Published at 2nd of February 2024 7:08 am

Chapter 876: Battle of Nola (I)

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Xanticles' heavy words stirred the strategoi of the Campanian League deeply, prompting Aeoles to reflect immediately on the plight of Neapolis. With numerous refugees converging in the city where food was scarce, it would become challenging to maintain order and the looming fear of an epidemic breaking out.

In contrast, the strategoi of cities like Herculaneum, Liternum, and so on eagerly looked forward to leading their people to return to their homes, but their houses were currently in ruins. Once the Samnites invade again, they won't be able to defend themselves…so do they have to continue hiding in the city of Neapolis in the future? Not only were the people struggling to endure, but the citizen soldiers under their command would also oppose it.

Xanticles saw the Campanian League's strategoi thinking depressedly and said, “It's true that our soldiers are exhausted after the bitter battle. However, aren't the Samnites who had come from afar also spent?! At least our soldiers have time to rest, while the Samnites used one day to reach here from Beneventum, and they surely didn't rest much on the way and will only be even more exhausted than our soldiers. So, could they still run like the wind when fighting like they did before?!

Besides, while our soldiers' morale increased from capturing Nola, the Samnites had lower morale than ours as they were worried and anxious about Nola. Moreover, even if the Samnites have ten thousand reinforcements, we still outnumber them. Remember, their force also includes over two thousand warriors from Nuceria. And just like what that Abellinum scout reported before, they have already covertly contacted the leader of the Nucerians, so these two thousand Nucerian warriors are not allies of the Samnite reinforcements but rather our supporters at the critical moment!”

As Xanticles continued to speak, his emotions began to get stirred up also, “Everyone, with all the advantages we have, it's exactly the right time to seize this favourable moment and take the initiative to meet the incoming enemies, defeat them, and completely expel them out of the Campanian Plains, so that you, the people of the Campania, can have peace and tranquillity!”

Xanticles' words stirred the hearts of most of the strategoi and dispelled their doubts.

But some still raised objections, “Can we even believe the words of those Abellinum?!” The Samnites and Campanians have been fighting for decades and regard each other as mortal enemies, so how could they easily believe them?

Before Xanticles could answer, Aeoles interjected, “The people of Abellinum assisted Lord Alexius in defeating the Samnite army in the mountains and are now helping him besiege Beneventum, so why couldn't we trust them?! The Abellinum are allies of Theonia and certainly friends of ours! And the Nucerians as well, and let's not forget that we owe it to them that we were able to take the city of Nola!”

In fact, it's not that the Nucerians didn't have conflicts with the Campanians during the battle in Nola; it's just that the officials of Irna tried to separate their tasks as much as possible to minimise contact. For example, they had given the Nucerians the work of cutting down the tree trunks and digging the trench without allowing them to participate in constructing the earthen rampart. They had also made them rest south near Nuceria’s territory at night. Of course, there was another reason for doing this, which was to keep the Nolan defenders from seeing that the Nucerians were closely interacting with the Theonians so as not to bring harm to the Nucerian warriors who were still among the Samnite Tribal Alliance.

That strategos could only remain silent.

Aeoles looked at Xanticles and solemnly asked, “If we follow your words and lead the army to face the Samnite reinforcements, can we achieve victory?”

Xanticles replied solemnly, “As long as we give it with all our might, we can achieve victory!”

Aeoles was concerned that once they lost, the slow-moving Campanian heavy infantry would find it impossible to escape the pursuit of the Samnites, thereby worsening the situation in the Campanian League.

But back when he assisted the Theonian army when they battled on the Campanian plains both times, he became impressed by Theonia's formidable military strength. Therefore, Xanticles' affirmation gave confidence in him. Thus, he faced the strategoi of the Campanian League and exclaimed, “Everyone, with the help of our Theonian allies, we will definitely defeat the Samnites! There's no need for you to hesitate. Go and gather your soldiers at once; we will meet the enemy and chase them out of the Campanian plains once and for all!”

No one expressed opposition this time.

.............

The Nolan defenders felt something was wrong when the Theonian army formed outside Nola early in the morning, so they sent a small team to sneak out of the city. After paying many casualties, they managed to escape the enemies' encirclement by scurrying through the hill to the southeast and into the mountain range. Then, they rushed to Beneventum to ask for help. But exactly noon, at the entrance to the mountain pass leading from Caudium to Beneventum, they managed to run into Segobani's army.

Realising the imminent danger to the city of Nola, Segobani promptly ordered them to speed up their march. Simultaneously, he dispatches heralds to relay the urgent message to Suessula swiftly.

Then, once the Caudini army left the mountains and entered Caudium's territory, they didn't even rest in the city but continued to march forward, cross the wider pass between the mountains and reach Abella. Here, they were joined by the one thousand three hundred warriors sent by Suessula, bringing the total force to over nine thousand, which was the largest force that the Caudini could now field.

Then they left the pass, entered the Campanian plain, bypassed the mountains, turned south and headed straight towards Nola.

Although the road from Caudium to Nola was flat, marching throughout the day left the Samnites, who were good at running and full of energy, exhausted. Many tribal chieftains even requested Segobani to allow the warriors to rest.

But Segobani rejected their suggestion as, from the several Nolan messenger's accounts, he realised the determination of the Theonian-Campanian forces to capture Nola. Therefore, he needed to reinforce them as soon as possible to prevent the Theonians from gaining control of this crucial location for the Caudini tribe. After all, it would result in the southern part of the Caudini territory being cut off, a situation he could not allow

About five kilometres from Nola, Segobani received a report from the scout he sent to check on Nola, “The enemy's army is coming out of Nola and heading towards us, with a large number of soldiers!”

“Are you sure the enemy came out of Nola?!” Segobani asked in disbelief.

“Chief, when we approached Nola…the battle had already ended, and we only saw many Campanians carrying corpses outside the city…the enemy did indeed leave the city through the north gate of Nola, fully armed, and they didn't look as if the battle had just ended…” the Caudini scout said with a mournful expression.

Segobani was shocked as he had rushed to lead this massive army to aid Nola, as he didn't believe the Theonian-Campanian forces could capture the city, defended by thousands of Caudini warriors, in just a few days. Unfortunately, the current situation exceeded his expectations.

But after only a moment of thinking, he snapped at the somewhat shaken chieftains, “Weren't you always complaining about if the Campanians hadn't hidden in their cities like turtles and dared not fight against us, we would have already occupied the entire Campanian plain?! Now, the opportunity has come as those cowardly Campanians dared to take the initiative to attack us! Do they really think that with just the help of the Theonians, they can transform from a pack of rabbits into a vicious wolf?! Their numbers are similar to ours, and they have also just finished sieging a city! They came just in time, as we can now finish them completely. Not only will we be able to retake Nola, but there will no longer be any forces in the Campanian plains that will stand in our way, and we, the Caudini, will alter the entire war situation!”

The chieftains became motivated by Segobani's fighting spirit as they all clamoured to fight the enemy to the death.

Thus, the chieftains executed the order to stop advancing, rest on the ground and begin forming up.

Earlier, Basani felt anxious as he originally thought that this Caudini army would rest in Caudium after travelling through the mountains. But beyond his expectations, they would go all the way to Nola. Thus, he could only send his men to inform the other Nucerian chieftains about the news that the Nucerians had already freed themselves from Segobani's control and allied themselves with Theonia.

Now that he learned they were about to engage in battle with the Campanians and were about to form up, Basani became even more anxious because Segobani had forcefully ordered the various Nucerian tribes in the army to disperse immediately to their appointed places in the formation, without refusal or delay!

Segobani places the dozen or so tribes of Nuceria to the front and rear of the entire left, centre and right flanks of the formation. He arranged them in this position to make it impossible for them to communicate with each other during battle.

In fact, the Nucerian forces were now like a hot potato for Segobani, and with what he had done to their territory before and now that Theonai was occupying it, he was certain that the Nucerian army would rebel once they learnt the truth.

Thus, Segobani thought it would be better to completely separate them and forcibly incorporate them into the armies of other tribes, which would certainly provoke resistance from the Nucerians. It wasn't that Segobani didn't try to solve it at the beginning: Right around the time the Samnite Tribal Alliance army had met at Beneventum, he had suggested to the other Great Chieftains that he wanted to use the Tribal Alliance's strength to suppress the resistance of the Nucerian warriors and take the opportunity to split them apart.

Unfortunately, Badani and Konteruk oppose it, especially Konteruk, who sternly rebukes this practice, arguing that it was Kinduk's fault for colluding with foreign enemies. Now that they had already punished him and his tribe, and the other Nucerian tribal warriors had shown such valour in battle (the Nucerian army, forced by Segobani, was always at the forefront of the battle), it was enough to atone for their previous transgression. Moreover, it was a military tradition in Samnite for the chieftains of the various tribes to lead their own people into battle, and breaking that tradition would only instil fear in the other tribes.

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