Vikings: Lords of the Ice Sea

Chapter 92 The Banks of the Seine (Part Two)

To the west, the central high platform.

"Why is he rushing in so fast when the main infantry force hasn't even advanced yet?"

With the plan disrupted, Vig threw the two flags into the wooden basket and quickly gave orders to the messenger riders:
"Notify Ivar's troops to advance, quickly crush the enemy's left flank, and clear the southern front."

"Leonard's and Theowuff's units are advancing normally. Tell them to play it safe and not push too far ahead!"

"After a fierce battle, Bjorn's troops have temporarily retreated to the rear."

Just as Vig was hastily changing tactics, Gunnar had already rushed to the junction of the Frankish center and left flank, where there were only three hundred or so infantrymen hastily arrayed.

As the iron hooves rolled across the grassland, kicking up dust, the tall horses crashed into the crowd, and the Frankish militiamen fell like stalks of wheat.

As they charged, slashed, and trampled, the militiamen in the back trembled at the sight of these seemingly crazed Norman riders, as if they were witnessing a group of demons from hell.

("Normans" means "northerners," which was the Frankish term for the Vikings.)

Soon, the surviving militiamen began to retreat in unison, ignoring their commander's shouts. Suddenly, a blond youth threw away his shield and rusty iron axe, turned around and knocked down his comrades behind him, and the rout began from there.

"Ignore them, keep charging with me!"

Abandoning the weak militia, Gunnar charged at full speed toward the dazzling blue banner with gold fleur-de-lis. Atop the banner stood a young man wearing a crown, his expression panicked. Unfortunately, he was too late. The nearby Franks swarmed forward, blocking the small group of cavalry.

Hulülü.

Upon seeing the dense bayonets ahead, Gunnar's horse reared up in fright, nearly throwing its rider to the ground. Forced to act without hesitation, he led his troops forward, charging towards the weak point on the eastern flank until they had penetrated the entire French formation.

At this moment, there were no more enemies to the east, only some scattered low farmhouses. A little further ahead, there was a bridgehead on the south bank of the Seine, and it seemed that many people were watching the battle from behind the battlements.

"Sir, the enemy is closing in!"

Turning around, Gunnar saw a large group of Franks in disarray pursuing him. He looked around and saw that most of the two hundred men who had accompanied him in the charge had scattered, leaving only a few dozen riders.

Outnumbered, he planned to take a long detour to shake off the group before returning to the Viking formation on the west side.

After running for several hundred meters, Gunnar gradually fell behind. He looked down at his warhorse's body and saw that its right foreleg had been slashed open with a large gash, from which blood was gushing out.

After running for a while, the warhorse's heavy body collapsed to the ground. Gunnar rolled a few times on the ground, and when he came to his senses, he saw seven Frankish cavalrymen rushing towards him.

Grabbing his longsword from the ground, Gunnar fled north toward the Seine. Upon seeing the Viking barbarian's disheveled appearance, the crowd watching from the bridgehead burst into joyful laughter.

"The Seine is wide, and there are our boats there. What makes him think he can swim to the other side?"

Surrounded by a group of noble ladies, Queen Ermentrud stood on the watchtower with the best view and was amused by the panicked barbarian.

The queen laughed heartily, and the noblewomen joined in the laughter. In the lingering atmosphere of merriment, the barbarian ran all the way to the shallow water and then stood still.

"He's crazy?"

The queen frowned.

The next moment, her younger brother, William, the eldest son of the Earl of Orléans, spoke up: "No, the warhorses are afraid of getting wet, and the cavalry can't charge, so he deliberately ran into the shallow water, intending to kill a few more before he died." Not long after, William's judgment came true. The cavalry at the front rushed to the riverbank, and his warhorse paced anxiously in the shallow water, the knee-deep water causing its hooves to slip constantly.

Suddenly, Gunnar grabbed a pebble and threw it, the splashing water startling the warhorse so much that it staggered backward. The rider had to tighten his grip on the reins to keep his balance. Taking advantage of the enemy's brief moment of distraction, Gunnar rushed forward and slashed the horse's belly with his sword.

In excruciating pain, the mount struggled desperately, plunging into the water along with its rider. Gunnar then used the counterweight on the hilt of his sword to strike the enemy's helmet, cleanly severing his neck.

Picking up the shield that had fallen into the water, Gunnar exchanged a few blows with the riders who had arrived later. After making a feint, he plunged his sword into the enemy's abdomen.

After killing two people, a third and a fourth followed, all of whom he killed in succession.

Seeing this, the three riders dismounted and charged forward across the slippery river pebbles. After one of them was killed, the remaining two were terrified by the blood-soaked Norman devil and dropped their weapons to flee in panic.

Exhausted, Gunnar had no will to pursue. He collapsed into the knee-deep river, gasping for breath. His longsword, worn from the long battle, lay at the bottom, its blade twisted like a saw. He tore off the silk robe of the dead cavalryman and pressed it against his wound. Crimson blood spread and faded in the clear river water, eventually disappearing completely.

After waiting for a few minutes, more than twenty Viking riders returned to meet their commander.

Pushing aside his confidant who tried to help him up, Gunnar mounted his horse, snatched his own brown bear banner, and charged to a point seventy paces from the bridgehead.

He slammed the flagpole into the ground and shouted to the defenders behind the battlements:
"With Lord Gunnar of Cambridge here, who dares to leave the city?"

"With Gunnar here, who dares to leave the city!"

At the top of the watchtower, the crowd couldn't understand his Norse language, but they roughly guessed that he was proposing a duel.

"Let me go down and kill him."

William had barely finished speaking when his sister grabbed his wrist tightly. "Several knights have died at this man's hands. You are too young to go into battle."

The Queen instructed a palace guard, "Go find Maurice de Montpellier; he should be almost fully recovered."

Upon receiving the order, the guard rode to the Île de la Cité at top speed and returned a few minutes later to report:

"Your Majesty, Sir Maurice's condition has not improved; he is even unable to get out of bed."

Hearing this, she worried that her brother would insist on leaving the city, so she steeled herself and roared at the archers, "In the name of the Queen, I order you to shoot this Norman to death!"

Faced with the arrows shot from the city wall, Gunnar retreated twenty or thirty paces, and cursed loudly at the bridgehead, denouncing these Franks for their lack of martial ethics.

He led his men in cursing for a full three minutes, then suddenly realized that the other side didn't understand Norse. Feeling utterly bored, he walked away cursing to the south.

"It seems I need to spend more time learning foreign languages ​​in the future, otherwise I won't even be able to swear, which is too frustrating."

Let's return to the battlefield.

Since Gunnar launched a surprise attack on Charles the Bald, various French armies rushed to his aid, causing chaos in the battle. Taking advantage of this opportunity, Ivar led a thousand heavy infantrymen in an attack, and with the cooperation of his allies, easily defeated the Frankish infantry on the south side of the battlefield.

"These people are too weak; they are no match for Anglo-Saxon heavy infantry."

Having achieved the first phase of the battle objective, Ivar looked towards the western high ground, where a figure was waving a flag, the message of which was roughly as follows:
Organize your troops, face north, and attack the enemy's center.

(End of this chapter)