Mediterranean Hegemon of Ancient Greece

“All of them recognise the Theonian legion's strength. However, they all hope that we could sit in the centre and connect the two flanks so that they could safely and boldly attack.” Philesius looked at both of them and said frankly, “Although I had the same idea as you before, but…I am also worried about whether the armies of the three city-states of Terina, Scylletium and Crotone, that are not united could keep the centre and the other flank from being crushed by the enemy…if they were to be defeated, the whole situation will become a brawl which would give the cavalries of Syracuse a chance to exert their strength…”

“This will turn into a contest of defence and consumption between the Syracusans and us, which I fear would make the battle last long!” Epiphanes, who is a Peltast, did not like this way of fighting.

“Isn't fighting a long-drawn-out battle is what our army's heavy infantry are best at?!” Drakos continued with confidence, “Even if our legion is arranged in the centre, I believe that we could still pierce the enemy's centre!”

“Since you already made a battle plan in the meeting, why do you still come to ask for our opinion?! Just give us the order, and we will carry it out!” A hint of resentment could be heard in Epiphanes' words.

“That was just a preliminary discussion.” Philesius then frankly said, “I need your experience and wisdom to make this battle plan better and improve our chance of victory. This is also for Theonia!”

Epiphanes and Drakos looked at each other and then got closer to Philesius…

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

After these two days, the Samnites – the Hirpini tribe expanded their camp into surrounding the city of Potentia, except to the south where there was the Basento River. Berani – the great chieftain of Hirpini, only sent his people to build a few simple sentry towers on the other side of the river to observe the city's movement. After burning the pontoon bridge, he no longer has any worry that the Potentians will cross the river and run away. Rather, he much preferred if the Potentians chose to abandon their well-defended city and wade across the river to flee.

However, the river that Berani thought would stop the Potentians from fleeing has some people swimming in the dark…

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

Half an hour later, Wolle, the one in charge of defending the city, came to the great chieftain's residence.

Pamot could not sleep peacefully with the current situation, so as soon as he heard Wolle coming to see him, he immediately thought something big had happened outside the city. Thus he immediately went to meet Wolle in the living room, where he listened to him as he reported excitedly, “The messenger of Theonia asked to meet you!”

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

“I am Phryntor, a senior centurion of Theonia's reconnaissance brigade's centuria. I have come to pay chieftain Pamot a visit!” When a drenched Phryntor saluted to Pamot, the great chieftain asked anxiously, “What about Lord Davos…who is in…Poseidonia?!”

“This morning, Lord Davos led the first, second and third legion to wipe out the Samnite’s defenders and reinforcements!” Phryntor replied quite simply.

“Wonderful! That's wonderful!!” Pamot became so excited that he impatiently asked, “Will Lord Davos lead his army to Potentia tomorrow?”

Phryntor did not immediately answer as he took out a small waterproof leather tube from his neck and pulled out a paper roll from it, “Lord Davos ordered me to give this letter to the great chieftain.”

Pamot quickly took and read it. Then his expression became serious, “Go and call Polet!”

After staying in the rear yard all day and feeling flustered, Polet learned that the Theonian army managed to defeat the Samnites in Poseidonia. And after reading the confidential letter from Davos, he reacted quite differently from Pamot, “Lord Davos asked us to cooperate with your reconnaissance brigade to disturb the enemies' camp tonight and support the arrival of the army tomorrow!”

Phryntor, on the other hand, looked calm as he said, “Before coming here, I went and observed the Samnite's camp. The constantly fleeing defeated Samnites made the camp quite chaotic, which allowed half of my brothers to pose as a Samnite and mixed in with them…giving me a better idea!”

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

The Hirpini's readied everything they needed to siege the city and are only waiting for the return of the troops that had gone to rescue Poseidonia.

That night, Berani peacefully fell asleep early.

“Father! Father!!…” Garni suddenly broke into the tent and woke him up.

“What happened?” Berani opened his sleepy eyes and looked at his son standing in front of him, who then said in a panic, “Something big has happened! The reinforcements that we sent to Poseidonia were…wiped out by the Theonians!!”

“WHAT?!!!” Berani's sleepiness was immediately blown away, “How is that possible?!! We sent more than 20,000 Pentri and Caudini warriors with Tolek and Kinduk, who are experience generals! Unless…unless…” He suddenly thought of a possibility, causing his breathing to speed up.

“Theonia's reinforcements from Thurii had already arrived in Poseidonia, but they quietly lie in wait…” Garni told his father what he had heard from the warriors who had escaped.

After hearing his son's words, Berani felt coldness in his hands and feet, causing him to sit back in the bed with his mind becoming a mess.

After a while, he suddenly raised his head and asked, “Did Tolek and Kinduk manage to escape?”

“I heard that chieftain Tolek died in the battle while there was no news regarding Kinduk…” Garni said dejectedly.

Berani suddenly felt a sense of sadness. However, this was not the time to feel sad, so he immediately asked, “How many Pentri and Caudini manage to escape?”

“How could we count in the dark? Anyway, they are constantly fleeing into the camp from several directions…” Garni finished saying. Then he anxiously asked, “Father, what should we do now?!”

The bad news came so suddenly that it made Berani confused, and he could not think for a while. Just as he bowed his head to think, a noise came from outside the tent, becoming louder and clearer, especially at night.

“The reinforcements we sent to Poseidonia was defeated!”

“Theonia's reinforcements are now coming! They have more than fifty thousand men! They are going to surround us!”

“Hirpini brothers, run away!”

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

“Terrible!” Berani jumped up and hurried outside his tent. Only for him to see the original quiet camp is now boiling up, the warriors were at a loss as they got out of their tent half-naked one after another and began to follow the others as they shouted in panic…

Berani saw many people moving around in the camp…and because this was the first time the Samnites had organised such a massive army and carried out such an extended war(counting from the time of their assembly), he has not experienced such a chaotic situation. Naturally, he didn't know what a camp disturbance was. Still, he instinctively felt the danger, so he immediately and severely criticised Garni, “You should have isolated those scattered warriors who fled back to avoid affecting the morale of our warriors! Immediately go back to your tribe and maintain their order, and make it so that the warriors stay in the camp and not come out!”

Garni hurriedly left.

Berani urgently called his personal guards and went to inform Lesguk, Lusen and the other chieftains, ordering them to do their best to restrain their main.

At this time, Berani found that due to having no plan when building the camp, the distance between each tribe was far and built the tents too densely and disorderly, resulting in narrow and curved passages between them. During the day, it posed no problem, but at night, it was easy to cause crowding in case of panic…

Thus he could only stay outside the tent, surrounded by hundreds of his personal guards, hoping that the tribal chieftains could play a role and wait for the commotion in the camp to subside a little. Afterwards, he sent his personal guards back into the camp to maintain order as he suspected that there were enemies who had taken advantage of an opportunity to mix in with the scattered troops and cause trouble.

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

At this time, outside the noisy Samnite camp, beneath the mountain where the city of Potentia stood, Polet led a thousand warriors as they quietly sneak around…

“Are we going to attack now?” Polet eagerly asked Phryntor in a low voice as he looked at the nearby Samnite camp.

Phryntor, who is the executor of the capturing of Aprustum, was unusually calm at the moment as he quietly said, “Wait a little longer.”

“Wait? What are we waiting for?!” If it weren't for the fact that the one he is speaking is an officer of Theonia under the order of Davos, Polet would have long acted already.

However, Phryntor seemed to not hear the urging and irritability in Polet's tone as he continued to stare at the camp ahead and whispered, “Waiting for the fire.”

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

Berani stood in his tent and saw that the dark camp had torches lighting up like that of a starry sky, making him think that the tribal chieftains had begun taking action.

But after observing for a while, he found that the situation had not been suppressed.

At night, the strong mountain wind did not cover the noisy camp. Instead, it made his body cold that he wanted to go back to the tent and put on wolf skin clothes, when suddenly, a greater noise rang out in the camp again, “Fire! The camp is on fire!!…”

‘Fire!’ Berani's heart suddenly trembled. He gazed forward, and even though it was still dark ahead, he still felt something wrong. Then he turned his head around, where he saw a fire in the distance directly behind his tent, which is where the Samnites stored their food and supplies.