In the Great Qin Empire's long-term war of foreign expansion, there were four legions with the longest history, and they made many outstanding achievements. In the time of Putimius, these four legions were given great honors, and they were called the Royal Legion, becoming the most trusted army of Putimius. These four legions were the Roman legion, the Sicilian legion, the Greek legion, and the Macedonian legion, of which the Roman legion was the only legion named after a city in the sequence of the Great Qin army.

After the death of Putimius, Caracalla and Gaita proclaimed their accession to the throne at the same time, but the Great Qin Empire did not break up and there was no civil war. This is a very strange phenomenon, just like the situation when the Senate and Putimius, the ** emperor, could be juxtaposed.

Based on the implementation of the Songun strategy, the army has become a force to be reckoned with within the Great Qin Empire, and their influence on the situation has even surpassed that of the aristocracy. Therefore, neither Caracalla nor Geeta gave up on the pull of the army.

While Putimius was alive, both Caracalla and Geta, as princes, were in direct control of a single legion, the Gallic Legion and the Germanic Legion. These two legions were also the elite units of the Great Qin Empire, but they were heavily damaged by the Han army in the invasion of Parthia last year and have not fully recovered until now.

In order to have enough say as soon as possible, Caracalla and Gaita invariably set their sights on the four Royal Forest Legions. These four Imperial Forest Legions are all loyal to Putimius, and after the death of Ptimius, they should be loyal to the new Great Qin Emperor, but now two Great Qin Emperors suddenly appeared, which made them a little confused, and the original monolithic four Royal Forest Legions were also divided within it.

Caracalla and Gaita also did their best, sending money and beauties, and promising generous treatment, but in the end, Caracalla, as the eldest prince, prevailed. The commanders of the Roman, Sicilian, and Macedonian legions declared their allegiance to Caracalla, and Geta enlisted the support of only one Greek legion.

The choice of the Royal Forest Legion became a weather vane, which directly led to the defeat of Gaita in the subsequent struggle for other legions, and he only won four of the sixteen legions of the time of Putimius, including the Germanic legions that were originally under his command. Although Caracalla and Geta each controlled four of the eight new legions that were formed, Geta was already in a very disadvantageous position in the battle for the throne.

The only way for Gaita to turn the tide is to fulfill Putimius's last wish with a victory over the Great Han. Of course, Caracalla understands this, he is now strong and strong, and he is certainly not willing to let victory fall to Gaita. This mobilization of thirty armies to work in the provinces of Asia Minor was Caracalla's masterpiece.

Although the 300,000 army is not much, they are fighting at home, they are familiar with the surrounding terrain, and they are waiting for work at ease, so they can have the upper hand. However, just as the Han army did not understand the movements of the Qin army, the Qin army did not know the movements of the Han army, let alone how many troops the Han army dispatched. As a precaution, Caracalla sent the Macedonian Legion, one of the three Royal Legions loyal to him, to the battlefields of Asia Minor.

The Macedonian Legion has always been known for its bravery and ferocity, and has played the role of the vanguard many times in the wars of foreign expansion over the years, and has rarely been defeated. However, in today's fierce battle, the Macedonian army suffered heavy losses. There were 50,000 warriors when they set out in the morning, and when they returned to the camp in the evening, there were less than 15,000 men, and all of them were wounded, and 8,000 of them were seriously wounded.

In this era, the medical conditions were very backward, and the Great Qin Empire did not have a complete medical school system like the Great Han, waiting for these seriously injured people would be an extremely difficult period of time, whether they could survive it depended on their own creation, and many of them would die due to wound infection and deterioration of their condition. In other words, after this battle, the Macedonian army was completely crippled by the Han army.

This news caused quite a stir among the Great Qin Legion.

In the Parthian encounter, the Gallic and Germanic legions, which were also elite legions, were also crippled or even annihilated by the Han army, but the situation was completely different this time. At that time, the Gallic and Germanic legions had no idea that the Han army would enter the battle, and they were a little caught off guard. Moreover, the Han army did not fight with them hard, they were defeated by trebuchets and Han cavalry, and the Great Qin army was somewhat unconvinced.

But this time it was different, the Han army and they launched hand-to-hand combat, completely fighting with a knife and a gun, inch by inch. Some of the soldiers of the Macedonian army were killed or wounded by the iron hooves of the Han army's crossbows and heavy cavalry, but at least more than 20,000 people were directly killed and wounded by the Han infantry, and this was when they had the advantage of their forces.

Even the Macedonian army was heavily damaged by the Han army, so that all the Great Qin troops who heard the news had to put away their contempt, and even began to have a trace of fear of the Han army. At the same time, the battlefield just now was brightly lit, and the Han soldiers were holding lamps and torches and cleaning the battlefield. This was supposed to be the best chance for the Qin army to carry out a surprise attack, but the few surviving legion commanders all chose to turn a blind eye. They didn't feel anything on the battlefield just now, but now they look at the comrades around them who lack arms and legs, and then think about those opponents who are worse than them in the battle, their cold hairs stand on end, and they are afraid for a while, and they don't even dare to give it a try when such a great opportunity is placed in front of them.

Zhang He organized the soldiers to clean up the battlefield, of course, not to test the courage of the Great Qin people, nor to covet the property of those Great Qin soldiers, but based on the usual tradition of the Han army. Before each expedition, Liu Xin would repeatedly emphasize that he would bring all the people back and not leave anyone behind. Casualties in the war are inevitable, especially when the road is far away, and the remains of those Han soldiers who died in the battlefield cannot be transported back to the Central Plains for a long distance. However, the surviving comrades will also try to collect their remains, and after cremation, the bones will be returned to the Han and buried in their hometown, so that they can be buried in the ground. Some of these warriors with outstanding achievements in battle, after obtaining the consent of their families, will be buried in the heroic cemetery on the outskirts of Chang'an, where the Ministry of Rites will preside over a grand ceremony and enjoy the four seasons of the Han court.

The battle was so tragic that more than 8,000 soldiers were killed. Watching these brothers who get along day and night wander to other places, the Han soldiers gathered them one by one almost with tears in their eyes, and then held a solemn cremation ceremony, the whole process lasted until dawn, and their ashes were collected into crockpots one after another, and labels were attached to the outside to indicate their names, ages and places of origin.

All night, Zhang He and Pang De didn't close their eyes, and together with other soldiers, they collected the remains of the heroes with their own hands, because Liu Xin kept emphasizing to them that they should love soldiers like sons. This is not a hard and fast rule, and people like Zhang Fei can't do it. However, Zhang He did a good job at this point, and the Third Army under his command was not the most elite unit, but it was definitely the most desperate unit in the war.

When the battlefield was finally cleaned up, Zhang He bowed deeply to the dozens of carts full of the bones of his sons, then waved his hand and said in a deep voice: "Send it away." ”

Pang De glanced at the corpses that were still piled up on the battlefield, frowned and asked, "General Zhang, how to deal with these?" ”

These were the corpses left behind by the Qin army when they were defeated, most of them died at the hands of the Han army, and some of them committed suicide with their swords unwilling to be captured. In a battle of this magnitude, the Han army did not capture a single prisoner of war in the end. The battle at that time was so tragic that many people who participated in this battle will still sigh when they recall it many years later.

Zhang He was silent for a long time, and suddenly bowed to the pile of corpses, waved his hand, and said, "They are all respectable opponents, let them be set on fire." ”

Some soldiers had already set up firewood and poured pine oil on it in accordance with the order, and thick smoke billowed from the entire battlefield. Unlike the bodies of their comrades who were cremated just now, the corpses of these Great Qin soldiers were all piled up together at random, and after being burned, they couldn't distinguish each other at all, and they became a pile of charcoal.

Zhang He ordered someone to dig a big pit, pushed all the remains of the Great Qin soldiers, buried them, and set up a stone tablet next to it, personally wrote down the situation of the battle, and asked the craftsman to engrave it as a commemoration.

No one thought that Zhang He's inadvertent move would have a very significant impact on the future battle situation.

Although the sky is not yet bright, yesterday's battlefield was full of fire. At this time, a gust of east wind was blowing, and the smell of burnt paste from the burning of corpses wafted straight into the Qin army camp. The tired Qin army was awakened by the smell from their sleep, and they all got out of their tents and looked around, and finally noticed something strange on the battlefield. Soon, the sent out Xiaozuo sent back the news that the Han army was burning the corpses they had left behind.

Since ancient times, there has been a saying that mercy is not in charge of the army, and the Great Qin people have taken this to the extreme, and they have been extremely brutal in previous wars, killing people and setting fires, ** captivity, and doing evil everywhere they go. But they never had the practice of burning corpses, even against the enemy, because in Daqin, people had to be buried after death, and cremation was not allowed, and they thought that only in this way could people return to the name of God, which was called dust to dust, and dust to earth.

The Han army's burning of the corpses of the Great Qin soldiers soon spread wildly in the barracks, and a terrifying atmosphere permeated the sky above the Great Qin military camp, and the Han army was also described as the most brutal army in the world.