The Lucanians finally appeared within Davos’s line of sight.

“Assume defensive positions as we drilled! Move now!” Davos immediately issued the order to his company commanders.

The cohort commanders began to direct their men into their designated positions with practiced efficiency.

“First Heavy Infantry Cohort, with me! To the eastern wall of the north gate!”

“Brothers of the Second Heavy Infantry Cohort, you’re with me! To the northern wall of the south gate!”

“Third Heavy Infantry Cohort, form up on the training ground! Move your asses, now!”

“Archers of the First Light Infantry Cohort, follow your squad leaders up to the watchtowers on the south wall!”

***

In a flurry of disciplined movement, the soldiers quickly took their posts, leaving only the routed soldiers, now encircled by the guard detachment, in the center of the camp.

“How many?” Davos asked Philesius, who had just returned from calming them.

“A lot. Close to four hundred, mostly freemen, and over half of them are unarmed,” Philesius reported.

“Mersis!” Davos shouted.

Mersis hurried over.

“How many javelins do we have in reserve?”

“Five hundred and twenty-six,” Mersis grumbled. “And that’s only because I had the blacksmiths in Thurii work overtime these past two days. Every coin we’ve earned from the market has been poured into making these weapons…”

Davos had no time for his quartermaster’s complaints. He turned back to Philesius. “Issue each of them a javelin. Then, distribute a few of them into each squad. They’re going to help with the defense!”

“Understood!” Philesius strode toward the cluster of broken men.

Mersis, however, remained rooted to the spot.

Davos knew what he was hesitant about and said sharply, “We’ll be collecting the javelins after this is over. Besides, aren’t the Lucanians delivering a fresh supply of weapons right to our doorstep?”

A wide grin instantly spread across Mersis’s face at the thought. He immediately ordered his slaves to the supply depot to haul out the weapons. His trust in Davos was so complete that the possibility of the mercenaries failing to repel the enemy and the camp being overrun never even crossed his mind.

The mercenaries standing behind the wooden walls shared that same lack of concern. They watched calmly as the enemy swarmed toward the camp like a tide, some of the veterans even finding the time to lecture the new recruits.

“So,” Matonis began with a smirk, “still think building such a complicated camp was a waste of time?”

“A waste? Hell no!” Ctippus exclaimed, his voice buzzing with excitement. “Right now, I’m just hoping these tribal bastards get a real good taste of the traps I dug!”

***

Leaning against the wooden palisade, the mercenaries took the opportunity to recover the energy they had expended earlier, all while eagerly waiting for the show to begin. Only Hylos’s⁷ Fifth Heavy Infantry Company, having missed the previous engagement, was itching for a fight, wishing the enemy would just hurry up and charge so they could finally get a piece of the action.

***

After splitting off from the forces of Grumentum, Pyxous’ warriors immediately resumed their eastward pursuit.

Gnaenat sprinted at the very front of the charge. The mercenary camp was now within his sights. “Charge!” he roared. “Slaughter every last one of them!”

His warriors answered with a furious roar of their own, the sound seeming to banish their fatigue as they surged forward with renewed speed.

“Company commander! The Lucanians are less than two hundred meters out!” a small squad leader of the archers shouted down from his watchtower to Alphens on the ground.

“Let me know when they’re at one hundred!” Alphens yelled back. He then turned to the slingers behind him and commanded, “Get ready!”

Because the walkway behind the wooden wall was too narrow for the slingers to operate effectively, they had taken up positions at the base of the wall. In silence, each man pulled an egg-sized stone from the leather pouch at his waist and nestled it into the sling’s cradle.

***

One hundred meters.

The soldiers on the walls, their eyes fixed on the approaching enemy, let out a spontaneous cheer as a significant number of Lucanians crossed the invisible line.

Gnaenat had no idea what the Greeks were screaming about, but he instinctively tightened his grip on his round shield. Many of his warriors had discarded their shields during the chase, finding them too heavy and cumbersome, but he had held onto his.

A few moments, Greeks, and I’ll make sure you can’t make a sound, he muttered viciously. Just as he took another step, a sharp pain shot through his right foot.

A trap! The thought jolted him. He instinctively tried to pull his foot back, but a far more excruciating pain tore through him, nearly robbing him of his voice. Looking down, he saw that a large chunk of flesh had been ripped from his right calf, which was now bleeding profusely. He pushed aside the tall grass for a closer look and found a thirty-centimeter-long iron spike, its tip sharpened and barbed, angled in the dirt. He yanked at it, but it wouldn’t budge. Only after clawing away the packed earth did he see that the spike’s base was firmly welded to a block of wood buried deep in the ground. No wonder it had torn away his flesh with such force.

“Vicious Greeks…!” Gnaenat cursed. He ripped a strip of linen from his tunic and wrapped it around his wounded leg, then used his spear to prop himself up. Gritting his teeth against the pain, he bellowed, “Careful! There are iron hooks on the ground!”

His warning came too late. All around him, warriors were collapsing to the ground, their cries of agony filling the air. From the walls, the mercenaries heard the enemy’s screams and erupted in cheers. “The meat hooks are working! There goes another one!”

The veterans proudly informed the new recruits that this was another of General Davos’s creations, deepening the awe the young soldiers felt for their leader. In truth, this type of trap was standard issue for Roman legionary camps throughout history, a piece of knowledge Davos had picked up from a military history forum. While it might seem to have limited killing power, a foot injury in the age of blade and spear was more than enough to take a warrior out of the fight.

The Lucanian warriors who followed saw the carnage and immediately became more cautious. They advanced slowly, hunched over, carefully scanning the tangled grass and rocks to avoid the terrible traps. But just as they slowed, the mercenaries’ ranged assault began. Though the slingers couldn’t see their targets, the archers in the watchtowers acted as their spotters. With the sheer number of Pyxous’s warriors packed together, their accuracy was devastating. Trying to dodge the hail of stones made it impossible to watch the ground, leaving the warriors with a grim choice: get hit by a rock from above, or impaled by a spike from below.

After struggling forward another few dozen meters, they encountered an even more terrifying trap—one the mercenaries called the “Tombstone.” It was a pit, about one and a half meters deep, with a sharpened wooden stake planted at the bottom and concealed with a thin layer of loose dirt. An unwary step was all it took for gravity to do the rest, the stake easily capable of punching straight through a man’s foot.

By the time Cincinnag, the paramount chieftain of the Pyxous, arrived on the scene, he was met with the sight of countless warriors on the ground, clutching their feet. The air was thick with their moans. The rest of his men stood frozen a hundred meters from the enemy camp, their faces masks of fear, unwilling to advance another step.

“What is this?! Why aren’t you attacking?!” Cincinnag demanded, his voice trembling with a mixture of fury and heartache as he looked at his fallen tribesmen.

“Father.” Leaning on his spear like a crutch, Gnaenat limped over to him, his face etched with pain. “The cowardly Greeks have laid traps all outside their camp. Many… many of our warriors have been wounded, and we can’t even get close to their walls.”

“Warriors?! You call yourselves warriors, acting like this?!” Cincinnag’s roar of contempt made the men around them hang their heads in shame.

Seeing his most valued son wounded and disheveled, his usual vibrant spirit replaced by exhaustion and defeat, Cincinnag felt his anger soften into pain. “How bad are your wounds?” he asked, his tone gentler.

“Just flesh wounds. I’m fine,” Gnaenat insisted, though it was clear he was struggling. “It’s just… we’ve lost too many of our people… We can’t… we can’t keep attacking…”

Cincinnag gave a slight nod. He gazed at the mercenary camp in the distance, and the memory of the casualties these men had inflicted on his warriors sent a fresh wave of hatred through him. “Send in the Bruttii.”

After the Greek army had routed, the warriors from Veii lacked the Pyxous’s burning desire for revenge and had pursued at a slower pace, arriving at the same time as Cincinnag. They had seen for themselves the wretched state of the Pyxous warriors. But when you’re forced to bow your head, you have no choice but to obey. Sedorum, the chieftain of Veii, accepted Cincinnag’s command, but with one request: to borrow the shields of the Pyxous warriors.

Cincinnag agreed.

The men of Veii, resentful of the Pyxous’s high-handedness, were nursing a simmering anger and a desire to prove they were better than that bunch of cowards. Learning from the Pyxous’s mistake, they avoided the treacherous grasslands, choosing instead to advance along the relatively narrow, flat path leading directly to the camp’s entrance. Holding the heavy round shields high to protect their heads, they formed a long column and began to advance, one careful step at a time.