Days of snow put a stop to the war, and both sides of the fierce battle waited in the cold.

The wide area of snow has gradually covered people's knees, and the straight Roman avenue seems to be difficult to walk.

It hasn't reached the level of snowstorms yet, but anyone walking in such a climate in peacetime is either a true snow hunter or a fool.

Such snowfalls are not too much of a problem for the Rus and other northerners, who regularly experience more severe snow freezes each winter. Ice and snow are absolutely useless to them, just because they have seen more and know how to live the "winter life".

The snow finally stopped, and it continued for a whole week since it started.

Winter in Saxony is not as cold as Scandinavia, and its low temperatures are not extreme, but the Elbe is still massively frozen.

The disappearing sun returned, and the sun shone on the vast snow. Those Ross warriors who wore sunglasses resolutely assembled the wooden-framed sunglasses and wore them to protect their eyes.

All the passive hibernating people climbed out of the shacks one after another. They began to clean up the snow spontaneously, and they kept lamenting the impermanence of the world.

The wooden fence became an excellent barrier, especially the north wall was windward, where a snow **** appeared, and the snow seemed to be so thick that the wall could be pushed down.

Rurik and many nobles have been watching the progress of the snow. When the sky was still dark, they all noticed that the ice layer of the Elbe outside the city was expanding rapidly.

Although it was three feet of freezing cold in a day, it continued to freeze for more than a week, and it looked like it was really frozen.

In order to have a good view of the world around him, Rurik climbed to the highest point in Hamburg.

The wooden and stone fortress is not high, and the platform at the top is quite cramped, and Rurik has to stand carefully against the wooden railings.

He wore a thick white velvet cap and a polar bear fur coat, and the whole person became a white existence.

The piercing and clear wind hit his face, forcing him to cover his face with his sleeves to avoid the cold.

"Damn. Really completely frozen."

Just glance at Rurik to come to the conclusion, a silver-white zigzag streamer blinking on the white earth, and the sun shines on it and reflects violently, and the entire Elbe River freezes as far as the eye can see.

Not only the Elbe, but the circular artificial river excavated to protect the city of Hamburg is even more solid.

Inside and outside the city were dark figures, and the hidden Saxon people walked out of various shacks.

Rurik looked at his Ross barracks from a distance, where intensive personnel activities also began to emerge.

The buzz killed by the cold is back, and the Hamburg region continues its winter life.

However, the broad Elbe River moat was frozen, and the so-called "natural moat" has disappeared.

Rurik came down from a height and immediately called all the nobles to hold a military meeting after the snow.

King Ross is going to have a meeting, and the purpose of his meeting is already self-evident.

A large number of nobles gather in the stone room, and everyone wears furs to protect their bodies. The open wooden windows make the room bright, and the temperature also drops to freezing point.

Rurik's breathing was heavily weaponized, his hands tucked into his clothes, and he paced the room.

"I sent someone to explore the ice. Even in the center of the river, the ice there is enough for armored warriors to walk. The ice is very thick!" He stretched out his right hand: "It's bigger than my index finger. Much thicker."

"This has happened in the past," said Robert, the real Earl of Hamburg. "In this case, we will no longer be protected by the river, and Ludwig's army will come back. Unless...they don't know that the river has frozen."

"They will definitely know." Ludov added nervously, looking at Rurik's face again, and asked with a solemn expression: "You said, when will they launch a new attack? From what I know about Ludwig, That man is likely to lead the charge."

"Haha? Take the lead! Is it really possible?"

"He is by no means a mediocre aristocrat, because he is first and foremost a warrior."

Ludov spoke highly of Ludwig, and the Blue Fox, who was also present, made a similar assessment. After all, the core of East Frank's rule is Regensburg in the east, which is a huge barracks. Holding a large barracks, such Ludwig can indeed go to war, in fact, his people are doing it.

"Then Ludwig could be evacuated?" Rurik couldn't help asking, "I arranged for the squadron to persecute their back-road and continue to destroy Bremen, a key transportation point. Is the Weser River frozen? If it freezes , Ludwig has the ability to evacuate quickly."

"I don't think he will withdraw. It takes a lot of time and energy to assemble an army. Besides, he can't just sit and watch us Saxons regain their power in the past. And..." As he spoke, Liudov's eyes drifted to those present. An unlucky guy.

Poor Baudouin, Count of Flanders, who had not been abused since his capture. After all, this is a guy who has both sides. He has no bigger pursuit. The first thing is to keep the wealth of himself and his family, and to keep his status as a great aristocrat in Europe. It is okay to sell some interests for this.

Baudouin was pulled into this meeting, and he was able to know the truth of everything, but unfortunately these truths were too horrifying, and he really hoped to avoid this unfortunate meeting because of shame and embarrassment.

Ludov made a special mention of the captured nobleman, deliberately shouting arrogantly: "It doesn't matter whether the Counties of Flanders make a choice, but the current situation is enough to make Ludwig believe that Flanders has Rebellion. So, not counting the self-governing Bishopric of Cologne, their East Frankish control is limited to Alemanni (Frankfurt Mainz and Rheingau), Bavaria and Osteria (Austria). Also There is a semi-independent Thuringia, haha, maybe the Thuringians are also thinking about restoring independence."

"Ludwig will never accept this outcome," Rurik added again.

"Yes. Otherwise he won't be determined to go on the winter expedition, and in the end we will continue to fight with them, maybe the decisive battle will be in a few days."

Rurik and Ludov sang and reconciled almost repetitively for pre-war analysis, and their inadvertent retelling really reaffirmed the grand strategy for the nobles present.

"Since they will definitely fight, we can just deal with it directly. Our army doesn't have to take the initiative to attack, and we will reorganize our forces in Hamburg." Rurik still issued orders as the military commander-in-chief, and he also pointed out a major drawback of his own side. .

"However, after a long battle, even we Russ are very tired. I don't have enough troops, maybe the next decisive battle will require you Saxons to fight hard."

"Ah? Is it as powerful as you, and there are times when the troops are exhausted?"

Inadvertently, there was a hint of teasing in Liudov's eyes when he spoke, and the man seemed to be mocking.

After all, Liudov is not a dog who was tamed after the defeat. He has his own great ambitions. Now the alliance with Ross and Denmark is for profit. After all, he still has to be the real master of Saxony.

Rurik sensed this special meaning, and immediately shrugged his shoulders with a prescient look. He threatened: "If the war is delayed until the warm period, everything will be extremely beneficial to my kingdom of Rus. I can order the second large fleet in the east, Send a brand new 10,000 troops here one after another. However, this requires the ice sea to thaw, and my disadvantage is only in the next 100 days. "

Rurik's words had an overly exaggerated description, and Liudov couldn't believe it, and he immediately twitched his tail when he heard it.

Ragnar knew the inside story, and he didn't care about the Rurik brothers' boasting. After all, it was not a complete boast.

"Temporarily short of troops?" King Ragnar of Denmark, who had listened to it for a while, abruptly stood up, "I can call up a group of Danish soldiers to go south quickly, and fighting in winter is not a problem. We are Denmark and Saxony, but neighboring countries."

"The current strength should be enough." Rurik shook his head and continued to look at Ludov. "In the final analysis, this is the battle for the founding of your Saxony Duchy. We Ross and Denmark will fulfill our alliance obligations to help you fight, after all, it is you who A lot. I! Will try to give you advice and even command your troops."

"Command my army? That's fine." Ludov smiled awkwardly. "I still command my army, but I will refer to your suggestions and requirements."

"Very good." Rurik nodded with satisfaction: "Since Ludwig is likely to lead the charge, I will try to capture him alive. We don't have to kill him afterwards, just make him sign some treaties. Everything continues as originally planned. Let's do it, we don't have to completely tear up with East Frank."

At the end of the meeting, all the military nobles once again strengthened and unified their thoughts, and immediately entered a state of combat alert, so that all armed men could immediately enter the battle.

The main force of the Ross fleet is now very sadly imprisoned by the ice of the Elbe River. This is not a big problem. After all, the fleet is stationed at the Kronstadt berth, and the ships can be imprisoned by the ice until April next year.

The battleship of the battleship has a high side, which can be used as a tactical commanding height. If the glacier is used as a battlefield, the frozen battleship can be used as a "permanent turret".

Rurik thought so.

The temperature is now rushing towards the lowest value of the year, and the ice layer covering the Elbe will further thicken, and the Frankish cavalry will be able to run wildly on the ice.

Ice battles are not inconceivable, and Ross has fought many ice battles with enemies in the past.

Even Rurik knew about the battle of Lake Chud. It was a battle in another time and another era, but on the side of the battle was the army composed of Swedish immigrants and the Slavs in the Novgorod region. The knights fought a decisive battle and won.

The direction of history has taken a turn. Rus in AD 840 and Rus in AD 1140 faced two worlds.

But they all share the same bloodline and can make some similar moves.

Rurik knew that if his bloodline continued, a huge group of nobles would rise in northern and eastern Europe.

Then come to a battle of the Elbe Glacier!

The coalition forces began a large-scale training after the snowfall, and the army was actively preparing for the decisive battle.

Rurik didn't know what the situation of the squadron he sent out, and the cavalry team had long since entered a state of loss of contact. They are all battle-hardened madmen, but unfortunately without their return, Rurik is indeed worried in the future.

Without the longbowmen and some ferocious berserkers, when the battle entered a state of slaughter, the coalition forces would not be able to exert sufficient strength.

Maybe victory is just a miserable victory.

However, Rurik noticed that people who slipped on the ice apparently just had to move quickly and fall over. Such a fall is unbelievable, especially if the person wearing heavy armor is likely to be unable to climb up because the ice layer is too slippery.

How to walk on ice without slipping? The problem is not with the walking mode, but with the boots.

Walkers can glide across the ice with skis or spikes.

"Yes! Spikes!"

No matter whether the decisive battle is on ice or snow, as long as there is ice and snow, it is easy to slip, and only spikes are the general anti-skid force. The Frankish army was absolutely incapable of tackling spikes, but the Allies could make them quickly.

So Rurik gave this order: "All warriors will take eight clusters of old arrows, and find out when to nail the planks to them, and bind them with ropes to your boots as a pair of spikes."

This move will undoubtedly consume a lot of arrows. Fortunately, Rurik's war preparations are very good, and he often focuses on recovering arrows after the war. There is no essential difference between mass-produced arrow clusters and mass-produced nails, but the former does more heat treatment.

The old arrow clusters were transformed into spikes, which could quickly arm Rurik's existing Rus army, which had less than 3,500 people.

During the half-year war, the Russ Army has had a lot of attrition, and now the Slavic flag team has transformed from a reserve force to the main force.

Those Saaremaa pirates became elites, and the Gothalans recruited from Gothenburg became Ruth elites.

Each flag team has suffered a lot, but the soul of the flag team is still there, and various personnel have been added to it, barely making each flag team have enough fighting strength.

According to the common sense in the north, a Viking army of 3,500 people is already a very powerful team.

However, the strength of the Frankish army was even greater. Due to its huge population, it could theoretically mobilize an army of tens of thousands.

The 3,500 members of the Rus army stationed in Hamburg are these 3,500 people. They are making spiked shoes, and when they are finished, they can run wild on the ice.

Such a move was refreshing, and Liudov immediately followed suit, even though he didn't have many nails.

The solution to the problem is not difficult. It is to order the Saxon blacksmith to dismantle the captured Frankish armor, remove the iron pieces embedded in the leather, and make them into the shape of nails to make wooden spiked shoes. This set of procedures takes time, and Liudov can only equip a small number of the elites he chooses as much as possible.

The Saxon army has an absolute manpower advantage, and theoretically they still have 10,000 soldiers. They are equipped with simple spears on a large scale, and most of their personnel are unarmored, and their individual combat capabilities are worrying due to a serious lack of training. On the contrary, they can hold spears in a group and form a hedgehog formation to advance and retreat together.

In response to this group of armed farmers, Liudov himself had no idea about tactics and only understood the so-called "invincibility theory of courage". It wasn't until he saw Rurik's dazzling multi-armed tactical arrangement that he realized that "tactics" still existed in the world.

It's a pity that he is a fool, and his soldiers are not smart. It is impossible to expect the peasant soldiers to carry out complex measures. What they can still do is to gather as a whole and rely on shouting to build their prestige, and then launch a dense formation to charge.

It's just that if there is a large-scale battle, he can only order his own people to launch a spear assault.

The actual combat proved that the spear and hedgehog formation was possible, and they were imitating the thousand ruthless men armed with halberds of the Slavic flag team in Rurik.

In the riverside battle before the blizzard, the casualties of the coalition forces reached 1,500. The casualties were mainly from the Saxons, and most of the wounded died later. On the contrary, the Ross-Danish army who fought on the front line suffered little loss due to a large amount of armor.

The Saxons still had a considerable number of soldiers, and because of their previous victories, the local nobles in the distance were informed by the Ludov messenger, and they also organized militias to support them.

Because they saw Ludov's victory, and the victory made them even more afraid of Ludwig's future revenge. Unless everyone joins forces to fight Ludwig completely~www.mtlnovel.com~ The total strength of the Hamburg side has been slowly increasing, and the new soldiers are better than nothing, and their political significance is enormous. At least the Saxon nobles who lived nearby brought people in person, even if they brought ten retinues.

As a result, the morale of the coalition army gradually increased, and as another army formed a fairly neat line, walking along the frozen river from downstream to upstream, the morale of the coalition army was even stronger.

For the hordes that suddenly appeared held high wooden poles with inspiring flags flying.

It was the flag of Ross, and the person who came was actually the missing squadron.

After experiencing heavy losses caused by the storm at sea, Arik's squadron took the remaining 800 healthy people and started the difficult final journey.

Large ships, most of the booty, and some left-behind people are still in the river mouth, where the waters have not yet been frozen but the sea is freezing.

The people who survived the calamity of more than 800 people include the old Rus, the Melarens, the Balmers, the Finns, and the Saxons.

Encountering a storm at sea is an unpredictable disaster. Arik can completely shirk it, but he regrets seeing a large number of his own personnel fall into the sea and drown.

Perhaps, transporting some very important booty back to Hamburg would be a marginal hedge against the morale of the squadron's natural disaster. These 800 people, regardless of their ethnicity, rushed to make a small sled that could be towed by one person, loaded a bag of grain, or a bundle of bundled iron weapons after the snow stopped.

They had to walk back, and for this reason they paused for two days on the way, before finally dawdling back to Hamburg.

At this point, Arik can finally report to his brother, who is the king, that he has indeed completed the task...

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