Chapter 559
With a few loud bangs, Antonios felt a few pieces of gravel jump onto his legs. It was a little painful. He asked with concern, "Is everyone okay?!"
Just as the guards were reporting that they were safe, the light infantrymen on the rooftop who were also responsible for attacking the enemy from a distance shouted, "Captain! Captain! Wake up! … "
Captain?! Antonios was shocked.
Cspit, who was commanding the light infantrymen to dodge, was hit in the head by a large piece of stone. He fell to the ground immediately.
As a comrade of the Persia Expeditionary Force and a colleague in the Senate, Antonios had a good relationship with Cspit. He was worried and angry when he saw him unconscious. He ordered the guards to call for the medical team while he gave the order, "Blow the bugle. Don't let the enemy escape!"
"Woo!" As the bugle of Diónia was blown, the Syracuse Coalition Army's retreat bugle sounded.
It was not that Masias did not want to lead his troops in a safer retreat, but the situation was out of control. Some of the Syracuse soldiers saw that the situation was not good and began to escape with their allies. The encirclement of the entire army was in a mess. If they did not act decisively, the enemy might surround the remaining troops. Hence, he gave the order to retreat. He would rather let the soldiers escape like scattered sand than be captured by the enemy.
The sound of the retreat bugle woke Antonios up from his grief. He shouted to the light infantrymen, "Brothers, don't just be sad. It's time to avenge Sir Cspit! Catch up with the escaping enemies and kill them! "
The light infantrymen roared and immediately ran downstairs to regroup with their comrades. They quickly joined the pursuit. These light infantries could be considered as the ones with better stamina in the First Legion. Coupled with the fact that they weren't wearing heavy armor or helmets, their pursuit speed would cause a lot of trouble to the retreating enemies. Antonios was convinced of this.
As the Syracuse Allied Army surrounded the First Legion in a circular formation, and as they retreated, the First Legion in the inner circle attacked from all sides, causing them to be unable to retreat in the same direction, and were forced to flee in all directions.
Many of the Syracuse soldiers wanted to escape from Mealor as quickly as possible, and at the same time avoid the traps that the Daenians had set up in the town. Everything went smoothly when they passed through the area that had been bombarded by the ballistae for a whole day yesterday. When they crossed the almost non-existent wooden wall and jumped into the river, the wooden stakes and iron spikes that the First Legion had buried in the mud at the bottom of the river pierced their feet. They screamed and fell into the river one by one, drowning. This caused the people behind to shrink back. Under the spears and daggers of the Diónia soldiers, they were either killed or surrendered.
There were also a small number of soldiers who chose to flee to the north. They were mainly the mercenaries of Tauromenian. Pursued by the enemy, they ran all the way to the mountains and were not far from the city of Tauromenian. However, nearly a thousand sailors with wooden oars and bows blocked their way.
It turned out that after the Dionysian fleet loaded the families of the refugees, they did not leave the port. Instead, they kept a close watch on the situation. When they saw the enemy retreating, the Dionysian fleet, eager to make a contribution, took advantage of the fact that there were many sandy beaches in the Naksos Bay and the straight-line distance of the sea. They quickly rowed their ships to land near the mountain pass and set up a net before the enemy.
The exhausted mercenaries had no will to fight when they were surrounded by enemies in front and pursuers behind. Most of them laid down their weapons and surrendered.
Most of the Syracuse soldiers followed the allied forces and escaped west out of the town of Mejaro. They crossed the river and fled south.
Masias rode his horse to the south bank of the Alcántara River early in the morning. He was prepared to gather the routed soldiers here before leading his army to the next step. However, he did not expect the Diónia to not give up even after their victory. They chased after the Syracuse soldiers relentlessly.
The routed soldiers surged across the Alcántara River like a tidal wave. They did not heed Masias's cries at all. Instead, they separated him from a few hundred cavalrymen and ran south in a rout.
The Legion of Dionysia soldiers were adept at chasing after the enemy after a victory. They often ran long distance during training, and they made Syracuse suffer. The Diónia soldiers were also exhausted after a fierce battle. The Diónia soldiers would catch up to the routed soldiers who fell behind from time to time. Their screams were like whips that drove the Syracuse soldiers to run with all their might …
After running for five or six miles, most of the Diónia soldiers finally stopped and turned back to capture the enemies who were squatting by the roadside and had their hands raised in surrender. Only the light infantry were still chasing after them angrily.
Hibagris still wanted to lead the army back to Sekulee, but the militia under him had long been scattered by the defeated soldiers. He rushed to the front of Sekulee and saw that the four gates were closed, and the rebels were shooting arrows in the city. He did not dare to stay any longer, so he could only follow the Syracuse soldiers around Sekulee and continue to flee south.
The Dionian light infantry finally stopped in front of Sekulee City. After they revealed their identity to the rebel army at the top of the city wall, they were happily welcomed into the city by the Sekulee rebel army.
Masias only managed to gather some of the routed soldiers on the way to Katanay.
While he was painfully thinking about what he should do next, Katanay and the tyrants of Sicouli found him and asked him to help recapture the city.
Just then, he encountered a messenger from Syracuse who rushed over to find him. Only then did he know that there was also a riot in Syracuse and they were anxiously waiting for him to lead his army back to rescue them.
Masias was shocked and could not care about anything else. He anxiously led his subordinates to gather the routed soldiers and wanted to return to rescue them.
… …
When Dionysius led his army to attack the Diónia camp, a small speedboat sailed in from the port of Sirium. Faced with the blockade of the Dionysian fleet, it was not afraid at all. Instead, it played a game of cat and mouse with the Diónia warships. The nimble and small speedboat shuttled between the gaps of the many warships and finally broke into the port with ease.
At this time, Dionysius, who had broken into the empty left camp but was blocked by the wooden walls and trenches outside the main Diónia camp, finally made the decision to retreat.
However, this order was a little too late.
Inside the main camp, the Devers had already arranged the First, Fifth and Legio VI who had returned to form a circular encirclement formation behind the wooden walls. They deliberately allowed the Syracuse soldiers to break through the wooden walls and rush into the camp to engage in a face-to-face battle.
After fighting for so long, the Syracuse soldiers and freedmen who had lost most of their strength and lacked the protection of armor were no match for the fully armed infantry of the Legion of Dionysia. In addition to the soldiers of the Fourth and Seventh Legions who were fighting on the remaining wooden walls, the Syracuse soldiers who attacked the main camp were quickly defeated and fled towards Sirium. If it was not for the threat of the army led by Dionysius, the Devers did not let the army pursue the Syracuse soldiers all the way to Sirium for the sake of safety.
When Dionysius learned that the frontal attack on the camp was defeated, he did not dare to stay any longer. He hurriedly led his army back into the city. To vent his anger, he burned down the left camp of Diónia.
Back in the city, before Dionysius had time to catch his breath, Leptinus came looking for him with a panicked expression.
After listening to his younger brother's report, Dionysius was extremely shocked. He never thought that while the Devers surrounded Sirium and divided their forces to attack the Rockley Alliance in Syracuse, they had also sent an army to land in Sicily!
Although according to Leptinus, there were only a few thousand troops that landed in Sicily, Dionysius was not as calm as Felistos. After another defeat at the hands of the Devers, he was full of vigilance towards the young Consul of Diónia. He even highly suspected that the Devers were willing to negotiate with him not only to cover up the fact that he had divided his forces to attack Hibernian and Medma, but also to delay him until the army landed in Sicily. This was probably the real killer move of the Devers!
As the tyrant of Syracuse and the overlord of the Greek city-states in Sicily, Dionysius actually knew how the people of each city-state thought of him. Thinking of this made him anxious, but he tried his best to pretend that nothing had happened. He bade farewell to everyone and returned to his temporary residence.
When Pharisus, who had reorganized his troops, came to Dionysius to report the losses of the battle, he saw a haggard general with full authority.
Dionysius listened to Fasipezas' report absent-mindedly. He was indifferent to the huge number of Syracuse's army that had more than 2,000 dead and nearly 6,000 wounded. Instead, he said quickly, "Syracuse has just sent a messenger to tell me that more than 3,000 Diónia soldiers have landed in the Gulf of Naxos and have quietly taken over Mejaro …"
In order to reduce the impact and avoid causing too much panic, Dionysius deliberately reduced the number of Diónia troops that had landed. But it still shocked Fasipezas so much that he even forgot to address Dionysius respectfully, "What?! The Diónia actually attacked Sicily?! When did this happen?! "
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