stubborn thief

Chapter 361 Ten days
The night is getting darker, and it is the second quarter of Yin time.

In the river valley thirty miles away from the main battlefield of Hehuang, a huge army is marching at night with fire.

Their strength was only four thousand, but they rode or led nearly ten thousand donkeys and mules, forming an eight-way column, and crowded the wide official road in the Hehuang Valley that could accommodate four horse-drawn carriages.

The lightly armed soldiers leading the horses were standing at the side of the team with a torch to illuminate the light. The night wind raised dust and made the torch flickering. Amidst the dull sound of thunder and hooves, one team after another quickly passed by him. .

The torches illuminated faces with expressionless faces. They closed their eyes on the backs of donkeys and mules. No one could tell whether they were awake or asleep.

All I know is that the bodies of these warriors are very relaxed, following the ups and downs of the donkeys and mules, their bodies sometimes move forward, sometimes backward, sometimes to the left, and sometimes to the right.

A full three rows of donkeys and mules and twelve people passed by, and finally one opened his eyes. Seeing the light of the fire raised by the soldiers in the pond, he tore the dried meat in his hand, mixed it with fried noodles, poured it into his mouth, and chewed it. The water bag bowed slightly to the Tang Bing and passed in silence.

When a column of hundreds of donkeys and mules passed by, followed by a column of leading donkeys and mules, the soldiers were all walking quickly with their eyes open, but most of them looked like they had closed eyes, their pupils reflecting the firelight, and they were lifeless. Waking up on the bed, in fact, the brain has rested, but the body is still walking mechanically.

However, this state cannot last for long. If you step on a small stone on the road or bump into Pao Ze, you will suddenly wake up, see that the team is not crooked, and you have not fallen into the ditch, so you will continue to walk forward in a daze. Repeat the process after a while.

After walking a long distance, the officer gave an order, and the infantry and cavalry sergeants all came to their senses, those on foot mounted their donkeys, those on donkeys turned over and walked, and continued to march in silence.

Wang Wenxiu rode his horse and stood on the dirt slope outside the official road, watching the army pass by silently, under the reflection of the guards raising their fire, looked down at the letter sent by Tang soldiers, handed the letter to the guards after a while, and took the paper The pen wrote a text message to Tang Qi: "Tell the commander-in-chief that Buying promises to arrive at the front line at Chenshi, and when he arrives, he can charge into the battle."

Afterwards, he reined in his horse and moved forward, saying: "Chuanqian Headquarters, move forward quickly, take a rest after fifteen miles."

The letter was sent by Liu Chengzong, nothing special, just to inform the situation on the front line, and to express condolences for the exhaustion of the training infantry battalion marching all night.

This kind of march was nothing special to Wang Wenxiu. He received an order eighty miles away from the front line. Although it was a night march, it was not a day and night trip. They walked very loosely during the day.

In the two days after Lintao General Wang Chengen was defeated, there were still occasional sporadic battles on the west side of the valley, but the stragglers who fled in all directions no longer needed infantry battalions to deal with them.

Especially after Dai Daozi led the Mongolian cavalry to complete the encirclement, there were [-] Mongolian soldiers joining, and the efficiency of cooperating with the Zhonghu cavalry to suppress and surrender the remnant enemies was very high. Later, they didn't even need ropes, and the defeated soldiers in Lintao Town found them surrender.

What should I say about the rout of soldiers, sometimes they will disperse and form bandits, which will have a great impact on local security, but sometimes there will be accidents.

For example, in today's Hehuang, the defeated soldiers who have lost their organization have become a truly vulnerable group.

To the west of them is Liu Chengyun, who is going to take the defeated army; to the east, is Dai Daozi, who is leading the Mongolian horse team to tie up the captives.

And in the mountains on the north and south sides, there are common people trying to kill them.

A broken army is like a river. When there are too many people, it will flood, and the people will be drowned by the flood; but Dayu can control the water, and the simple people can also fish in the river.

The broken soldiers carrying armor had enough belongings all over their bodies for the common people to sell for a year's rations.

In Hehuang at this moment, compared with the ordinary people whose eyes are full of entrepreneurial enthusiasm, the ferocious Zhong Hu looks amiable.

Wang Wenxiu didn't need to hunt down or guard the defeated army, so the sergeant of the infantry battalion was in good condition.

And because a lot of donkeys used to resist the guns died on the battlefield, their food level in the past two days has also been greatly improved compared with usual, everyone's morale is very high, and they are ready for the next battle.

On the front line on the other side of the river valley, in the phalanx surrounded by dim flames, He Huchen, who had been up all night, walked back and forth in the army formation, comforting the soldiers of each small army formation and boosting their morale.

But He Huchen didn't know how much this level of encouragement would play.

Throughout the first half of the night, the enemy's artillery seemed to be convulsed, without any pattern at all. In four hours, nearly 37 blind-fired artillery shells landed in the formation, causing him and Yang Qi to lose, including a commander. [-] soldiers and one horse included.

When a burst of shells hit the formation, the soldiers wanted to take a nap between the shells, and just as they closed their eyes, another shelling had already come; There was no sound of gunfire for an hour.

The process of war is to wait.

Waiting for the next bombardment, waiting for the next attack.

During the long wait, the morale of the soldiers was slowly worn down, but Liu Chengzong at least did He Huchen a favor.

The horse that was killed by the shells made the soldiers drink a bowl of minced meat soup that was better than nothing. Fortunately, there are ditches everywhere in the Hehuang Valley, and the Huanghe River is close at hand. It won't be long.

He never knew that Han Chinese plus Mongols and Westerners would form such a strange combination.

Throughout the night, apart from the shelling, the most frightening thing is that the army array is in all directions. At any time, there will be a corner with strange overtones from the Mongols, the weird prayers of the Westerners, and the terrifying suona sounds of the Han soldiers and the chariots running over the ground. sound.

When their soldiers panicked and took up their weapons to prepare for the attack, the flags and drums outside fell silent again.

Finally, when people relaxed, there was a burst of clacking, and the particularly large lead bullets might hit people, or they might miss people.

But it was very irritating whether it was hit or not, because the sergeants who were shot reported that when they returned fire, they never heard the sound of the enemy's gun being fired.

The buckshot had been fired at least 150 paces away.

It's almost fatal.

He Huchen walked around the army, returned to the right-wing central army, and praised his son: "We can't wait until morning, the morale is not enough to hold on, we must find a way to break through."

He Zan brought his servants to watch for his father the night before, and slept for an hour yesterday morning. By now, he was so sleepy that he was unconscious. Hearing He Huchen's words, he replied instinctively in a daze, "Father said yes. "

After he reacted, he suddenly became sober and said, "What did father say, break through?"

Now that there are enemies on all sides, this is not a situation to break through!

Even if you don't look at the front, but look far away, Liu Chengzong's frontal line is on the west, and it is very difficult to break through;

The north and the south are all unfamiliar mountains, even during the day it is difficult to break through the mountains, and at night to drill into the mountains, the army does not need to be attacked by the enemy at dawn, it will either hang on the tree or fall off the cliff, and it will be gone.

In such a situation, He Zan asked, "Where can we break through?"

In fact, He Huchen didn't know where to break through. His determination and self-confidence had been exhausted by repeated mistakes, and now it was time to hesitate.

When He Zan asked, he doubted himself again.

Suddenly, another burst of artillery echoed in the river valley. Several artillery shells landed in the formation. One shell was only a few steps away from He Huchen and He Zan who were talking. superior.

Before the two of them recovered from the sudden shock, there was a shrill scream from the camp. Someone had been shot, and he was still alive.

It is definitely good luck to be hit by the blunderbuss, but not to be killed by the shell, no one knows whether it is good luck or not.

If you are lucky, you will suffer for a long time, and you will eventually become disabled; if you are unlucky, you will toss for days in vain, and you will eventually die.

The He family father and son didn't bother to say anything else, they ran over Xunsheng and found many soldiers gathered around the wounded soldier, it was a drummer in the army.

His snare drum was smashed by shells, and his hip bones were also smashed through. He Huchen had just leaned forward, before he could think of what to say. When the drummer saw him, he was suddenly full of strength like a god possessed, and he writhed and crawled over on the ground. , grabbed the hem of his armor skirt, and twitched as he spoke: "Handsome, handsome, take me back, back to Zhongwei!"

He Huchen quickly squatted down: "Go back, go back to Zhongwei."

The drummer pulled his face and smiled with difficulty, and slowly let go of his hands.

Before He Huchen could say anything more, the low overtones of the Mongolian soldiers suddenly came from the northwest corner of the army formation. Accompanied by the high-pitched suona, a row of gunshots sounded in the night, interrupting people's comfort to the hopeless wounded soldier.

Immediately, a short battle began. People fired their cannons at the place where they fired in the dark, and a swarm of scattered pieces and blunderbusses fired back. He Huchen also hurried back to the central army, fearing that this was a harbinger of the enemy's massive attack.

But this was another feint, and after a short while, the outside returned to tranquility.

When He Huchen went to look for the wounded soldier again, he found that the soldiers were all standing in place, and they didn't even salute when they saw him, but they all called out the word handsome in a low tone.

By the time he pushed through the crowd and walked into the middle, the soldier had died.

Although the drummer asked him to take him back to Ningxia Zhongwei like a flashback, he couldn't bear the pain, and finally tried his best to wipe his neck with a wrist-relieving knife.

He Huchen was depressed and didn't say anything. He returned to the army and waved his hand to let the guards around him turn off the torches. His whole body was hidden in the shadows. Although he was still standing, his spine collapsed.

Take him back to halfback.

He was No. 30 eight soldiers killed in battle this early morning, and all they had was a bloody horse hide.

Even if He Huchen searched the entire army, he couldn't find a second mat to wrap the corpse. How could he bring this drummer back to the central defender!

He wasn't terribly sad, he just despaired of his incompetence.

If the drummer can't go back to the central defender, they can't go back.

It's just that the war situation won't give him the slightest chance to show his emotions. People in war don't deserve to have emotions. Only a quarter of an hour later, another shelling strikes again.

This time two shells landed precisely in the trench, killing one man and wounding five soldiers.

More deaths, and more haze enveloped the hearts of everyone in the formation until the sky turned white.

Before the sun rose, the generals stationed in the rear suddenly ran over, with a face full of surprise and joy, turned back and pointed to the east, saying that they saw the light of the torch.

He Huchen hurried over, and the distance to the east was exactly as his subordinates said, under the dark blue light of the early morning, the hazy firelight in the large shadows was slowly spreading towards this side.

A look of ecstasy appeared on his face for a moment, and then he restrained himself and hurriedly sent people over. Seeing the Mongolian soldiers wandering in groups to the east, he hurriedly asked two cavalrymen to lead six horses and rush over to see Did You Shilu lead the army over?

But as soon as the two cavalrymen ran out, He Huchen's heart sank to the bottom... The Mongolian cavalrymen turned a blind eye to those two cavalrymen and had no intention of stopping them.

The hazy shadow stopped in the distance, until a long time later, two people and six horses, only a dejected soldier came back, prostrated himself in front of He Huchen, and said with despair on his face: "Commander, there are no reinforcements, they are the enemy. The enemy general said he was Yang Yao, a member of the Marshal's Mansion, You Shuai...You Shuai ran away, and ran back to Lanzhou."

It was approaching early morning, under the light blue sky, the visibility in the river valley was very poor, Yang Yao with a tired face was riding on the horse, and led the team slowly on the bridle. From yesterday evening to this morning, this night was a relatively dark one for him. He Huchen still has a long time.

Too bad.

Yang Yao attacked eastward, but with almost no results, he failed to get any general's head.

He knew that there was a He Renlong in Yansui Town, and in Tubao City, Liu Chengzong specially used a telescope to show him what He Renlong looked like from a distance.

But he never thought that He Renlong could run so well.

He didn't set the fire in the officer's camp. As soon as he got close to the officer's camp, the fire started, and the officers who stayed in the camp ran eastward like a gust of wind.

Yang Yao rushed into the mountain platform and left Qianzong Yang Chengzu to rescue him. He led his army to pursue the retreating army. After driving forty miles, he only caught up with two generals, and could not catch up with the main force of the enemy who was fleeing. .

Recently, he could even see He Renlong, who was leading six horses and dragging You Shilu to escape, but couldn't catch up.

Even after chasing him to the mouth of the river, he saw He Yong, an old acquaintance from the Lion Camp, riding his horse to the hillside and shouting: "Don't chase, General, thank you for not killing me, General!"

When Yang Yao sent a cavalry team to drive He Yong away, the boss of this family could run as well as the general.

Fortunately, after running back, Yang Chengzu, who was born as a thief, did a good job of putting out the fire in the camp. He didn't put out the fire with water, but first let the two generals under his command get into the river, and then rushed up the mountain to put out the fire. , cotton-padded jacket to the side, and rescued more than [-] stones of grain and grass.

This grain almost killed Yang Yao, the fire burned badly, but less than one-tenth of the grain was turned into charcoal, that is to say, there was only enough grain for ten days in the camp of the officers and soldiers. Do the officers and soldiers dare to fight?
On the contrary, a lot of armored equipment, war horses, donkeys and mules were seized.

Just for this little food, Yang Yao led the army to the west without resting in the earthen fortress. He got off the captive soldiers and asked them to carry the grain and go west. The captives had a good meal and told them that they would not starve after following the commander.

Twenty miles further on, none of the more than 4000 captives made trouble.

When the three armies had assembled in the early morning and surrounded the officers and soldiers on three sides, Yang Yao rode his horse and ran to Liu Chengzong, shaking his head and said, "Commander, don't fight, let's put a pot outside and cook, and call them, surrender!"

　good evening!

　　
　
(End of this chapter)