Unknown Knight

Chapter 414: Battle of Ruibao (2)

Seeing the Swadian cavalry launching a charge, Aix did not order the soldiers to be on high alert and hold up their shields to prepare for the attack of the enemy cavalry. Instead, he ordered the messenger to signal a slow retreat.

It turned out that as soon as the army in Aix had finished forming its battle array, it ordered the infantrymen in the array to start digging.

This is a new tactic developed by the Combat Research Institute based on the situation of infantry fighting against cavalry in the field.

The specific operation is: each array infantry squad must carry one or two shovels at all times. When encountering cavalry combat, they must quickly dig a small ditch about 30 cm wide and 20 cm deep. Such a small ditch does not require much work. In places with soft soil, one or two shovels can be used to dig to the appropriate depth and the digging can be completed quickly.

Generally, three such small ditches are dug, with each ditch about three meters apart. This distance ensures that even if the horse's hooves can safely cross the first ditch while running, they will generally get stuck in the second ditch, and at most stop charging before the third ditch.

Although this small ditch is neither deep nor wide, it is enough to cause a running horse to trip and fall once its hooves step into it, or even break its hooves, rendering the cavalry unable to fight.

The key point is that this small ditch is not dug deep, so it looks like an inconspicuous pit from a distance. If you are not careful, it will cause a tragic situation where people and horses will fall.

Even if an experienced general discovered the insidious effect of the small ditch in advance and stopped the horses before the cavalry reached it, the main purpose of digging such a small ditch was still achieved, which was to force the enemy cavalry to reduce their speed to the minimum.

You must know that the reason why cavalry is so powerful is because of its strong impact force. Once the cavalry loses its impact force, its combat effectiveness is not much higher than that of ordinary infantry, and sometimes it is even not as good as well-prepared shield-bearing infantry.

This time, due to the poor discipline of the Swadian Kingdom's army, after Aix had finished forming their battle array, the Swadian army on the opposite side was in chaos and took another half an hour to finish forming their battle array.

So after Aix dug three small ditches, they were afraid that the number was too small and would not be effective, so they dug two more small ditches. After waiting for a long time, the enemy finally launched a cavalry charge.

The two armies were more than 350 meters apart. The Swadian knights first let the horses move forward at a jog to allow the horses to stretch their bodies. When the two armies were more than 150 meters apart, they accelerated the horses and launched a charge, crushing them with a thunderous momentum.

When Aix saw the Swadians launching an attack, he began to retreat slowly while maintaining his formation. By the time the enemy cavalry launched a charge, he had retreated to three meters behind the fifth ditch. His formation remained strict without any sign of chaos.

The cavalry's charge was extremely fast. In less than ten breaths, the Swadian cavalry had already reached the front.

As expected, these Swadian knights, who prided themselves on their excellent riding skills, did not care at all about the insignificant bumps and grooves in front of the Aix soldiers' formation.

The result is predictable. Dozens of Swadian knights were immediately thrown off their horses, and their lives were unknown.

Fortunately, the Swadian knights were all experienced fighters, and the people behind them immediately pulled the reins when they realized something was wrong.

Count Te Sweden, who was in charge of commanding the cavalry, was also very experienced. He immediately ordered the cavalry to split into two, changed the vanguard formation into a straight line formation in front of the small ditch, and led the cavalry to both sides of the formation in order to dissipate the horsepower and reduce the speed of the charge.

Although this move successfully avoided the pit in the small ditch, it also reduced the advantage of the horse charge.

Seeing that the biggest threat from the enemy had been eliminated, Axe immediately launched a counterattack. Flying axes, javelins, slingshots, crossbow arrows, and arrows shot by the last row of archers smashed into the Swadian knights in front of the formation.

Although these Swadian knights had amazing armor defense and removed their cavalry shields in time, they were less than twenty meters away from the soldiers in the first row of the infantry array. Being shot at such a close distance, the damage caused was not small. The Swadian knights fell to the ground in an instant, and the sounds of people howling and horses neighing could be heard one after another.

Count Te Sweden saw the loss of his knights, looked at the formation not far away, and immediately gritted his teeth and shouted:

"Charge! Charge! Charge forward and stick to them tightly. This way, you won't be afraid of their archers."

Hearing the order from Count Te Sweden, the dozen or so guards who were guarding him shouted and took the lead in riding their horses to charge towards the infantry in the formation in front.

However, over such a short distance, the cavalry simply could not increase the speed of their horses to create a strong impact force. Moreover, there were four or five small ditches under their feet, so that even if the Swadian knights rushed in front of the array infantry, they would lose speed and be useless.

The Swadian knights, having lost their speed advantage, could not shake the shield formation in the slightest, no matter how hard they kicked with their horses' hooves, smashed with their maces, or stabbed with their spears, in front of the shield formation. Instead, many of them were stabbed by the spears that extended from behind the shield formation.

This made Count Te Sweden, who was in charge of the command, very anxious. He was so angry that he cried out in anger and didn't know what to do.

At this moment, the light cavalry on both wings of Aix also surrounded them from both sides.

Most of these light cavalry were archers. As they advanced, they poured arrows at the Swadian knights on the opposite side, immediately causing considerable casualties to the Swadian knights.

However, this also successfully attracted the attention of the Swadian knights. Since they could not break through the solid shield formation, they were still confident that they could defeat and destroy the light cavalry whose defense and combat power were far inferior to theirs.

Then these Swadian knights found an outlet like a blocked flood, and without the need for the Swedish count's command, they immediately rushed towards the light cavalry on both sides.

Upon seeing this, the light cavalry immediately turned their horses around and ran, turning back to shoot arrows as they ran.

The two sides were chasing and fleeing, and soon there was no space in front of the infantry formation.

At this time, the Swadian infantrymen who were following the Swadian knights in the charge also rushed forward. Although they were in chaos, they were very aggressive. Like a new torrent, they crashed into the infantry formation of Aix.

Although these Swadian infantrymen came with great force, they had no organization or discipline, and no formation. They just charged forward with all their courage.

After all, there were four or five thousand of them, and the impact force they generated was not small. They suddenly approached the front of the shield formation and fought fiercely with "bang bang bang". The impact force they generated even squeezed the interlocking shield formation and deformed it, forming a concave arc.

However, as the saying goes, the first attack is powerful, the second is weak, and the third is exhausted. This unsystematic fighting style has no advantage in front of the array where shield bearers can rotate and exchange.

Soon, the Swadian infantry's high momentum faded, but the Aix infantry's formation remained intact.