The Lord of the Rings: Lords of Middle-earth.

Chapter 133 Broken
"Quickly! We need to inform the Grand Duke! It's no longer safe here! We need to retreat!" Ravian said gravely.

"Hiss! My lord, I suggest you find a way to deal with that thing in the sky first! With that thing around, our whereabouts are transparent to the enemy! The pursuers behind us were all attracted by that thing!" Hollin said weakly, lying on his horse.

“He’s too far away! I can’t reach him!” Ravian’s lips twitched. This two-headed dragon air knight was really disgusting. He could fight them on equal terms but he just wouldn’t come down, hanging behind them like a fly.

"Alas! It's a pity we don't have any air knights!" Hollin sighed.

“Even if we had one, we couldn’t beat it! It’s a sub-dragon! Although its bloodline is mixed, dragon blood still flows in its veins. What do you plan to use to deal with it? A unicorn? A griffin?” Ravian glanced at the two-headed dragon in the sky and suddenly felt a tightness in his chest!

Indeed, the entire Crusader lacked the means to counter the Sky Knights. If it were Roland, it would be much easier to deal with. Caslo would show him what the majesty of a Dragon Knight truly meant! Having taken the Dragon Blood Potion, Kaldor had already broken through the limitations of his bloodline and was evolving into a dragon! To deal with this hybrid dragon, simply unleashing his own dragon might would be enough to bring it down from the sky.

"Lord Lavian! It looks like our men are ahead!" Hollin narrowed his eyes as a light cavalry unit clad in dark purple leather armor came into view.

“It’s the Bauhinia banner! Our cavalry!” Ravian breathed a sigh of relief.

……

"Soldiers! I am Ravian, the Knight Commander of the Bauhinia Knights! Now obey my orders! Retreat the way you came!" Ravian had no time to explain and could only give the order quickly.

“…We will obey your orders, but we hope you know what you are doing!” The cavalry captain at the head of the cavalry was silent for a moment before speaking.

"If you don't want to be completely corroded by the two-headed dragon's acid, you'd better retreat with us immediately!" Hollin straightened up, supported his injured left arm with his right hand, and then gestured towards the direction in which the two-headed dragon was circling in the sky.

"By the Dragon God! Two-Headed Dragon Sky Knight!" The cavalry captain's expression immediately changed.

"Let's go! Take me to see the Grand Duke!" Ravian said succinctly.

"Yes, Commander Knight!" The cavalry captain immediately realized the seriousness of the situation; the appearance of the Sky Knights meant that they had been under enemy surveillance from beginning to end...

……

"What's wrong, Lavian?" Nyx elegantly crossed his legs and casually accepted the Dovenian fine-ground coffee served by the waiter.

"Your Highness, we should retreat!" Ravian's face was grim.

"Why?" Nyx looked at the knight commander he trusted most. He knew that in the entire Duchy of Nyx, Lavian's rank was among the highest, and his words carried considerable influence in the army.

“We’ve probably been under enemy surveillance all along. I went out to scout with a knight, but we were chased by a two-headed dragon air knight! On the way back, we were ambushed by the charioteers! So I have reason to believe that we are in a very dangerous situation!” Ravian blurted out.

"Is that so... then what do you mean we should do?" Grand Duke Nyx was also at a loss. After all, it's fine to ask a little girl to be beautiful and cute, but asking her to lead an army in battle is a bit of a stretch.

“My advice is to retreat immediately!” Ravian said decisively.

"Why? Can't our Crusaders defeat them?" Nyx asked, puzzled.

“It’s not a question of whether we can defeat them, but that we know absolutely nothing about the enemy… We can’t even effectively counter their two-headed dragon air knights!” Ravian poured cold water on his enthusiasm.

“I see…” Nyx sighed.

"So... we have no hope of restoring our kingdom?" Nyx's voice was already tinged with a faint sob.

“Your Highness, we should conserve our strength and plan for the long term. You must understand that we are currently like a rootless duckweed! After a battle, we can’t even properly maintain our weapons! Our knightly order is down to only 24 knights! We can’t even muster a decent hundred-man knightly order.” Ravian could only explain.

“Then let’s order the soldiers to retreat, but where should we retreat to?” Nyx asked, looking up. “Hmm… we can only retreat westward for now. If the situation becomes serious, we’ll have to retreat all the way to the Shard!” Lavian sighed. After all, there weren’t many human settlements in the north, and they were unfamiliar with the area, so they could only take it one step at a time.

"Your Highness! My lord! Something terrible has happened! Those Dongyi people riding chariots are catching up... My lord, you'd better come and see for yourself..." Hollin lifted the tent flap, his face grim.

"Damn it! They're really sticking to me!" Ravian cursed, then immediately stood up and strode out.

……

"They really think highly of us!" Ravian said through gritted teeth, standing on the camp's watchtower. The scene that came into his view almost made him grind his teeth to pieces!

Nearly a thousand chariots were lined up in a row, forming a massive formation that stretched for a kilometer. The three-man chariots were covered with halberds, their cold light gleaming! The entire army consisted of at least three thousand men.

"We're in big trouble!" Hollin said coldly, leaning on his cane. Although they had a numerical advantage, the Crusaders, mainly composed of infantry, were no match for the Eastern Barbarians with their thousand chariots. The powerful chariots could easily shatter their formations...

"What do we do?" Nyx appeared behind Lavian without anyone noticing, looking somewhat flustered. He was wearing a mink coat.

"All troops, listen to my command! Form ranks with your backs to the camp!" Ravian commanded helplessly. Although holding the camp could effectively reduce losses, the dense camp also limited the Crusader soldiers' ability to perform. The narrow passages would block their formation and affect the transmission of orders. If they were trapped in the camp, the entire Crusader would be in an embarrassing situation of losing command. Therefore, between the two evils, Ravian had no choice but to have his army fight with their backs to the camp.

"Assemble! Prepare for battle!"

"The time has come to serve His Highness! The Crusades have begun!"

"Fight for the Duchy!"

"Assemble! The enemy is attacking us!"

Nearly five thousand crusaders quickly assembled under the command of officers of all ranks. They put aside their work, donned their armor, picked up their weapons, and surged out of the camp like a tide, forming a huge square formation with their backs to the camp.

Linen robes embroidered with blood-red crosses, pale purple leather armor, kite-shaped iron-clad broadwood shields, one-handed fine iron swords, three-meter-long ash wood spears, and one-meter-long single-edged skull-crushing axes—these unpretentious equipment equipped the light infantry, who constituted the main force of the Crusades! At this moment, the Crusaders were lined up in neat rows, preparing to face the most terrifying mobile force on this continent—the Eastern Barbarian chariots.

"Woo-wah-wah!" The Dongyi people roared madly, uttering meaningless shouts. Their grotesque howls put immense pressure on the Crusaders.

"Hold on! Prepare for the charge!" The officer at the front roared as the horses pulling the chariots began to slowly accelerate. The formation absolutely could not be disrupted at this moment. Once the disciplined formation was lost, these lightly armored ordinary soldiers would be perfect targets for the chariots!

"Archers, prepare!" Ravian raised his lance. In addition to the main Crusader force of nearly 4000 men, there was also a mixed force of archers and marksmen of about 1,000 men in the entire Crusade. They were the most valuable long-range attack force in the entire Crusade.

"Release the arrows!" Ravian pressed his lance down hard, and a volley of arrows flew out. Among them were arrows with archer skills that were even more deadly, and the chariot army that had just started to run was hit head-on.

Some soldiers carrying halberds were shot and fell painfully out of the chariot, only to be run over by the wheels behind them... Others had their drivers pierced by arrows, causing their chariots to lose control and crash into the chariots next to them, resulting in a chaotic scene of men and horses falling over...

"Hold on!" the officers roared at the top of their lungs.

"Boom!" With the impact of the steel torrent, the once intact square formation was instantly torn apart as if it had been bitten, and the soldiers at the front lay down in droves as if they had been harvested...

The blades of the chariot's axle sliced ​​through the Crusaders' shields, leather armor, and flesh! Steaming entrails littered the ground, and the screams of the wounded Crusaders echoed through the sky as countless others struggled in their death throes...

The Dongyi people fared no better. Although they inflicted horrific casualties on the Crusaders, the Crusader phalanxes ultimately managed to halt their advance. Countless broken white waxwood spears told the story of what they had suffered... Countless Dongyi soldiers and their chariot horses, pierced by the spears, lay dead in various bizarre positions...

There were no winners in that collision...

(End of this chapter)