Summoning Total War - Chapter 2

Chapter 2: Sparta!

Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio

Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

The morning sun woke Murphy from his deep sleep. He had just opened his eyes when the maid helped him to get dressed. A cold, emotionless, electronic “ding” sound rang in his ears.

“Ding! You received an attendant.”

The sudden sound of the auxiliary system made Murphy momentarily confused, but as soon as the maid opened the blinds, the voice of the herald from outside the Governor’s Mansion could be heard.

“Your Excellency, there is someone outside who claims to be an agriculturalist. He wants to see you.” The herald was a middle-aged man with a full-faced beard. As Murphy’s first attendant, his role was to convey his orders on regular days and on the battlefield. He also had an additional role, which was to act as a commanding general.

When Murphy heard this, he immediately came to his senses, quickly got dressed, and commanded, “Bring him to the hall. I’ll come over immediately”

When he thought about his character class, which he knew by heart, it turned out that at the moment he had one more follower in the character attributes of the auxiliary system—an agriculturalist.

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Character attributes:

Name: Murphy-Sparta. (A great surname can give you many benefits.)

Commander: ★★ (Increases the leading army’s morale.)

Management: ★ (Increases administrative capacity and city revenue.)

Influence: ★★★ (Increases security, the number of guards, and slightly increases morale.)

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Title:

Handsome (Your appearance makes it easy for people feel close to you, influence +2) <<>>

Strong physique (You have an exceptionally strong physique, vitality +6)

Smart (You were born quick-thinking, commanding +1, management +1, influence +1)

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Attendants:

Herald (Every qualified ruler needs a herald, commander +1)

Agriculturist (A scholar who is proficient in agriculture, agricultural income +1)

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If Murphy remembered correctly, the commander decided morale, and about two commander points was equal to one morale point.

During the age of cold weapons, armies quickly collapsed. Generally speaking, even for a regular army, when faced with more than two head-on confrontations, 30% in casualties would start to result in a collapse. Because of this, morale was really important, and the chief commander was integral in determining the army’s combat effectiveness.

Management ability was a bonus to the city’s revenue. Having a strong management ability made it easier to convince people.

As for influence, that was a comprehensive attribute.

People who had a lot of influence could motivate others. Influence could also increase security, increase public sentiment, indirectly affect taxes and population growth, and much more. While in battle, influence could affect the army’s morale, even though the effect it had on an army’s morale wasn’t as great as the effect it had on other things, since its value was lower. About four points of influence was equivalent to one point of morale. Influence could also be better understood as reputation, and reputation is something that’s always very useful.

Among the many attributes given him, the only thing Murphy felt puzzled by was the surname behind his name—Sparta.

Could a great surname really give him a lot of benefits?

If so, what were they?

Murphy had no clue as to what these benefits were.

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His talk with the agriculturalist went very smoothly. After all, pragmatic scholars are straightforward, and they don’t waste time.

When the agriculturist, whose name was Hammonia, met Murphy, he said that because the town had already established defensive measures, it was urgent to cultivate farmland to plant the spring wheat. Later, the agriculturist even volunteered to show Murphy that he was capable of handling this properly.

Murphy asked him to make arrangements to plant the spring wheat.

Because he didn’t know much in the way of growing wheat, he naturally wouldn’t intervene if there was an expert in this field.

The agriculturist transferred a thousand people to sow the crops and dig ditches.

And Murphy directed the remaining idle population to begin preparations for the construction of the temple of the goddess of wisdom, Athena.

In fact, all he had to do was issue orders.

Among these 1,000 people, who were idling about, there was bound to be someone who would split and allocate the work of building the temple and carving the statues, and so on.

The auxiliary system suggested that the population required to build the Temple of Guidance was three hundred, but Murphy immediately increased the number to eight hundred, as he wanted to build the temple as quickly as possible.

He sent the remaining two hundred people to repair the burnt, damaged houses. This included cleaning the floors and fixing the drainage.

In the game, it was clear that residential houses weren’t on the construction list. But since this was the real world, it was an issue that needed serious consideration. This town had been destroyed, but there were still many things in it that were usable. Murphy’s plan was to build some simple wooden houses in the north of the town as homes for the citizens.

The Nidoria River was located further to the west. After the port was constructed, the west side could be used as a commercial area.

To the east was the military camp, and to the south was the governor’s mansion. The center of the square was where the temple would be built. These were Murphy’s current plans for the city.

The current population still wasn’t very large, so Murphy didn’t have any plans regarding the drainage, public baths, and other communal buildings. His focus was on the crops and the army.

Although he wanted to recruit two more teams of Greek infantry, he eventually gave up on the idea.

This was because the recruitment of an army would dwindle the town’s population. At the moment, the town was urgently being constructed, so population size was critical.

The two Greek infantries were transferred out to protect the townspeople, while Murphy led the General Guards and the unusually strong Spartan infantry to a hillside that was close by.

His main task now was to draw a map!

Although he wasn’t a professional, he’d learned how to paint in his previous life. He couldn’t draw an accurate map that was to scale, but a rough topographic map was within his capabilities. When he came to this world, he was completely unfamiliar with the environment and types of life here, but it was important for him to figure out the surrounding terrains and what creatures were there, and whether they were friend or foe. Additionally, there were many details he needed to work out. Only when he became the general himself would he understand how difficult it was to be a general caught in a regime.

When Murphy had gone out to draw the map in these last few days, he’d encountered a few gnolls.

These creatures seemed to be very fond of attacking humans. Despite the fact that Murphy had been surrounded by many guards, they had still rushed up to them, howling.

But rushing over only resulted in their own deaths. The Spartan infantry, with their red cloaks, was powerful in , so the gnoll’s combat ability was of no concern to them.

It was only then that Murphy discovered that the creatures from this outside world weren’t so different from them.

They could also feel pain, and they would also bleed when their limbs were pierced and crippled by weapons. When they were pierced through the heart, they would also die immediately.

Maybe there were some all-round powerful beings out there, but the creatures Murphy saw when he explored the surrounding terrain were all real creatures. Although powerful, they weren’t invincible.

Gnolls were very powerful, but they weren’t as powerful as the Spartan infantry. As so-called “perfect warriors” who had spent their entire lives as professional soldiers, the Spartan infantry could easily defeat the gnolls, even when having to face them one-on-one. And when the Spartan infantry entered a coordinated formation, dealing with the gnolls was as simple as squashing a bug.

But this wasn’t surprising.

As the ones who could single-handedly take out the Berserkers, the Spartan infantry was capable of winning more than losing in one-on-ones with the Roman army (Elite urban troops). With their top-notch fighting power, they were elite in the world!

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Unit: Spartan Infantry

Recruitment Rounds: (2)

Unit size (80), experience (0)

Attack (16), charge bonus (4), weapon (spear)

Total defense (17), armor (3), defense skills (9), shield (5)

Vitality (2)

Morale (14)

Recruitment cost (1,220), maintenance cost (460)

Ability: High morale, able to hide in the forest, ability to form phalanx, incredibly strong, able to dig tunnels.

Explanation: Super elite! Disciplined! Very strong! Can form a phalanx! Can dig tunnels!

All the education and training that members of the Spartan infantry received since childhood was for turning them into “perfect warriors.” Spartans spend their entire lives training for war, and the weaker ones are quickly eliminated. As children, they’re asked to steal and harass slaves as part of their training, and as youths, they learn everything related to war–even the music and dance for marching and military purposes. All of this creates a man with a victor’s mindset: only expecting victory, and frightening opponents. The spartans fight as a traditional infantry. Using their spears and hoplons, they form a phalanx to attack: a group of soldiers who are dependent on each other will defeat the enemy together. Their weakness is that they’re extremely traditional. Hence, the once powerful Spartan town-state didn’t advance with the times.

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In the few battles of Star Zero, Murphy had roughly estimated the fighting strength of the gnolls.

Just their combat strength alone made them stronger than the Greek infantry, but as long as the troops were commanded properly in the battle, they could completely overtake the gnolls.

These gnolls only had some crude weapons, and were basically unequipped. The best they had was a piece of leather armor, which was poor defense. A single stab from a spear could kill them.

Generally, the fighting strength of gnolls was slightly higher than that of ordinary soldiers, but they weren’t disciplined. Each gnoll was strongly individualistic, so they were unable to fight as a cohesive group.

They looked ferocious, and their strength was much greater than that of an adult man. They moved swiftly, but in the long-term, this type of combat effectiveness wouldn’t be much stronger than that of humans. After being pierced by a spear, they would lose their fighting ability due to blood loss and pain. Generally speaking, a gnoll was just a relatively strong creature. Judging by the gnolls’ fighting ability, and how the humans who used to live here moved away, Murphy was able to infer that the civilization in this world wasn’t too advanced.

At the very least, the level of civilization wasn’t more advanced than that of the Middle Ages.

Based on the gnolls’ fighting strength, and excluding any possible fear they might have, Murphy estimated that even with the fighting ability of the Han and Tang Dynasties, they could completely crush them!

In the end, they were nothing more than a group of clever beasts that were slightly stronger than humans.

Everything else was uncertain, but Murphy was absolutely sure that they would be able to settle the gnolls with the Chinese spear formation.

Now, the only thing he was uncertain about was whether there were more powerful and strange creatures besides for these gnolls. Possibly some legendary, powerful creatures that possessed magic!

Perhaps, even the dragons from the Western legends…