TNL 29 – The First Command Part Five

That same afternoon, Raidon is informed that the tax collectors and their guards won’t accept his decision. Although they have been expelled from the city unarmed, they are still not leaving, and blocking the gate.

As Raidon gets ready to go to the gate, to tell the tax collectors to leave, he gets messages about those guys again. It seems as if the tax collectors have sent a message to their colleagues, and they don't seem intent on leaving peacefully. Soon the small group in front of the gate has grown into a crowd. At the end of the day, more than two hundred guards and tax collectors have arrived at the gate.

The next morning, Raidon gathers a squad of soldiers to act as an escort. He then goes through the gate to talk to the leader of the tax collectors.

It seems as if Raidon was already expected, because the man is already waiting. A short distance in front of the assembled mass of guards and tax collectors, he stands just out of range from the walls.

Raidon addresses the captain.

"Your meeting is not allowed. I said you should disappear from the province."

Then the leader of the tax collectors defends his actions.

"That may be the case, but we do not accept you as an authority. You and your bums shouldn't even touch those weapons. Let alone that such a boy as young you should be the boss of a province of the empire. I've said it before, it's my right to run this province. You are a nobody and you have too few men to keep control over the other citizens. This is the end of this nonsense of civilians playing warrior!"

The captain draws his sword and lashes out at Raidon.

However, Raidon had already expected something like this when the man started his last sentence. Therefore, it is no problem for him to pull his short sword out of the scabbard in time and ward off the sword of the captain. Even before the guards can react, Raidon's escort steps forward and slam their shields together in a shield wall.

"Form a square, men," Raidon shouts to his soldiers as soon as the other tax collectors and their guards charge.

The soldiers quickly form a square with three men on the front and sides. The last man holds the back. He is assisted by Raidon, who in the meantime has received an extra shield from one of the soldiers. To the best of their ability, the men brace themselves, where necessary they help the man behind them to stay upright. Then the tax collectors arrive and hit the small group.

Within moments, several soldiers are hit on their armor and helmets when the tax collectors find openings in their defenses.

Now it is to be hoped that the other squads will react quickly to relieve Raidon's small group.

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As soon as the captain of the tax collectors makes his first move, Morris sees it from the gate. Precisely because he and Raidon had already expected the tax collectors to betray the talks, he is on the lookout on top of the walls.

"Platoon forward!" he shouts quickly down to the soldiers who are waiting.

With Gareth in the lead, the squads rush through the gate in a quick pass.

"To the sergeant, forward!" shouts Gareth quickly.

The tax collectors, who did not expect such a quick response, step back for a moment. This gives the soldiers enough time to get to Raidon and his escort.

A little later, the square of Raidon and his escort is no longer a square. The other squads of the legion each in turn extend the square by taking the left and right of Raidon's position. In a few moments, Raidon's square has become a lined shield wall that is two men deep.

"You can still withdraw now! No one has lost their lives yet!" shouts Raidon to the tax collectors, who unfortunately do not respond to this. With renewed passion, the guards attack, only to be held back by the shield wall of the legion.

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Raidon gives the only order possible in such a situation:

"Shields and attack!"

As one, the soldiers of the New Legion punch their shields into the faces of the tax collectors. As soon as these recoil, the short swords come into play. Like snakes, they come out from between the shields and there are cries from the tax collectors. These are experienced bullies, but they are not real warriors. They are more used to intimidating civilians than fighting real battles.

"Forward!" shouts Raidon suddenly, whereupon the soldiers step forward as one. The tax collectors at the front recoil again, but the tax collectors further back don’t realize this. As a result, they are increasingly jammed together. This action is repeated over and over again, until almost half of the tax collectors lie dead or injured on the ground.

"Retreat for loose formation!" shouts Raidon, to which the soldiers give their helpless opponents a break.

The tax collectors do not know what is happening. One moment they are still heavily pressed and the next moment the soldiers are suddenly gone.

It soon becomes clear why the soldiers are withdrawing. Once they have distanced themselves enough from the tax collectors, they throw their shields on the ground and draw their other weapons.

Each soldier of the New Legion has learned to use different weapons during their training. For example, everyone can somewhat handle a crossbow, they can fight with spears and of course they are experts with their formidable short swords. But each soldier has also chosen his own heavy weapon. The soldiers now take these and the guards now see iron giants in front of them all with huge weapons such as double-handed axes, war hammers and two handed swords.

Anxiously, the front tax collectors watch until the inevitable order sounds.

"Attack!"

The soldiers then go on the attack again. Now that they have distanced themselves from each other, they have the space to wave their huge weapons. The tax collectors don't stand a chance, and soon their morale is broken. Some still try to flee, but most are surrounded by the New Legion.

For Morris, who is still watching from the gate, it looks like grain is being mowed. That quickly the tax collectors fall under the attack of the New Legion. Only now does he see the devastating effect these heavily armored soldiers can have on an enemy unit.

"Glad I never met them when I was fighting at the front. They chop them up like they’re chopping vegetables," he mumbles to himself.

A little later it's all over. At the end of the battle, only about thirty of the tax collectors are still alive, almost all of whom were wounded to a lesser or greater extent. Among those thirty men is also their leader. Raidon has them all secured and lets Morris go as a messenger to the closest garrison in the city of Arma. Morris will ask for an escort for a number of criminals to the capital.

"Let the commander there know that after the fighting we don't have enough soldiers to arrange the escort ourselves," Raidon says. "Convince him of the necessity and agree that this is not the most ideal situation."

"I will, but don't expect too much from it. These garrisons are very much focused on themselves and are not really inclined to help each other. But I will do my best."

Morris then leaves to carry out his task.

In the office, the newly promoted squad leader Gareth reports.

"Of the first platoon, seven are wounded. Most of them not serious, but Soldier Jayden broke his arm. Furthermore, soldier Manis from the sixth did not survive his wounds."

"Thank you, Gareth, we got away extremely well. Fortunately, these bullies were not used to fighting soldiers. They succeeded in intimidating simple citizens, but that was it."

"True, but we can't count on that next time. Certainly not if we ever face the experienced soldiers of Chakra."

At that moment, their consultation is disturbed by knocking on the door.

"Inside!" shouts Raidon. "Sergeant, the mayor is here," reports the soldier on duty.

"Let him come in," Raidon replies.

The mayor enters Raidon's office and takes a seat on a chair. He and the inhabitants are very happy with the actions of the New Legion. The mayor also explains in detail what the tax collectors have done. It turns out to be even worse than Raidon had already thought.

"The taxes were sky-high and less than a quarter of them were sent to the Empress," the mayor says passionately. "If someone couldn't pay, then everything was broken as a warning!"

The man keeps going like this for a while before Raidon interrupts him.

"Fortunately, we have now stopped them. I will send a report to the Empress to see how we can best address the situation further," Raidon promises, after which he accompanies the mayor outside.

In the week after the fight, the reports come in slowly. Outside the city there were no soldiers watching, so the actions from tax collectors were even worse. Many houses have been burned down and even more people have lost all their possessions. Even things like plates and other household goods have been destroyed.

Raidon has claimed the collected taxes. With them, he tries to alleviate the suffering of the people. But because of all the random damage done, it is not nearly enough to repair everything. It also means that there are no taxes from the province to send to the capital. That is why Raidon writes a report to the Empress to explain what happened. This way she can hear first-hand what the situation was.

Then Morris returns from the garrison in Arma.

"The garrison refused. The commander, another major, thinks that each garrison should arrange their own guards," Morris told Raidon. "I think he even wants to send a complaint to the generals because we dared to ask."

"I get pretty tired of those nobles in the army," Raidon replies. "These kind of things should easy enough to arrange, working together only makes the empire stronger. Now they're only making a bad situation worse."

Raidon decides to send one squad along with Morris and the prisoners to the Empress. The squad to guard the prisoners and Morris to report personally to the Empress. To help him, he gives Morris a written report to hand over to her.

Just before Morris leaves, Raidon pushes another pouch into his hand.

"This is for my mother. The soldiers know where she lives. Could you give it to her and tell her that I'm fine?"

Morris agrees with a smile. Deep beneath the born leader is still the young boy who arrived at training camp a few months ago.