In the long-term foreign expansion war of the Great Qin Empire, the four legions have the longest history and have made great military exploits many times. In the era of Putimius, these four legions were given a very high honor, and they were collectively called the Imperial Forest Army, becoming Putimius's most trusted army. The four legions are the Roman legion, the Sicilian legion, the Greek legion, and the Macedonian legion. Among them, the Roman legion is the only legion named after a city in the Qin army sequence.
After Putimius's death, Caracalla and Geta declared ascended the throne at the same time, but the Great Qin Empire did not split and there was no civil war. This is a very strange phenomenon, just like the situation where the Senate and Putimius, the autocratic emperor, could be side by side.
Based on the implementation of Songjun's strategy, the army has become a force that cannot be underestimated within the Great Qin Empire, and their influence on the situation has even exceeded that of the nobles. Therefore, neither Caracalla nor Getta gave up on wooing the army.
When Putimius was alive, both Caracalla and Getta, as the princes, directly controlled a legion, the Gaul Legion and the German Legion. These two legions were also elite troops of the Great Qin Empire, but they were hit hard by the Han army during the invasion of Parthia last year, and they have not fully recovered until now.
In order to grasp enough right to speak as quickly as possible, Caracalla and Getta unanimously set their sights on the four imperial forest regiments. These four imperial forest regiments are all loyal to Putimius. After Putimius died, they should be loyal to the new Da Qin emperor, but now two Da Qin emperors suddenly appeared, making them a little bit at a loss. As a result, the internal division of the four imperial forest regiments also appeared.
Caracalla and Geta also tried their best to give money to beauties, and they were given generous treatment. In the end, Caracalla, the prince, prevailed. The commanders of the Roman Legion, the Sicilian Legion, and the Macedonian Legion successively declared their allegiance to Caracalla, and Getta only won the support of one Greek legion.
The choice of the Imperial Forest Legion became a weather vane, which also directly led to Getta's defeat in the subsequent struggles with other legions. In the sixteen legions of the Putimius era, he only won four, including the original one. It belongs to the Germanic Army under his command. Although Caracalla and Getta each control four of the eight newly formed legions in the future, Getta is already in a very disadvantaged position in this contest for the throne.
If Getta wants to reverse the unfavorable situation, there is only one way, and that is to fulfill Putimius' last wish with a victory over the big man. Of course Caracalla also understands this truth. He is now strong and strong, and he is definitely not willing to let the victory fall to Getta. This time mobilizing thirty troops to wait for work in Asia Minor is a masterpiece of Caracalla.
Although the 300,000 army is not too much, they are fighting at home, they are familiar with the surrounding terrain, and they wait for work at ease, so they can have the upper hand. However, just as the Han army did not understand the movements of the Qin army, the Qin army did not understand the movements of the Han army, let alone how much force the Han army deployed. Just in case, Caracalla sent the Macedonian Legion, one of the three Royal Forest Legions loyal to him, to the battlefield of Asia Minor.
The Macedonian Legion has always been known for its bravery and ferocity. In the wars of foreign expansion over the years, it has played the role of vanguard many times with few failures. However, in today's fierce battle, the Macedonian Army suffered heavy losses. There were 50,000 warriors when they set off in the morning, and less than 15,000 were left when they returned to the camp at night, and all of them were injured, of which as many as 8,000 were seriously injured.
The medical conditions in this era are very backward. The Da Qin Empire does not have a complete medical school system like Da Han. It will be an extremely difficult period of time waiting for these seriously injured people. Whether they can survive it depends on their own destiny. Many of them will be because The wound was infected and his condition worsened and died. In other words, after this battle, the Macedonian Army was completely maimed by the Han army.
This news caused a lot of shock in the Daqin Army.
In the encounter in Parthia, the Gaul and Germanic regiments, which are also elite regiments, were also maimed by the Han army and even annihilated, but the situation was completely different from this time. At that time, the Gaul and Germanic regiments did not know that the Han army would participate in the war, and they were a little caught off guard. Moreover, the Han army did not fight head-on with them. One of them was defeated by the trebuchet and the other by the Han cavalry. The Daqin army was somewhat unconvinced.
But this time it was different. The Han army engaged them in hand-to-hand combat, fighting each inch by inch. Some of the soldiers of the Macedonian Army were killed and wounded under the iron hoofs of the Han army’s crossbow and heavy cavalry, but at least more than 20,000 people were directly killed by the Han army’s infantry, and it was under the condition that they were superior in strength. .
Even the Macedonian army was hit hard by the Han army, so that all the Daqin army who heard the news had to put away their contempt, and even began to have a little fear of the Han army. At the same time, the battlefield was brightly lit just now, and the soldiers of the Han army were cleaning the battlefield with the light torch. This was the best opportunity for the Qin army to carry out a surprise attack, but the surviving legion commanders all chose to turn a blind eye. They didn’t feel much on the battlefield just now, but now they look at their colleagues who lack arms and legs, and think about those opponents who fought a war that are worse than them. With such a great opportunity in front of me, I didn't dare to try it.
Zhang Yun organized soldiers to clean the battlefield, of course, not to test the courage of the Daqin people, nor to covet the property of those Daqin soldiers, but based on the customary tradition of the Han army. Before each expedition, Liu Xin repeatedly emphasized that we should bring everyone back and don't leave one person behind. Casualties in the war are inevitable, especially when the journey is far away. It is impossible for the remains of those soldiers who died on the battlefield to travel long distances back to the Central Plains. However, the surviving colleagues will try their best to collect their remains, and after cremation, they will be sent back to the big man, buried in their hometown, and let them be buried in the land for safety. Some of the warriors with outstanding military exploits will be buried in the Heroes Cemetery on the outskirts of Chang'an City after obtaining the consent of their families.
The battle was too tragic, with more than 8,000 soldiers killed. Seeing these brothers who lived together day and night, the big men and soldiers almost converged them one by one with tears in their eyes, and then held a grand cremation ceremony. The whole process lasted until dawn, when their ashes were collected into the earthen jar. , Put a label on the outside, indicating their name, age and place of origin.
All night, Zhang Xi and Pound didn't close their eyes. Together with other soldiers, they held the body of the hero with their own hands, because Liu Xin had always emphasized to them that they should love soldiers as children. This is not a hard and fast rule, and people like Zhang Fei can't do it. However, Zhang Jun did a good job on this point. The Third Army under his command was not the most elite force, but it was definitely the most desperate force.
After the battlefield was finally cleaned, Zhang Xi bowed deeply to the dozens of carts filled with the skeletons of the children, then waved his hand, and said in a deep voice, "Send away."
Pound glanced at the corpses still piled up on the battlefield, frowned and asked: "General Zhang, how to deal with these?"
These were the corpses left behind when the Qin army was defeated. Most of them died at the hands of the Han army. Some people were unwilling to be captured and committed suicide. In a battle of this magnitude, the Han army finally did not catch a prisoner of war. The fighting situation at that time was so tragic that many people who participated in the battle would still be sighed when they recalled it many years later.
Zhang Xi was silent for a while, then suddenly bowed to the corpses, waved his hand, and said, "They are all respectable opponents, let's set the fire on fire."
Long ago, soldiers followed orders to set up firewood and pour pine oil on them, and smoke billowed across the battlefield. Unlike the corpses of his colleagues who were cremated just now, the corpses of these Daqin soldiers were randomly stacked together.
Zhang Yun also ordered people to dig a big hole, push all the remains of the Daqin soldiers, and bury them, and set up a stone stele next to him, personally write down the situation of the battle, and let the craftsman inscribe it as a memorial.
No one thought that Zhang Xi's inadvertent move would have a very significant impact on the future of the war.
Although the sky hasn't been bright yet, yesterday's battlefield was raging. At this time, a gust of east wind blew, and a burnt smell from the burning of the corpse floated straight into the Qin Army barracks. The exhausted Qin Jun was awakened by the smell from his sleep, and he got out of the tent and looked around, finally discovering the strangeness on the battlefield. Soon, the meticulous work sent out returned news that the Han army was burning their leftover corpses.
Since ancient times, there has been a saying that the people of Daqin have taken this to the extreme. They have been extremely cruel in previous wars, killing people, arson, looting, and doing no evil wherever they go. But they have never practiced burning corpses, even if they do not do this to the enemy, because in Daqin, people must be buried after death, and cremation is not allowed. They believe that only in this way can people return to the name of God. It is the so-called dust return to dust, soil return to soil.
The incident of the Han army burning the bodies of Daqin soldiers quickly spread madly in the barracks. An atmosphere of horror permeated the sky above Daqin barracks. The Dahan army was also described as the most brutal army in the world. They were all cannibals. Among the barbaric thugs who drink human blood, among the commanders of the Daqin Legion, there are also two completely different opinions.