Steel, gunpowder, and spellcasters

Chapter 575 Siege (Twenty-Seven)

[Kings' Castle]
[Outside Knightsburg]
"What it is?"

Inside the trench, Winters pointed to the fortress on the riverbank and asked.

"Which one?" Mason immediately leaned closer.

“Those holes,” Winters gestured to his senior.

Following the direction Winters pointed, Mason understood that the other person was asking about the shallow pit on the embankment.

“I don’t know what those pits are called either,” Mason explained with a wry smile, speaking rapidly. “There weren’t those pits around the enemy’s fortress originally, but after Major Loson’s cavalry charged straight to the top of the slope, they immediately dug those pits on the gentler slope of the embankment, so I call them ‘horse traps.’ Alas, the enemy learns warfare through warfare, while I’m using the experience of the last battle to command the next.”

“No one prepares for the next battle without learning from the experience of the previous one,” Winters said calmly, casting his gaze at the distant castle. “Isn’t this learning war through war itself?”

Hearing his senior's words, he re-examined the sloping dikes around the fortress, confirming that the steeper ones were of the standard design. Only on the relatively flat slopes were shallow pits dug.

Moreover, he made some new discoveries: there were exactly three rows of shallow pits, resembling a honeycomb, with an estimated total width of about two meters.

Two meters, a very delicate distance.

If it were flat ground, Winters was absolutely confident that he could easily cross it on his Longwind.

Even the weakest warhorses, if properly trained and unafraid of ditches, can leap across them.

In other words, a two-meter-wide open ditch was a terrain worth taking the risk for cavalry.

However, if the slope of the embankment is taken into account, the risk becomes very uncontrollable.

Winters put himself in the position of the enemy commander. If he were in charge of the defense, he would dig one or two more rows of shallow pits, increasing their width to three meters, thus completely eliminating the enemy cavalry's idea of ​​directly charging the slope.

But the enemy only dug two meters – considering there wasn’t a single extra pit outside the fortress, Winters was quite certain that the commander who set up these “horse traps” was deliberately using a risky but necessary trench to lure his enemy into attacking.

Winters disliked this meticulously calculated style.

“The other side,” Winters said, still finding it hard to believe despite having learned the enemy commander’s identity from the letter, “is it really Jason Cornelius?”

Mason answered hesitantly, "That's what the 'insider' who ran out of the city said."

"Head of the General Staff—Commander-in-Chief of the Southern Army; Professor Raymond Montecouccoli, Inspector General of Artillery; and Major Fritz, Inspector General of Quartermaster."

"It is said that the people of Kingsburg secretly call them 'the Three Mud Wagons.' This is because, although there is also a Lieutenant Colonel William Lordwick, in reality, the three of them make the decisions, big and small."

"Sounds like something Chief Cornelius would do," Winters remarked casually as he counted the bullet holes.

Mason sensed a hint of personal grudge and asked, "You... know the Minister?"

"And you?" Winters asked noncommittally, "Do you know the Minister?"

“How could I possibly know the Minister?” Mason shook his head instinctively, but then felt his answer was inaccurate and quickly corrected himself, “Of course I know the Minister, but the Minister probably doesn’t know me.”

Without turning his head, Winters said, "In that respect, I'm the same as you. So do you think I 'know' Secretary Cornelius?"

Mason understood Winters' meaning, but this only made him more confused. "Then why does it seem like you have some kind of problem with the Minister?"

“Because he whipped me,” Winters turned around, a half-smile on his face, “and didn’t apologize to me.”

Mason was speechless. Corporal punishment was commonplace at the Army Academy, and to hold a grudge over a single lash seemed petty. But advising someone to let go of "hatred" at this time seemed inappropriate, let alone advising a Venetian.

Mason changed the subject, asking about something more important. He asked anxiously, "Knightburg... what do you think?"

What do you think?
Winters did not answer immediately.

Compared to the last time he "entered" and "exited" Zhuwangbao, the city's defenses had undergone a complete transformation.

If the original Kingsburg New City was a leaky house, now not only have the gaps in the walls been plugged, but thorny fences have been built, drainage ditches have been dug, and at least two thousand dogs have been borrowed from next door. As for Knightsburg alone, its location was originally the weakest point in the New City's defenses.

John Jessica once taught Winters: "There is a lot to learn about the seams of a map."

Winters' own observation was: "There is a great deal of knowledge to be gained at the junctions of terrain."

At the northernmost point of the new city, in this area between the river and the land, the soil is soft, making it difficult to lay a solid foundation. Therefore, the city wall of the new city makes a turn here, bending eastward along the direction of the river, giving up a large section of the riverbank.

Furthermore, perhaps because the budget had been almost exhausted, this section of the city wall along the river was not built with stones, but rather with two wooden walls with earth rammed between them, and was hastily finished.

Therefore, if the United Provinces had not added any fortifications, Winters would have chosen this section of the wall as the point of attack.

Even with the existence of Knightsburg, this place is not insurmountable.

However, the cost involved will be extremely high.

That's right, cost.

Once the "cost" is taken into consideration, the attacking side will naturally turn its attention to other areas of the new city, looking for a location with a lower "cost" of breakthrough.

For example, King's Castle, "Castle Castle", Margit Island, the Old Town...

This is a very rational line of thinking, but that's not the point.

The key point is that this feeling of being led by the enemy made Winters instinctively uncomfortable.

He couldn't pinpoint exactly what was wrong, but he just felt uneasy.

It felt like stepping into a small house covered in cobwebs. Sticky spiderwebs clung to my hands, face, and arms. The lighting was dim, and I couldn't see the spiderwebs, but the unpleasant sensation proved that they were definitely there.

Winters just had that feeling.

But he couldn't tell Mason.

He stared at Mason—the senior's face was pale and ashen, showing signs of exhaustion, clearly indicating that he hadn't had enough rest, as evidenced by his severe dark circles under his eyes.

However, those bloodshot eyes had a morbid excitement, even neuroticism—this was due to excessive pressure.

Even if Mason didn't say anything, Winters could sense that, due to the lack of progress in the battle at Kingsburg, his senior had begun to doubt himself.

Self-doubt leads to self-negation, thus triggering a vicious cycle.

Winters understood his senior well, because he had also fallen into this kind of self-doubt, or rather, he was constantly doubting himself, wondering if his judgment was the optimal solution, and whether he had let others down.

Language is powerless in the face of such emotions.

When faced with self-examination, everyone can only rely on themselves to get through it.

Therefore, Winters couldn't offer any advice to his senior, because it would be pointless and would only make things worse.

He couldn't directly express his discomfort of being "entangled in a spider web," because it was just a vague feeling, and it could potentially cause Mason even more pain.

“I agree with your judgment,” Winters decided to stick to the facts and only talk about the objective situation, without mentioning subjective feelings.

Knightsburg Castle may not be large, but its defenses are excellent and it won't be easy to take. Let's go check out the other places; first, let's see Kingsburg Castle, and then we'll go see Margit Island.

Mason nodded and turned to lead the way.

“By the way,” Winters followed behind, “I still want to meet that ‘insider’ who escaped from the city before we take King’s Castle.”

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(End of this chapter)