Sextus's army reached 30 meters from the perimeter walls and, without saying a word, drew their javelins and hurled them at the clone guards.
Sextus's soldiers, and Sextus himself, did not consider it necessary to engage in conversation with rebels who had executed a prefect.
Septimus watched as the thrown javelins struck the perimeter wall and his guards' shields; with a single thought, his clone guards returned the attack, hurling javelins at the enemy formation.
Unlike Septimus's army, which had a defensive wall, Sextus's army, with only shields, took more damage; the javelins pierced the shields, pinning the hands of unlucky soldiers and causing groans of pain within the formation.
Sextus frowned as he observed the resistance; he was somewhat surprised by the number of javelins thrown from the wall, which seemed to indicate that the number of enemy soldiers exceeded his expectations.
"Order the soldiers to climb the wall; it is not very high, and the first to climb it will be rewarded with 500 denarii," Sextus shouted to his subordinates.
Sextus was unaware that his order would cause many casualties among his soldiers.
At Sextus's command, his legionaries, helping each other, climbed the wall of just over 3.5 meters easily, only to be met on the other side by dozens of clone guards who showed no mercy and fought and killed them on the spot.
The wall, in the light of dusk, gave the impression of a monster that devoured all the soldiers who climbed it, without showing any sign of change in the battle.
The fight lasted an hour, until the screams and laments, along with the silence of the soldiers who had climbed the wall, became evident to Sextus's troops; seeing that the sun was almost gone, many of Sextus's soldiers withdrew along with those wounded by javelins.
The brief battle had been a disaster for Sextus's soldiers, who were exhausted, in which all those who climbed the wall with the help of their companions were killed by Septimus's clone guards without a trace.
Adding the wounded from javelins, from the beginning to the end of the battle, Sextus lacked knowledge of the number of enemy soldiers he was facing.
In Sextus's impression, the number of enemies should not exceed 500 rebels; if he had known that he was besieging an entire legion with his soldiers almost exhausted from a forced march, he would have entrenched himself in the city of Capua, requesting aid from Rome.
With low morale, Sextus made an unpleasant expression; it was a disgrace that almost half of his 2,500 soldiers had perished in this place; even if he won and crucified all the rebels, he would not be able to explain how he had lost so many Roman citizen soldiers.
With anger growing inside him, Sextus ordered his demoralized soldiers to camp 5 kilometers from the villa; he planned to lick his wounds and build a battering ram with nearby trees at first light in the morning.
With the orders given, the exhausted soldiers organized a simple camp, preparing to take the villa the next day and avenge the humiliation of today.
Up to that moment, all of Sextus's soldiers still had blind faith in being able to defeat Septimus's guards, believing that their defeat was due to exhaustion from the forced march and the wall that prevented them from unleashing their full numerical strength.
Meanwhile, Septimus counted his losses in the battle; although he had numerical advantage and could easily defeat those 2,500 soldiers, Sextus's reckless attack with a tired army was advantageous to him and reduced losses.
In the hour the battle lasted, only 8 clone legionaries had died from unexpected javelins, and the wounded were barely 56 clones, also due to javelins and bad luck.
The individual combat skill of his clones was superior to most of the enemy soldiers in individual combat; as a result, Sextus's soldiers who climbed the wall were easily defeated and executed due to an overwhelming advantage.
Having killed a large number of enemies by mobilizing only half of the clone legion, Septimus organized his entire clone legion to move out in battle formation outside the villa.
Septimus planned to surround and wipe out Sextus's entire army, giving them no chance to escape.
In the dark night, Septimus's legion split into small groups under the command of a centurion, advancing slowly through the darkness as they encircled Sextus's soldiers.
Like a well-disciplined army, the clone legion, in an unsettling silence, easily surrounded Sextus's camp without the exhausted soldiers on watch noticing.
While Sextus's exhausted soldiers ate dry bread preparing to rest, the clone legion advanced slowly, tightening the encirclement little by little.
In the dark night of the Campania region, with few trees blocking the view for the camp's watchers, a sepulchral silence reigned, which was suddenly broken.
"We are under attack!!" shouted a guard with sharp sight upon seeing shadows in the darkness of the night.
As soon as the shout was heard, the clone legionaries in their black armor charged rapidly toward Sextus's camp.
The soldiers in the camp, who had barely begun to sleep, woke by reflex from their training and grabbed their weapons; those eating dry bread also reached for their weapons, and the camp quickly descended into chaos.
In little more than a minute, the clone soldiers penetrated Sextus's camp, catching the disorganized soldiers inside off guard.
Sextus also came out quickly; he had been awake when he heard the guard's shout, and upon leaving his tent, he saw an infernal scene in his army's camp.
Hundreds of clone soldiers in black armor, with symbols on their armor that appeared to be three severed heads impaled on stakes, were massacring his soldiers, surging like a black tide through his camp.
Sextus recognized the symbol as the same as that of the rebel villa, but he was horrified by the number of enemy soldiers attacking the camp; he had not thought there would be so many rebels.
The clone soldiers swept through the entire camp like a black tide, easily massacring all the enemy soldiers.
The night turned infernal, with burning tents, screams of agony, and soldiers in red armor being killed throughout the camp by soldiers in black armor.
In less than half an hour, only a dozen of Sextus's soldiers remained, with various weapons they had found nearby, protecting their general; they were being surrounded by hundreds of soldiers in black armor.
Sextus tried to escape, but the large number of enemy soldiers prevented his flight; these men were difficult to kill—it was necessary to sacrifice 3 or 4 soldiers just to be able to deal with one of them—and in front of him there was an entire multitude surrounding him, without being able to know how many there were.
In the end, Sextus could only gather a dozen of his surviving men scattered throughout the camp and maintain a defensive formation.
"I demand to see your leader, I am a Roman noble and the admiral of Campania," Sextus shouted hysterically at the soldiers in black armor.
To Sextus, this army seemed strange; they were veteran and well-trained soldiers, and by common sense, only great figures in Rome could form such a trained army; not even with enough money could such a capable army be obtained.
"Bring your leader, I will only surrender to him," Sextus shouted nervously as he saw how silent the clone soldiers were.
The army in black armor opened a path in an orderly manner so that a clone with distinctive armor, followed by four centurion clones, could advance.
Septimus had only changed the color and emblem of the Roman armor, maintaining the same style as the armor of Roman private guards, which is why Sextus could identify that they were centurions.
The clone approached to within five meters of Sextus.
"I am Agor, the commander of this legion," said the clone Agor, alter ego of Septimus, in a calm voice.
"I am a Roman noble, I surrender and expect to be treated with the dignity that corresponds to me," Sextus said seriously as he looked at that rebel general.
"Surrender unconditionally or all will die; those are the orders of my lord Septimus," Agor replied without expression.
Septimus had planned to kill everyone in the camp to deter future enemies, but seeing that Sextus was proposing surrender, he began to see a possibility of negotiation and of avoiding a confrontation.
Since it was confirmed that he had killed a prefect, it was only a matter of time before his sugar trade caravans were attacked in retaliation; although losing the sugar trade would not affect Septimus too much, his quality of life would be reduced without the trade, and he would be isolated in Capua, which would not be convenient.