Recaps

As Heshima drove the Barbarians into renewed assaults, they attacked both the Northwestern Border Fortress and Victor’s Temporary Camp, but the defenders held until reinforcements arrived. Victor then welcomed Alex and the Northern Alliance nobles by train and prepared to take them to the frontier for the coming fight.

• Levant promised to finish the railway connection and rushed a temporary line so Victor could bring Alex and the nobles into Two Rivers County by train.
• After learning that Shikele’s detached force had been defeated, Heshima concealed the news, rallied the chiefs, and launched repeated assaults on the fortress as his food supplies dwindled.
• Heshima’s cavalry used a decoy to draw the Border Patrol away before attacking Victor’s Temporary Camp, where the Guard Corps held until Dane arrived with reinforcements.
• The Barbarians then launched a full assault on the fortress, but James’s defenders used Flowering Shells and their Reserve Force to repel them.
• Victor sent Dane after the scattered Barbarian riders and requested medical aid, while Alex’s Northern Alliance Army approached and blocked the Barbarians’ retreat toward the steppe.
• Victor met Alex, introduced him to the nobles, and arranged for them to travel ahead by special train while the army camped overnight.
• The train reached Woodfort City late that night, and Victor prepared to take the nobles to the Northwestern Frontier the next morning.

The Northern Alliance and Two Rivers County crushed the Barbarian forces besieging the Border Fortress, then pursued Heshima and Keledu across the grasslands. Ron’s cavalry defeated a Barbarian ambush, while Heshima rallied his commanders around the belief that rain could neutralize the enemy’s weapons.

• Alex assembled the Northern Alliance Army at the Temporary Camp and led it north, while Heshima and Keledu withdrew with the Iron Bone Tribe and Faith Order after bargaining with the other chiefs.
• Victor and the Allied Army encircled the Barbarian force at the fortress, and Two Rivers County’s mortars and Flowering Shells shattered its ranks until the survivors surrendered.
• Victor, Alex, and the nobles left troops to guard the prisoners and set out after Heshima, while James and Powell began transferring fit prisoners into Two Rivers County.
• The Expeditionary Army followed the Iron Bone Tribe and Faith Order across the grasslands, maintaining its pace despite Heshima’s efforts to speed up and Barbarian cavalry attacks.
• Ron pursued a decoy cavalry force into a trap, then used hand crossbows and grenades to break the Barbarian charge and rout the enemy cavalry with Jackson’s flank attack.
• Ron returned with prisoners and captured horses, and Victor joined him as Alex and the Vela nobles welcomed their victory before the army resumed its pursuit.
• Heshima and Keledu learned how the enemy weapons had routed the cavalry, and Heshima decided to flee toward the ancestral lands while claiming that rain would prevent the weapons from working.
• Heshima told the Iron Bone Tribe’s commanders that water and rain were the enemy weapon’s weakness, and they began planning to fight during the rainy season.

Heshima and Keledu fought to secure crossings over the Shattered Ice River while the Northern Alliance Army struggled to contain the Barbarian advance. The Barbarians completed a pontoon bridge and prepared to break through, but Alex and Victor’s Expeditionary Army arrived and halted the battle until morning.

• Heshima and Keledu led the Barbarians across the icy river against the Northern Alliance camps, suffering heavy losses as they fought to capture footholds on the north bank.
• Viscount Raine and Viscount Pim led cavalry and the Iron Mask Army in counterattacks, but Heshima held his camp while Keledu captured another crossing point.
• Heshima led a 5,000-man force against another camp, but Count Benjamin’s veterans held a second defensive line and forced him to withdraw by boat.
• The Northern Alliance Army attacked Keledu’s camp at night while Heshima sent a vanguard downstream, where Bazak’s men infiltrated and seized a different stockade.
• Heshima reinforced the captured camp and repelled Count Benjamin’s attempts to retake it, while Keledu’s forces held their own foothold.
• The Northern Alliance Army abandoned its assaults and guarded the captured camps as the Barbarians completed a pontoon bridge and moved people, livestock, and supplies across the river.
• Heshima and Keledu prepared a night attack, but Alex and Victor’s Expeditionary Army arrived, and all three forces stopped fighting until daylight.

After defeating the Steppe Barbarians, Victor and Alex managed the captives and expanded Two Rivers County’s influence while the Raine-Vela alliance fought the East Sea Alliance. The war settled into a stalemate, and Victor took charge of restoring agriculture in Vela-controlled occupied territory.

• Heshima appointed Barak his successor, but the Barbarians’ encirclement of the Two Rivers Legion was shattered by Victor’s rain-resistant mortar shells, and Heshima killed himself.
• Alex and Victor arranged for the Vela Nobles to sell their captured Barbarians to the Slave Merchants' Alliance, while Victor brought many slaves and Faith Order members to Two Rivers County.
• Keledu shared information about the Faith Order and helped Victor establish an intelligence division to monitor the grasslands and Barbarian Alliance.
• The Raine-Vela forces invaded the East Sea Alliance, destroyed its navy at the Daur Strait, and captured much of its territory before supplies forced them to halt.
• Duke Sheriff’s assault on Stone Mountain City failed, and Alex and Victor covered the Allied Army’s retreat before the front settled into a stalemate.
• Duke Barick and Earl Stanley sought Vela support for the war, and Victor and Alex agreed to cooperate with Stanley in exchange for guarantees over their interests.
• Victor and the Vela Nobles formed a Management Committee to restore agriculture and commerce in the occupied territory, then cleared out bandits and offered farmers loans for seeds and tools.
• Victor focused on supplying farmers in Vela-controlled lands, while Raine nobles left their farmers without adequate seeds or tools and Count Stanley did not intervene.