Chapter 280
The Devers let their imagination run wild. Instead of sailing northwest with the fleet, they went straight forward, passed through the second water gate, and headed for the real port of Tarantum.
Although it was wartime, the port of Tarantum was still very busy, even more than usual. Due to the continuation of the war, Tarantum's demand for various materials had increased. Therefore, despite the full assistance of the port staff, it still took a long time for the Devers' ship to dock.
The Devers were not in a hurry. He carefully observed the port, comparing the differences with the port of Turín …
When they got ashore, the Devers, especially the fully armored guards led by Martius, attracted the attention of many people of Tarantum. They stopped what they were doing and looked curiously. Some people who knew the inside story guessed that they might be Diónia's reinforcements, but no one expressed a welcome, let alone the cheers that were common in the port of Turín. They just watched indifferently, and some even showed sadness in their eyes. The Devers noticed that many women had black cloth on their heads. The shadow of the defeat of the war had shrouded the people of Tarantum.
The people of the Senate of Tarantum did not go to the port to welcome them out of the reservation of an old and powerful state. Instead, they waited at the city gate.
"They're here!" With this shout, everyone perked up and looked forward.
A young man walked toward them. His expression was calm, his steps steady, and his whole body exuded a sense of stability that was far different from the average young man. However, as the consul of a city-state alliance, he was indeed too young.
Umarcas touched Diomiras, who was still deep in thought, and was about to remind him.
Diomiras understood what he meant and said, "Don't say it, I understand. We have a favor to ask."
After that, he strode forward and said, "Welcome, young consul of Diónia. We are waiting for the arrival of reinforcements from our close ally, Diónia, like a dry field waiting for rain. Thank the gods, you are finally here! "
Umarcas frowned, worried that the Devers would be unhappy to hear this.
Who would have thought that Davus would immediately say apologetically, "I'm really sorry! I believe that you are aware that the Diónia Alliance has only been established for less than two years, and this is the first time that we have sent reinforcements of nearly twenty thousand soldiers, which is almost two-thirds of the Turís population. Moreover, it is the autumn harvest season, and this is the first time that we have transported so many soldiers across the sea. The affairs are too complicated, and we are inexperienced. That is why we have only arrived today. I hope that there are no delays. "
"Not too late! Not too late! You came at the right time! " Yomakas hurriedly said, "I really didn't expect Dionysia to send such a large team. This is really a great help to us! Lord Devers, the people of Tarantum are very grateful for your generous rescue! "
At this moment, Polydorus had the opportunity to interject and introduce, "Lord Devers, this is Marcus, the consul of Tarantum."
Judging from his words just now, this Consul at least had a good impression of Diónia. The Devers bowed solemnly.
"This is Diomiras, the Consul of Tarantum," Polydorus continued to introduce.
As for this … Devers glanced at him. He had long and narrow eyes, a thin nose, thin lips, and a serious expression. He had a mean look, and it was obvious that he was biased against Diónia. According to Aristiras' intelligence, there were many such people in the Senate of Tarantum, but the Devers still bowed and greeted him solemnly.
Next, they greeted the senators of the Senate of Tarantum. The Senate of Tarantum came from the Sparta Council of Elders, but compared to the Sparta Council of Elders that only had thirty seats, there were many more senators in Tarantum. Moreover, the senators of the Tarantum Senate were the same as the consul, elected by all the citizens every year.
"This is —" Before Polydorus could finish, the old man in front of him raised his eyebrows and glared at the Devers. He pointed at them and scolded, "You still have the face to come to Tarantum? Back then, you swore to promote our school in Amendarra, so we sent apprentices to Amendarra to help you. Who knew that not only did you make them betray the school, but you also made them use money to tempt more apprentices to leave Tarantum! To think that my son regarded you as a friend. Is this how you repay the selfless help of the Pythagorean School to Diónia! Let me tell you, you are not welcome in Tarantum! "
The Devers did not expect to meet someone from the Pythagorean School here. He was a little embarrassed and quickly looked back at Polydorus. "This is?"
"Archita's father, Histiavis," Polydorus replied.
The Devers was moved. He took a step forward, and regardless of how unhappy the old man was, he bowed respectfully. "Archita was a good friend of mine. I will definitely avenge him, defeat the Mesapi, and bring back his body. I hope you can restrain your grief, Uncle!"
"We don't need Diónia's help. We, Tarantum, can also defeat the Mesapi and take back my son's body!" Histiavis' eyes were filled with tears, but he was still stubborn.
At this moment, a cavalryman galloped over, shouting repeatedly along the way, "The fleet is back! The fleet is back! … "
Upon hearing the news, the Senate elders immediately abandoned the Devers and ran to the port.
Polydorus hurriedly explained to him. The Devers listened and expressed understanding, and offered to go and see the situation together.
Standing on a high place outside the port and looking down at the beach, warships were lining up and slowly entering the most crowded central port of Tarantum …
Polydorus' eyes widened as he counted the number of ships. The more he counted, the more flustered he became. In the end, his voice was trembling. "Only … only 19 warships, 25 passenger ships …"
If the Devers had not held him in time, he would have collapsed to the ground.
The Devers also frowned. According to Polydorus, the Tarantum fleet had 80 warships, 100 troop ships, and 4,000 soldiers when it left the port. Now, only 1/4 of the ships had returned. Tarantum's losses were huge. Not only the warships and soldiers, but also the sailors. A full crew of a three-decker oar warship required nearly 200 sailors. One could imagine how much manpower this had caused to the port of Tarantum …
This also gave the Devers a warning: before obtaining absolute control of the sea, use ships to transport soldiers to fight across the sea must be very careful!
Everyone in the port was in great grief. Even though they were so far away, the Devers could still hear the deafening cries. Even though he was used to seeing life and death, he could not help but feel a little moved.
Polydorus was still stretching his neck to look forward, hoping that there were still warships that had not entered the port in time. In the end, he finally gave up and held the Devers' hands tightly. He said repeatedly, "Master Devers, Tarantum really needs the full help of Diónia!"
Daves nodded and thought to himself, Including this naval battle, the war between Tarantum and Mesapi has probably resulted in tens of thousands of casualties among the Tarantum soldiers, and it has indeed been a serious blow to the bones.
As the Senate of Tarantum was busy dealing with the aftermath, the joint operations meeting that was about to be held had to be postponed.
The Devers did not care. They could go back and build the camp with the soldiers.
… …
The defeat of a major naval battle would affect many aspects. Compensating the casualties was only the most basic. There were also repairing the remaining warships, speeding up the reconstruction of the new fleet, appeasing the merchants in the port, making sure that the sea trade route had not been cut off by the enemy, and so on. These complicated aftermath matters could not be solved in a day or two, but the urgent war situation forced Tarantum to temporarily put it aside the next day. It was necessary to immediately convene a joint operations meeting to launch a land counterattack against the Mesapi coalition as soon as possible to reduce the enemy's threat to Tarantum.
Considering that he had neglected the Consul of Diónia because of the unexpected incident yesterday, Umarcas decided to invite him personally.
Umarcas rode to the northwest corner of the bay, and the scene in front of him surprised him. In front of him stood a huge military camp with trenches, fences, camp gates, sentry towers, tents … It had only been a day, and the people of Diónia had built a "city" in this relatively sparsely populated area. This efficiency was too high!
Of course, Umarcas did not know that because Diónia attached great importance to the construction of camps during battle, under the initiative of the Devers, the army engineers had standardized some of the camp facilities after research and repeated tests. For example, the materials needed for the camp gates and sentry towers were made in Turií in advance and transported by ships from the supply camp. When they arrived at the destination, they were assembled according to the actual situation. This saved time and effort, and they could be taken away when the camp was pulled out. Of course, the premise was that there must be a strong logistics transportation capability and better road conditions.
While Umarcas was in shock, he heard someone calling him. When he took a closer look, it was Timias, a theater owner in Tarantum. He could not help but ask curiously, "Why are you here?"
"Of course, to do business." Timias pointed to a few coquettishly dressed women beside him and said helplessly, "The war with Mesapi has failed, so the citizens are not in the mood to watch the show, nor are they in the mood to play with the girls. I have not earned any income for two months now. I heard that nearly 20,000 people of Diónia's reinforcements have arrived, so I specially came to see if there is any opportunity to earn money, but the guards here actually did not let us in! "
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