Brother Zhu Youxiao

Chapter 424 The Enemy Does Not Surrender

Outside Kelinga, the war elephants roared, and the Ming army fought and retreated, but the 100 light infantry soldiers who were hoped by the Kolinga guard Shah were beaten and cried by more than [-] Ming soldiers who fell off their horses as if they were facing Gundam. Father calls mother.

"Allah... oh..."

"Back, back, back!"

"Don't be afraid, don't be afraid!"

Facing the Mughal light infantry, the Ming army who fell off the horse seemed to be unparalleled, and drove more than 6000 of them to the trench.

This is not because the Mughal light infantry were not capable of fighting, but because most of them came from poor families, which led many people to join the army to solve the problem of food and work.

Their military pay is the income of several families, so they are extremely reluctant to die.

In this era, facing the education of patriotism, the officers and men of the Ming army led by military attache Yanshan, who was proud of expanding the territory, can be called the division of tigers and wolves.

Compared with them, the Mughal light infantry and their officers who served with the original intention of material and living determined their inertia on the battlefield.

For military pay, their primary purpose of going to the battlefield is to save their lives, so they have no dedication and will to fight at all, which leads to the rapid disintegration and collapse of these soldiers when they encounter adversity during wartime.

This is the case at the moment, the light infantry corps mainly composed of native Indians, that is, the lowest untouchables, does not want to work hard at all.

They can fight with the wind, but when they encounter tigers and wolves like the Ming army, they will retreat "heroically" one after another, which is called "preserving the vitality".

Not to mention that the Shah of the Mughals had a headache because of this, even if Zhu Youjian was moved over to become the emperor of the Mughals, he would also have a splitting headache.

Nationalism, the spirit of family and country... None of these things that can motivate people can motivate them. They are like salted fish that lie completely flat. Except when they are more active when receiving military pay, the rest of their activeness is given to worldly desires.

More than a hundred cavalrymen who had fallen from their horses led people to drive them down the ditch. The process was so easy that many soldiers found it inconceivable.

"Damn! Will there be fraud?"

"I also think it's a fraud. Only a dozen people were killed. How come these thousands of people fled?"

The "fleeing" of the light infantry corps made the fallen Ming army hesitate. They always felt that the enemy had set up a trap.

This means that the Southern Army and the Western Army had no contact with Korean soldiers and Japanese shogunate soldiers, otherwise they would not have hesitated, but rushed into the formation to kill the Quartet.

"Retreat first, and help the brothers out from behind!"

The fallen cavalry who were worried about traps began to turn into infantry, turning back and killing behind them.

Their actions disturbed the elephant herd that was raging in the Ming army formation.

War elephants are not stupid, on the contrary they are very smart, they know how to judge the situation, and they know which side is their own in a calm state.

Because of being so smart, when they saw the 100 light infantry regiment being driven away by more than [-] "enemies", they instantly became uneasy.

Especially when they saw the more than 100 "enemies" rushing towards them, as the head elephant wailed, the remaining more than 500 war elephants immediately turned back out of the Ming army formation.

While leaving behind seventy or eighty war elephant corpses, they hurriedly fled towards both sides of their own city, no matter how the elephant soldiers on their backs pulled them, they did not stop.

The situation of the battle was reversed in an instant, and Shah's blood pressure rose after watching this scene, and he almost felt that his eyes were dark.

"I'm going to kill them! I'm going to kill them!"

Shah leaned on the city wall and looked at the light infantry who hid in the trench and continued to talk and laugh. He wished that the 6000 people would be smashed to pieces!
The great situation failed because of their pity on their lives!

"After the war elephant returned, he found that too many of his companions had died, so he was definitely unwilling to charge again. What should we do now?"

"The distance is too close, and there is no chance to use artillery."

The Mughal general and the Portuguese artillery officer next to Shah spoke one after the other, which made Shah even more angry.

"Guard! If everyone dies, I have to guard!"

Shah suppressed his voice and ordered, and the lieutenant next to him heard that Dang even followed his military order and ordered everyone to stick to the outer line of defense.

The moat of Kelinga is three feet wide, with stone bridges on the north and south sides and wooden bridges on the east and west sides, but they only set up an outer defense line on the south side.

This is not self-confidence and stupidity, but that they have understood the Ming army's style of play.

The Ming army has always pursued effective annihilation of the enemy. In addition, they have shelled Kelinga for several months. The southern city of Kelinga is dilapidated and easy to break through, so they will not choose other places to attack.

It's just that both sides put their forces together, which made the whole battle more complicated and confusing.

According to the standards of the Ming army, even the entire world cannot pick out a hundred generals who can calmly command tens of thousands of people, and Shah is a typical general who has no general talent, but is entrusted with heavy troops.

If he is asked to command 3000 people to defend the city, or 5000 people to defend the city, then he will definitely be much better than commanding 2 people.

Since the war with the Ming army, he has never been Qi Yuanbi's opponent. Even now, Qi Yuanbi has not been serious. Only with the cooperation of Li Zicheng and the others, he has taken advantage of the battlefield.

Less than a quarter of an hour after the war started, the casualties of more than 2000 cavalry, more than a hundred elephant soldiers, and dozens of war elephants were enough to bring the morale of the Mughal army to the bottom.

Compared with the heartless light infantry corps, Shah could see the morale of the retreating cavalry and elephant corps constantly falling.

Affected by them, the musketeers became a little nervous and scared.

On the battlefield, if the morale is not good, it is equivalent to losing three points first.

Shah looked anxious, but there was nothing he could do in his heart.

It is impossible for him to say how much the reward will be, because he does not have the qualifications to promise.

It is also impossible for him to pay out of his own pocket, because he does not have much family property, let alone take out his own property for the Mughals.

Compared with him, the Ming army made blatant adjustments before the formation, and emptied the sand from the chariots overthrown by the war elephants, and used the chariots to escort the wounded soldiers back to the rear.

The musketeers wanted to shoot, but the distance of more than 80 steps made them helpless.

Although the furthest distance of the arquebus in their hands is 150 paces, only artillery can penetrate them at this distance in the face of chariots filled with sand.

After several rounds of shooting, the Mughal officers gave up their attack and prepared to wait for the Ming army to approach before counterattacking.

"Damn! More than 200 brothers were lost!"

"More than 500 people were also injured."

Behind the chariot, Li Zijing and Li Guo shouted and cursed respectively, while Li Zicheng looked at the artillery on the top of the wall with a binoculars, and then secretly said happily:
"The artillery of these guys can't shoot us. Take this opportunity to take down his outer positions and avenge the brothers!"

After finishing speaking, Li Zicheng turned around and said to Li Guo and Li Zijing:

"Ask Jiexuan (named by Liu Zongmin) to lead the cavalry to cruise around first, and we will use the chariot to push away the rejecting horses, and he will go on after clearing the road!"

"Okay!" Li Zijing agreed, and Li Guo also turned his head to say hello: "Extend the handle of the chariot!"

"The handle of the chariot is extended!"

With a word of transmission, the Ming army soon pushed the handles of the three hundred chariots in the front row to lengthen, and the reason for the lengthening was to guard against some traps.

After generations of improvements by the generals of the Ming Dynasty, the chariot has already blossomed, and this flower will now bloom in the South Asian battlefield.

"Beat the drums and march!"

Li Zicheng waved the command flag, and the hundreds of drummers who were hidden in the formation instantly laid the waist drums on their waists, and then beat the waist drums with small drumsticks.

At the same time as the drums sounded, the soldiers of the Ming army began to push the chariots forward side by side.

It is difficult to push a thousand-jin primitive chariot, but the current chariots and gun carts all use rubber tires produced by the Rubber Factory of the Armament Academy, although these rubbers are obtained from "Euphorbiaceae" plants, which are not as pure as rubber trees , but it is enough to face a smooth battlefield.

The chariot advanced step by step, but Shah looked a little anxious, he turned his head and asked the Portuguese artillery officer: "Can you release the shotgun?"

"If we fire shotguns, our men will be attacked too." The Portuguese artillery officer knew that the Shah did not regard untouchables as human beings, but there were many Persians and Ottomans among the Musketeers.

"..." Hearing what the Portuguese officer said, Shah could only grit his teeth and turn his head to continue observing the battlefield.

"There are so many line infantry... I am afraid that Vasa (Sweden) can mobilize so many line infantry with the strength of the whole country. I suggest that we can retreat."

The Portuguese artillery officer looked at the battlefield. When he saw the most advanced Swedish line infantry tactics in Europe appearing on the battlefield, he immediately felt that the Mughals might not be able to defend Kolinga.

You must know that such line infantry, even the Swedish Vasa Dynasty, only had 3 people.

But even with only 3 people, Sweden managed to punch Denmark, step on Tsarist Russia, and beat Poland, which greatly consolidated the rule of the Swedish Vasa Dynasty.

If it weren't for the fact that the whole of Europe is currently in chaos and there is no time for training, I am afraid that countries have already begun to learn and understand this tactic.

The Portuguese artillery officer sighed a little, but because he left the Portuguese army very early and switched to the Mughal army, he didn't know that as early as the fourteenth century, the first version of line tactics had appeared in Ming Dynasty.

After the continuous completion of the generals of the past dynasties, and Zhu Youjian equipped the army with flintlock guns in large quantities, the line infantry of the Ming army is more terrifying than the line infantry of Sweden.

The Swedish Vasa dynasty was powerful in northern and central Europe with 60 line infantry, and such a line infantry, Ming had a full [-]...

"put!"

"Clap clap clap-"

Dense lead bullets were fired from the Mughal positions, hitting the Ming army's chariots one by one.

The front of the tank was pierced, and the sand bag was hit.

The sand in the bag continued to flow out of the pierced holes, but the Ming army did not stop, and continued to approach the Mughal army's position.

Fifty steps... Thirty steps... Twenty steps...

The Mughal musketeers had already started filling gunpowder and lead in a hurry, while the Ming army relied on chariots to push down rows of repelling horses and knock down the horn wall.

It's just that when the chariots passed the horn wall, there was an overwhelmed "click" sound on the ground in an instant, and the chariots fell suddenly one by one.

Seeing this, the Ming saber player resolutely let go, raised his shield and retreated to defend.

In the overwhelmed "click", the fallen chariot fell into the ground, pressing the spikes in the ground deeper into the ground.

"Beep-"

Different from the simple whistle ordering to shoot, this time the whistle sounded one after another on the battlefield, and it was very long.

This represented the discovery of a trap, and upon hearing this sound, the knife players in the back row immediately rushed to the front row carrying a solid wooden board.

The line infantry of the Ming army stopped in front of the trap, and they were only less than [-] steps away from the mughal musketeers, which was very dangerous.

"Beep-"

"Beep—

The crisp and decisive whistle began to blow from the mouths of the chief banner officers. All the sword players in the first row squatted down instantly, and the riflemen in the second row began to raise their guns and pull the trigger.

"Clap clap-"

While the white smoke was rising, the dense lead bullets were like hail falling from the air, instantly knocking down some Mughal Musketeers and light infantry who did not understand "trench warfare".

"It's useless to imitate the shape, only the shape has no spirit, and you can't use it if you have a trench..."

Qi Yuanbi in the rear looked at the situation on the battlefield ahead, and at the same time commented flatly, he turned his head and ordered to the artillery battalion general: "Fire the cannon."

"Yes!" The general replied, turning around and waving the command flag to the chief flag officers of the posts who had been looking at him.

Seeing the command flag being waved down, the chief flag officers of each post blew their wooden whistles one after another, and the team under them also started shouting and firing.

The match was ignited, and amidst the chirping sound, the four hundred cannons of the Ming army let out a roar...

"Boom boom-"

The muffled sound of cannons sounded from behind, and before Li Zicheng and others could react, the cannonballs flew across the sky with a "sharp" whistling sound, and bombarded the crumbling Kelinga city one by one.

"it is good!"

Li Zicheng and the others cheered when they saw their own artillery making great achievements, and then continued to focus on the battlefield.

No matter what period it is in, the will to fight is a crucial part of war, especially for generals who want to win.

However, due to the laziness of the Mughal nobles, they gave up artillery, muskets, and light infantry to European, Persian, and Ottoman mercenaries and local untouchables. Therefore, for these mercenaries, what nation and country?That's bullshit.

When the line infantry of the Ming army began to discharge guns continuously, the musketeers composed of Persians and Ottomans had no idea of ​​showing up to fight back, let alone the light infantry corps who only wanted to lead the army and not fight.

Shah watched helplessly as the group of guys didn't show their heads, and watched the sword players of the Ming army lift the wooden board to the front of the formation.

"Counterattack counterattack!"

The Mughal Mongol officer in the trench was also very helpless. He kept yelling and even chopped off several Persians who didn't obey orders in a row, which made the light infantry and musketeers start to fight back.

It's just that before a row of light infantry climbed the trench, they were knocked down by the Ming army's guns one after another and fell into the trench.

It is obvious that the Ming army did not have any protective guns, and the Mughal musketeers could rely on trenches to shoot, but the two sides had the opposite effect.

"Withdraw to the city!"

Looking at the Ming army that had already started to land in the trench, Shah had no choice but to let his troops in the trench retreat.

They don't understand trench warfare at all, just like what Qi Yuanbi said, they only have form but no spirit.

"Retreat, retreat!"

As the command flag was waved, all the Mughal soldiers began to retreat as if they had been beaten with chicken blood. Their enthusiasm was comparable to that of the Ming army chasing and beheading after defeating the enemy.

The large group of people retreated around the trench, and Li Zicheng swung his knife directly when he saw this:

"Stop firing guns, the front army will concentrate firing on the stone bridge after entering the trench!"

"Beep--"

Two long whistles made everyone stop firing their guns, and the flag soldiers sent to each headquarters also informed the officers of each headquarters.

The Ming army began to step over the trap, and the end of the volley of guns also prevented many Mughal soldiers from retreating around the trenches as originally planned, but climbed up the trenches and rushed directly towards the stone bridge.

There are a thousand Musketeers stationed on the stone bridge, different from the [-] Persian and Ottoman Musketeers on the front line, this Musketeer is a rare Mongol Musketeer.

They built defense lines such as horn walls and horse refusals on the stone bridge, relying on the gaps in the horn walls to shoot.

The stone bridge was only three feet long, and only the middle foot was passable, so many retreating Mughal soldiers were blocked here.

Li Zicheng had already guessed that it would end like this, so under his command, the Ming army musketeers started to pull the trigger fifty steps away from the Mughal army blocking the stone bridge after they crossed the trench.

The musket sound of "crack, bang, bang" kept ringing, and the lead bullets began to harvest the group of rout soldiers who took shortcuts, which made Shah clenched his fists.

Although he didn't care about the life and death of those untouchables, it was still uncomfortable to see his own slaughtered.

"Roar..."

Fortunately, at the critical moment, the war elephants finally returned to normal, and under the command of the elephant soldiers, they attacked the Ming army along both sides of the city.

The Mughal Musketeers sitting in the wooden frame of the war elephants began to shoot from a long distance, and as soon as the war elephants that caused the most casualties to the Ming army appeared, Liu Zongmin, who was cruising around the battlefield, immediately led more than 2000 cavalry to kill them .

This time they were more prepared. Each cavalryman held the scattered spears on the battlefield and his own cavalry blunderbuss.

Under the leadership of Liu Zongmin, the cavalry passed by the elephants, the bullets from the blunderbuss were left for the elephant soldiers on the back of the elephants, and the spears were left for the elephants.

Staggering around, pulling the trigger, and stabbing out the spear has almost become the muscle memory of every cavalryman.

The war elephants were howling and neighing, while the elephant soldiers suffered heavy casualties under Liu Zongmin's targeted attack.

"Shotgun!"

Shah couldn't bear it anymore, he would rather shoot some of his own troops, but also inflict heavy damage on the Ming army.

"As you wish..." The Portuguese officer didn't bother anymore, because he concluded that if the Ming army didn't suffer some painful casualties, Kolinga would soon be breached.

Therefore, under his command, one hundred cannons on the city wall began to be filled with gravel, iron nails and other "shotguns" wrapped in cloth.

As the match was lit, the hundred cannons fired in bursts of roar.

"Boom bang bang-"

Fierce artillery sounded on the battlefield, but this time it was not from the Ming army, but from the Mughal army.

It is indeed a bit wasteful and extravagant to use cannons to shoot shotguns, but it has to be said that it successfully achieved the effect Shah wanted.

Shotguns and iron nails were shot out like celestial maidens scattered flowers, strafing the entire battlefield like a shower over a distance of a hundred steps.

The Mughal light infantry borne the brunt of the casualties as they had the thinnest armor, followed by the Ming army.

Many cavalrymen of the Ming army were hit and fell down on their horses, and the cavalry on horseback were thrown away, and some line infantry also suffered blows.

Nearly a hundred Ming soldiers were shot, and they didn't know whether they were alive or dead. Li Zicheng's scalp was numb when he saw this scene, and he turned his head and shouted: "Let the rear artillery support!"

"Yes!" Li Zijing next to him waved the largest flag.

Qi Yuanbi, who was in the rear, frowned immediately after seeing the semaphore: "Cannon fire support?"

"General Soldier, it should be that the southern captives used artillery similar to the tiger crouching cannon to open flower shells and shotguns, so General Li and the others asked for support." The general next to him tried to guess, because the Ming army's line infantry tactics If you don't have a chariot, you will only be afraid of such mortars and shotguns.

"How long will the artillery be able to shoot again?" Qi Yuanbi looked at the artillery battalion that had just opened fire, and the general of the artillery battalion also returned the salute:
"About thirty breaths."

"Okay!" After hearing the time, Qi Yuanbi turned his head and continued to look at the battlefield.

"Mother! Why haven't you fired the cannon!"

Li Zicheng on the front line cursed, but Li Guo frowned and tried to explain: "Perhaps the artillery has not met the conditions to fire again."

"How long has it been?!" Li Zicheng cursed, but he also knew in his heart that only in this case, the artillery battalion would not shoot.

It has to be said that on the battlefield, for Qi Yuanbi and others in the rear, time passed quickly.

For Li Zicheng and others, time passed very slowly.

It was obvious that their side's shelling had not been over for a long time, but they felt as if a stick of incense had passed.

Fortunately, the artillery of the Ming army dissipated heat quickly, while the artillery of the Mughal army dissipated heat slowly. Therefore, after the shooting ended, the artillery of the Mughal army could not fire again in a short time.

"Beep-"

"Hit me hard!"

Li Zicheng couldn't ask for artillery support, so he could only blow the whistle to let the line infantry under his command continue to harvest the group of light infantry.

In the war between the Mughal Mongols and the Ming Han, India's local untouchables and some Persians and Ottomans became consumables.

After more than a dozen rounds of firing, the artillery of the Ming army finally broke out.

With the muffled sound of cannonballs, four hundred stone bullets roared towards him, and Shah once again became a turtle with a shrunken head helplessly, squatting behind the city wall.

When he finally survived the shelling of the Ming army and looked up again, the stone bridge was already covered with corpses, and the moat was also stained red with blood.

More than half of the more than 5000 light infantry who retreated were lost, and the Musketeers were not spared.

Seeing the unfavorable situation of the battle, the war elephants rushed out of the battlefield with the corpses of the elephant soldiers on their backs.

Only 6000 people survived to withdraw into the stone bridge, and more than half of them were lost.

"Beep--"

Seeing that the opponent retreated into the stone bridge, Li Zicheng did not choose to storm the stone bridge, but ordered his soldiers to occupy the Mughal trenches, and then rebuilt the trenches to surround the city of Kolinga in reverse.

"Let the front army and the left and right troops rest in the trenches, and Liu Zongmin leads the cavalry to cruise around the east and north gates."

Putting down the binoculars, Qi Yuanbi arranged tactical arrangements methodically, while Li Zicheng ordered people to start harvesting heads.

Although the heads of South Asia are not rewarded with silver, they do military service.

The Ming army harvested the heads on the battlefield and piled the corpses on the battlefield, but Shah in the city had an ugly face like a pig's liver.

Only 200 cavalry were beaten, 300 light infantry, 400 musketeers, and [-] elephant soldiers were still alive, but many war elephants were lost, only [-] More than head.

The artillery was bombarded by the Ming army, and more than 100 people were killed or injured.

Counting it all, there were still 2 Kolinga defenders before the war, but in just one afternoon, there were only less than 1000 left.

Although Shah was angry in his heart, he couldn't show it. He could only let the troops retreating into the city strengthen the stone bridge and the city defenses, while he himself watched the Ming army calmly harvest their heads on the battlefield.

The dead bodies of the Mughal soldiers whose heads had been cut off almost piled up into hills. The Ming army poured kerosene on their bodies, and then ignited them with a fire.

During this period, Shah did not dare to act rashly, and he did not let the Ming army be bombarded.

After all, the Ming army was angered, and the Ming army threw all those corpses into the city or into the moat, and the plague was inevitable.

Shah was afraid of the plague, and the Ming army was even more afraid, so even though they knew that the plague could effectively kill the enemy, Qi Yuanbi still asked them to burn the corpses.

Nearly 9000 corpses of the Mughal army were burned. The billowing black smoke filled the entire battlefield with a bleak atmosphere, and the "white snowflakes" floating on the battlefield from time to time were even more depressing.

For a time, the morale of the entire Kelinga City fell to the bottom.

At the same time, the wounded soldiers and corpses of the Ming army were sent to the rear, and Qi Yuanbi got the number of casualties on both sides before dusk.

The Ming army killed 450 seven people and injured 870 five people.

The Mughal army beheaded 620 people, and the injuries were unknown.

The ratio of casualties between the two armies reached one to six, and the ratio of combat deaths to one to eighteen...

　Eight o'clock in the eveningChapter 2
　　
　
(End of this chapter)