Chapter 5 - Victory Summary

At dawn of the second day of combat the Persian army again attacks. This time a vast rabble of lightly armed and armored soldiers is driven forward by the lashes of their officers. The inviolate Spartan hoplite phalanx slaughters them as quickly as they advance. As the attack collapses, Xerxes begins to execute his generals for incompetence. He then orders in an attack of elephants. The massive beasts bear huge howdahs which house numerous archers and men armed with lances. The seemingly indestructible beasts lumber forward onto the rocks of the Hot Gates which are covered with the slime of gore and blood. As the elephants take injury they recoil and thus lose their footing on the blood-slimed ground, the Spartans drive the elephants over the cliff and into the sea below with relative ease and few casualties. Victory...