“It’s so cold”

The heavy snow started to fall again, and Frank Wenqin couldn't help but wrap the cloth strip on her body tightly, allowing the ragged coat that had been with him for ten years to tightly wrap around her body.

Wenqin, a German-speaking farmer, can be seen that this man's ancestors have never had any wealth.

He is twenty-five years old this year, from Hannover, a place where Protestant and Catholic forces repeatedly compete and fight. The originally prosperous castle, the countryside has long become a white land after thirty years. He, a member of the Hannover Iron Industry Union, was forced to become a soldier and now a mercenary.

He was a craftsman who casts cannons in Hannover. He is now one of the artillery soldiers of Kalinovsky and these heavy artillery soldiers. After Kalinovsky's defeat, their artillery soldiers naturally became prisoners and were escorted to Zaporoze by cavalry.

Wenqin is one of the only gunners of two forty-eight-pound heavy artillery in the artillery team. This kind of artillery is three meters long, has a caliber of nearly twenty centimeters, and weighs three tons. In this way, a cannon requires sixteen tall horses to be pulled by.

Needless to say, such artillery is specially used to attack cities, and there are not many in Europe. Now that it appears in Ukraine, it must be that the Polish king is a little impatient with the protracted Cossack war.

Such artillery has extremely high requirements for roads. In Europe, except for the United Kingdom, the Netherlands has barely a small number of roads paved with stones. Most places are muddy roads stepped on by people and animals. Such roads can only be walked in a cold winter. In other seasons, even if you spend a lot of effort, you can walk ten miles a day and burn incense.

At present, France, the largest European power, needs to develop a large-scale path centered on Paris, and it will take ten years to go. Why is the Netherlands the most developed in Europe at this time based on the densely weaved river network (including canals) and land transportation in the country. The whole of Europe will need to wait until a hundred years before it can be paid attention to it.

In their eyes, the Daxia's way of heaven is an extraordinary existence, and the railway is like the re-coming of Christ.

At present, Wenqin's artillery team has been taken over by the Hanhai Army's infantry. According to Nikan's idea, it is natural that most of these gunners from Germany are willing to join the Hanhai Army, and it is okay if they are unwilling. The Hanhai Army does not say that professional soldiers are employed to fight. The vast territory of the empire, countless mines, and roads require a lot of manpower.

Wenqin voluntarily joined the Hanhai Army, so she received preferential treatment and was licensed to continue to retain a short knife.

On both sides of the artillery team as slow as a snail, the Hanhai Army's infantry brigade was marching. In Wenqin's opinion, this team from the East was different from all the teams he had ever seen.

He joined the army at the age of fifteen. He had seen the German Protestant army, Catholic army, Swedish army, Bohemian army, and Spanish army. Everyone was almost the same. Most of them were professional soldiers with skilled tactics and weapon operation skills, but they were all confused and dull. On the battlefield, they were all professional soldiers with strict discipline and brave combat. However, when they were not fighting, they were also skilled robbers, thieves, rapists, and murderers.

When encountering an enemy that is obviously higher than you, it is conceivable to retreat wildly, and you have never fought to the end.

Such soldiers are the most suitable for mercenaries. The Germans were deeply involved in the Thirty Years of War and also trained the most professional soldiers. If this force is combined, it is still quite terrible, but it is scattered in the names of electoral princes and castles. In addition, the thirty-year war has caused half of the population of the entire German country. Even the ambitions of aristocrats will be discouraged.

Like Wenqin, most people, including infantry, artillery, and cavalry, were walking in the wind and snow with their arms held, while the Hanhai Army soldiers around them were completely different.

Right next to Wenqin was a company of Hanhai artillery. In addition to the driving people, they followed the people on both sides of the sports car in a neat row.

Wenqin couldn't help but envy. Most of these soldiers were strong in wool coats, shiny copper-buckle belts in the middle, fur-shaped leather hats with brims, and military boots up to their knees. Military boots like this were also found in German military officers, but their boots were made of wood and glue. Often, the soles of the boots were basically scrapped after a fierce battle.

But the military boots of the Hanhai Army are extraordinary at first glance. Like the wheels of the carriage in Daxia Kingdom today, they have used rough rubber made of asphalt, resin, fish glue and sap - something that looks extremely rough but has an actual effect that is close to rubber.

The mercenary teams were dressed in various ways. It can be seen that most of their clothes were stolen, some were stolen enemy uniforms, and some were stolen aristocratic clothes. They could survive the cruel thirty years of war (mostly they started to participate in the war in the last ten years of the thirty years of war). They must have rich experience in combat, escape, and robbery.

Compared with these prisoners, the Hanhai Army's standard uniforms and all the standard weapons almost blinded them, because in the current European countries, only people with knights or above can own a set of "military uniforms" made according to tradition. Of course, there are Poles' winged cavalry, but now they have no war horses and are all hiking in the huge captive team.

Wenqin also discovered that even artillery soldiers in the Hanhai Army had weapons, each with a musket and a sabre. When walking, the musket was slung on his shoulder, holding the gun belt in his right hand, and waving his left hand with his steps, and walking with awesomeness.

Wenqin was even more envious of those cavalry. After the battle, most of the Hanhai Army's cavalry had already taken off their armor, but they were still wearing thick cotton coats with copper nails. At first glance, they were a kind of armor that could keep warm and had certain defense capabilities. The people put the terrifying long spear with sharp rifles behind their backs, and carried cavalry and short guns around their waists. Even on the horse, their upper bodies were straight.

When a cavalry, who was probably a messenger, rode his horse and rushed past Wenqin, his eyes were just opposite Wenqin. Wenqin sighed secretly, "These people, whether they are cavalry, infantry, or artillery, have very firm eyes. However, compared with this, these mercenary prisoners are a little timid, and most of them are confused and indifferent. The winged cavalry are slightly better, but they are limited."

In front of Wenqin was the twelve kilogram of Nibchu bronze cannon carried by the Hanhai Army infantry. I heard that this was the largest artillery in the Hanhai Army's caliber. Wenqin and the others had been on the land for three days. During these three days, they rested at noon for about one or two hours a day. Wenqin had seen the artillery soldiers of the Hanhai Army's test artillery.

It was a terrifying cannon that could accurately hit objects two thousand meters away. Although Wenqin and his guns were extremely heavy and had a large caliber, their range was far inferior. Even if they had to attack the city, they had to reach a certain distance before they could fire. The artillery mount, the body of the cannon and the first ammunition placed on the cannon stand, only four horses can be pulled and run quickly. After reaching the predetermined position, they can also quickly land, fix, and test-fire, which is more than about a mile faster than Wenqin and his guns.

"This is called a field gun"

Looking at the black, thick, rough cannons beside him, Wenqin suddenly felt bored.

The Hanhai Army needed a legion to watch these prisoners. Under Nikan's personal leadership, the remaining people had already set off towards Zaporoze first.

In the open battlefield of Halta, the Hanhai Army could not have captured all the enemies in one place, especially the Polish winged cavalry, some of which escaped, some of which escaped northward, and some of which escaped to Zaporoze.

Zaporoze, Pototsky camp.

After learning that Kalinovsky had suffered a crushing defeat, Pototsky fell ill again, and this illness was permanent. In history, he passed away this year, but not in this month, but this is not important. After the death of Konetspolsky, the great Polish kingdom, another famous general withered on the rough land of Ukraine.

Poland is not short of excellent generals, but this cannot save his fate. The seemingly extremely "democratic" political system made them look like a kingdom on the surface, but in fact they were a combination of noble lords similar to the Holy Roman Empire. Such a political system was quite a matter of peacetime, and they would not recover when they encountered a critical situation.

Zaslavsky, the leader of the Polish winged cavalry, took over the command power. He also had five thousand winged cavalry and ten thousand mercenaries, and could still fight the enemy to the death!

The five thousand-winged cavalry were not used by the Poles during the invasion of the Swedish Kingdom.

Just as Nikan led the Dachun Legion and his Shenwu Army approached Zaporoze, Zaslavsky had already set up a formation in the wilderness.

Another legion led by Ji Jiajie, who arrived in Kafbas with a large number of prisoners, did not go directly to Zaporoze, but went south, crossed the Dnieper River from near Nicopol, and returned to the jurisdiction of the Crimean Governor of the Kingdom of Daxia.

There were 15,000 people in Zaslavsky, and Nikan was almost the same. He started a confrontation on the wilderness on the west bank of the Dnieper River!

At this moment, the Poles were waiting for their work, but according to the regulations of the Hanhai Army, those who were obviously surrounded by great enemies, had to go forward fifty miles, and Nikan also had time to prepare, but the Poles would not give you time to camp.

Therefore, these fifty miles were the time for the Hanhai Army to rest, wear armor, eat, and feed horses. The Polish winged cavalry were heavy cavalry, and it was impossible for them to rush fifty miles to sneak attack the Hanhai Army.

A battle of Ming Cards is about to begin!

After about two hours, both sides, who were prepared, met on an open land of about tens of thousands of acres on the west side of the Polish camp.

"I finally met the authentic Polish winged cavalry."

Later, Nikan wrote in his memoir.

"There are about five thousand riders on the opposite side, and two thousand riders are similar to our flying dragon rider. They are wearing heavy armor, which is said to be heavy armor, and they are different from our full plate armor. The helmets are similar to the eyes. The armor on the upper body is similar to a mixture of plate armor and fish scale armor. They are connected by three or four pieces of steel armor. The chest is obviously a whole piece, and there are two to three pieces below. According to the size of each person, there are three pieces of plate armor, and two pieces of smaller ones."

"The lower body is a chain mail, on the arm, the top arm is plate armor, and the forearm is chain mail."

"It's similar to the Dragon Rider. Most of these two thousand riders hold spears, but there are about five hundred riders holding rifles - a kind of musket about one meter long, and some hold flails and warhammers."

"All the horses were not armed, but their war horses were still taller than those of Han Hai."

"Their spears are longer than our tiger spears. There are various small flags tied to the end of the spearhead. The patterns on the flags are different, probably the symbols of their respective families. The flags are slender, so that they can fly quickly in the wind."

"I've seen it"

Many years later, when Nikan recalled this scene, he was still a little excited. The Polish winged cavalry, due to the lack of information, even the Poles themselves could not explain what "wing" method it was. According to the speculation of later experts, most of the wings behind them were used in rituals and could not be used on the battlefield.

"They used it. It was a kind of wings that were closely connected to the armor. I don't know whether it was made of metal or wood. It was like a pair of wings, covered with feathers of various types of birds. Not only that, their upper body was covered with some beasts' fur, some were a whole piece, and some were a small piece, probably based on financial resources and different identities."

"The wind was very strong at that time, and the winged cavalry's wings and small flags on the tip of the spear were all clamoring in the wind, and the formation was indeed amazing."

"There are two groups of cavalry, and they are also equipped with winged cavalry, but they are not armed, and they are not armoured, but are not long spears, but sabers and short guns. Most of them are their light cavalry, which are used to further defeat the enemy or pursue the enemy after winning."

"Like our side, they have two thousand heavy cavalry in front, and one thousand five hundred light cavalry on both sides are on the back, in the shape of a font. Behind the cavalry is a large formation, most of which are their infantry."
Chapter completed!