Warfare's Final Frontier

Chapter 8 The Sincerest Sacrifice

After the battlefield settled down, Lieutenant En heard of the grave situation that their army was in, this made En even more fired up to bring down Baron tonight. Soon the darkness of the night came along, and Lieutenant En sent a messenger to both of the other two officers he had picked the previous night to lead this night incursion. With accuracy and precise timing, the three large bodies of cavalry struck at the weak points of the enemy camp and easily broke through the patrols and started to hunt down Baron. After they entered through, the place was filled with many noises. Some of which were soldiers shouting enemy attack, while others were cursing for being woken up in the middle of the night, most were people who were confused as to what was happening.

Messenger (M) "Sir, our camp has been breached by multiple cavalry units"

(BM) "How many enemy troops in total?"

(M) "There appears to be about 1500-2000."

(BM) "How many losses have we taken so far?"

(M) "Not too many, only about a hundred."

(BM) "That little?" Baron was confused, the point of a night incursion was to use the element of surprise to deal a serious blow to the enemy.

(M) "They seem to be avoiding most of the troops, sir."

(BM) "No wonder." Baron finally realized what they were planning to do in this night raid. They wanted to kill him while everyone was running around in confusion. "Tell me who is leading this raid"

(M) "Going by our reports, it seems to be the work of the enemy lieutenant and two enemy officers." The messenger quickly replied.

(BM) "Oh," Baron said thoughtfully. Thinking for a while, he quickly thought of a perfect solution to this ordeal. Baron grabbed a piece of paper scribbled something on it, handed it over to the messenger and said "quickly send this message to Lieutenant Ben"

(M) "Yes, sir" he grabbed the piece of paper and immediately set out to deliver the message to the lieutenant.

When the messenger left, Baron grabbed the weapon closest to him, a spear, and set out to lead a counterattack against the marauders. However, against opponents who were resting the entire day Baron's army could not hold them back. The two sides went back and forth a couple of times until the detachment that Lieutenant En was leading happened to spot Baron battling it out with another detachment. Baron could barely hold on against one detachment, but against two even he was no match for them.

Just when his forces were about to seemingly crumple in front of the pressure, a ray of hope came out of the darkness. Officer Phillips, who had set out to light firecrackers with the 200 men, returned back to camp to rescue Baron. This surprising turn of events had upset what was an imminent defeat for Baron. Phillips came up to Baron with an empty horse and handed over the reins to Baron.

(OP) "Boss, we have to get you out of here."

(BM) "No, we have to stay and fight for a little while longer," Baron said while thinking of his plan to deal with these enemy cavalries.

(OP) "Are you serious?" Phillips was in absolute shock, so much so that he got off his horse and gave Baron a satisfying backhand. "If we stay here any longer the only thing we'll accomplish is more deaths on our side. We have to lure them away"

(BM) "You're right," Baron said surprised by the actions of Phillips. He had originally wanted to keep the enemy stalled for a bit longer to give Ben enough time to act according to their newly devised plan.

(OP) "Good, now get on the horse and follow me. We've opened up a path to retreat when we came in to rescue you."

(BM) "Good man lets set out now," Baron said with satisfaction.