Therefore, Antium was an important target for his raid to lead the Third Legion to land. The reason for attacking Asturra first was because he needed a port to safely unload the siege equipment carried on the ship.

Before dawn, Lizaru left only two thousand soldiers to stay in the city of Atlas, leading 6,000 soldiers to the port of Naples, boarding a cargo ship prepared early, and landed on the coast near Astura City under the escort of the Third Fleet commanded by Midolades until early morning.

More than 6,000 people attacked the small town of Astura, which was guarded by only 120 Roman soldiers, and easily occupied it.

Then, the Third Legion marched north almost without stopping, and it took only more than half an hour to reach the city of Antium.

In the city of Antium, four Roman squadrons and baggage teams had only 700 people, but they had to defend this not-so-small town, which seemed to be insufficient.

In front of the city, Lizam completely unfolded the siege array composed of 5,500 soldiers. When the siege equipment arrived, he immediately asked the soldiers to carry ladders, push the siege cars and shield cars... to launch a full-scale attack on the Antium city from south, north and east.

Just as the Roman defenders were struggling to defend, the third fleet led by Mirlades broke into the port from the south, and 500 Third Legion soldiers landed on warships and forcibly landed at the dock.

Lizaru's move to attack the east and west was completely beyond the expectations of the Roman defenders. They had never seen such a tactical style of combining sea and land, so they did not set up defenses at the port, and of course they did not have more people to defend. But this is a subject that the legions of the Kingdom of Dionia would train from time to time in the barracks and were extremely skillful in using it.

After the soldiers of the Dionians got ashore, they quickly advanced southward and soon occupied the almost unguarded southern wall connected to the port.

The Roman defenders are in a desperate situation...

When Kuntus and Frius led their troops to arrive, all they left was an empty city.

The sailors of the Third Legion of the Dionia and the Third Fleet brought all the food and supplies stored in the city to the cargo ships that had been prepared.

At the same time, Camillus and Lisinius have led the remaining troops to demolish the camp and began to retreat northward...

That night, when they learned of the retreat of the Roman army, the people of Polefornum and Setia cheered for victory. The senior leaders of the Volsey Alliance held a banquet in the city of Polefornum to entertain senior officials of the First Army of the Dionys, such as Amintas and Printols, to thank them for their contributions in the rescue of Volsey. At the same time, they also hope that the Dionys army can continue to help Volsey and regain the territory occupied by the Romans.

Amintas, who had been criticized by Davers in the letter, learned his lesson this time, and he answered cautiously: "Dionia is very willing to assist the Volseys in regaining the lost territory, but if the Romans heavily stationed in the occupied towns, if we want to regain it, we need more soldiers to attack the city. And you all know the situation in the Kingdom of Dionys. Due to drought and food shortage, we cannot send more troops, so during this period, we can only do our best!..."

The Wolsey people understood this.

Despite such a small episode, the atmosphere of the whole banquet was still very warm and everyone returned home with great pleasure.

…………………………………

The next day, the troops led by Camillus and Lisinius arrived in Antium.

Here, the four military officials had another small dispute.

Because from yesterday to today, Quentus and Frius have been receiving news from the port sentry: the Dionian fleet is cruising on the sea outside the port, blocking the cargo ships coming to the port.

This made the two military officials who had never experienced this experience both helpless and nervous. They stood on the south wall and looked outside the port. The huge fleet formed by hundreds of Dionyan warships covered the entire offshore surface, giving them unprecedented pressure. Therefore, they believed that Antium was too far away from Rome, and at the same time, they were always threatened by the Dionyan fleet, and they also had to prevent the landing of Dionyan soldiers at all times. This would restrain too much of Rome's troops, and it was really unnecessary! It would be better to give up Antium and concentrate on defending the cities of Vilitre and Satnikum in the east, so as to get rid of the naval threat of Dionyan, and the city of Rome could also provide support at any time...

Lisinius clearly expressed his opposition to this. He believed that the Senate had passed a resolution to use Antium, Villitre and Sartneycomb as Roman colonies and decided to move landless civilians into these three cities, except for part of the land as Roman public land, all other land was distributed to these citizens. If they gave up Antium without authorization, they would probably be criticized and attacked by Roman citizens.

Camillus also said at this moment: This matter must be approved by the Senate. As a military and political officer, you must not make any decisions.

In the end, the matter was put on hold and the four people reached an agreement: Li Sinius led 10,000 people to guard Antium, and three other military officials led the large army to retreat to Satneycomb City.

Due to the lack of troops in the Wolsey coalition, the war between Rome and Wolsey was temporarily restored to peace.

But in the city of Rome, it began to become uneasy.

The deaths and injuries of tens of thousands of Roman militias and allied soldiers shocked the whole city. The last time such a large casualties occurred in the battle with the Celtic River ten years ago. Ten years have passed, and when the Roman people who have become accustomed to victory see the remains of the dead citizens after cremation were transported back to Rome, they almost fell into grief.

Some of the relatives of the deceased cursed: the incompetent military and political officials who led the army to fight actually suffered such a great failure while gaining an absolute advantage!

Some people who know some of the inside story also complained loudly: they shouldn't provoke the powerful Kingdom of Dionia, otherwise they would not have made such a great sacrifice!

Of course, there were also people who shouted arrogantly: the envoy of Dionys should not have been let go, otherwise he could use his head to pay tribute to the lost soldiers! Rome should reorganize a powerful army and launch an attack on the Volsie area again, completely destroy the Volsie and Dionys there, and avenge the dead citizens!

Compared with the urban citizens who were in anger and grief, the landless civilians breathed a sigh of relief after learning that "Antium was lost and the Volsi people also stopped attacking." After the Senate announced the resolution to "allocate the conquered Volsi land to them", they eagerly waited for the implementation of the proposal.

In the Roman Senate, a meeting was underway. Except for Lisinius who was also stationed in Antium, all the other senators appeared in the venue, and they all listened attentively to Camillus, Quintus and Frius, the three military officials who had returned to Rome, told the whole process of the war.

The first thing to tell is Camillus. He first started by receiving the orders of the Senate and leading his army to Tusteron to suppress the rebellion. He talked about: He found that Tusteron had no intention of rebellion, and took the initiative to offer hundreds of hostages and re-signed the alliance agreement dominated by Rome. On the way back, he received the orders from the Senate again to support Quentus and the others and accelerate the conquest of the Volsey area. So he and Frius led the army to march quickly and successfully raid the city of Antium.

Then he quickly attacked south and reached the city of Setia. Because of the arrival of Volsi reinforcements, he had to stop and station in the camp and wait to meet with Quentus and his troops. However, because he did not know the arrival of the Dionian army, he did not withdraw the grain raising troops in time. He did not expect that the Dionians would actually rush dozens of miles to attack the grain raising troops, forcing him to lead the team out of the camp to support him. In the end, under the attack of the Volsi and the Dionians, he suffered a crushing defeat...

Quintus tells: He and Lisinius led their troops to capture Velitre, defeated Volsi's reinforcements, and then went south to meet with Camillus' troops, and then attacked Setia several times. Finally, because the Volsi people crossed the swamp area and bypassed the scouts' exploration, they suddenly appeared on the battlefield and suffered failure. Just when they were about to launch an attack on Setia again, the Dionians took ships and went around the rear of the army to capture the empty defense of Antium. Because the food transport passage was threatened, and the fear that Rome and surrounding allied territories would be landed by the Dionians, they led their troops to retreat.

Frius's story is more about confirming and supplementing the facts mentioned by the two military officials. For example, he talked about Camillus's opposition to the direct attack on Setia and had another combat plan. At the same time, he also mentioned that retreating the army was Camillus's first proposal...

The three of them finished telling the whole process of the war. The elders were excited from the beginning when they heard the successive victory, and finally suddenly reversed the battle and were shocked and depressed. Most people could not remain calm, whispering to each other and talking nonstop.

At this time, a veteran named Apuleus stood up and accused loudly: "The reason why our Rome failed in this war is first of all, Camillus' responsibility! If he had not led his army out of the camp and had not defeated the Dionians in time with superior forces, resulting in a crushing defeat. Not only did we lose many brave citizens, but we also hit the morale of the remaining soldiers, encouraged the arrogance of the Volsians, and gave them the courage to resist the attack of our army in the subsequent battle, causing us to suffer failure again... Therefore, given the command error of Camillus and the huge losses caused to Rome in this war, I think the Senate should give Camillus severe punishment, and should also consider whether he still has the need to serve as a military officer."
Chapter completed!