Summoning Total War - Chapter 21
Chapter 21: Massacre (Part 1)
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
It was seven o’clock in the evening.
The sky was now completely dark. Tonight, dark clouds filled the skies and covered the moon, and only a hint of starlight shone from the sky.
The town of Athens was surrounded by reclaimed farmland, and there was nothing as far as the eye could see in any direction. The lush wild grass that had been growing there before had been completely razed at Murphy’s order.
As such, it would obviously be pretty difficult for the gnolls to launch a sneak attack on Athens.
The area surrounding the town was completely wide open, and there weren’t any objects around that the gnolls could use as cover.
However, the darkness obviously still provided some form of cover for the gnolls. Because the gnolls had good night vision, they could hide in the shadows and stealthily maneuver around the town fence and enter little by little.
Since the beginning, they had been attacking human towns like this.
Based on the gnolls’ previous experience, as soon as they entered a human town and set it on fire, the town would erupt into chaos, and the humans would become disordered from fear. At that point, it was time for the humans to be slain, which meant there would be a lot of delicious food to fill the gnolls’ bellies.
. . . . . . . . . . . .
Murphy didn’t arrange for many night sentries to guard the town, and there were actually even fewer sentries tonight compared to the past.
There were twelve four-meter-high arrow towers that surrounded all four sides of the town fence. There were torches on these arrow towers that could illuminate everything within a 20-meter radius. There were three night sentries on each of the arrow towers, and they took turns keeping watch.
Under cover of the night, the first group of gnolls quickly approached the town.
The sound of insects suddenly stopped. When the gnolls approached, only the sound of leaves rustling in the blowing wind could be heard. These subtle changes didn’t escape the sentries’ notice. They looked in the darkness beyond the light of the torches, carefully guarding against any potential attacks.
“Suo!” An arrow shot out of the darkness and hit the sentry in the chest, but the arrowhead was caught in the leather armor.
The horns were immediately blown!
Piercing alarms echoed throughout the town and woke up everyone in the territory.
The gnolls’ archery skills weren’t very good, and their clawed hands weren’t suited for using bows. In fact, the gnolls’ long-range attack was to throw javelins, because the gnolls were incredibly strong.
Of course, their claws were more often used for hunting because they allowed them to run really fast.
Very few people knew that the gnolls were actually colorblind!
Although the gnolls had good night vision, it didn’t change the fact that they were colorblind. The gnolls relied mainly on their sense of smell when hunting, and were extremely sensitive to the smell of fresh blood, just as if they were wild animals. This gnoll race would stealthily approach their prey’s nest in the dark and turn the creature into their own food!
Oh, right. The gnolls were also semi-nocturnal animals.
They were most active during the evenings and nights.
The sneak attack was a failure. The gnoll who failed to kill his target with his arrow made an angry roar and broke the bow and arrow in his hand. Then, he went down on all fours and charged toward the gate like a beast! Although the gnolls could walk on their own, when attacking and hunting, a large number of gnolls would land on their front paws and run like wild animals!
The gnolls were extremely fast!
The distance of thirty to forty meters was quickly closed by the gnolls, who were charging in at full speed!
The gnolls jumped up, grabbed the edge of the fence with their sharp claws, and jumped into the town of Athens.
“Shua shua shua!” Multiple long spears stabbed out from behind the fences, and these long spears pierced the palms of the gnolls who were trying to climb over the fence, nailing their palms to the wooden wall.
The sentries on the arrow towers took out their hunting bows and shot the gnolls that were nailed to the wooden wall one by one and killed them!
Seeing that the night attack was a failure, a group of creatures howled like wolves in the distant darkness.
After that, a dense rustling sound could be heard, carried along by the night breeze, and tens of meters away from the town, dark shadows began to emerge! A large group of gnolls abandoned their sneak attack and changed their plan of attack, instead directly hitting the town’s gate from the front.
A powerful horn sounded from within the town of Athens.
As if this sound were some sort of command, the sentries on the arrow towers all started to evacuate, and the spearmen who were hiding behind the wooden wall for a coordinated defense also withdrew their weapons and began retreating into the town!
The gnolls captured the town gate without delay.
The fact that they didn’t encounter any enemies made the gnolls feel gloomy. Instead, they had gotten several of their own comrades killed because they had rushed in too fast and were shot down by arrows that had come out of nowhere.
Although within their hearts they felt that something was wrong, the large number of companions behind them gave these pioneer adult males courage!
They began to approach the interior of the town of Athens!
Soon, they were able to see their enemies.
There were two teams of Greek infantry with spears, and the line of spears looked like a forest of trees. A few torches were lit around them, and all the soldiers stood in a tight formation.
Had they given up on the city gate and decided to fight on their streets instead?
The dense formation of spears made the pioneer gnolls’ hair stand on end, but the little wisdom they were born with told them that it would be much safer for them to attack from both sides. So, the gnolls that first entered the town divided themselves into two teams and started to attack the enemy in front of them from both sides!
“Dispersed formation! Line up ahead!” the commander of the infantry shouted. The first row of Greek infantry pulled half a meter out laterally, and then the Greek infantry at the rear began to advance. Suddenly, the entire street was filled with traffic, and the gnolls’ plan to strike from the side was cut short.
To tell the truth, this formation could have been done before the battle had even begun.
So why did they wait until after the battle started to enter this formation?
The reason was very simple. On a battlefield during the era of cold weapons, once a charge was launched, all commands became null and void. Unless a full retreat order was given, the back row would squeeze to the front row, and the front row would have no choice but to push on ahead! In such a situation, such as running at a modern school, if there was an emergency at the front that caused them to halt, the back rows would still squeeze toward the front!
So, after the gnolls issued a command to split the two sides of the Greek infantry, the gnolls in the back row could only run behind the gnolls in the front row. The gnolls in the front row couldn’t stop, even if they saw the changes in the enemy’s formation, because there were a lot of gnolls running behind them who were also charging. They were afraid that the first one to stop would be unlucky!
Thus, they were left with no other choice but to push on.
It would obviously be impossible for the gnolls, who were just humanoids, to issue a “cancel” command.
The change in formation that occurred in just five seconds also made it impossible for the gnolls at the front to stop. They could only tough it out with their flesh and blood and head right into the Greek infantry’s formation of long spears.
The light from the torches was really limited, and the Greek infantry in the front row could only protect themselves by the round hoplons in front of them as they attempted to pierce into the dark shadows with their spears.
Suddenly, sounds of “puchi” came from all directions as weapons pierced through flesh.
The momentum of the gnolls’ charge was stopped by the Greek infantry. The back row of gnolls couldn’t see the front, and the gnolls who had launched the charge at the front couldn’t stop and were blocked by the Greek infantry’s formation. The gnolls in the back row could only tough it out as they collided with their comrades at the front.
Suddenly, the gnolls were knocked off their feet.
The width of the street had been accurately calculated by Murphy based on the number of gnolls across it. Unless the gnolls were able to break into smaller teams and chip away at the Greek infantry’s formation, they would be stuck and killed because of the large number of soldiers! At this point, the gnolls were all sitting ducks waiting for the soldiers to kill them one by one!
“Throw javelins! Ready!”
“Launch!’
At the vigorous command, the town residents lined up behind the Greek infantry formation threw the sharp javelins out of their hands!
With a shrill roar, nearly a hundred javelins were thrown at the gnolls that were huddled into a heap!
The soldiers that were throwing the javelins were divided into five teams that consisted of a total of twenty people each. Each person was equipped with five javelins.
The Greek infantry pulled back to secure the line of defense as the javelin throwers quickly took the opportunity to throw all the javelins they had as quickly as possible.
A miserable howling quickly sounded.
A thick and strong bloody smell gradually spread across the town.
. . . . . . . . . . . .
Almost simultaneously, the four sides of the town defended against the gnolls’ attack with the same method.
After achieving a victory in the first step of the battle, the Greek infantry began to steadily retreat. The javelin throwers who had thrown their weapons began to evacuate and disperse toward the town square.
