These grape shot cannons, which fired cheap and fragmented stone and iron projectiles with decent lethality, were modified by Manuel with some effort. Although these small, smooth projectiles were not suitable for bombarding buildings, they were excellent for targeting unarmored laborers and sappers. As for the shield-bearers, they couldn't cover all angles, and some of them, lacking sufficient armor, couldn't withstand the artillery very well.
"What's going on?" The generals overseeing the front lines were all startled, watching the laborers and soldiers being killed and wounded by successive grape shot cannons, momentarily at a loss.
"It's artillery! And good quality artillery at that." After the message reached the central army, Klier, a Janissaries general, quickly made his assessment. "Khan, where are the Khanate's cannons? Bring them up quickly!" he urged immediately.
But Giray didn't respond to him right away. Only after several of his tribal chiefs also began to urge him did he inform them with concern: "Our Khanate does have cannons, but their quality is very poor. To put it plainly, they are just crude cannons."
"That's enough, Khan. Just enough to slightly curb the arrogance of these Kafir," Beijin Xilin tirelessly persuaded.
Finally, Giray relented, allowing his soldiers to use the five cannons accompanying the army to counterattack the Theodore defenders' grape shot cannons.
As these five cannons were about to deploy, Klier took a closer look, his vision went black, and he felt a great premonition of disaster. He quickly advised, "Allah above, listen to me, everyone, cannons don't seem that important after all. Why don't we just use conventional methods?"
However, his words were interpreted by the Tatar nobles present as a sign of weakness: "What, we are all warriors of Allah, do the noble Ottoman Janissaries look down on us Tatars?" "Who suggested using cannons just now, why the change of heart now? Is that fair to us?" "The Janissaries are well-traveled and knowledgeable, we steppe nomads truly can't compare."
Klier suddenly regretted why he had accepted Chandler Pasha's order to support the Crimean Khanate.
Ultimately, under the Tatar nobles' inexplicable persistence—well, in fact, it wasn't "inexplicable confidence," but rather a lack of understanding of the disparity in artillery strength between the two sides and the need to boost morale—nevertheless, on that afternoon, these five cannons were brought into the battlefield.
After the Khanate's cannons entered the battlefield, the Khanate's general immediately ordered his artillery to engage in a bombardment with Theodore's. But the effect, rather than being less than ideal, was completely counterproductive. Because the Crimean Khanate's cannons were old and dilapidated, had a short range, and lacked maintenance before the war, during the bombardment against the Theodore Principality's cannons, they were useless except for shaking off some debris from the fortifications. Instead, they drew Theodore's attention, making them targets for their own artillery.
As a result, by nightfall, after the first wave of Crimean assaults ceased, Giray tallied the losses and gains and almost spat out a mouthful of old blood: in just one day, hundreds of the Khanate's laborers and sappers had lost their combat effectiveness; all the cannons had been completely destroyed by the enemy's counter-bombardment, and not a single one was usable anymore; the progress of the advance was still acceptable, at least at this rate, the trenches in front of the Isthmus should be filled within three days.
But Giray knew they faced more than just trenches; at least according to what they had seen, there was also a "moat" about as wide as the trenches, and an earthen rampart over half a pule rong high and almost as wide as the Isthmus. Although at first glance it seemed to be just that, anyone with a bit of sense knew that behind this earthen rampart there must be more troublesome defensive works.
"These damned Christians! When did they start all this?" Giray angrily slammed his fist into the air, and suddenly a wave of fear enveloped his mind: if Theodore had truly been prepared all along, then the Crimean Khanate was not without the possibility of failure. "If I fail, how will I control these half-hearted tribes under my command?" After this thought entered his mind, Giray even considered whether to withdraw his troops now.
"No, I can't withdraw. Otherwise, my prestige will decline even faster." If he were to withdraw after only one day of attacking the Isthmus, wouldn't that be showing his incompetence to his subordinates? Besides, he still had over nine thousand troops at hand, which restored his confidence. "Nine thousand men, we could drown this small Isthmus with our spit. I captured it once the year before last, there's no reason I can't capture it this year!
"But with these casualties, I need to adjust my strategy."
The next day, the Crimean Army continued to conscript laborers and sappers to fill trenches and conquer the defense line. This time, Giray adopted a slower but more secure tactic: he first reduced the number of laborers and sappers and increased the number of defending soldiers. At the same time, he had the army's archers aim at the enemy's watchtowers, ordering them to shoot down any enemy soldier who showed their head, regardless of their type, although due to the distance, how many would actually be hit was a big question.
To be fair, the Crimean Army's measures did show some effectiveness. As a result, the Theodore artillerymen and archers on the watchtowers, threatened by enemy archers, had to consider their own protection when launching attacks, which slowed down their efficiency in interfering with the Crimean Army's laborers and sappers. Meanwhile, the relatively well-protected Crimean laborers and sappers could finally work in relatively stable conditions, if one ignored the cannonballs flying around from time to time.
Facing the Crimean Army's response, Manuel sneered, "Not bad, the nomadic tactics are quite mature. However, I also have a countermeasure in mind." As soon as he finished speaking, he loudly ordered, "Pass on my military command: equip the artillerymen and archers on the towers with armor!"
That afternoon, the Crimean Tatars were surprised to find that the frequency of arrows and cannonballs from the watchtowers had returned to yesterday's level. When Giray, astonished, inquired about the reason from the front lines, he received a reply that almost made him spit blood: "Khan, Theodore's artillerymen and archers have all, all put on heavy armor."
"Where do they get so much money to arm themselves!" Haji Giray fumed.
"It's not impossible, Khan. If the enemy disassembles the heavy infantry armor from their own army to equip these relatively few artillerymen and crossbowmen, it would be more than enough," Klier calmly explained to Giray after hearing about the matter.
"Damn it! So, General Klier, do you have any countermeasures?" Giray sought help from the Janissaries guest general.
"Yes, I do, but it will come at a price," Klier said with a calm smile.