Marlow now faced a math problem.
Namely, once a fuse that might be three meters long, or perhaps shorter, was lit, how long would it take to burn its way into a barrel of gunpowder?
Well, perhaps it wasn't a math problem. It was a gamble.
Marlow didn't dare gamble. When he saw the rebels toss a torch onto the wagon, he turned and ran with his halberdiers, cursing all the way.
He had run a considerable distance, and three minutes had passed, when he happened to glance back. A brilliant flash erupted, followed by a thunderous boom. Sound and blast waves swept outward, making the ground tremble.
Amid the flames, the wagon disintegrated into sharp fragments alongside wood splinters, gravel, and unburned grains of gunpowder, tracing countless charred arcs through the smoke.
During the explosion, a thick column of gray-white smoke shot into the sky. Indigo clouds of sulfurous fumes churned within it, coiling upward around the flames like a giant python.
The gunpowder smoke rapidly spread into a mushroom cloud that blotted out the sky. Scattered secondary explosions burst within it, blooming with eerie green flashes like ghostly flames deep in the smoke.
The spectacle was magnificent, but it also held Marlow up for a good ten minutes. Only after the black powder had finished exploding and burning did he lead his men onward to pursue the fleeing cavalry.
"After them! Their horses are carrying gunpowder. They can't get far. We have to chase them!"
As Marlow encouraged his men, he also sent people into East Birch Town to forcibly requisition the dozen or so riding horses there. He had the slimmer halberdiers who had ridden before strip off their brigandine and mount up, turning them into mounted infantry, then sent them ahead in pursuit.
"You don't need