At the second hour of the morning, on the edge of the distant steppe, a column of about 2,000 Turkic cavalry, who were the vanguard of Kudb's reconnaissance by force, appeared in a procession of about 2,000 Turks, while this Atarberg and Firouz, with the remaining 5,000 soldiers, spread their wings and stretched out a front of about six guli behind the front army, which was also the usual tactic of the Turks to deceive and intimidate the enemy: to make the enemy shocked by their "sheerness" in numbers. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info

If the Turks lined up the formation as a "huge flying shear", then the "Merlot Task Force" in the Ashlon village on the defensive side is a "hard walnut" situation: Merlot divided the entire team into five parts: the avant-garde, the left flank, the right flank, the middle army and the rear guard, and rigidly surrounded the village as the central nuclear position, which is also the most normal mode of "Byzantine village defense battle". However, Merlot reduced the number of men set up in the avant-garde, and he sent only two detachments of Armenian logisticians, both on horseback, on the first line of the avant-garde, and behind them a line of one hundred and twenty Genat cavalry. On the right flank, Merlot also placed the logistics department of two detachments, and there were also one hundred and twenty Genat cavalry to serve as "guardians" on the second line, because this wing was close to the mountains, so it could save troops by relying on natural hazards; On the left flank of the earthen embankment and the side of the stream, Merlot placed a full 400 red hand cavalry, dismounted and guarded it, and inserted dog's foot wood into the earthen embankment; In the village, Merlot divided an infantry detachment of the Guardian Brigade into three parts, each with 200 men, each with a fire tongue flag as a communication signal, respectively guarding the stable in the north of the village, the residential warehouse on the south side and the entrance to the front line in the east of the village, surrounding three independent garrison areas, all with staggered horse trenches and wooden fences, and connected earthen walls as fortifications. At the end of the village, two hundred Red Hand cavalry served as the reserve line.

The Turkic front army did not hesitate too much, most of them were herdsmen and horse bandits hired from the Turkmen tribes, and after the trumpets and drums sounded, they quickly swept towards the village without discipline like a dark cloud pouring torrential rain, and the sound of horses' hooves shook the lime of the old church at the entrance of the village. Milutin. Monquiro, a small squire from Bolgar, now the flag officer of the Guardian Brigade, was in charge of two hundred soldiers at the eastern entrance, forming a closed line in the shape of a ring, and Milutin divided the men into two lines, the one hundred and forty men on the front line were armed with sharp spears and axes, half kneeling behind the earthen wall and the erected wagon frame, only showing their eyes at the enemy cavalry, all the blades of their weapons were outstretched, and the sixty soldiers in the rear line, half lightly armed with swords and axes, and half kneeling in front and back, The latter has a partial crossbow on the shoulders of the former, which is staggered.

Seeing that the left and right flanks of the task force occupied important positions and did not dare to make a detour, they boldly rushed forward, using bows and arrows to exchange fire with Merlot's avant-garde cavalry, and the rest of the cavalry were also running back and forth, shooting arrows non-stop, slowly forcing Melot's avant-garde cavalry.

"Flag officer, our avant-garde cavalry seems to be in a commotion." After entering the earthen wall, a soldier leaned out and took a few looks, and the dust of the entire wilderness in front of him was billowing and killing. Then several arrows flew in and landed on the earthen wall and the frame of the cart, and the soldier hurriedly crouched down with his arms raised, and said to Milutin.

"Don't let up, everyone, the enemy's cavalry is about to burst in." As soon as Milutin's words fell, when the cavalry of the Turkic front army saw that the advance line of the Merlot army was only two hundred feet away, they suddenly gathered together, which was the natural specialty of their nomads, and shot the densest array of arrows with their heads and faces, and then all drew their sabers and rushed to cover the kill.

The avant-garde cavalry line was quickly "torn apart", and both the Armenians and the Genat cavalry, having been shot a group of people, automatically divided the ranks into two waves, and the dust fled in the direction of their own flanks.

"Woo woo", all the Turks and Turkmen on horseback raised their arms, raised their shining sabers, slanted down with their long lances, wrapped their heads and the straps on their helmets to the wind, and let out a wolf-like howl, not to make a detour, not to outflank, but to form a sharp column, stirring up billowing smoke and dust, rushing straight towards the entrance of the village, they are going to directly destroy the task force's central nuclear position, knocking off the back of the entire task force!

"Don't move in the front!" Milutin shouted, the first one stood up from behind the earthen wall, waving his arms in the midst of a flurry of arrows, "Ahh

At this time, the Turkmen cavalry, who galloped to the edge of the anti-horse ditch like lightning, hid in the stirrups very flexibly, threw the straw bales in their hands into the ditch, and then turned over, and stepped on the edge of the ditch and the straw bales with their bridles, and in the neighing of the horses, the soldiers of the "Milutin" detachment at the forefront instantly lowered their bodies in unison, and they felt that a huge shadow flew overhead - all the cavalry in the front row, most of them flew directly over the wall, A few unlucky ghosts slammed into the frame of the tall Glamorgan, and the scattered wooden bars rolled upside down into the anti-horse ditch with the men and horses.

In an instant, the soldiers of the Milutin detachment on the rear line, when the standard-bearer put down the red tongue of fire flag, all the crossbow shooters shouted, and fifteen powerful arrows came out of the crossbow machine, and directly swept the cavalry queue that Turkmen jumped into, many big arrows directly penetrated the horse's head and body, blood spurted, and some cavalry were directly on the saddle, and they were killed by the big arrows who flew upside down for several feet.

This projectile weapon, which is between a pedal crossbow and a porcupine arrow, is rarely equipped in the Guardian Brigade, and it requires two people to control, one to wind up the foot to aim, and one to kneel in the front half to carry the frame to target and adjust the angle of fire, making it a standard killer for static garrisons. "Damn it, slash you dwarfs on horseback!" As soon as the crossbows were fired, the remaining thirty stragglers shouted and pounced on the Turkmen in disarray, wielding swords and axes, and pulling them off their horses one by one and slashing them down. "Thorn!" With this command, all the soldiers on the front line also raised their bodies, stabbed the tips and blades of their spears down the platoon, and the Turkmen cavalry who poured into the rear column to follow were pierced in the belly of their horses, and slid down the wall with a wail, rolling down into the trench, and the pillow of death. Then the armor and weapons of the front-line soldiers, splashed with blood, quickly and effectively became excited, and they stood up straight with the soldiers who were following the rear line, leaned against the walls and carriages, slung their long-handled weapons on their shoulders, and stabbed desperately downward, and the dead or wounded enemy horsemen soon filled the entire trench, and the hooves and legs of the horses were tumbling everywhere. The Milutin team guarding on the earthen wall, and the stragglers shouted, throwing out a few fire pots, the flying flames burst into flames in the subsequent cavalry ranks, and some emitted bursts of black smoke (in this era, it is normal to fail to fire), and soon the east entrance of the village out of men and horses rode across the bloody trenches, surrounding the conflict and fighting, and the black and red pillars of fireworks were scattered around. (To be continued.) )