“The best course of action in war is to defeat your enemy’s plans before they could even come into effect.” - Liang Shi-zu, famed tactician from the Huan Confederacy.

The second day of the battle proceeded much like what the defenders expected. The invaders had not repeated their charge from the previous day, as they had realized its futility, and instead spent a good part of the day having their soldiers fill up the trenches that blocked their way with shovels. Of course, the defenders had not allowed them to do that freely, as the trenches were made just within arrow range, forcing the enemy soldiers to work while subjected to a near-constant rain of arrows.

This time the invaders did their work patiently, however, with soldiers bearing large wooden shields – pretty much just wooden boards the size of a small door given a handle – keeping those working on the trenches safe. Again, that was expected. The trenches had served their purpose, and with the petty tricks the dwarven engineers pulled off, would likely still claim some more victims even after they were filled in.

It was mostly an uneventful day, just the enemy soldiers working to fill up the trenches – a job that would likely take them all day long – while being protected by the shieldbearers before them and archers from both sides trading arrows with one another over the distance, with the defenders having the advantage due to their height advantage.

At least until a couple hours before the sunset when Reinhardt noticed a sneaky movement from the enemy side.

Under normal circumstances, the maneuver attempted by the enemy would not have been noticeable by the defenders, as it was far back and covered from sight by the rest of the invading army. Reinhardt’s eye piece relayed to him the overall situation of the battlefield from a bird’s eye viewpoint, however, as Hannah was flying high above to keep watch over the enemies. As such, the movement could not evade him.

“They’re trying to make a sneak attack through the forest, a team of around five hundred on each side, probably assassins or the like. The ones that went south are ours,” said Reinhardt succinctly, his words relayed directly to Nestor, who has one of the receiver artifacts. The receiver artifacts couldn’t exactly send a message back, but they could send a signal to the main artifact that was typically used to signal that the message had been received, or to call for attention. Nestor flashed a signal of acceptance mere moments after his report.

If you come across this story on Amazon, it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

Meanwhile, Reinhardt informed his people of the situation and incoming enemies. The Free Lances had further trapped the southern forest to the point that they were confident of defending it from as many as ten thousand enemies. While the five hundred the enemy sent looked familiar with traveling through a forest, they were still no match to the mercenaries in their preferred terrain.

Since Reinhardt needed to keep watch over the battlefield situation and there wasn’t that many enemies, he delegated the task of dealing with the incoming foes to Lars, who accepted the job and left with the platoons led by Alva, Branka, Erycea, Alycea, Egil, Fatimah, and Nicole to welcome the enemies, roughly half of the company’s fighting force put together.

It was probably overkill to ambush five hundred people with nearly double their number on well-prepared killing ground, but if there was one thing the mercenaries adhered to religiously, it was to not underestimate their opposition. Lars swiftly arranged for the archers from Alva and Branka’s platoons to spread out along the sides of the prepared killing ground, while the other six platoons including his own were deployed in a semi-circle around the ambush location.

They had a good grasp on the route their enemies would likely take, because all the other possible paths to take had already been trapped to hell and back, with the intention being to herd any enemy who braved the forest to the remaining “easier” path, which led straight to the killing ground the mercenaries prepared for ambush from days ago.

For what it was worth, their foes showed a familiarity with the forest like people who lived their lives in one. Likely trained foresters and agents, the group knew how to traverse the terrain – some of them even moving through the trees – well and smoothly. They even noticed and disarmed some of the traps the mercenaries had set up.

That said, their failings were also visible, as the enemies were clearly unfamiliar with the sort of traps Egil’s people set up. There weren’t that much difference between traps set up by humans and goblins in terms of construction, but the ways they used to hide such traps differed quite a bit. The invaders were clearly familiar with the former, but not the latter, and thus fell for those traps specifically.

Given the way these enemies moved, Lars guessed that they were likely infiltrators and assassins, sent to reach behind the defense lines around the time the battle ended that day, to make their move at night when people were less wary. Unfortunately for them, their movement being noticed at the start meant that all that awaited them were premeditated ambushes, captivity, and death.

Once the enemies were funneled into the killing zone, Alva and Branka’s archer let loose with their arrows from the sides, placing the enemies under a crossfire from two directions. Their arrows alone dropped at least a fifth of the enemy troops, and the moment the arrows stopped coming, Lars signaled for the assault, his platoon surging forward with Erycea and Alycea’s to the sides.

Needless to say, the enemy infiltrators and assassins were not prepared to direct combat in that manner, and the ambush routed them swiftly. The majority of the enemies were slain or captured by the ambush, while those that turned tail and fled found themselves harried by Nicole’s, Fatimah’s, and Egil’s people before they were taken down or killed as well.

None of the five hundred enemies escaped their fate that day.