Chapter 290: 285: The Execution

A volley of bolts is poured on to the executioners and the former Mega Doux, penetrating their bodies making their flesh burst open from the arrow head's impact, dropping end immediately ending the sufferings of Loukas Notaras, bringing along several Janissaries and the weird man in grey robes to accompany him on the path to either heaven or hell. 

But following the volley of arrows a series of things happened. According to the prior investigations by the Ottoman scouts this should be a safe distance from Rumelian archers, but these bodies lying lifelessly before them can only mean one thing, that is there investigation results are completely wrong, or the Rumelian now have a kind of cross bow that has a much farther range than what they have speculated. 

The Janissaries horridly grouped together forming a shield formation and escorted their Grand Vizier and the young Sultan back to safety.

But facing this kind of change the Grand Vizier showed not a single bit of panic, and ordered the assaulting troops to start pitching their tents setting up a new temporary encampments just merely one Roman mile outside these fortresses, and start assembling the necessary equipment for the upcoming siege. It might seem like an action of being overly confident pitching their new encampment, and indeed this greatly angered Antonius' captain constantly observing them.

"Encampment? At a one mile distance?"

"What the hell are they thinking?"

"They are way too confident about themselves thinking that we are not going to try to come out and attack them!"

"Should we send our troops now? Take the chance when they are still making their camps?"

"Hell no! What are you thinking of, this short distance added with the terrain it makes our cavalries impossible to assemble and accelerate to maximum distance?"

"Then what do we do then? Just seat here and watch them casually pitch their tents like they are on vacation?"

"You know what, these Ottoman pricks know that we are unable to come out of our turtle shells and punish them, that is exactly why they built their freaking camp in this distance."

"They are humiliating us!"

In the mid of all the quarrels and debate, Antonius stood there folding his arms while he watched these Ottoman soldiers bustling around that looks even smaller than a pack of ants under his feet, then he let out a cold sneer and commented. "Look at these folks, what a bunch of weaklings!"

The captains and commanders around halted their quarrel hearing their admiral's comment, not knowing whether his comment is for them or for the foes. While Alexios rolled his eyes and followed up. "Indeed! Admiral, these Ottoman infidels are truly a bunch of weaklings that can be blown away by a breath of air!"

However, these words of appeasement did not seem to receive the effect that Alexios wanted, the later stared back at Alexios and asked. "Tell me, Master Alexios, how are the Ottomans a bunch of weaklings then? And any mind blowing idea you have to blow them away by a breathe of air?"

"ummm…" Alexios kept his mouth shut.

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"Think about it lads." Antonius ignored the man and continued. "Think in a positive way, from my understandings of this Candarli Halil Pasha he will never do things just to humiliate us… There has been a lot of suspicious things going on since the start of today, like, why did he execute a man that can be of use to him, and why did he construct his camps in a mere one mile distance?"

No one tried to answer seeing the out come of Alexios just now. Abdullah thought for a while and tried breaking the silence. "Because killing that Loukas Notaras now gives him more benefits than losses…"

"Exactly, normally why do they like to execute prisoners of war right before a siege on both sides?"

"It is to scare the defending troops in to submission, and to boost the morale of themselves…" Abdullah's eyes brightened up as he started thinking in this direction. "You mean that it is because first they think that we are really under the command of the emperor in Constantinople, and second, they themselves too needed to boost their morales by making that speech just now telling the warriors this is a holy war to punish us and the benefits they can get through this war blah blah blah…"

"Exactly." Antonius nodded. "That Candarli Halil should know very well about the consequences of executing Loukas Notaras. By doing so no one from any Christendom shall be willing to surrender to him after seeing what they can become one day, getting their head chopped down when needed…"

"And also, he knows that with the current force he has, he cannot guarantee himself that he shall take down us here because of his massive, conscripted army… That is what I have always said about conscripted armies, if they are not truly loyal to their lords, fighting a defensive war on their own land, or truly patriotic to the Ottoman Sultanate, a conscripted army shall always have the lowest morale in battle with a poor organisation level and diminishing morales along the way, so…"

Julian now understood the meaning in his admiral's words. "So, he must construct a new camp in only a one Roman mile distance from us not to humiliate us, but to re organise his forces, boost up their morale and establish a forward base so that if any thing in the incoming attack there is still a base to prevent his own men from collapsing in to a precipitate chaotic retreat causing a stampede in the process and failing the entire battle."

"Correct." Nodded Antonius as he gave Julian a look of compliment. "After he came here and had a look at our tough fortifications, thanks to our Helios, he knows that after a long march his tens of thousands of conscripted soldiers are totally uncapable of an immediate battle, and thus he decided to retreat to one mile away leaving that pressure on us while setting up his base."

The people surrounding Antonius are slowly starting to be convinced by the words, relieving that tense muscle on their faces just now. Although they know that despite all of these facts that Antonius just said is unable to change the reality that the enemy is still much more formidable than their fortress, but at least, there is still hope right? Seeing their admiral is so confident and knowledgeable about his enemies.

Seeing the relieving expression on his captain's faces Antonius pointed at the Ottoman flag and gave another cold sneer. "Well for the reason why they encamped at an one mile distance… Have you not thought about the idea that, if the enemies found themselves in a difficult position of running out of supplies before successfully breaking our defences, it shall be a perfect place to cover their men while they retreat?"

"The captains started discussing among themselves.

"I have always believed that our forces are a tiny but elite fighting force of professional combatants with the best equipment and modern technology that I can offer, while the enemies have a large but clumsy and ill equipped conscripted army with many of them having no armour and only a spear… Although we got terrain restriction but once we get past these hills it is still possible for a full out cavalry charge, and so I think the Candarli Halil laid his camp so damn near just to prevent our cavalries from attacking."

Khalid and Abraham by the side started explaining to the other usually sea faring captains that such a short distance is insufficient for the cavalries to spread out in formations occupying the battle width and accelerate to a speed high enough before they reach the enemies for full impact.

"Yes! Admiral!" Alexios started appeasing again shouting excitedly. "That is why they are a bunch of cowards! Thinking of ways to escape the fight even before they start!"

"It is always important to think about how should the battle end and how to bring one's men out of the area safely before a battle even started." Antonius' immediate words almost choked Alexios. "I bet that our old friend is pretty much in a desperate state right now…He knows that he needs a quick victory, but he cannot withstand too much loss of his forces which will make him be on the lower hand later on against Zaganos…"

"And he cannot choose to leave because he needs a decisive victory against a major foe to solidify his power grip inside the court of Edirne to continue be in power, but at the same time he knows if he runs out of supplies and failed, the Ottoman financial deficit and great famine can push him to collapse together with his Sultanate, so he tried to ambush us luring us out of these walls and eat our forces up, but we saw through his tricks and stayed put, forcing him to come and try to bite on our turtle shell."

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