Herald of Steel - Chapter 1139: Crucial Bridge

There were several good reasons for Alexander wanting to have the bridge, and thus let his men chase after the fleeing enemy.

One was because his officers were right. Killing even one of them would reduce their opponents by that amount.

And even if the size of the garrison seemed inconsequential, a few hundred at best, well even if only a drop of water from an entire ocean was lost, that would still count as being lost, no matter how small.

And Lord Parker’s forces were certainly not as vast as the oceans, amounting to only twenty thousand.

Two was because he felt this would be a good way for his men to vent all their built up frustration, and to get some of the rust in their joints out.

Because in recent days, Alexander had been getting worried that the men had been cooped up in their tents for too long, only having themselves to dig new wells and drink melted snow while killing the rest of the time in wasteful sloth.

All this was beginning to affect morale, as evidenced by how there were already whispers, albeit very faint ones, of the soldiers wanting Alexander to cancel the campaign and sue for peace.

These hushed voices were of course very wizened and nascent, but Alexander took them very seriously and intended to quash them at their roots.

And the remedy he thought of was letting the men swing their swords a few times at the people

solely responsible for making their lives so miserable.

If the men could also bring back some ‘trophies’ as souvenirs back to camp, macabre as that concept might be, and then share it with the rest of the men, well the proof would surely get quite a few cheers among the men.

In this way he hoped that the news of the successful attack and capture of Phyrros Island would work to raise morale, displaying to the legionaries that they were not powerless chickens who could only stay cooped up behind their lines, ever fearful of the big bad fox.

But were instead opportunistic hunters able to bring the fight to the enemy whenever the situation presented itself.

As for the third and final reason why Alexander did not stop his troops from chasing the running enemy, well the man himself explained it to one of the commanders as such,

“Have the men follow the enemy till they reach the end of the bridge on the other side. And then pull them back. Do not let them go beyond the bridge. I only want to take control of it.”

The officers however did not seem to quite understand why Alexander would want to do such a thing, finding taking control of the whole bridge to be inconsequential.

In this mind, just one side seemed to do.

But of course, he did not dare question Alexander.

Instead, he chose to pretend to have full comprehension, wanting to appear clever.

Hence in an effort to impress Alexander, the man let off an almost slimy grin, and then added in a saccharine laced tone,

“Lord Pasha is indeed wise. Going any further would lose us the choke of the bridge and open up the men to a counterattack. It would be playing right into the enemy’s hand.”

“Now is not the time for us to face them in open battle. Indeed you are most erudite, sire.”

Alexander had been listening to the man with a nonchalant heart, until that very last sentence.

Those words suddenly ‘stung’ Alexander’s ears as he felt it was too flowery, almost overflowing with such a sticky, almost mucus like ‘ass kissery’, that it made the man internally nearly retch.

Now, Alexander had been lord for almost five years, some flattery and buttery language when addressing him had become commonplace among the soldiers.

That was to be expected and frankly, the young lord had also by now gotten used to it, choosing to mostly put it in through one ear and out the next.

But what was just said now on another level, and he could not help but turn to have a good look at the man who uttered this.

Tall, with a square body, and a warm glow on his clean shaven face, Alexander soon recognized him as one of the newer recent replacements taken from the captain cadre in order to fill up a few vacancies created due to recent losses.

“You… I remember you are called Pyanos, right?” And after churning his memory a bit for the name, the pasha posed the statement with great certainty in his voice.

Yes, this was the same Pyanos whom the merchant father and son, Jamiz and Niloy were talking about, the one who got his position by greasing the wheel of his superiors.

It seemed that through the subtle cracks in the military apparatus, as well as a bit of skill, this crooked man had somehow managed to get himself a seat in Alexander’s most prestigious unit.

The effects of such contamination on the unit as well as the whole legion remained to be seen.

For now, though, the man’s face lit up with a great grin, as he felt genuinely flattered seeing Alexander had remembered his name.

This was not a usual occurrence, especially for a lord of Alexander’s caliber, to remember the name of relatively low ranking captains.

In most cases, a Pasha only bothered to learn the name of the man leading the army and the important nobles in them, who were all without exclusion put in high ranking positions, such as second in command, quartermasters, etc.

Pyanos thus quickly expressed his gratitude, lightly bowing and letting off another round of butter, “It is the honor of a thousand lives that my lord knows the name of such an insignificant one as myself. Truly the gods favor me.”

Needless to say, Alexander was not impressed.

This might be the way to get some other lord’s favor, but not Alexander’s.

In fact, this might be the very opposite way to please him, as the man suddenly began to feel ticked off, wondering how such a man got into his unit.

Alexander thus quickly hatched a plan to test him.

Putting on an intrigued face, his eyes suddenly turned sharp, as he then posed in a curious tone, “Oh? And why do you think I want the bridge?”

The street smart Pyanos was able to instantly catch on to the fact that he was being tested, and instead of feeling intimidated, he began to actually feel excited.

Because passing it would undoubtedly mean rich rewards.

Hence, although he did not quite know the answer to the question, he quickly put on his thinking cap and began to think.

It did not take long for the clever man to find one.

So turning to face Alexander with a pleased glow in his eyes, Pyanos hypothesized,

“Because it connects Phyrros Island to the mainland. So if we do not take it, there will always be the threat of Lord Parker sending men this way to reclaim the island.”

The simple answer seemed to fit the narrative in the man’s head.

While Alexander hearing this was able to ascertain that the man was at least somewhat competent, and had not joined the ranks suddenly from the sky.

He determined as such because although such a logic sounded very simple, even childish to a modern man, in this current period, where the literacy rate was in the single digits, it was surprisingly a hard thing to do for many men.

In fact, Alexander personally knew of many legionaries in his army who could not have come up with this answer.

This might seem strange but the phenomenon was very similar to how many of the university entrance exams from a hundred or two hundred years ago were much, much easier.

It happened because people had access to much less information, and so their thinking and deductive capabilities did not get to develop that much.

The exceptions to this case were of course the nobles, who were helped in this aspect by having very good teachers to show them the way, as well as their own life experiences, since they had to deal with many complicated affairs from a young age.

Anyway, returning to the matter at hand, Pyanos’s answer was not quite exactly the reason why Alexander wanted the bridge.

So he pointed out to the theorizing man,

“Hmmm, you say that… but if that was the only thing I wanted to do, then why would I want the men to stop all the way at the other end? Would it not be better to have them stop on this side? Or better yet, simply have a part of the bridge broken and collapse? That seems much easier does it not?”

“…….” Pyanos had little to reply to this, and his heart sank at failing the test and losing the reward.

While the Pasha, not wishing to keep the man hanging, revealed the reason to be such,

“Because this bridge also lets ships pass through under it. And that gives Lord Parker a direct way to attack our fleet at the east harbor”

“But if we can fully control the bridge, and then place a few catapults on top, well we can cut off this route for good! Got it?”