stubborn thief

Chapter 311
A Haidaiqing turned over the rolling snow-capped mountains with chilblains all over her face, counted all the hands, and crossed the Yellow River eastward, cursing.

He led the remaining [-] troops into Huangnan Xiaohetao, followed the figure of Chuoke Tutaiji all the way eastward, and fled into Bajiao City, Jishi Prefecture in embarrassment.

Bajiao City belongs to Jishi Prefecture. It is a hollow cross city with a special shape. The city wall is rammed with layers of sand, reeds, red willows and other materials. There are eight towers in the corner of the city, with moats, horse-faced sheep walls, and no shooting dead ends. Easy to defend but difficult to attack.

This city used to have many names. It was called Baishi City in the Han Dynasty, Diaowo City in the Tang Dynasty, and Yigong City in the Song Dynasty. Later, it belonged to the Han family of Sarah Chieftain.

When Huoluochi entered Qinghai, it was taken by Xiao Lazun as his lair in the hinterland of Huangnan. Now Xiao Lazun has withdrawn and is occupied by Chuoke Tutaiji's advance cavalry.

This is also the only place where Liu Chengzu and Chuoke Tutaiji failed to compete for Huangnan City Defense.

When A Haidaiqing arrived in Bajiao City, he was catching up with Han Qingjian, the young chieftain of Jishi Prefecture, and led his men to try to seize the city. Before they reached the edge of the city, they were scared away by A Hai Daiqing's men.

But even so, Chuck Tutaiji didn't have a good face when he saw him.

In fact, Chuck Rabbit is A Haidaiqing's uncle, but the Golden Family has more stars than the stars in the sky. If you really have to count, Chuck Rabbit and Xiao Lazun are distant relatives.

Chuck Rabbit is in a fit of rage, and in just ten months, he has undergone extreme psychological changes.

First, thousands of troops were stationed in Xiaohetao in the south of the Yellow River, and the three armies were stationed in Wulan Mountain, the source of the Yellow River, and Xiaohetao in the south of the Yellow River, which was only one step away from ruling Qinghai.

The envoys sent to unite Lin Dan Khan have already gone out, but the front has encountered extraordinary resistance, first the troops were blocked in Guide, and now he doesn't know whether the army fighting with him for Guinan City is the Marshal's Mansion or the Ming Army.

This situation made him very puzzled, why it was so easy for Razun to occupy Huangnan, and the Ming army did not see a large-scale conquest; when Razun ran away, the Ming army rushed across the Yellow River to help. .

It was not Liu Chengzong's turn to block his retreat. Liu Chengzu split Guide County in half from north to south, occupied the northern mountainous area, and neither sent troops nor retreated.

After finally breaking into Bajiao City, he ended up offending Sarah's chieftain Han.

The ancestor of the chieftain of Han was the pro-military army of the Western Regions formed from Samarkand in the Yuan Dynasty. Now it is divided into two branches. The chieftain of Han is called Han Jinzhong. There are hundreds of households in the official land.

Han Qingjian used to be very obedient to Lhazun Na Timba, but when Lhazun left, his courage doubled, and he pulled more than 200 people from Jishi Prefecture, and was about to retake Bajiao City.

It is naturally impossible for more than 200 people to attack Chuoketu Taiji, which is surrounded by thousands of troops. Han Qingjian did not plan to attack the city, but he has been lying around day and night to make Nausea Chuoketu.

They are very familiar with the terrain here. They hid in the nearby mountains during the day, and approached the city with a few bowl-mouth cannons when it was dark. They lit torches and opened the shells into the city across the moat. They didn't even clean the barrels. After two rounds Get up and shoot.

Chuck Rabbit didn't dare to pursue it any further. His army is now scattered in the southwest of Guide to communicate with Wulan Mountain, and send guns from there.

These days it is difficult for the Ming army to realize how important firearms are, because they are very familiar with firearms; but the Mongols are different, and almost every battle tells them how important firearms are.

In the era of alternating hot and cold weapons, the final factor that determines the outcome is still close combat, but that is under the premise that both sides have firearms.

If one side has firearms and the other doesn't, it will be very difficult to fight.

Ahai Daiqing knew guns and artillery in Mobei. In his hometown of Khalkha, if he walked a little north, he would enter the forest area of ​​Zhongshu Province in Lingbei, where the people living in the forest were the Buli Yati tribe. That is Buryatia.

Before going south to Subei, Ahai Daiqing fought in the north. Those people built wooden stockades in the forest based on the rivers and mountains, bullied the tribes attached to him, and demanded fur goods.

A Haidaiqing wanted to march north at first, but those people had muskets, and they carried small boats with muskets, and went down the river until they approached the grassland.

In the end, the two sides negotiated. The Mongols pointed to the Cossacks' iron weapons, and the Cossacks pointed to the Mongols' furs. The two sides reached a deal, and A Haidaiqing also got many good horses.

This is beneficial to the people in the forest. Lingbei Province used to be the capital of Dayuan, but the local area is very poor. With its most extensive land, the commercial tax only accounts for [-]/[-] of the country's total. There are still troops and farmers in Han , Craftsman conditions.

Today, A Haidaiqing thinks that it is not worthwhile for him to lead the army across the grassland, into the forest, and fight against the enemy with wooden villages and muskets.

For him, as long as he can pay tribute to him, it is not necessarily a bad thing for a group of robbers who are richer than the people in the forest to occupy the forest.

In the Bajiao City, the Mongolian soldiers under the command of Chuoketu were busy repairing the city wall, and the tribesmen also scattered outside the city and wantonly felled trees to prepare for the city.

A Haidaiqing was very angry when he was scolded by Chuoketu, but he still persuaded: "Taiji, we have to retreat to the west. The east of this place is Hezhou Wei, the north is Xining Wei, and the south is Songpan Wei. If you can’t keep it, it’s better to retreat to Wulan Mountain.”

Chuoketu knew that what Dai Qing said made sense, but it was only reason.

He asked: "How did you lose? If you don't have firearms, can you win?"

A Haidaiqing originally wanted to nod to give an affirmative answer, but just before nodding, he hesitated when he thought of those artillerymen in Liu Chengzong's army who jumped out to fight on foot.

It may come as a surprise to say that the nomadic army is most terrifying when it is not when the herdsmen shoot arrows in groups on horseback. First, this skill does not require special training for the herdsmen. Second, riding and shooting also means safety. .

But if the shepherds can dismount and form a position to fight, it can explain two things very intuitively. They really dare to risk their lives, and they have been well trained.

For A Haidaiqing, the artillerymen can give up their guns and jump into battle, which is the same reason. The foot battle may not be better than their use of guns, but it can show that their fighting will is superior.

Soldiers who can stand still in the center of hand-to-hand combat will only be stronger with guns and artillery.

He shook his head.

Chuoke Tutaiji then asked: "Field battle, can you beat Liu Manzi?"

A Haidai Qingxin said that you asked nonsense: "Taiji, if I can beat him, why bother to come here?"

Chuoketu gave him a blank look: "Then why do you think I can beat him wildly?"

"You can run even if you can't fight." A Haidaiqing frowned and said, "It's better than being stuck here and being a bastard."

Chuck Rabbit ignored him and only looked at the cannons at the top of the city.

He panicked.

No matter how much planning is done, and the battle ends together, the situation will soon get out of control with the game of all parties. No one can clearly calculate the actions of all aspects, especially the unfamiliar opponents.

Originally in his plan, Huangnan Xiaohetao should be the battle between him and La Zun, and the Marshal's Mansion should be in a position of watching the fire from the other side. Daming is used to doing this, watching them fight each other, anyway, they are not considered friendly forces.

As long as the Marshal's Mansion does not participate in the war, he will be able to overwhelm others and gather Lazun's followers. He never expected that Lazun could run so decisively.

If being scolded once means you have to sneeze twice, counting from the time Lazun left Huangnan, little Lazun beat himself to tuberculosis more or less.

Because both sides in the war scolded him almost every day.

Liu Chengzu naturally wanted to scold him, but Chuoke Rabbit, who had taken over the territory, also scolded him.

Chuoke Rabbit thought that it was Razun's escape that forced the Marshal's Mansion to participate in the war on a large scale.

Of course, the biggest factor affecting the war was that Liu Chengzong from the south came too fast, and his momentum from south to north abruptly interrupted Chuoketu's plan to attack Qinghai Lake on the third front.

Now his question is, to stay or go, to stay is to stay here and defend the city; to go is to retreat westward in a large scale.

Each has its own advantages and each has its own disadvantages.

Staying here to defend the city, he has enough defenders and livestock, at least he can rely on the fortified city to block Liu Chengzong. If he defends well, he will not be captured quickly, but he will end up in a helpless situation. He can only count on himself to defend until next year. Maybe Lin Dan Khan can lead the Chahar cavalry into Qinghai.

While retreating westward, he had a chance to escape, but he lost almost everything, and came back in a hurry. I am afraid that he will not be able to be the leader of this army, and he may be intercepted by Liu Chengzong.

A Haidaiqing led an army of over [-] and was beaten to avoid it. Even Gu Yang died. He fled westward with the same force. If he was intercepted by Liu Chengzong, he might not be able to fight better.

Chuoke Rabbit looked at the artillery in the city and was indecisive, and finally made up his mind that it would be better to stick to the city and fight to the death instead of being beaten to death on the grassland.

Just at this time, several members of the tribe came over with a bronze Buddha, saying that they found the Buddha statue that Lazun had not taken away in Bajiao City.

Chuoke Rabbit bowed to the Buddha statue again and again, and left the city defense to go to sleep... He has already sent someone to send a message to Arslan, ordering him to lead the army to complete the strategic conception of attacking from east to west.

But now Liu Chengzong may have cut off the Yellow River. If the messenger can't arrive on time, he has to try to entrust his son with a dream.

Bajiao City was heavily guarded, and the defenders in the city were terrified. Four hundred miles to the west, Liu Chengzong's army was stationed in the Heka Grassland, and they were in full swing to complete the arrangements before the final attack.

His army is cooperating with the Zhonghu Department of Nanshanbao to sweep along Xikang Road, recruiting and expelling the tribes on the west bank of the Yellow River, completing the connection between the north and the south and rebuilding the post station. intelligence.

In addition, he had to wait for Yang Yao in Juerwan to lead the garrison to reinforce Nanshan Fort to guard against the enemy at the foot of Wulan Mountain in the west. He was worried that the Mongolian army would attack the back and back while he was attacking Chuoketu.

Moreover, after the Battle of Hegu, he had more than 3000 captives. After all, the Qinghai Marshal's Mansion is a separatist regime that cherishes food very much.

He planned to divide this group of people into four groups and send them to Xining, Haibei, and Haixi. Those who should quarry and log should quarry and log, and those who can build fortresses should build fortresses.

At the same time, his army also completed further reorganization in the Heka Grassland. The right battalion was withdrawn due to excessive losses, and the remaining noble cavalry was incorporated into the Zhongjun battalion, which had its own title: Fanma Fubing.

But before he sent the prisoner to his father, Master Liu's reply came.

After reading the reply, Liu Chengzong clapped and laughed happily, and said to Zhang Tianlin: "My brother took down the Guide Thousand Households, Chuoketu couldn't get Guide, so he had to go east all the way, and now he is trapped in Bajiao City. I talked a lot about front-line intelligence, and the Mongols from Khalkha were actually cutting down trees and preparing to defend the city.”

Zhang Tianlin didn't know why Liu Chengzong was so happy, she just shook her head and said, "Bajiao City is the city that Xiao Lazun occupied before, right? It's easy to defend but hard to attack. It's not a good thing for them to want to defend the city."

Storming a city has always been a battle with heavy casualties. Unless the city is too large and the defenders are too few, it is not easy to capture the city.

The advantage brought by artillery to the siege side is not as great as people imagined. It is difficult for people to blow down the city wall with artillery. In Liaodong, the most common method of breaking the city in the later Jin Dynasty was to besiege the lone army and persuade them to surrender.

And if you want to take the city by storm, you often have to pay the price of stacking corpses on the city, that is, the corpses of the siege army pile up a slope outside the city wall, and step on the slope to climb the city.

Liu Chengzong restrained his smile when he heard the words, waved his hands and said: "I am not happy that he defended the city, but that he went to Bajiao City, which is very close to Hezhou Guard. It is better for him to occupy Bajiao City than Hezhou Guards occupy Bajiao City." The city is easy to fight."

In fact, in Liu Chengzong's original expectation, he had to storm Bajiao City, but he didn't expect that the enemy of Bajiao City was Chuoketu.

Little Razun ran to the south, what worried Liu Chengzong the most was the ownership of Bajiao City. In his imagination, the Lintao Ming Army would definitely take this opportunity to send troops from Hezhou Guard to occupy Bajiao City.

In that case, after he finished cleaning up the Chuoketu, took over the old land of Huoluochi, and set up another mansion, the east gate would be Bajiao City.

There is no reason to hand over the portal to others, so there will definitely be a battle in Bajiao City by then, and the Ming army defending the city is a more difficult enemy for him to deal with.

After all, the lion army has the ability to fight in the field, but lacks the experience of siege; while the Ming army has rich experience in defending the city.

On the contrary, that city is now occupied by the Mongols, and Khalkha Mongol's experience in defending the city is at best comparable to that of Liu Chengzong's siege experience.

Liu Chengzong smiled easily: "Anyway, we have to attack that city anyway, so let's choose the lesser of two evils... But since we are going to attack the city, these captives can't be sent to the north for the time being, let them pick wood, I want Hurry up to make a batch of siege equipment, it’s so nice to see greenery here.”

Not only to build siege equipment, in order to storm Bajiao City, Liu Chengzong also transferred a batch of guns and artillery from Haibei to prepare for the siege to suppress the defenders.

The preparations for the siege on his side have just begun, and Dai Daozi has captured something in the east, and he came back with the prisoners and reported: "Marshal, I caught a messenger from the Tartars and said that I would go to Wulan Mountain to give to the son of Chuoke Rabbit." Send a message, this old guy wants to attack us with something."

It was the same as what Liu Chengzong was worried about, but at this moment, he was not worried anymore.

"Excellent, let him go back." Liu Chengzong thought for a while, and said to Dai Daozi: "Let him tell Chuoketu that the news has not been passed, and I already know about it; send another prisoner to Wulan Mountain. Tell that Arslan that Chuck Rabbit asked him to flank me, but he must know, I let him know the news."

　good evening!

　　
　
(End of this chapter)