“Attack when you have the advantage, retreat when at a disadvantage, hold your ground when you must, sneak around when the opportunity presents itself.” - Liang Shi-zu, famed tactician from the Huan Confederation.

“Their cavalry is sallying to engage you. Break off the run and harass their cavalry,” commanded Reinhardt through his artifact as he watched the battlefield from high above through the orb Hannah carried. From that vantage point, he clearly saw how the enemy cavalrymen started to separate from the infantry they were escorting to engage with an assault by the mercenary and Levainian cavalry.

Too bad while the distance might have been too far for the cavalry in question to notice, their movements were clearly visible to an observer high above. As such, Reinhardt simply adjusted his tactics and passed on his orders to Ze’phane and Soledad, who were leading the two prongs of the attacking cavalry. They heard and acknowledged his command moments later.

As their commanders relayed the order, the attacking cavalry aborted their run and instead swerved towards the west ahead of time, giving the sallying cavalry from Podovniy no chance to catch up to them. Even when the vanguard of the Podovnian cavalry approached them, all they received was a warm welcome in the form of thrown javelins, which quickly blunted the charge.

The frustrated enemy cavalry doggedly chased after Ze’phane’s and Soledad’s people, but were left eating dust. Some of them broke off the pursuit after a while, but a couple groups of cavalrymen continued to persistently chase after their fleeing opponents. Reinhardt watched the chase from his artifact for a while before he gave another command at last.

“Alvaro, Branka, your turn. Ze’phane, Soledad, break to the sides as we rehearsed,” he said into the artifact, trusting its enchantments to carry his voice to the people he intended them for.

Soledad brought her group of cavalry to merge into Ze’phane’s as they rushed towards the south-west, crossing the road at one of the safe spots. Their pursuers were still chasing after them, and it was all they could do to keep the distance open. After a while, they finally saw their destination, where a medium-sized grove of trees grew some distance away from the trees that lined the southern side of the road.

Ze’phane led her riders towards the left of said grove, while Soledad brought hers towards the right. At around the same time as when the first rider galloped past the grove, Alvaro led his platoon of former warforged out of the grove and lined up in formation, four deep and twenty wide. Their shields overlapped one another’s, while their spears pointed forward menacingly.

So it was that the Podovnian cavalry found themselves faced by a solid spear wall as they chased their foes towards the grove. The dust cloud kicked up by their enemies had obscured their sight, and they had not noticed the spear wall until it was too late. At the same time, a hail of arrows shot out from within the forest to their north, courtesy of Branka and the second archer platoon.

Some of the Podovnian war horses were felled by arrows and caused those behind them to stumble and crash as well. Others had their riders shot out from their backs. Yet others balked at the sight of the menacing spearwall and refused to advance, their sudden stop causing some riders behind them to crash into them, causing the riders involved to fall into a tangle along with their steeds.

In truth, Alvaro’s platoon was merely a bluff. Due to the cover from the dust cloud and how they positioned themselves with the grove at their back, the Podovnian riders were unaware that their line was so thin that a direct charge would have gone straight through without too much trouble. Instead, they dithered and ended up falling over each other.

“Aly, do your part,” added Reinhardt as he saw the enemy cavalry falling into a mess from his vantage point.

Shortly after he gave the command, Alycea’s platoon rushed out from the forest where Branka’s platoon was hidden and struck the enemy’s right flank ferociously. They had been stationed there to bail out Alvaro’s platoon in case the bluff failed, but fortunately that wasn’t the case. Alvaro himself already led his platoon to press the attack against the enemy cavalry, a literal wall of spears advancing towards the skittish horses.

As if the Podovnian riders hadn’t suffered enough, a few minutes later Ze’phane and Soledad had circled around and brought their riders back into the fray, striking against the enemy’s left flank with extreme prejudice. Some of the Podovnian officers had realized just how few people were in Alycea’s and Alvaro’s platoons by then and tried to exhort their troops to fight back, but the return of the mercenary cavalry shattered any hope of that happening.

Within moments, the Podovnian cavalry formation broke apart and routed as they were pincered from three directions, many of the riders forgetting all about discipline and cohesion in favor of running for their lives. The mercenaries did not chase the escaping enemies, and instead focused their efforts on those already caught in their pincer attack.

It was a one-sided slaughter.

The half of the Podovnian cavalry that remained already had their morale broken and their formation in tatters. As they were subjected to enemy attack from three directions, some of their soldiers went as far as stabbing one of their own officers who tried to instill order into the chaos so they could escape instead. That the mercenaries did not chase the escapees further emboldened the runners.

It did not take long for the mercenaries to thoroughly rout and dismantle the rest of the enemy cavalry caught in the jaws of their trap. Screams of pain from the riders mingled with whinnies from their mounts and both men and horses were slaughtered mercilessly. Those who tried to escape at that juncture found to their dismay that the mercenary archers had stopped providing support fire to the melee and instead shot at people trying to escape like them.

By the time some of the earliest escapees from the ambush returned to the site of the battle with reinforcements, the mercenaries were long gone, and all that was left were hundreds of corpses strewn haphazardly on the ground.