Hunting

Two days had passed since the celebration banquet. Victor was now personally overseeing the military camp every day, handling the various issues related to the army's reorganization.

The officers above the squadron level were manageable; they were either seasoned squad leaders or directly appointed by the detachment leaders. However, selecting squad leaders sometimes proved problematic. This was because the auxiliary troops had not yet arrived. Of the 200 barbarian herdsmen planned for reassignment, only a little over a hundred had been recruited so far. Even if auxiliary squad leaders were appointed, they would be leading empty units.

As for the section leaders, it was simpler. They were generally elected by their respective sections and then formally appointed after a period of assessment. After all, some soldiers might gain support from others through their strength or personality, but that didn't necessarily mean they had the ability to manage a ten-person squad effectively.

The construction of other logistical detachments was also merely a framework. Normally, only a tenth of the personnel were on duty, with vacancies filled by new recruits during wartime.

Currently, the combat units had basically completed their reorganization. Temporary deputy squad leaders were appointed within each squad, with the intention of them directly taking on the role of auxiliary squad leaders during wartime.

This also brought a practical issue: this organizational structure required the auxiliary troops to possess basic combat capabilities. Victor's solution was to wait until winter, when construction work would halt. He planned to select auxiliary soldiers from the engineering corps for training. To this end, he instructed Powell to find people to produce a batch of warm clothing suitable for winter excursions. Fortunately, the Gorn Trading Company had recently delivered a large amount of cloth and furs.

Before that, he had to ensure the troops could apply the new organizational structure. He planned to organize a large-scale hunting operation once the flag bearers completed the first stage of their flag language training. Coincidentally, the territory's patrol cavalry had discovered large herds of yellow sheep, numbering in the thousands, north of the Great Fish River.

He had already issued a task to the calculation module to produce a hunting plan as soon as possible. The goal was to use this hunting operation to train the newly reorganized troops as much as possible, accelerating the entire unit's adaptation and integration with the new structure.

Thus, while busy with the army's reorganization and adjusting the hunting plan, Victor also drew over a hundred people from the territory's engineering corps to supplement the logistical detachments. This ensured that the supply convoys and engineering teams were at least half-staffed, capable of meeting some of the demands.

The date turned to October 15th. Victor decided to commence the hunting operation today. The specific time of the hunt was not announced in advance, but the hunting plan had been communicated to all detachment and squadron leaders. Victor intended for this hunting operation to help the troops adapt to the new organization and improve their response to emergency situations.

According to the hunting plan, the operation would be divided into four teams:

The First Cavalry Detachment would serve as the vanguard, tasked with scouting and driving the prey. The First Infantry Detachment would form the main body, responsible for encirclement and killing. The Second Cavalry Detachment would cover the flanks, providing mobile support. The Second Infantry Detachment would act as the rear guard, responsible for vigilance and acting as a reserve.

This hunting division was inspired by Victor's memories of the Jurchen tribes' hunting activities in his past life. Such encirclement hunts were essentially practical exercises that could effectively enhance the army's organization, coordination, and combat effectiveness.

Victor ordered all troops to cross the river as quickly as possible and proceed at full strength to the location of the yellow sheep herds, commencing the hunt according to their assigned tasks.

Ron's First Cavalry Detachment plunged into the grasslands like a wedge. "Spread out! Twenty men per patrol, report every five miles!" he shouted, cracking his whip. The cavalrymen quickly dispersed into over a dozen small teams, skimming the waves of grass towards the northeast. Their mission was scouting and driving – to find the flanks of the yellow sheep herds and use arrows and horns to force them into the encirclement.

But problems soon surfaced: the small teams repeatedly collided during their advance. "Damn it, left flank, slow down!" he roared, veins bulging on his forehead. A warhorse stumbled into a marmot hole in the chaos, and both horse and rider tumbled to the ground. Ron had to divert a team to rescue the injured, immediately thinning the vanguard's formation like a torn net.

Meanwhile, Santos's First Infantry Detachment was forming ranks in the center of the grassland. Squads of fifty men formed squares, layering upon each other to create an arc. "Present spears! Leave gaps during the encirclement; don't let the sheep stampede the formation!" His voice boomed like muffled thunder. The soldiers silently followed orders, but Santos noticed that the spacing between several squares was too wide – their flag language training was still insufficient, and some were still using old gestures to transmit signals.

The yellow sheep herds surged into the encirclement like a brown flood. They were far more agile than Victor had anticipated. The vanguard cavalry's efforts to drive them had failed to completely seal the eastern gap, and hundreds of yellow sheep darted through the gaps in Ron's detachment, heading straight for James's Second Cavalry Detachment. The young blond knight immediately became excited. "Flank charge! Cut them off!" His two hundred light cavalry thundered forward, but they charged too quickly and nearly collided with Foss's Second Infantry Detachment – the latter, meant to be guarding the rear, had been forced to advance prematurely by the stampeding sheep.

Ron's vanguard cavalry, with its loose formation, was scattered by the charging yellow sheep. Santos's main body formation had managed a rough encirclement, but the soldiers on the west side, unable to understand the new flag signals, had held their spears horizontally like defensive barriers, inadvertently forcing the sheep to turn and charge the vanguard formation. Victor watched everything with a cold gaze, allowing the messenger to anxiously ask for instructions on whether to intervene.

"Let them bleed, so they can learn how to stop it."

As the setting sun dyed the sea of grass blood-red, a turning point finally arrived.

Santos suddenly changed tactics. He ordered his soldiers to strike their weapons against each other, replacing the obscure flag signals. Amidst the deafening clang of metal, the infantry squares began to contract with the rhythm of drumbeats. The yellow sheep, startled by the noise, bunched together, falling directly into the ambush set by James's cavalry detachment. The rash knight now displayed astonishing adaptability: he abandoned the pursuit of the scattered sheep and instead divided his cavalry into three groups, combing the herd like a rake into a narrow column, directing them towards Santos's spear formation.

Ron's vanguard cavalry finally found its rhythm. He abandoned frontal interception and personally led thirty elites to the rear of the herd, setting the grass ablaze with oil-soaked rockets. As black smoke billowed, the startled yellow sheep were forced to turn, merging with the sheep driven by James, leaving them no room to escape. Foss's rear guard infantry, meanwhile, delivered the fatal blow in silence: when the last few hundred yellow sheep attempted to break through from the south, Foss had his soldiers suddenly withdraw their shield walls, revealing the horse pits dug in advance. The bleating sheep tumbled into the pits, their throats precisely pierced by the spearmen.

The campfire crackled, and the aroma of roasting lamb oil wafted through the camp. The four captains sat around Victor, their armor still stained with blood and grass.

Victor looked into the distance: the soldiers were mingling around the bonfires. Cavalrymen showed infantry improved buckle designs for stirrups, and infantry taught cavalry how to block stray arrows with their weapons. The morning's awkwardness had been replaced by a rough understanding – much like the sparks that always rose with the smoke when a blacksmith quenched steel.