Ragnar looked down into the courtyards of Wessex, admiring the defensive formations he had arranged over the past few days.
Positioned along the secondary defensive walls and waiting patiently in the main courtyard were 2,000 traditional Wessex infantryn. These n were a fascinating display of local military lore. In this world, the backbone of any Saxon army was the elite core of professional warriors known as the thegns.
A thegn was a noble retainer, a fierce warrior who was granted large tracts of farmland by the king in exchange for his absolute loyalty and military service. They were the tanks of this era, clad in heavy, ringing chainmail and carrying massive, tear-drop-shaped kite shields.
These veteran thegns led the fyrd, the basic peasant militia composed of regular farrs and tradesn holding simple wooden spears. They fought in a tightly packed shield wall, a tactic that had won them countless wars against rival kingdoms. Ragnar genuinely liked the Saxons. They were brave, stubborn, and incredibly hard-working. But as he watched them proudly forming their shield walls, he couldn’t help but feel a protective affection for them.
He knew that a wooden shield, no matter how thickly painted, was completely useless against modern artillery. He was determined to protect these brave n by letting his machines do the heavy lifting.
Behind the gates, waiting in the shadows of the city, were 1,000 elite cavalryn. They rode massive warhorses and carried newly forged Besser steel swords. They were Ragnar’s sweeping force, waiting for the perfect mont to charge out and clean up the battlefield.
But the true pride and joy of the Iron Empire was positioned right at the front lines.
Standing in perfect rows along the primary battlents were 2,500 Viking Grenadiers. These n were Ragnar’s core industrial soldiers. They wore blackened breastplates that could stop an arrow dead in its tracks, and their belts were heavy with cast-iron fragntation grenades.
They stood with total discipline, their eyes fixed on the horizon.
Looking up at the reinforced stone watchtowers, Ragnar nodded. His engineers had successfully bolted 20 heavy iron mortars directly into the stone floors of the towers.
These short, stubby artillery pieces were angled perfectly to rain explosive, high-arcing death down onto the beaches. Beside the towers, resting on the grassy hills just inside the city walls, were more than five massive wooden trebuchets.
Ragnar hadn’t actually wanted the trebuchets but the local Wessex commanders had begged to use them. Ragnar, being a kind ruler, had allowed it just to make them feel included in the defense plan.
However, Ragnar’s eyes were drawn to a very special, highly exclusive unit positioned on the safest, highest ridge of the wall.
There were exactly 500 n standing there, and they were holding Ragnar’s latest, greatest, and most frustrating invention. They held the very, very primitive prototype rifles.
Ragnar had spent weeks pulling his hair out trying to create these weapons. They were incredibly basic... essentially long, smoothbore iron pipes attached to wooden stocks, utilizing a very primitive matchlock firing chanism.
They didn’t have the beautiful grooves of his heavy cannons yet, and they took nearly a full minute of frantic ramrodding to reload a single lead ball and a pinch of black powder. If it rained, they wouldn’t work at all. They produced blinding clouds of white smoke that choked the user.
But despite their flaws, Ragnar loved them. They were the very first step toward a true, modern infantry line. These 500 n didn’t need decades of archery training to pierce a man’s armor; they just needed to point the heavy iron tube and pull a lever. The sheer psychological terror of 500 thunderous cracks echoing across the battlefield would be worth its weight in gold.
Far out on the churning, gray waves of the English Channel, the Tang expeditionary force was slowly approaching the shoreline.
The ocean was completely covered by massive deep-water Junks. Their distinctive red sails blocked out the horizon, creating a terrifying, moving wall of imperial might.
Standing on the beautifully polished wooden deck of the flagship, General Zhao Feng clasped his hands behind his back.
He narrowed his eyes as he stared at the distant stone walls of Wessex.
"So, this is the grand fortress of the barbarians..." Zhao Feng murmured, "It is larger than I anticipated, but it still reeks of primitive mud and unwashed peasants. They do not even have proper moats."
Standing beside him, the elderly and fiercely intelligent Strategist Sun gently waved his silk fan, observing the shoreline.
"Do not let the simplicity of their stone walls deceive you, General," Strategist Sun advised smoothly. "Even a mighty lion uses its full, unrestrained strength to hunt a simple rabbit. We have sailed across the entire world, and we have brought fifty thousand of the Emperor’s most elite soldiers to these foreign shores. But numbers alone do not win a siege."
Zhao Feng nodded slowly, turning away from the railing to look at his assembled officers. The Tang army was highly professional, and even with their overwhelming nurical superiority, they were not going to charge blindly onto the sand.
"We must be ticulous," Zhao Feng commanded.
"The enemy is undoubtedly terrified by our sheer size. They will likely hide behind their walls and rain basic arrows and boiling oil down upon us. We will not give them the satisfaction of a panicked landing."
"What is your command, General?" asked a junior officer, bowing respectfully.
"We will drop anchor just out of range of their longest bows," Zhao Feng declared with confidence.
"We will deploy our shielded landing crafts first. Once we secure the imdiate beachhead, the infantry will dig deep, reinforced trenches in the sand to protect against any desperate cavalry charges. Only then will we unload the heavy siege towers and the battering rams. We will surround their city, cut off all their trade routes, and systematically starve them out while our engineers dismantle their walls piece by piece."
Strategist Sun smiled, closing his fan. "A flawless plan, General. We have enough stolen Arabian grain to feed our army for months. These western barbarians likely only have a few thousand n huddled together with wooden spears. The math is entirely on our side. This will be a slow and entirely one-sided slaughter."
The Tang commanders shared a laugh. They were preparing to fight a traditional, dieval siege.
They were completely and utterly oblivious to the fact that the walls of Wessex were currently bristling with industrialized, explosive death.
Back on the stone ramparts of Wessex, the light-hearted thrill in Ragnar’s heart was bubbling over into a joyful laugh. He could see the massive ships slowing down, clearly preparing for a highly organized, careful landing.
"Oh, this is going to be so much fun..." Ragnar whispered to himself, leaning his elbows on the stone wall.
"They are actually going to line up on the beach for us!"
Standing right next to Ragnar, Ealdred, the royal caretaker, was not having fun. In fact, Ealdred felt like his heart was going to explode right out of his frail chest.
The older Saxon man was clutching a stack of inventory parchnts so tightly that his knuckles were entirely white. He stared out at the ocean, his eyes wide and completely bloodshot with terror.
"M-My King," Ealdred babbled. He looked at the 2,500 Grenadiers, the 2,000 infantryn, and the 1,000 cavalry.
"We only have roughly six thousand n ready to fight! I have counted the sails! There must be hundreds of ships! If each ship carries even a fraction of what they appear to hold... that is fifty thousand n! Fifty thousand!"
"Give or take a few, yes," Ragnar replied cheerfully, not even looking away from the ocean.
"It’s a very impressive logistical feat on their part."
"Impressive?!" Ealdred shrieked, completely losing his mind.
"They have fifty thousand n!" Ealdred cried out, tears of genuine panic streaming down his wrinkled face.
"The thegns cannot hold off a force of that magnitude! Their shield wall will break! They will wash over us like a tidal wave! We are sitting ducks!"
Ragnar turned to his caretaker, offering a smile. "Ealdred, my friend. Just stay behind the wall and cover your ears."
Ealdred survival instincts had completely hijacked his brain. He couldn’t stand there and watch the end of the world.
"I must get the rest of the fyrd... I must ring the grand bells! We need every farr, every blacksmith, every boy who can hold a stick!" Ealdred yelled hysterically, throwing his hands in the air.
Without waiting for Ragnar’s permission, the terrified caretaker spun around, his long robes flapping wildly behind him.
"Well, you can’t bla him for caring about his city..." Ragnar mused softly.
He turned his gaze back to the ocean, watching the first Tang landing crafts detach from the massive Junks and begin rowing toward the sandy shores.
Ragnar raised his hand, signaling the mortar crews on the towers to light their matches.
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