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Teodoras I was pressing harder and harder on his nobility to recruit more troops for a second great campaign, gathering forces from the entirety of the Rus'. The "independent vassals" of Tver, Suzdal and Novgorod were practically forced to rent their entire armies for a minor cost. The Grand Duke of Lithuania was determined, but stubborn to a fault. His vision of "either I die, or Corvinus does" was not helping for the well-being of his nation, not at all. The spring of 1464 saw a resumption of military activity. Lithuanian troops encroached on Kamenec, one of the strongholds of Lubomirski's loyalists, and sieged the town.

Despite a few clashes with bandits, Bohemo-Hungarian formations and other loyalist units, the siege was successful. Lithuanians under Viktoras Kaributaitis razed quite a few districts of the city, looted the territory of any useful military supplies - be it weapons, grain or else - and established themselves in the smoldering ruins. The scales were being slowly tipped in Podolia, and B-H forces responded with attacking Lvov that same year. Once against the inhabitants suffered,cane even though the defenders in the fort held out against the attackers, the rest of the city was burned and looted. Outside of these two campaigns, though, the "front" in Podolia remained mostly static. There were hundreds of undocumented small raids, be it against the peasants or the enemies, though.

In the North, 1464 marked the beginning of a two-year long Leczyca Campaign. Having suffered a strong defeat in Czestochowa, the Lithuanian forces, now lacking a leader (Teodoras I was in Lithuania, busy with rebuilding his army), were somewhat scattered and disorganized, a situation which Mathias Corvinus and his victorious Black Army used to make a push into Greater Poland. Despite having captured Poznan without a single arquebus shot last year, the Bohemo-Hungarian control of Greater Poland was minor at best. The region was torn apart by hundreds of noble feuds and local clashes. The city of Danzig had declared independence as a free city, asking help from the Teutonic Order, and the Knight intervention was slowly retaking Pomerelia from the Poles. The Leczyca Campaign was ordered to clear out the region and capture it before the Januszites and Lithuanians could retaliate.

As was said, so was done. In October of 1464, the Black Army reached Poznan, slowly pushing eastward. Numerous small skirmishes followed across the region, almost resembling a guerrilla campaign due to how spread out and non-intense it was. In January of 1465, Corvinus reached the outskirts of Leczyca, but something... unexpected forced him to avoid attacking immediately.

This "unexpected" event that echoed across all of Poland was nicely described by the Lithuanian Chronicle:

"When Duke Narimantas, an envoy of the Grand Duke to support the warriors in the war, arrived to Lvov, he was horrified to see what the great war with the Westerners had done to the land. The fields of Poland were littered with corpses, each one resembling a bare skeleton than a human being. Entire villages turned into wastelands, the survivors walked among our soldiers asking for any sort of food, each one looking more like a ghoul than a person. They'd rip off tree bark and eat it, chew on their fellow corpses, crunch on grass and leaves, just to stay alive... In the entire region of Podolia, there was not a single village or city where people weren't dropping like flies. Narimantas was angry, not with the horror, but with the fact that there was no more loot left to feed his men with"

The loss of two harvests to marauding enemy forces, constant pillaging, raiding and looting, and demands of tribute from all sides to sustain the war effort started a massive famine across all of Poland in the winter of 1465. Indeed, all sides reported similar sights - the situation in the nation was critical, and getting even worse every year. Lithuanians blamed it on the Bohemo-Hungarians, but the latter had the initiative - they even invited a Papal legate to observe the horror that "the Schismatics forced onto fellow Christians". Charles I hoped to acquire Papal support in the conflict, and he was successful - the Pope was quick to make an official bull, declaring the Polish Succession War as "a legitimate war against the enemies of Christianity", and provided the King with granted money to keep up the war effort. The prestige of Charles I continued to rise across Western Europe...

The famine across Poland slowed down the war effort. Large-scale army movement was no longer sustainable. 1465 was a calmer year than the last - the Leczyca Campaign continued, it's highlights that year being the Bohemo-Hungarian capture of Gniezno and reaching the Vistula there. In Pomerelia, small-scale clashes between the Black Army and Teutonic-Danzig forces started across the region. A Lithuanian army crossed the Vistula near Plock and attacked B-H positions near Leczyca, with limited success. Podolia remained oddly calm that year.

The horrors of human condition across Poland continued, as the winter of 1465-1466 saw an epidemic of smallpox across the region. Hunger, malnutrition, combined with an unusually cold winter and lack of hygiene due to the war, resulted in the immune systems of most Poles to weaken enough for thousands to drop from this horrible disease. Once again, chronicles from both sides described the event with horror, and, once again, both sides pointed fingers at each other. Both sides suffered hard from the smallpox, too, and this, along with the war lasting over two years with no end, led to a sharp drop in enthusiasm for the war in both belligerents. Not even talking about Poland itself.

In 1466, Bohemia-Hungary achieved another success - the capture of Leczyca. Held by the loyalist Polish forces, this fortress finally gave up in June, leading to the end of the Leczyca Campaign. Charles I's personal forces began pushing from Krakow along the Vistula River, though this time suffering very hard resistance. Despite Lithuanian efforts, Lublin was captured in October of 1466. In response, Viktoras Kaributaitis achieved a solid push in Podolia, often, according to the Chronicle of Lithuania, "having to walk knee deep in famished corpses", but overall, the war seemed to be tipping in Bohemia-Hungary's side! Polish szlachta knew this, and many soon switched their allegiance to obtain the King's favor. But the war was not over yet... In winter of 1466-1467, the newly organized Lithuanian Army under Teodoras I himself, over 30 000 men strong, marched south from Vilnius, towards Mazovia.

Teodoras was now with a blood vengeance. He was determined to end the war here and now, defeat the Bohemo-Hungarians in the battlefield, reconquer Poland and regain what was lost. No matter how many more innocent Poles have to die in his way.

In 1467, April, Teodoras reached the outskirts of Plock, reconnecting with the Lithuanian remnants in Mazovia. The region was being attacked from two sides - Matthius Corvinus in the west, Charles I in the south. Even though his spy reports told him that the King's forces were tired out, weakened from constant fighting and would be easy to beat, Teodoras ordered his troops to march West, on the reasons of vengeance alone. A big mistake. The Lithuanian forces had marched for eleven straight days practically without stopping, and now, without giving them even a reasonable break, he ordered a forced march, making the same mistake that Konrad von Wallenrode did while fighting against his father - tiring out his troops before a major fight and getting overconfident.

B-H spies saw the approaching Lithuanians before they even reached Poland, and Corvinus ordered his troops to consolidate and prepare for battle. And a battle happened.

This time near Bydgoszcz.

The Battle of Bydgoszcz was a much closer and tougher endeavor than Czestochowa, partly thanks to Teodoras not being completely insane, but, well... The battle took place near the Vistula, on a flat plain, though with some marshes and forests at the side.

Hoping to learn from his mistakes from last time, Teodoras did not order an immediate cavalry charge. Instead, he opened up with a barrage from his archers and javelin throwers. Unfortunately to him, though, his troops were too scared of an another land mine gambit, and tired out by the constant marching before the battle, and thus they avoided approaching the Bohemo-Hungarian forces, ending up missing pretty much all of their shots. Matthias Corvinus was quick to think of a strategy in this particular scenario. The Black Army moved it's arquebusiers to the back, pulling out the cannons, and using the "barrage" as time to prepare them. Soon, the slowly approaching skirmishers found their lines getting torn to shreds by cannon shots, and started fleeing back. Teodoras unleashed cannons of his own, but they were of poorer quality and not as numerous. Many of them exploded instead of firing, others didn't have the range.

Corvinus already knew that the Lithuanian Grand Duke's temper was building up, and ordered his troops to stand in formation of two lines - pikes in the front, archers and arquebusiers in the back. The Hungarian general was absolutely right to think that, as soon the Lithuanian infantry moved to the side and allowed through a pincer of heavy cavalry to charge forward. They charged, and charged... and then stopped at the likes. Or, their horses stopped. The pikemen then kneeled down, and in one of the earliest known cases of pike-and-shot tactics, gave way to an entire line of fire against the unsuspecting Lithuanians.

Teodoras wasn't completely inept, though. Knowing that his cavalry won't punch through a line of pikes, he ordered his archers, no longer fearful of a possible mine field, to fire upon the enemy infantry, while the knights moved to the flanks. This time, the Lithuanians were successful - the stationary infantry lines proved to be an easy target, Bohemian and Hungarian soldiers falling in droves. Corvinus ordered a tactical retreat from the position, once again ordering his artillery to fire. This sowed chaos into the Lithuanian ranks, enough chaos for him to safely send his own cavalry and infantry to charge. Teodoras tried to bring his own heavy infantry to the front, but it was already too late. The final Bohemo-Hungarian punch broke the Lithuanian lines, and Teodoras had to retreat from the battlefield once more, with both sides suffering heavy losses. Not disgraced and humiliated like in Czestochowa, but still weakened.

But even though the Black Army was kicked down at least a notch, that wasn't all of the Bohemo-Hungarian armies... Retreating east, Teodoras reached the Vistula, hoping to cross it and reorganize in the other side - but while crossing, on a pontoon bridge his forces were suddenly ambushed by the army of Charles I! Burning the bridge and bombarding it with cannon shots, the soldiers of the Dual Crown sent over five thousand Lithuanians to the depths of the Vistula, as well as many of their horses and cannons. Teodoras was once again forced to flee.

After crossing the Vistula, the Black Army clashed with the remnants of the Januszites, abandoned by Teodoras, near Warszawa. The disorganized, untrained rebels, many of them wielding straightened scythes, were easily subdued and defeated, the pretender Janusz Piast was captured, later executed in 1469, and Mazovia fell under Charles I's control.

Teodoras I was well willing to give it a third shot, but something much more horrifying arrived to his camp in Grodno (Gardinas) as news:

The Black Army began to march north! To Lithuania! Through Lithuania! They already crossed the Bug River, and their target was none other than Lithuania Propria itself! And with them marched a small army led by Mykolas Žygimantaitis...

Is this the end? The Lithuanian nobility was already tired of war. Teodoras's forces were weakened, lacking reinforcements and poorly equipped, and, most importantly - tired. Can Lithuania somehow survive in this scenario!

Men, women, anyone who can listen - Corvinus is at the gates!