Mediterranean Hegemon of Ancient Greece - Chapter 1295

[Chapter 244 The Battle of Cyprus (1)]

Sekelian shook his head gently and said calmly: “The reason why Your Majesty made us take huge risks and travel long distances to come here, the capture of Cyprus is only a secondary purpose, the most important thing is to destroy the Persian fleet and control the Near East waters. Dominance… Now that more than 4,000 heavy infantry have landed, this has posed a great threat to Cyprus and has undermined the attempts of the Persian fleet to intercept us at sea. Under such circumstances, they are likely to face When it comes to the threat to our powerful fleet of Dionia, we choose to retreat temporarily, and instead send reinforcements and supplies to towns such as Nicosia on the island, so that it cannot be easily conquered by our army.

After all, our fleet Coming from a long journey, the materials we carry cannot guarantee the material consumption of our fleet’s huge crew. If the army cannot quickly capture towns such as Nicosia, our fleet will have to retreat first. At that time… hum, the Persian fleet can be easily cut off. Landing on the army’s sea supply line, the army will be in big trouble at that time-”

Having said this, Sekelian’s face became very serious: “The army is still unlucky, the key is that this time His Majesty personally led the army and wanted to Acquiring the great honor of conquering Persia, our navy has been given the important task of destroying the Persian fleet and gaining dominance in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. If the mission of lure the enemy fails due to passive avoidance of war, it may even lead to the failure of the first battle, which will affect the entire war to conquer Persia. , I am ashamed of His Majesty’s trust, and I even have no words to meet those army generals that I once laughed at!”

“It’s not so serious…” The flagship captain murmured.

Sekelian glared at him dissatisfied, and said solemnly: “I am the commander of this operation, I must seize every possible opportunity to ensure the smooth progress of the operation, so we must stay here and cannot leave. For the Persian fleet, what could be more attractive to them than to destroy a Dionysian fleet far fewer than them, while completely besieging the island with several thousand Diorian troops!”

“My lord, our warships are too few after all. I’m worried about the Persian fleet… Really eat us as a delicacy—”

The captain stammered halfway through his speech, when he was interrupted by Sekerian sharply: “Even if the number of Persian warships is two or three times ours, the fleet led by Sekerian will definitely be a hard rock. , it will break the teeth of the Persian fleet! What’s more, I believe that Midorades, he is not only experienced in naval battles, but also has a good intuition, and will lead other warships to join us in time to destroy the Persian fleet together! After

Sekelian

made up his mind, the captain of the flagship did not dare to persuade him any more, but instead conveyed the command of the fleet commander to all the warships: All Raven warships were mounted on the drawbridge and ready for battle!

More than an hour has passed, and no trace of the enemy ship has been found, but a small number of Cypriot cavalry have appeared on the island. They spy on the Dionian Legionnaires building a camp near the beach from a distance, but they have not dared to approach. It seemed that the Cypriots had no intention of gathering their troops and fighting the landed Dionian army.

Of course, the Dionian Legion who landed also had no plans to do so

. What they had to do now was to stick to the landing site and facilitate the arrival of the successor troops.

“The clipper to the south has raised a yellow flag!” the lookout on the flagship mast suddenly shouted loudly.

Sekerian, who was anxiously waiting, was not excited, but muttered to himself with some doubts: “There are fewer Persian warships than us?”

Seeing Sekerian’s dissatisfied expression, Instead, the captain of the flagship sighed lightly and asked, “Sir, do you want to inform the warships to prepare for battle?”

Sekelian paced back and forth on the deck, pondered for a while, and then said in a deep voice, “Wait a little longer. First! Let all the clippers be divided into two parts, one part will bypass the Persian warship, continue to probe south, and the other part will probe north.” The

flagship captain’s heart moved: “Sir, do you suspect that the Persian fleet is divided?”

Sai Keli An calmly replied: “I don’t think the Persians are so daring to lead a small number of warships to attack us. What’s more, I am convinced that our fleet can easily take this number of enemy ships without much preparation. Defeat them all!”

Just when the crew of the southernmost warship of the Dionian Fleet could see the silhouette of the enemy ship in the far distance, the Dionian Clippers, rushing to the south, passed the information back by changing the flag on the mast. fleet.

“Two yellow flags!” The lookout’s shout made Sekerian still silent, but the flagship captain heard another report from the lookout, and clenched his fists nervously: “The Persian warship is not far from us. To four miles!”

He looked at Sekerian who was sitting on the deck like a clay sculpture, and hesitated several times.

At this moment, the voice of the lookout sounded again: “Three yellow flags! The clipper in the south has raised three yellow flags! There is no change in the north!”

Sekelian suddenly jumped up: “Three yellow flags! Persian warships The number exceeds ours, which means that their main force is coming, and the Persians have taken the bait!”

Sekelian danced with excitement, and immediately said the battle plan he had already thought up: “Blow the bugle and let all the warships. Arrange into a circular formation and conduct defensive operations!”

“Circular formation?!” The flagship captain was slightly taken aback.

“What? Think I can only attack, not defend?!” Cykrian said with a half-smile.

“I’ll communicate it right away!” The flagship captain’s worries were eased, and it was obvious that his respected fleet commander did not lose his calm because of the arrival of the fighter plane.

“By the way, arrange all the iron ships at the forefront of the circle, facing the direction of the Persian fleet’s attack!”

“Yes!”

……………………………………………… …………

This Persian fleet headed by Phoenicia and Cyprus has nearly a thousand warships and is stationed in various naval ports in eastern Cyprus. After receiving the order from Yalitaka, the Cypriot crew members acted the most. Actively, they boarded their warships at the fastest speed, and rushed out of the military port. Then, without waiting for the warships behind to line up, they set off westward along the coast of Cyprus.

When Yalitaka’s flagship sailed out of the military port, he discovered that under the leadership of the Cypriots, many warships did not stop after leaving the port, and headed westward like a swarm.

As the fleet commander, Yalitaka stomped his feet in anger, but he had no choice but to scold the Cypriots for being stupid. At the same time, he hoped that when the entire fleet reached the waters off the west coast of Cyprus, the Dionysian fleet had not yet arrived. He still has time to regroup the fleet.

The Persian fleet has formed a long column after leaving the port. During the journey, due to the different levels of input of the crew members belonging to various parts of Persia, this long column gradually began to disjoint, and the warships of Cyprus were in the forefront. , the Phoenicians are in the center, the Syrian and other warships are at the end… and the Cypriot warships in the front are also out of touch, and the warships from the westernmost port of Larnaca are in the forefront… …

After a voyage of more than three hours, the Cypriot warship rounded the westernmost promontory of the island from the south, and with the help of the southerly wind, the speed increased again, and after only 20 minutes, the Cypriot warship looked The hands saw the Dionysian fleet in the bay, the many Dionysian cargo ships docked on the beach, and the Dionysian soldiers (actually, the Dionysian soldiers going back and forth from the cargo ships to the beach) Because of the distance and psychological effects, the Cypriot watchers had an illusion).

The Diorians are landing!

… This news made all the Cypriot crew nervous, and the belief in defending their homeland made them forget their fatigue and made them feel the urgency of the situation.

According to the military order, they should stop advancing after discovering the Dionysian fleet, join with other warships, and then follow the command of the fleet commander to launch an attack.

But at this moment, under the command of the Cypriot naval admiral, they only slowed down in the process of changing the formation, and after the completion, they continued to accelerate, charging the Dionia Fleet in a double-column formation. .

During the Hippo-Persian War, the warships of the city-states in the Near East were famous for their large and heavy hulls and large crews, but they lost to the small and flexible Greek coalition forces in the Battle of Salamis. Warships, and many times lost to the Athenian Navy in the process of Athens’ expansion to the eastern Mediterranean, forcing the city-states in the Near East to abandon large and inappropriate warships and rebuild their fleets with three-tier oars as the main body, even if the The same is true of the Phoenician city-states, so later, those two-headed dragon warships, four-tiered oars, and five-tiered oars were only used by Carthage in the Western Mediterranean, and the city-states in the Near East were the main naval forces. The composition of the Persian fleet was completely identical to that of the Athenian fleet.

At this time, although the Cypriot warship had lowered its sails, the sailors were rowing hard, and the forward speed of the warship was accelerating. Soon the Dionysian warship was close at hand, and the Cypriot crew was even on the deck. In the nervous maneuvering, they looked curiously at the crow suspension bridge that was erected high and constantly swaying on the enemy ship in front. Although they had not fought against the Dionysian fleet before, they had also heard of the peculiarity of the Dionysian navy. The warship is somewhat on guard.

Since the Dionysian warships were almost only turning in place, the warships on both sides were always bow to bow. At this time, the Cypriot warships did not want to die with each other, so the helmsman turned the rudder slightly, and the captain turned towards the bilge at the same time. Shouting: “Close the paddle!”

txt download address:

mobile phone reading: