Herald of Steel

Alexander watched the two huge Margraves ships bulldoze towards his rear with fearful incredulity in his heart.

'Why are they attacking us now?' He found himself asking, for it was clear to all that neither side was in any shape to fight.

Nothing good could appear out of this for either of them.

Of course, he remained completely oblivious to the attack and subsequent great wound inflicted on their general by one of his men, carried out without his permission.

And thus the source of the enemy's fury and insistence to commit this suicidal act remained a mystery to him.

They only seemed like suicidal desperados to him.

And speaking of desperados, the nearly thousand men atop the bridge who saw their general fall too became utterly enraged and losing all concerns for their own lives began to dash after the ships that were still close by, intending to rain arrow and javelin fire on them.

"Run faster! Do not let these scums get away!"

"Avenge the general! Avenge his soul! Do not care for anything else!"

"Throw your spears! Shoot your arrows! Kill them! For the general!"

It seemed that there were many among the Heeat soldiers who thought that the shot and subsequent fall had been fatal for Achillas and thus rushed to extract a hefty blood price for their general, even as the bridge beneath them groaned with a pitiful panting cry, ready to give out any second.

The wood, stone, and mortar structure gave one last chance to its tormentors, pleading to cease their actions and get off it before they both were destroyed.

But the crazed Heeat family soldiers appeared to have lost their minds. They only wanted to make the other side pay for killing their general, even if it meant perishing in the endeavor.

Hence, while Alexander's rear ships suffered the ramming attack from the Margraves, the front ships were suddenly peppered with a hail of short spears and arrows.

Due to their close proximity and slow speed, the attackers were able to make quite precise and deadly attacks, which unfortunately caused a notable number of casualties.

Most of the legionaries had no shields to take refuge behind, hence facing this cloud of missiles, they were unable to properly defend themselves and were fatally struck, be it in their chest, legs, arms, or torso.

The arrow hits were still somewhat bearable, made edible by the sheer thickness of their armor.

However, the javelins with their greater mass and large metal heads proved a much more deadly foe, piercing all the way through the metal and leather protection despite their toughness and hence claiming many lives.

The threat was such that many such as that many including Alexander were forced to run and duck to the lower decks, while those on the top sought any cover they could find around the surroundings, be it behind the mast, the rigging, the barrels, or even just the corners of the ships.

"Turn the ship! Turn the ship!"

"Move us away from the bridge! Hurry! Enemies atop!"

"Men! In formation! Come to formation!"

"Enemies ships at the back! Evasion maneuvers! Rowers! Take evasive maneuvers!"

Amidst the middle of this, the rowers were immediately asked to take evasive maneuvers, to increase the distance from the bridge and thus make the attacks less accurate.

However such maneuvers naturally took some time, and in the meanwhile, Alexander lost not an insignificant number of good men.

But perhaps much more than that, the sudden attack from above caused such great panic amongst the inexperienced rowers below that they immediately tried to steer their ships in a very crude and haphazard manner, paying little attention to anything that was around them.

They were like a novice, verdant driver, shuffling their steering wheel wildly at the slightest sign of trouble with not an ounce of thought put into scanning their surroundings and looking out for other obstacles.

The resulting mistakes were hence hardly surprising.

*Bang!!!!*

One of them, trying to go under the bridge as a way to get out of this attack, struck one of the pillars on the port side with an immense thud, causing a giant crack to develop along that flank and making the stone pillar vibrate almost like it was a metal bell.

The damage on the ship was so immense that it nearly sunk itself then and there, with water beginning to fill up its belly through the exposed crack with a torrential zeal, while its stranded crew soon began to feel a new threat beginning to drizzle upon themselves.

Instead of the Heeat soldier' deadly projectiles, now came onto them copious amounts of bags of dust, and small pebble sized stones and wood chips, all originating from the creaking platform above, and whose sizes were starting to increase by the second.

It was apparent that it was only a matter of time before the whole thing came loose and crushed them.

"We are stuck! Jump ship! Save yourselves!"

"The bridge is not going to hold! Abandon ship! With haste men! Jump!"

"Take off your armor! Take off your armor and start swimming."

"Hurry! The island shore is not that far! Hurry men! Before the enemy ships spot us!"

This was the tragic end of one of Alexander's ships.

While another ship, which was accompanying the vessel that got rammed, first swerved away to save herself, and then after getting its bearing sometime later, tried to go save her sister in Alexander's direction, only to miss her target and ram another pillar, being the fateful attack that broke the camel's back and began the ultimate collapse of the bridge.

While in the meantime, Alexander's own flagship got accidentally hit by a friendly ship trying to get away, and the result of this blue on blue was deadly- it immobilized both of them.

The blow was honestly not that hard, as the ships were relatively close together, and so from the looks of it, the smack should have been relatively harmless.

However, it seemed that Alexander's rams might have been a bit too efficacious, as with even that simple slow, angled blow able to immobilize its target,

"Fucking dammit!" And as Alexander felt the attack, seeing who it was who really attacked them, in a rare burst of anger, let out this curse.

If he was not struggling so hard just to maintain his balance, he would have run up there to give a tight slap to everyone on that ship.

But now, he pushed his anger down and soon got the captain to report on the damages.

It was not good.

The ramming spear had clearly pierced the hull and if the other side were to pull out they would begin to too much water, in a situation very reminiscent of what had happened with Lord Kite and Remus.

"Can we make it to the island shore if we hurry?" Thus Alexander made this query, wanting to just reach any shore.

"I cannot guarantee it, my lord. I was not able to get a good look at the size of the hole. We might be able to, or the hull might become full immediately." Came the reply from the slim man wearing soaked clothes, who found his head getting lowered with each passing word.

He could feel the anger radiating from the man beside him.

"......." And hearing the negative news, Alexander heaved a great sigh of frustration, suddenly feeling a great urge to slap the man in front of him.

Of course, the captain was nowhere at fault here. But it was just that Alexander could not believe everything was going this south this quickly.

Things were not supposed to get this complicated. The capture of the island was supposed to be a really simple affair.

However things were as they were, and Alexander quickly turned his attention to the imminent threat of the encroaching enemy, thus leaving the innocent captain to his devices.

"Get in formation! Kill every fucker that tries to get close." He officiously ordered all the surrounding men in a loud, cold voice, while the Margraves' ships noticing the enemy's commander's ship get rammed by one of their own like so could not help but guffaw,

"Hah hah hah! Idiots! These idiots never wetted their feet, hah hah hah!"

The experienced sailors laughed at their inexperience and were of course very happy at the thought that they would not need to chase their prey.

It had oh so generously ensnared itself for them.

All they now needed to do was go claim it, grab it by the throat and slit it.

Thus like any time before today, these Margraves soon boarded Alexander's and his sister ship with alacrity, but soon found them to be a very hard nut to crack.

In fact, they were a much harder nut to crack than the other ship because the men directly under Alexander were much more organized and their numbers were much more balanced.

Thus soon a brutal melee developed on the decks here too, with Alexander personally taking part in the fights.

Of course, the man did not fight in the frontlines, mostly because Alexander had lost his bronze armor, but many of his bodyguards did, including the captain of the unit Hemicus himself.

And the fighting continued until the ship began to tilt.

Let us say no to piracy! Don't take part in a crime! Don't patronize thieves!

Please come Here!

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