The dawn’s early light.
Accompanied by the rapid sound of hoofbeats, an attendant rider brought back a dreaded but expected news: the Saxon Barbarian Race had launched a massive invasion and was ready to press on and attack the Duke of Dingtiger’s territory.
The Saxon Barbarian Race rose from plundering; they would raid and sack multiple times before occupying the land.
The Barbarians are not very good at sieging cities.
Their current main attack direction is London, while elsewhere, they merely loot. This looted wealth can attract more Saxons to join the invasion of Great Britain.
The Saxons, Angles, and Jutes are allied forces, often slaughtering and looting together against the Britons.
Money is the root of all evil.
This is how the Saxons nibbled away at Great Britain little by little.
As a small group of Barbarian cavalry appeared within sight, the Saxon messenger arrived in the morning.
— Saxon Noble Knight (One Star).
With the Duke of Dingtiger’s face turning grim, the Saxon messenger threw the heads hanging from his horse outside the castle.
There were five heads in total.
Two were commanders of the British Legion appointed by him, and three were knights loyal to him.
Duncan stood on the city wall listening to the dialogue between the Duke’s attendant and the Barbarian messenger. They were conversing in Old English, babbling a conversation, followed by a very obvious threatening gesture.
He felt he could understand some of it but not entirely; perhaps he hadn’t slain enough Saxon Barbarians.
The Crow Queen - Triss softly translated: "The Saxon messenger wants the Duke of Dingtiger to admit defeat and pay them about fifteen thousand gold coins in tribute."
"Otherwise, the Saxon army will destroy everything here."
Setting aside whether the Duke of Dingtiger could come up with such a large sum, from his flattering attitude towards the group yesterday, it was clear this British Duke had no wish to submit to the Saxons. Even though the Britons’ fighting prowess was mediocre, they had resisted down to Wales for nearly a thousand years.
Negotiations between the two sides ended in discord.
By evening, the Saxon army had already camped over ten miles away outside the castle.
Duncan left the city to scout together with the Duke’s knights and attendants.
At this time, Anya had already reached a preliminary cooperation intention with the Duke of Dingtiger. To ’show sincerity’, this Roman noblewoman lent her personal guard lover to assist the Duke’s few light cavalry in scouting enemy positions.
In the current situation, the Duke of Dingtiger needed to seize every available force.
The situation was even worse than anticipated.
Because Saxon reinforcements had arrived, the army swelled from over a thousand to around three thousand, seemingly reinforced from elsewhere, intending to decisively crush the Duke of Dingtiger and push him into the mountainous areas of Cornwall.
Unlike the previous battle, this time there were two conspicuous marked figures in the Barbarian army.
— Hengist[Chieftain][King][Odin’s Gaze][Legend](Two Star Gold)!
— Hosa[Chieftain][Chieftain][Odin’s Gaze][Legend](Two Star Gold)!
"Barbarian chieftain units? I don’t recall hearing of them."
Duncan observed the camps across the river from a god-like perspective. The most conspicuous targets in the enemy formation were the two marked as chieftain units, surrounded by numerous Barbarian noble knights and priests of the Germanic polytheism faith.
Hengist and Hosa were the Saxon Barbarian leaders who invaded Britain. They initially served as mercenaries helping the Britons resist the Picts, who were the early Scottish savages, indigenous people never conquered by Rome. Under Roman rule, the Britons considered the Picts to be a barbaric race, plagued by their raids and repeatedly sought aid from the Empire.
Later, these two brothers realized the Britons were so weak and conceived the idea of seizing this land.
They defeated the Briton army and established the Kingdom of Kent in the Kent region.
At this moment, the enemy was conducting a blood sacrifice.
This horrific blood sacrifice ritual originated from Scandinavia and was known as the Blood Eagle ritual. The priest would first carve the shape of an eagle on the victim’s back, then cut open the sacrificial target’s back to expose the spine, severing each rib from the spine, one by one till the ribs were lifted open. Finally, the victim’s lungs were pulled out to resemble a pair of wings.
It is also called the Blood Crow Sacrifice, generally targeting captives who dared to resist. Another blood sacrifice involves hanging corpses, as Odin hung on the World Tree for nine days and nine nights; thus, sacrifices dedicated to him must be hung.
Duncan almost vomited at the sight.
He was accustomed to battlefield slaughters but was witnessing such a brutal and primitive blood sacrifice ritual for the first time.
"Compared to the Roman and Greek gods, the Germanic barbarian gods are more bloodthirsty in their worship."
The ancient Greek gods merely indulged in excesses, not fond of bloody and cruel sacrifices. (Zeus in particular)
These must be the Barbarian leaders who established the Kingdom of Kent.
Duncan had only seen ’Sol Warriors’ before, and now seeing ’Odin’s Gaze’, he couldn’t help but focus his mind to observe more.
— [Odin’s Gaze]: The target conquered the Kent region of Great Britain and established a Germanic Barbarian kingdom there. His sacrifices to Odin have garnered the attention of the polytheistic divine spirits, immensely boosting his influence and appeal among the Germanic Barbarian race. (Odin’s Gaze lasts for three months, requiring ongoing sacrifices to maintain divine attention.)