Fierban was rushed away to bed as soon as they reached Shaocoun. Doctors treated his wounds and priests did the necessary praying for a swift recovery. Then Fierban lay down on his bed and entered a deep meditative trance, awakening only to use the bathroom and to eat rice and honey mixed with healing herbs.
Fierban&co. move into Shaocoun. Fierban rests for the week.
Tsoi watched the former horsemen marching up and down in proper armour with proper weapons. He was a soldier of Fierban and infantry called to him; neat ranks of men who moved and fought properly, without the interference of an unpredictable animal. He oversaw them marching for another hour, then organised them into combat drills.
"Sure, you know how to fight as a an individual, but an infantry man has two extra weapons in every fight; the man to his left and the man to his right. Learn how to use them!"
So they fought in rows for a few hours. And then they marched some more. Ad infinitum for the rest of the week.
The inexperienced cavalry in Shaocoun are replaced with infantry.
The experienced cavalry ride south from the SE of the city (under control of a captain)
The land sloped upwards slightly as they neared the water. They could see the three islands far to the south, and across the wide river the other land which the bridge would connect them to, but of the bridge there was no sign. Ohon could not believe that any bridge could ever span the river. Such a bridge would take a week to cross at least! But the engineers seemed to be in no doubt that it was possible. On the contrary, they seemed hardly interested in the prospect at all.
Then, at a seemingly random place in the landscape, the head engineer told him to stop. The area looked the same as all the others. Ohon supposed that the islands looked sort of in a straight line from here, but it was hard to tell. But the engineers were confident and were already unpacking their carts, so he stopped. And then he watched. With mild interest at first, then with amazement, and finally with disbelief, as the carts yielded more and more junk, which, put together, made machines that towered two stories high.
"But this is amazing!" he remarked to one of them. "How did you manage to fit all this in your simple carts?"
"I could tell you" the engineer replied, slotting a doodad into a thingy "But I would have to kill you"
So Ohon simply watched as a crane twenty meters tall appeared from simple wooden beams and lifted rafts down into the water. He watched as the engineers cleared away soil, revealing stone pillars it took a minute to walk across. He boiled his leather helmet and ate it as blocks of stone the size of a man appeared from the river and were lifted into place with ease. The engineers remained ever uninterested in what they were doing, even as the beginnings of the bridge appeared, wide enough for fifty men to walk abreast.
"Of course, the actual bridge will be fortified" explained one in a rare moment of openess. "We're just doing the minimum here"
The engineers and accompanying cavalry moves east, and construction begins on the great big bridge.
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Topic: Wars of the Celestial Lord - a game of intrigue, strategy and roleplay (Read 22134 times)