Recaps

Bone Baldy launched a poorly prepared assault on Border Fortress to test its defenses, but James’s forces repelled the attack with devastating volleys and coordinated defenses. Bone Baldy ordered a retreat after the Barbarians failed to gain a foothold and suffered heavy casualties.

• Bone Baldy and Priest Sparison led more than thirty thousand troops in an attack on Border Fortress, and James ordered the defenders to prepare for battle.
• The fortress defenders unleashed more than fifteen thousand arrows in a devastating volley that tore a large gap in the Barbarian forces.
• The Barbarians pressed forward under Bone Baldy’s orders, but arrows and stone shot inflicted heavy casualties as they approached the walls.
• Tuowutuo abandoned the ramps for ladders, while Bone Baldy sent armored Iron Bone Tribe warriors up the ramps under cover from Barbarian archers.
• James’s defenders used spear formations to stop the ramp assault and quickly overwhelmed Barbarians who reached the battlements by ladders.
• Bone Baldy ordered the retreat after the defenders destroyed the siege equipment and blocked the assault, leaving Barbarian corpses scattered below the walls.

After the Barbarians suffered devastating losses, Bone Baldy and Priest Sparison arranged a pause in the fighting and secured permission to recover the dead. The mass funeral shook the Iron Bone Tribe's Forward Camp but drew many Barbarians to the Faith Order, advancing Sparison's missionary work.

• Bone Baldy and Priest Sparison agreed to suspend the fighting until Keledu and Heshima arrived, and Bone Baldy sent his wounded to the Faith Order for treatment.
• At Sparison's suggestion, Bone Baldy sent a messenger to the Border Fortress to request permission to clear the battlefield, and James granted it while keeping the garrison alert.
• More than twenty thousand Iron Bone Tribe herders and laborers spent over two days recovering bodies and equipment, and the priests counted more than forty thousand bodies.
• News of the death toll, estimated at over sixty thousand when other losses were included, damaged morale among Bone Baldy's troops and Heshima's units.
• Priest Sparison held a collective funeral, and many Barbarian herders, soldiers, and junior officers came to the Faith Order to learn about it or join.

Heshima reviewed Bone Baldy's account of the costly assault on the fortress and decided to postpone rewarding him while keeping the Faith Order's influence in check. Heshima's main army marched toward Bone Baldy's Forward Camp, concentrating its forces for a major attack on Two Rivers County.

• Keledu praised Bone Baldy's reported results, and Heshima acknowledged that the assault had weakened the fortress and reduced the army's supply needs.
• Heshima withheld Bone Baldy's reward until the campaign ended, then ordered him to prepare Forward Camp for the arriving army.
• Keledu declined Heshima's offer of a prepared camp site for the Faith Order's troops and said they would build their own camp.
• Heshima and Keledu led more than two hundred and fifty thousand troops toward Bone Baldy's Forward Camp while another subordinate took nearly eighty thousand toward the Blue Lake Bay Region.
• Heshima concentrated the army's strongest forces at Bone Baldy's camp, leaving smaller forces at the Blue Lake Bay outpost and the original Main Camp.

After learning from Ranger Cavalry that the Barbarian main force was approaching, James asked Victor for support. Victor considered the request but had not yet decided whether to send his reserve troops to the Border Fortress.

• James sent Ranger Cavalry behind the Barbarian Forward Camp, where they ambushed messengers and learned that the Barbarian army would soon arrive.
• The Ranger Cavalry returned to the Border Fortress and reported their intelligence to James.
• James told the officer corps the Barbarian main force was approaching and sent Victor a telegram requesting support.
• Victor discussed the report with Orlando and Saruman, who said the Barbarian main force numbered more than 200,000 and included the Faith Order’s elite Order Warriors.
• Victor weighed whether to send his roughly 15,000 reserve troops to support James, despite preferring not to deploy them.

Victor sent three thousand troops and newly developed grenades by train to reinforce James at the northwestern Border Fortress, while keeping forces back to protect Two Rivers County and Blue Lake Bay. He believed the fortress remained stable and that delaying the Barbarians would give the Northern Frontier Allied Army time to assemble.

• Victor decided to send three thousand troops and the Research Institute's new grenades to James, while retaining mobile forces for Two Rivers County and Blue Lake Bay.
• Saruman praised the heavy, fuse-lit grenades, which were designed to devastate and frighten enemies attacking city walls.
• Victor ordered the reserve troops to take five special trains to the northwestern Border Fortress, noting that limited railway capacity remained a problem.
• Victor reviewed plans to expand railway stations and manage railway land while restricting sales and monitoring employees for corruption.
• Victor watched the trains depart, then returned to the Lord's Mansion, believing the Border Fortress was stable and that Two Rivers County needed to hold off the Barbarian main force longer.

Heshima arrived at the Forward Base and inspected the battlefield after Bone Baldy and Keledu arranged a grand welcome to improve his view of Bone Baldy. He saw that the Border Fortress’s defenses had been cleared, leaving the Iron Bone Tribe better positioned for its next attack.

• Bone Baldy welcomed Heshima and Keledu at the Forward Base with music and praise, and Heshima was pleased by the ceremony.
• Keledu revealed that he had suggested the welcome to ease Heshima’s unfavorable impression of Bone Baldy and the Faith Order’s cooperation.
• Heshima declined to rest and asked Bone Baldy and the three Commanders of Ten Thousand to lead him to the battlefield.
• Heshima inspected the Border Fortress and saw that its trenches and moats had been destroyed and earthen slopes had been built to connect to its walls.

James and the fortress officers identified Heshima among the Iron Bone Tribe’s forces and fired a new pulley crossbow at him. The bolt killed a nearby commander instead, but Heshima’s guards fled in confusion, and Soyasdin was hailed for slaying an enemy general.

• James and Jackson recognized the Iron Bone Tribe’s Dire Wolf Guard, while Horne identified Heshima by the black bear hide he wore.
• James ordered Soyasdin to test the new Large Pulley Crossbow against Heshima, who stood just beyond one kilometer away.
• Soyasdin fired the crossbow and struck a well-armored man standing beside Heshima.
• James and the others saw the Dire Wolf Guard shield Heshima and escort him from the scene amid the chaos.
• James promised to report Soyasdin’s merit, and soldiers on the wall shouted Soyasdin’s name.

Horne led riders from the Border Fortress to reclaim Heshima’s discarded bearskin robe, then escaped the pursuing Dire Wolf Guard. James ordered the fortress’s crossbow units to attack the pursuers as they approached.

• Horne asked James for permission to leave the city, and James sent him with about a hundred trusted riders to retrieve the robe.
• Horne rode to the discarded belongings, seized the bearskin robe without dismounting, and raced back toward the Border Fortress.
• The Dire Wolf Guard pursued Horne and his riders, but they reached the fortress before the pursuers could catch them.
• James ordered Soyasdin to teach the pursuing cavalry a lesson, and the Bed Crossbow unit shot down dozens of riders.
• The Heavy Crossbow unit fired volleys into the chaotic Dire Wolf Guard and inflicted further casualties.

James ordered the Intelligence Department to rescue surviving Dire Wolf Guards after they retreated, while Heshima punished Guqien for the heavy losses. Keledu defended Guqien and quietly left him questioning Heshima’s judgment.

• Guqien led the surviving Dire Wolf Guards out of the fortress’s arrow range, leaving their dead and wounded behind.
• James ordered the Intelligence Department’s special operations team to rescue the wounded, and eight survivors later provided useful intelligence.
• Heshima berated Guqien for losing 120 Dire Wolf Guards and struck him with a cup, but Keledu argued that the men had acted to avenge the attack on Heshima.
• Heshima spared Guqien’s life but stripped him of command until he earned new military merit.
• Keledu cautioned Guqien not to resent Heshima, prompting Guqien to privately wonder whether Heshima should have been blamed for ordering the pursuit.

After Heshima lost a trusted commander and his prized cloak, he moved up the assault on the Border Fortress despite Keledu’s attempt to dissuade him. The exhausted Iron Bone Tribe troops were spared the main attack, while three units already stationed at the Forward Base prepared to storm the fortress.

• After Heshima’s commander was killed and the Former Tribal Alliance took his bearskin cloak, Heshima ordered the assault on the Border Fortress to begin early.
• Keledu visited Heshima that night to argue against the decision, but stopped when Heshima refused to listen.
• The Barbarians launched their assault the day after Heshima reached the Forward Camp, using three units stationed there because his arriving troops were exhausted.
• Heshima assigned the central attack to the unit whose commander had been killed and demanded that its soldiers avenge him.
• The fallen commander’s followers faced pressure to win enough merit to appoint a new chief or risk having their people divided among rival warlords.

As the Iron Bone Tribe began its siege, James learned that the Faith Order had supplied the Barbarians with modular siege engines. Sagras and Solington judged the engines weak in materials but praised the Faith Order’s technical expertise, prompting James to send Victor a recommendation to capture its craftsmen if the army won.

• James questioned how the Iron Bone Tribe had obtained so many siege engines, and an intelligence officer explained that the Faith Order had built them.
• Soyasdin identified a Catapult’s metal connectors as evidence that the engines were modular and assembled on-site.
• James summoned Sagras and Solington to assess the enemy’s siege engines.
• Sagras judged the Catapults inferior in materials and range but praised the Faith Order’s designs and urged James to capture its craftsmen after victory.
• Solington agreed that the Faith Order likely had advanced researchers, and James telegraphed their recommendation to Victor.
• Victor read the assessment and realized the Faith Order had more to offer than he had expected.

James led the Border Fortress garrison as the Barbarians launched their first major assault, sending cavalry toward the three earthen ramps without coordinating with their siege equipment. The chapter left the attackers climbing the ramps under the fortress’s concentrated fire.

• Victor agreed that the Faith Orders' technical teams were worth investigating and instructed James to prepare to seek them out with help from Intelligence Department personnel.
• James discovered that the Barbarians had sent more than ten thousand cavalry toward the ramps while leaving their siege engines far behind.
• James sent Sagras and Solington away from the walls and ordered the officers to unleash the fortress’s defenses.
• The Barbarian Cavalry endured two volleys of arrows, dismounted beneath the walls, and charged up the ramps.
• The garrison’s crossbows and archers covered all three ramps, shooting the climbing Barbarian soldiers down.

The Border Fortress repelled the Barbarian assault with icy, uneven ramps, Bed Crossbows, and relentless volleys, destroying most of the main attacking force. Great Chieftain Heshima initially ordered the survivors back into the attack, but Keledu and Bone Baldy persuaded him to permit their retreat.

• The Barbarians struggled up the slippery, uneven ramps as the fortress defenders shot them down.
• Soyasdin ordered Bed Crossbows to kill the Legion Commanders who had gathered beneath a wall corner, throwing the assault force into chaos.
• James unleashed the fortress’s Catapults while ranged troops concentrated fire on the disorganized Barbarians, and fewer than one in ten of the main force escaped.
• The two feinting Barbarian units withdrew, leaving the main assault force exposed as its soldiers panicked and fought among themselves.
• Great Chieftain Heshima ordered the retreating troops to keep charging, but Keledu and Bone Baldy blamed the defenders’ tampering with the ramps and convinced him to let them withdraw.
• Only about thirty-six or thirty-seven hundred soldiers from the main assault unit survived, and half of them were wounded.

After a disastrous attack left the Iron Bone Tribe's ten-thousand-man force devastated, Heshima arranged for Bone Baldy to take in the survivors and revised the campaign plan. Keledu grew wary of the Northern Frontier Noble Territory's defenses and agreed to provide siege equipment in five days, when the attack would resume.

• The Barbarian force's losses exceeded sixty percent, and its officers were nearly wiped out by Bed Crossbow crews and expert marksmen.
• Keledu offered doctors and medicine for the wounded and suggested assigning survivors to Iron Bone Tribe groups that had suffered losses.
• Heshima ordered Bone Baldy to take charge of the survivors, leaving Bone Baldy unable to refuse.
• Keledu reconsidered the Iron Bone Tribe's chances after seeing the fortress's defenses and decided to keep watching before committing the Faith Order further.
• Heshima asked Keledu when the siege equipment would be ready, and Keledu promised it would be nearly ready in five days.
• Heshima ordered all forces to rest for five days and then resume the attack with the Faith Order's siege equipment.

After the Barbarians withdrew from the Border Fortress, James and his officers assessed the battle and uncovered that Soyasdin had killed a Commander of Ten Thousand. Victor approved Soyasdin’s promotion to baron, and the public reward ceremony boosted the garrison’s morale, while the Barbarian army’s morale continued to weaken.

• James kept the Border Fortress on alert while his officers studied the captured prisoners and gathered intelligence on the Barbarians.
• The Intelligence Department discovered that Soyasdin had killed the Commander of Ten Thousand whose death had left his unit as the main force in the siege.
• Victor verified Soyasdin’s accumulated merit, signed his promotion order, and made him a baron of Two Rivers County.
• James held a public ceremony where soldiers received their rewards and Soyasdin’s promotion was announced, raising the garrison’s morale.
• At the Barbarian Main Camp, the failed assault and the destruction of the ten-thousand-man squad weakened the smaller tribes’ confidence, but Heshima was not informed of their concerns.

Bone Baldy turned to Keledu and the Faith Order for help handling the wounded, hungry remnants of a ten-thousand-man squad that had joined his command. Priests treated and mediated with them, easing their conflicts with Bone Baldy's followers and helping them integrate.

• Bone Baldy sought Keledu's help after his forces more than doubled with the addition of the remnants.
• Keledu sent priests and medical followers to treat the wounded and supplied grain for the enlarged group.
• Bone Baldy struggled to feed the remnants after other Iron Bone Tribe leaders seized their pastureland, herds, slaves, and most of their wealth.
• The veterans formed an independent faction within Bone Baldy's command, and disputes over campsites, water, and supplies broke out.
• Keledu's priests addressed the remnants' fears that Bone Baldy was weak and their group would be divided or plundered again.
• The priests persuaded the remnants that Bone Baldy could protect them from future battles, and the group stopped clashing with his original followers over territory and water.

Bone Baldy asked Keledu why he had helped him take over the Iron Bone remnants, and Keledu explained that he wanted to preserve the Faith Order’s independence rather than oppose Heshima. Keledu then warned that Heshima had chosen an unusually formidable target, and Bone Baldy worried that his exaggerated battle report would be exposed.

• Bone Baldy questioned Keledu about why he had helped him take charge of the remnant force, since he doubted its people would oppose Heshima.
• Keledu said he had no plan to rebel against Heshima and asked how many of Bone Baldy’s people would truly follow him away from the Iron Bone Tribe.
• Bone Baldy estimated that only about thirty percent might follow him, including roughly ten thousand people who were loyal to him and his craftsmen’s group.
• Keledu explained that he had hoped Heshima’s campaign would succeed, but said the noble territory was unusual and Heshima might have chosen the wrong opponent.
• Keledu pointed out that Bone Baldy’s battle report had exaggerated enemy casualties, and Bone Baldy worried that Heshima would discover the truth.

Keledu explained to Bone Baldy why the noble territory’s defenses and weapons made it a formidable enemy, then warned that Heshima and the Iron Bone Tribe faced a likely disastrous defeat. The chapter ended with Keledu predicting that Heshima might not survive the war and that the Steppe Barbarians would pay for his choice of enemy.

• Keledu reassured Bone Baldy that Heshima would not learn about the inflated battle results because Heshima’s men had not joined the attack and Bone Baldy’s tribesmen would keep quiet.
• Keledu argued that the noble territory’s walls, bed crossbows, and soldiers were too powerful for even Heshima’s elite ten-thousand-man squad to overcome.
• Bone Baldy recalled seeing a bed-crossbow bolt kill a Commander of Ten Thousand and enemy arrows pierce the Iron Bone Tribe’s iron armor.
• Bone Baldy asked Keledu whether the Iron Bone Tribe would be defeated.
• Keledu said the failed sieges showed that the enemy was exceptionally strong and warned that Heshima and the Steppe Barbarians would pay for choosing to fight it.

Keledu advised Bone Baldy not to sabotage the Iron Bone Tribe and to wait for an opportunity, while Heshima revised his siege plan after suffering heavy losses. The chapter leaves Heshima preparing to use nearly two hundred thousand herdsmen and slaves as cannon fodder for massive earthworks.

• Keledu warned Bone Baldy that the invasion might fail, but told him to perform his duties rather than tamper with the army's equipment.
• Keledu planned to provide the army with a new siege machine to counter the castle's catapults and Bed Crossbows.
• After losing an elite ten-thousand-man squad, Heshima abandoned his original plan and decided to build earth ramps along every wall using cannon fodder.
• Three days later, Iron Bone Tribe soldiers gathered nearly two hundred thousand herdsmen and slaves and drove them into the open ground before the Border Fortress.
• Heshima watched the captives as Keledu pitied them, expecting that many would not survive the siege.

Heshima ordered herders and slaves to build earth ramps beneath the fortress walls, threatening them with death if they refused. The chapter left the barbarian army poised to begin a full-scale siege alongside the forced laborers.

• The gathered herders and slaves feared they would be used as cannon fodder after learning what had happened to earlier captives.
• Heshima ordered the herders to carry earth and stones beneath the walls to build ramps and steps for the assault.
• Heshima had several thousand escaped slaves executed in front of the crowd and threatened the rest with the same fate if they resisted.
• Heshima promised survival and membership in the Iron Bone Tribe to those who obeyed, while warning that refusal meant lifelong slavery.
• Heshima ordered soldiers who pleaded for relatives to join the herders' ranks as cannon fodder.
• Heshima prepared the barbarian army to launch its siege while the herders filled in the earth.

James prepared the Border Fortress for a Barbarian assault, ordering the Catapults to ready Fire Oil Bombs and the crossbow troops to target the advancing herders. As the enemy closed in, researcher Solington confronted James for withholding the Thunderfire Cannon No. 1 and Flowering Shells, leaving James trying to persuade him to keep the weapons in reserve.

• James rejected an officer’s suggestion to use the secret weapon immediately and instead ordered Kabor to prepare Fire Oil Bombs for the Catapults.
• Barbarian horns and war drums signaled an attack, and roughly seventy or eighty thousand troops advanced toward the fortress in a half-circle, with elite soldiers on both wings.
• James ordered the defenders to prepare, directing the Bed Crossbow and Heavy Crossbow troops to concentrate their fire on the herders and preserve the archers for fighting on the walls.
• Solington arrived with his escorts and demanded to know why James had not deployed Thunderfire Cannon No. 1 or the Flowering Shells.
• Solington threatened to take the weapons to Northwest Fortress and report James to the Marquis, and James began trying to persuade him to stay.

James kept Solington from using the Thunderfire Cannons and Flowering Shells on the Barbarian laborers, then returned to the wall as the siege began. After ordering Capor to target the enemy archers with fire-oil bombs, James narrowly avoided a catapult stone.

• James persuaded Solington to hold off on using the Thunderfire Cannons and Flowering Shells, but Solington threatened to report him if he failed to act when an opportunity arose.
• James returned to the city wall and found the Barbarian siege forces at its base, where their archers’ volleys caused casualties among the defenders.
• James asked Capor about the catapult unit’s fire-oil bombs and ordered the first wave to target the Barbarian archers.
• A warning alerted James to incoming catapult fire, and his guards dragged him aside just before a stone struck where he had been standing.

James assessed the Barbarians’ long-range catapults and ordered Capor to conceal the defenders’ full range while targeting enemy archers and advancing siege engines. The defenders’ Fire Oil Bombs routed the Barbarian archers and set several catapults ablaze, spreading chaos through the army.

• A Barbarian catapult stone nearly struck James, who saw that only a few of the enemy’s larger, modified machines could reach the walls.
• Capor judged the improved catapults had greater range but less power, and James ordered him to hide their own catapults’ maximum range while attacking enemy archers and advancing machines.
• The defenders fired Fire Oil Bombs into the Barbarian archers, igniting soldiers and disrupting their volleys.
• The Barbarian commander ordered his front-line archers to retreat from the mysterious weapons.
• Fire Oil Bombs struck several moving catapults, setting their wooden frames alight and spreading chaos through the Barbarian army.

High Chieftain Heshima used the Dire Wolf Guard to restore order among the halted Barbarian troops, then had Keledu’s Catapults bombard the Border Fortress. The Barbarians reached the fortress walls and began building earthen ramps as James and the defenders faced renewed danger.

• When firebombs and burning Catapults caused the Barbarian advance to stall, Heshima sent the Dire Wolf Guard to force the troops forward.
• The Dire Wolf Guard killed herdsmen and slaves who hesitated, then ordered the rest to charge or face death.
• Bone Baldy watched Heshima’s swift suppression of the chaos and feared the fate he would have suffered if he had rebelled.
• Keledu told Heshima that the Catapults were ready, and Heshima ordered him to put them to work.
• The Barbarian Catapults launched heavy stones at the fortress walls, prompting James’s guards to pull him away.
• Barbarian herdsmen and slaves reached the fortress and began building earthen ramps while the defenders tried to hold the walls.

James ordered Capor’s catapults to retaliate against the Barbarian siege engines, and the fortress’s accurate fire oil attacks quickly set several ablaze. Keledu identified the weapon and urged Heshima to withdraw the remaining catapults and modify them to extend their range.

• After Barbarian stones struck several standby catapults, James ordered Capor to suppress the enemy catapults while continuing to target the withdrawing archers.
• Capor brought his standby catapults into action, and the fortress’s fire oil attacks set several more Barbarian catapults ablaze.
• Heshima asked Keledu what weapon was burning the catapults, and Keledu recognized it as likely being the persistent fire oil used by the Raine Kingdom.
• Bone Baldy noted that the flames resisted water and sand, and Keledu explained that jars of fire oil could ignite siege engines and disrupt the army.
• Keledu advised Heshima to withdraw the remaining catapults and modify them to attack from beyond the fortress’s range.