without having a single mage like Toni, Sophie or myself involved,:
Toni worked with Sophie, and half of the Amazons on their field craft. By the end of the third day Sophie’s field craft had risen to level four, while the Amazons skills as a group, increased to level three. Daphne worked with the few maps Alexander provided, and written testimony from eye-witness accounts of the area where the battle could take place. The locals seemed to have a good understanding of the land.
Taking two companies with her, Daphne visited the areas of the upcoming battle and returned to Cain and the others to see if her plan would work. As they sat in Bounty Daphne said to them, "There is plenty of available water and the lay of the land can be used to our advantage." She took them into the workshop and sketched on the interactive table, a rough map of what she envisaged. Cain said, "Water is often used as a defensive measure, the Belgians used it in World War one, the Dutch used their dykes in wars against the Spanish, so yeah why not use water against the Athenians."
The next day Daphne went back with her two companies and began to create several natural caches of water. She raised the banks of the Vardari river and widened the river for twenty miles down its length, then created several large lakes controlled by weirs which were linked to a weir near the river mouth outside of Thessele.
Alexander let Cain know the levies his father King Philip had raised were a now weeks travel from the assembly point. His father's scouts reported the Athenian mercenary army was around a third of the way into the mountain passes heading toward the summer palace. Cain, Daphne, and Toni, along with their protectors, took Alexander and went to visit the most likely site of the upcoming battle. They used a mobile travel-post, and kept Alexander hooded so he could not report on what or how they travelled.
Sending Myrina ahead to Thessele, Cain asked her if with Josephine they could carry out long-ranged recon of the pass the Athenians travelled in. With five squads of Amazons as her protectors, Myrina and Josephine kept a close watch on the Athenians mercenary army as it marched through the valleys in the mountain range on the way to Pellane. She reported to Cain daily their advance and size of the approaching army.
Cain knew the long range efforts of Myrina helped in his planning, but he trusted his instincts so he moved Myrina and Josephine from Thessele to Serrena. There they flew a search pattern covering the approaches to Pellane, out as far as fifty miles. Two days into Myrina and Josephine’s search, they spotted two large caravans heading from the borders of Macedonia, one came from Paeonia, the other from Epirus.
Myrina told Toni what she noticed, then she had Josephine take a closer look. On the closer look Josephine noticed the caravans contained lots of marching men, around a thousand in each caravan. There could be more in the covered wagons, as Josephine did not go below a thousand feet. She also said they had not noticed any children or females in either caravan.
Toni messaged Cain, and he agreed with her they were most likely mercenaries, whom Jason’s people had hired. Lesley and Areto visited the three allied cities, spoke to the leaders who arranged for their troops to be ready for travel-post insertion.
Alexander informed Cain, he would leave with his father and his two phalanxes in a day's time, and take charge of them once they arrived. Cain sent three Amazon companies with Alexander, one as his personal heavy cavalry and two lighter armed archer units. Daphne let Cain and the others know, the Vardari river had filled all the lake caches she made. She also moved the earth in several areas as her plan was completed. Daphne formed three natural-looking waterways on the flanks of the river where they believed the attack would come from.
Sending two of their companies out as a large unit before they separated into six large teams of scouts, comprising four squads each. They were to keep an eye on the r
outes the two caravans would take. One of the scouting groups let Sophie know there was a small village near the northern edge of the battlefield.
Where a store keeper told the scouts they thought it strange because there was a high proportion of men, young healthy-looking men new to the area who dropped in regularly for supplies over the past month. The owner of the store looked ill-at-ease as she spoke when she sold dried meat to the squad leader, so she informed Sophie with the coms-ring she wore.
Toni collated all the different information leads from her sister-wives and the scouts and she laid the information out on a sand map Daphne made. She used blocks of wood for the troops and caravans they knew about. She showed Cain and her sister-wives later on the third day, after King Philip and his troops left to face the Athenian mercenary armies.
Toni said, "Philip and Alexander have twenty-two thousand men while our reports give the Athenians thirty thousand, plus around five thousand additional men travelling to the battle field in caravans or billeted in local villages. Realising they could do nothing from within Bounty they retired to eat and went to bed early. Everyone settled and drifted asleep within two hours of sunset, Enoch spoke to Cain as he drifted asleep.
{Ruth scanned the reddit boards regarding Forsaken, she noticed Jason had begun a large recruitment drive three weeks earlier. It was only obvious as she read a linked message which was innocuous yet it been shared over one hundred thousand times. She read Jason is promising to pay a player's online costs for ten years and give them a bonus should they complete certain tasks. It is hard to count how many have signed up on the recruitment drive but expect to come face-to-face with hundreds more of Jasons' JW Killers clan,} Enoch said.
Cain made breakfast and fed his wives before a single finger of the sun showed on the horizon. Up, fed and ready they gathered their forces and they travelled to Thessele and a portable travel-post outside the city walls. Once there Cain led his DreamBabes and close protection Amazons rode out to where they expected the battle to take place. Cain had shown Daphne on Toni’s sand map where he would like the static artillery to be placed. She made solid earth and rock mounds ten yards high as bases for the catapults and large ballistas; which Cain had designed and their support staff based in Thessele had constructed. Myrina said to everyone,
"Josephine has spotted the advanced scouts of the Athenians nearly through the gap in the mountains. While King Philip's army, is half a day from the crossing the Vardari river. King Philip is heading for his forward camp on this side of the river, he should be there by nightfall, if he continues at the speed he is currently travelling."
Cain was pleased with the reports and asked Myrina if Josephine could carry out a head count of the Athenians, now they were around a day and a half from the battle site. The Amazons pitched a large command tent for Cain and his wives, up against the river bank and a deep part of the river. Once the command tent had been erected, the Amazons laid their camp around in a semi-circle behind five layers of spikes and thorn bushes that were grown from seed in three hours, as they used alchemy potions.
Alexander, rode with the three groups of Amazons ahead of his father and came to see Cain, he arrived as the sun sank lower casting long shadows over the ground. Cain share with Alexander most of the information Toni had gathered and what their scouts and Josephine had seen. Though Cain did not tell Alexander their own plans for the battle, and the reserve forces he would call upon should they be needed.
Nithey spoke to Cain using a coms-ring, he said to Cain, "There has been several small raids by JW Killers clan players on each of our three cities. My VETS and the specialist militias at each location repulsed those and captured two new recruits outside Mantabele. They said their orders were to disrupt any aid you could call upon. Especially when the battle goes sideways in the Athenians favour." Cain made sure the troops and equipment were ready to be deployed, Nithey said, "You need to stop worrying and trust to the plans we have made
Alexander’s Amazons would not let him a ride back to this father’s encampment. There was a significant risk of small teams of assassins being deployed and used against high value targets, such as Alexander himself, his lead Amazon Roxana told him.
The nighttime patrols around Cain’s encampment, caught two such teams, they killed the six players and two NPCs with no problems. Both groups were dressed and ready for battle an hour before dawn. Cain watched, impressed with his women, they were acting more like former colleagues each battle they fought, professionals to the core.
:These women, my wives, are becoming hard when in a battle yet soft and loving when we are alone. Either as a couple or all of us together. Maybe that is what special operatives need, some love in their lives to help us keep from that spiral down to despair,: thought Cain.
Exiting Bounty and the command tent, Cain mounted his horse and with Alexander rode over to King Philip’s encampment. Cain noticed the king was well into his cups and his speech was heavily slurred. He tried three times before he said, "Alexander, my son you can stand your troops down. The battle, our attack will now be tomorrow as the Athenians had problems late yesterday, and only now have their advanced troops reached the head of the valley they travelled down. So go drink and sleep with your women for tomorrow we fight."
Dismissed by his father Alexander bit his tongue and took Cain to see his two phalanxes, he showed Cain the training he had given the men on their march to the battle site. Looking at the men King Philip had given Alexander, Cain knew half a company of the Amazons would easily wipe out the two phalanxes, with no losses on their side. Taking Alexander aside, Cain suggested to Alexander he forbid his troops alcohol, until they concluded the battle.
Using his foot, Cain drew in the earth the best location for Alexander and the two phalanxes to be during the battle. Withholding information, Cain did not let Alexander know about the four phalanxes and artillery reserves he would bring, once the battle was under way.
Returning to his own encampment, twelve assassins thought they would surprised and ambush Cain and the protectors. Josephine had spotted the would be assassins and Myrina informed Cain before he left Alexander and his troops.
Cain, twenty protectors and the three hundred Amazons loaned to Alexander rode the assassins down. Someone injured one Amazon as an assassin threw a dagger at them while a horse rode him down. Sophie used her healing skill, restoring the Amazon to full health in under a minute. The three hundred Amazons returned to Alexander, Cain returned to the command tent and looked at the table map Toni had drawn.
Toni spent two hours using charcoal to draw the map of the battlefield, laying out with wooden blocks where the opposing forces would be likely line up. For the next five hours Cain, Toni, Daphne and Sophie spent turns in being the Athenians and the Macedonians. Enoch and the AIs informed them they were being watched by over one hundred million live streamers.
Myrina’s final count of the Athenian mercenaries, came to thirty-eight thousand, including the two caravans which were only one hour from the battle site. She also included the four villages they knew to contain troops on the other side of the Vardari. Cain, told everyone present around the table map, "I don't think King Philip’s army is large enough or trained enough to win this battle. The Athenians have roughly eight thousand more men, nearly half the number of King Philip's army. We need to be ready to leave the field of battle once things go south. All our support staff are behind Thessele’s walls, we are all mounted, no worries as we can easily leave."
[I like the fact Cain is carrying out his briefing, where the game cameras can record what he is saying. The battle will be the largest immersive VR battle, ever. Enoch thinks Jason will have over two hundred of the JW Killers clan in the battle. He will hope they can turn the tide and kill Philip and Alexander. Keep a watch for dirty tricks.
[Should Jason achieve either of those targets, the game will change the conquests Alexander carried out. I have looked into the game code, where the game planners had planned for our Alexander, to
follow the real Alexander's path around the 337 BC game zone. With the time lag on streaming, Jason will see what King Philip plans and Cain’s plans two hours before the start of the battle. He will be able to re-arrange his battle plan before the fight starts. Perhaps Cain's verbal doubts will give us an edge and make Jasons side sloppy on their implementation,] Rahab said.
Fight For Pellane
Toni told Cain what Rahab had said to her. Shrugging his shoulders, Cain said battles change once the command to attack is given, telling Toni to keep to their plans and everything will work out fine. Cain asked Myrina to have Josephine carry out a high over flight of the battle site. Myrina told Cain everything she witnessed through Josephine’s eyes.
"The Athenian’s have laid out their troops as we expected in phalanxes, they have no visible archers nor any force of mounted troops beyond the leaders and fifty players dressed differently in metal armour. We can see King Philip’s troops are marching to their positions, half a mile beyond their encampment. There is around a mile separating the two sides. The rear of the Athenians have moved six to seven hundred yards beyond the rock piles you laid down two weeks previously."
Using the coms-ring, Cain spoke to Nithey and asked for the troops in each city to be ready for a fast deployment. He told Nithey, they would call on the ballista and catapult units after they deployed the troops.
Looking through Josephine's eyes, Myrina noticed one of the villages they marked for having Athenian mercenary troops, those men have joined with others from two more villages. Together seven hundred men now marched toward the rear of King Philips encampment, on the opposite side of the river. Myrina promptly messaged Cain.
Everyone in the Amazons encampment, could hear the battle horns of King Philip. After the horn blasts, came the moving of four additional phalanxes, moving forward two hundred yards. Another round of horn blasts, and the rest of Philip’s troops moved in formation, joining the first four phalanxes.
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