Road to the Crown

Chapter 298: Advance (1)

22nd September 1574

The Ostros shot first.

It was hard to say what made them act like idiots there. Maybe one of the poorly trained fire-man slipped and pressed his igniting stick right on the special hole in the cannon, resulting in the first fire? Or maybe the same poor guy simply panicked when seeing my overwhelmingly big and coated in steel carriages pressing forward? Or maybe it was just an attempt to sap the morale of my forces right before the attack?

Either way, whatever was the reason behind this, the projectile only managed to create a small ravine about two hundred meters short of the position of my spearhead, made with the heaviest war carriages that I had.

Soon, the entire position of the enemy hid behind the quickly rising cloud of smoke, as the rest of the cannons followed suit. Once again, rather than a proper order, it was most likely caused by the chain reaction of people just aiming to shot only after the barrage started. Given how the scouts reported the type of the units that Ostros had under them, I doubted that even half of their combined army was properly managed by the officers!

On the other hand, unbothered by the ongoing and slow barrage from the embankments, all five of my steam tanks pressed forward all the way to the point that was marked as the edge of the effective firing range of the enemy artillery. Given their height advantage, one might think that they would be able to shoot further and better. Thankfully, for the industrial power that stood behind the back of my army, this three or four meters of difference in elevation didn't matter at all!

"Raise the barrel! Forth notch, sixth-degree!"

Thanks to the prolonged training of the officer's voice, even standing good three hundred meters away from the place where the action was happening, I could still hear the piercing sound of the orders being shouted inside the safety of the thick, steel can.

"Cannon ready!"

This time, I had to properly strain my ears just to hear a faint hint of the soldier's response.

"Sir, what about their cavalry?"

With all of our troops now readying for the fight, one of the officers that took part in the general meeting back in the headquarters tent ran towards my position before saluting and asking this unregulated question.

"What about them?"

Focusing my eyes on the thick barrels of the cannons embedded into the heavy war carriages of mine slowly raising to their designated position, I couldn't really be bothered with someone annoying me right now. With just the mass of my troops and their equipment, once set in motion, changing their orders would be akin to voluntarily pushing them into a huge delay that could deconstruct our entire attack!

"Since it's given that they wanted us to attack through the middle and clog the road with the wreckage of our machines, why do they keep all of their cavalry on their left-wing? I'm worried that there might be a small path leading beside their trenches that their cavalry could take to flank us!"

Taking a look at the distant enemy positions, I had to imagine how they looked like with the thick smoke made of burned gunpowder covering them as some kind of smokescreen of the future times.

"You might be right"

Given how focused I was on overcoming the greatest hurdle of the battle that was now in its opening phase, I actually made the mistake. I ignored the greatest and mobile strength that the enemy had!

Two banners strong of cavalry, meaning, about a thousand men strong force that entire commonwealth always prided itself with!

"Take ten of the light carriages from the reserve and deploy them on our right flank. Make them stand sideways to the rest of the camp and bring additional ammunition to them. In the case of the attack, they will be our main and last line of defence. Sadly, I can't afford any bigger changes right now."

Just like I said, as I was talking with the officers, the line of the light carriages stuffed to their brims with the soldiers was now starting its raid. With the enemy artillery still trying its absolute best to rain fire on their path, one might think that this few hundred meters that separated their starting positions from their target would turn into a hell of killed soldiers and broken machines.

In fact, I couldn't blame anyone for thinking that, given how slowly those overburdened carriages were moving right now!

But it all changed once they entered the range of effective firing of the enemy artillery!

BOOM!

As if dolls coordinated by the agile hand of the theatre master, the salvo of my five powerful cannons could be taken as the sign for the attack. With a huge cloud of smoke suddenly erupting from the small chimneys hidden at the back of the light carriages, all of them burst forward, as if the angels themselves were pushing them towards the enemy lines!

"Sir, the first line is advancing! Should we send the second one right away?"

Given how hard those carriages were to manoeuvre while moving at high speed, they all had to be spaced away from each other, as to prevent any crashes. 

"No, keep them to the moment when the footmen will take their position and then reinforce. We need them to pass the message to bring back now empty the first line back."

Despite how this entire battle was taking place on land, it had some sides that made me compare it to the legendary scene of landing at the Omaha beach from the Colonel Ryan movie. Once the war carriages of mine basically crashed against the steep slope of the embankments, the reaper guns would cover all of their surroundings with the hail of bullets, sweeping all the stupidly courageous soldiers of the enemy from their places!

Only after the closest trench and the front of the enemy fortifications were declared to be emptied out from the resistance, the sides of the war carriages started to open. One by one, the footmen swarmed out of the light carriages, splitting into two groups. Half of them jumped into the closest trench to clear it out from the possible remaining soldiers of the enemy, attempting to establish a fall-back position for the other group. 

At the same time, the advance force climbed the steep, sandy slope, only stopping about a meter below its edge. With the reapers guns quickly making a short work of anyone who dared to approach it, as soon as the machine-gun fire stopped, my troops, reached the edge and used it as the support for their rifles. 

"Push the second line in!"

Seeing how my men managed to secure a foothold, I instantly ordered the next line of attack. Despite how efficient my guns were both in terms of quickly clearing large swaths of crowds and in shooting anything that dared to move within the trenches, in less than just a few minutes, the barricades were taken!

"Sir, the enemy cavalry is moving!"

As soon as the rest of my light carriages moved in against the line of enemy trenches, a report came. Taking a quick look at the place where the enemy units were bound to appear, I could only curse at the lack of communication. 

If only I had a radio in every single carriage of mine, I could just halt the right-wing of the second wave, putting them perfectly lined up along the path that the enemy cavalry would have to take in order to attack! 

Sadly, that thinking belonged to the dreams. Without the radio-communication, I was forced to watch how in just few moments, a thousand strong unit of enemy best troops raced down the cleverly hidden path, quickly approaching my camp!

"Reserve carriages, open fire!"

With how congested that small path was, Ostros could give my gunners a better present. Even though the distance at which they started shooting was quite away from what they were trained to shoot at, even if a pulled were to miss someone that the gunner aimed for, there were still multiple lines of enemy perfectly lined up behind him!

"Move the fire of the artillery at the throat of that path!"

Aiming with my hand at the small opening in the left wing of enemy embankments, I quickly moved the suppressing fire of my cannons on it. With how the battle was developing, even the soldiers that were freshly arriving at the front line, quickly noticed the commotion, dropping the idea of climbing the fortifications and just turning to the side to shoot at the orderly lines of enemy cavalry!

In such a crowd, every bullet hit. 

By the time the enemy commander realised that this suicidal charge wouldn't even get the time to properly spread and execute a charge, nearly a third of the enemy elite units was already dead!

"Continue with the advance, heavy war-carriages on the road to make a spearhead!"