Steel, gunpowder, and spellcasters

Chapter 563 Siege (Fifteen)
Margit Island
At the outpost located at the southern end of the coastal defense position, the sentry is slacking off.

For this young man who had never left the foothills before, the darkness of the land of galloping horses terrified him, and only the narrow trenches could give him a sense of security.

The cramped space, the slightly warm blanket, and the deep-seated fatigue quickly made him yawn repeatedly.

Just as the sentry was half asleep, a low thud came from the direction of the water fence.

The sentry instantly snapped out of his daze, quickly pulled the whistle out of his clothes, puffed out his cheeks, and was about to blow it.

But just before issuing the warning, he became more cautious, held his breath, and quietly poked his head out of the trench for a glance.

The river was pitch black, utterly silent.

The sentry finally let out a long breath, only then realizing that he was covered in a cold sweat from the fright.

"A waterbird?" the sentry wondered.

Just as he was hesitating whether to go out and take a look, two muffled sounds came from upstream and downstream of the river.

This time, the sentry heard it clearly—the sound was muffled and heavy, definitely not the noise from wild ducks.

But he hesitated for a moment and still did not blow the whistle to warn others.

Because when the whistle blows, the whole island will be awakened.

Previously, in order to stake out the rebels, the sentry and his comrades worked until the middle of the night. They finally managed to get some time to rest, and now, the others have probably just closed their eyes.

If you were to pull everyone out of their bedding at that moment, only to find out that you were just making a fuss over nothing, even if the superior doesn't punish you, you'll still be blamed by your comrades.

Moreover, there are all sorts of situations that can arise during night watch; although the night is quiet, it is not completely silent.

Aside from the noise pollution from the natural environment, the rebels also harass the soldiers guarding the island by floating logs downstream from upstream in the middle of the night.

Therefore, if you blow the whistle to warn others at the slightest sign of trouble, you will only fall into the rebels' trap.

With that thought in mind, the sentry put away his whistle and decided to go find the officer on night watch first.

Before long, the officer on duty followed the sentry to the outpost, but the night was dark and he could not see the water's surface from the trench.

"Lights," the officer on duty uttered a brief command.

The sentry took out his flint and steel, and after a few crisp strikes, a warm, bright yellow flame filled the outpost.

The sentry put the lampshade back on, and the outpost was once again swallowed by darkness—in order not to expose themselves, the military lanterns issued to the United Provinces Army all had a specially made lampshade that could be adjusted in brightness.

The sentry put away his flint and steel and prepared to go out and investigate.

But the star-keeper picked up the lantern before him.

"You stay," the officer on duty said, still sparing with words. "If anything happens, report it to the police."

After saying that, the officer on duty dug out the trench.

After leaving the outpost, the duty officer did not turn on the lamp immediately. He groped his way down to the riverbank, waded through the water for a distance, and arrived at the water fence.

Then, he opened a small gap in the airtight lampshade and carefully searched along the water fence.

Soon, the officer on duty spotted the target: a raft hanging on the water's railing.

The muffled thud the sentry heard was probably the sound of the raft hitting the sharp wooden stake.

At a glance, the young officer was already convinced that the raft came from the rebels.

Only rebels lacking boats and oars would stoop so low as to use simple wooden rafts to navigate the Ten Arrows River.

Upon closer inspection, the lieutenant became even more certain: the rafts hanging on the fence, made of logs and barrels bound together, were the same type used by the rebels to smuggle supplies into Bishop's Castle every night.

It was painted entirely black, which explains why it was completely invisible from the outpost.

In addition, compared to the rafts captured before, this time the rebels' rafts had an extra mast, with a stiff sail that was also dyed black hanging on the mast.

The officer then remembered that the wind was blowing from the northwest tonight, whereas it had been blowing from the northeast the previous few nights.

It is likely that the rebels used the wind to make the rafts drift silently to the island.

The officer then recalled that the sentry had reported hearing three muffled thuds.

He looked around, but unfortunately he couldn't see anything clearly.

Just as the officer was considering whether to call someone to move the raft now or wait until dawn to deal with it, he suddenly noticed that the rebels' raft seemed to be "hung" unusually firmly on the water railing.

In the past, the rebels' rafts were propelled by the current and loosely attached to the water railings. They could be pushed downstream by simply pushing them with a stick.

This time, the dark raft clung tightly to the sharp wooden stakes, remaining completely still despite the crashing waves.

He bent down to examine it carefully and finally found the reason—the rafts used by the rebels this time had an extra ring of gleaming steel nails around the edges, compared to the previous rafts.

The young officer paused for a moment, then suddenly realized that the rebels intended to firmly nail these black rafts to the sharp wooden stakes.

Several terrible possibilities immediately flashed through his mind. He turned his head, wanting to warn others, but it was too late.

Right in front of the young lieutenant, the black raft burst into flames of death and exploded with a deafening roar.

The flames engulfed the lieutenant, choking his cries. The shockwave tore his body apart, hurling his remains along with tons of river water into the sky.

Even the sentries in the trenches were thrown overboard by the blast wave.

Immediately afterwards, a light drizzle of water, carrying chunks of meat and wood chips, fell into the trench, like a rain shower.

There was no need for a warning, as everyone on Margit Island was awakened by the deafening explosion.

Even the citizens and soldiers as far away as Zhuwangbao heard the thunder coming from upstream.

Even the soldiers of Tiefeng County who were lying in ambush behind the river embankment could smell the gunpowder smoke and sulfur odors that were coming towards them, like the gasps of hell.

Mason, who had been staring intently at the Nuremberg clock in his hand and desperately praying that the time delay device would not malfunction, finally breathed a sigh of relief in the fortifications on the riverbank.

"My God! That's some force!" Even the seasoned veteran Gaisa Adonis was taken aback by the commotion Mason had made. "Major, how...how much gunpowder did you use?"

Mason was somewhat ashamed. "I didn't know what the effect of underwater explosion would be, and there wasn't enough time to experiment. Just in case, I simply used more than I should have... If all three delay devices malfunction, we'll lose a lot of money."

“Malfunction? Wasn’t it supposed to be a loud explosion?” Gaisa laughed. “Well done, Major. I bet after this battle, your rank will be higher than Veneta’s.”

Mason felt even more ashamed. "Actually... there was still a problem... the explosion happened much later than expected... the delay device is still too unreliable. I thought at least one out of three would work, but now it seems that even one out of three working was lucky..."

“Alright,” Gaisa waved his hand. “Stop being so hesitant. On the battlefield, there is only success or failure, not luck. Send the signal to move the fleet.”

"Yes." Mason raised his hand in salute.

On the riverbank, the beacon fires that had been prepared beforehand were immediately lit.

But there was no need to send a signal at all; the earth-shattering explosion was the clearest instruction.

……

[Upstream of the Ten Arrows River, a very far place]
Upon hearing the distant rumble of thunder, Samukin immediately rushed onto the deck.

"Beat the drums!" he roared. "Raise anchor!"

The deafening sound of war drums echoed across the river.

"Weigh anchor!" "Weigh anchor!"

"Weigh anchor!"

The voices of the officers repeating their orders echoed across the water.
The seven warships converted from flat-bottomed barges from Iron Peak County—the only naval force in the newly formed army—are no longer hiding their heads and tails.

Sailors chanted and turned the winch, and with a sickening groan of wood, the rusty anchor rose to the surface.

Oars extended from the oar holes on both sides of the boat and began to slap the water.

To the beat of drums that spurred the rowers on, the newly formed Paratú Republic "navy" sailed downstream in a mighty procession toward Magitek Island.

On the lead warship, Lannis, the commander of the Fifth Battalion, walked onto the deck and stood next to Samukin.

……

At the same time, a deafening battle cry also erupted on the west bank of the Ten Arrows River.

A small figure leaped off the riverbank, shouting at the top of his lungs, "Fight for—Blood Wolf!"

Countless people responded in the same high-pitched voices, as if shouts were echoing from the riverbank:
“Uukhai!”

“Uukhai!!”

“Uukhai!!!”

The short figure hoisted a sampan from the ground and rushed towards the other side of the river.

Behind him, as if appearing out of thin air, hundreds of soldiers carried large boats, small boats, and sampans down the riverbank and rowed vigorously to the other side of the river.

……

When Gaisa, who was personally supervising the battle on the front line, heard the battle cry of the First Battalion of the Iron Peak Regiment, he was so angry that he kept snorting, "They can shout like that even when the people aren't here?"

“It’s a habit, and it’s hard to change overnight,” Mason tried to smooth things over. “Next time I’ll have them shout ‘Fight for the Republic’ instead.”

“What’s there to change?” Gaisa said with a half-smile. “Once we take Margit Island, you can call us whatever you want from now on.”

……

Margit Island is neither too close nor too far.

To those on shore, the small boats of Tiefeng County seemed frustratingly slow.

But to the soldiers of Tiefeng County, who had been holding back their energy for several days, they appeared to be approaching the other side of the river with incredible speed.

The "horse-stopping stakes" that the United Provinces had planted on the shallows had been breached, leaving a gap four or five meters wide.

Although the horse-stopping posts around the gap were not uprooted, they were blasted into a jagged mess, like dog teeth.

The short figure took the lead in the "boat," rushing straight into the gap, landing on the beach, and then jumping into the trench, disappearing from sight.

Other soldiers, riding in small boats and sampans, inspired by the "centurion," roared and charged toward the riverbank.

On the river, the few large boats that remained were kept at a considerable distance from the breach created by the demolition ship.

Furthermore, all the large ships were concentrated on the right flank of the battle line, that is, on the south side.

Firstly, because the large boat is wide and has a deep draft, if there are broken wooden stakes underwater at the gap, the large boat will block the gap if it tries to pass through.

Secondly, Tribunal Mason assigned more important tasks to the few large boats they had.

Each large boat was towed by a cable.

To prevent the small boats from being capsized by the mooring lines, the larger boats were positioned at both ends of the battle line.

On the large boat, the sergeant in charge of steering had to be careful not to scrape against other small boats, while also being protected from being caught by the towing cables of other large boats. The task was arduous, so each of them was carefully selected.

Even within Iron Peak County, there wasn't enough manpower, so Mason had to borrow some skilled boatmen from other infantry regiments.

Therefore, the larger boat, which should have been faster, was actually slower than the smaller boat in crossing the river.

The short figure leading the charge had already stormed into the provincial barracks, while the slow-moving large boat finally reached the other side of the river.

But once the large boats were attached to the bollards, they immediately became active and began to destroy the bollards south of the blast point.

The soldiers standing at the bow of the boat finally got their chance to show off their skills. Standing on the swaying boat, they accurately threw lassos at the wooden stakes.

When they lost it, they were holding two strands of rope in their hands.

Once they had used up all the lassos, they quickly tied the lassos on the two adjacent bollards together, then tied one end of the combined lasso to the towing cable of the large boat, and the other end to the large boat.

After doing all this, the sergeant on the large boat ripped off the lampshade of the lantern at the stern.

On the west bank of the river, Tamas finally received the agreed-upon signal.

"Turn!" Tamas roared, "Men! Turn!"

Behind the riverbank, out of sight of the island's defenders, the winch that Woods Frank had spent several days building began to prove its worth.

Soldiers from Tiefeng and Baishan counties raised their whips high, hardened their hearts, and lashed the bull on the winch.

The oxen took heavy steps, and the huge winch turned slowly.

The thick cable first slid across the ground like a python, making a series of crackling, tiny snapping sounds.

At a certain moment, the cable suddenly tightened, and a slightly deflected "stick" then leaped out of the water.

One end of the stick was tied to a pulley on the riverbank, and the other end was attached to a sharp wooden stake that the people from the United Provinces had driven into the riverbed.

Faced with the amplified power of gears and levers, the wooden stakes and chains that the United Provinces were so proud of were simply no match for them.

A dozen or so wooden stakes were pulled out of the shallows one by one by a winch on the opposite bank of the river, just like pulling up radishes.

Seeing that the plan was working, the soldiers on the large boat cheered enthusiastically.

"Next! Next!" Tamas shouted urgently from the riverbank, "Cut the chains! Cut the chains!"

The soldiers on the opposite bank of the river seemed to have heard the acting commander's shout, or perhaps they remembered their duties.

After a brief celebration, the operation was repeated on the top of the second large boat.

Meanwhile, engineers on each large boat jumped into the water with axes on their backs and began chopping at the chains that hadn't been blown apart.

On the other side, the soldiers of the Second Battalion also transported building materials such as pontoons, sheepskin rafts, and sealed wooden barrels down the riverbank.

They tied the ropes to stones and threw them into the river as anchor points to secure floating objects such as pontoons and sheepskin rafts.

Then, the floating objects were connected together using planks and nails.

A simple pontoon bridge began to extend towards the other side of the river at a visible speed.

……

Meanwhile, on Margit Island, Lieutenant Colonel Raymond Montecouccoli, who arrived at the scene immediately, was horrified to find that the situation on Margit Island was already extremely precarious, even though the battle had only just begun.

He had to make a decision immediately.

[A new week begins, and I'm dedicating myself to the song "The Newly Created Man"]
The Ottomans had previously used winches to pull wooden stakes on the island of Malta. Furthermore, during the siege of Malta, they replicated this land-based rafting technique. This time, the scale and efficiency of the land-based rafting was even greater than the one in Constantinople. However, the outcome of the siege of Malta was the opposite of that of Constantinople in 1453; the Ottomans suffered a major defeat, so this land-based rafting technique is largely forgotten in history.
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(End of this chapter)