Silver Fox of the Three Kingdoms

Chapter 450 The Battle of Ziyun Mountain

As night fell, the sunset glow finally disappeared in the western sky, and a round disk slowly rose in the eastern sky.

During the Mid-Autumn Festival, when the moon is at its roundest, the bright silver glow falls on the earth, and together with the bright moon, there is also the bright silver starlight that fills the sky, and the stars hang all over the sky.

On the official road to the east of Ziyun Mountain, the Han army lined up neatly and trotted all the way.

Ziyun Mountain is an L-shaped mountain range that is connected horizontally from east to west and vertically from north to south. Between Longshan Mountain to the west of the mountain range and Baigui Mountain to the south is the later Pingdingshan City.

The position of the Han army is the Ziyun Avenue connecting Xiangcheng and Pingdingshan City in the later generations. On their right is the continuous Ziyun Mountain, and on the left is the wilderness plain.

Since the Yellow Turban Rebellion and feudal lords' hegemony, this area has lost many people.The most important thing is that after the confrontation between the North and the South, the people on the front lines of both sides were basically relocated, so that this place has long since become a wilderness.

Tens of thousands of Han army units were spread out in the field almost in a scattered manner, each with a scale of about 5000 people, led by generals at all levels, forming seven or eight formations, and running slowly.

The phalanx at the front of the team was relatively neat, while the two phalanxes at the back were much more scattered. The soldiers had almost no formation, and marched southward in clusters.

There are a large number of scout cavalry cruising at the end of the team, blocking the detection of enemy scouts and covering their actions.

Zhang Bao was in the scout team at this time. He held a torch in his left hand, stepped on the stirrups with his legs, kept the horse in a slow walking posture, and then kept looking back.

The sky was gradually dimming, and the city of Xiangcheng in the distance had long since disappeared, but Cao Jun still had no sign of chasing him. This made him wonder if there was something wrong with the prime minister's strategy, and the enemy was afraid that they would not come after all.

"If you want me, I won't chase."

Gan Ning's eldest son, Gan Gui, is tall and tall and rides on horseback. He is two years older than Zhang Bao. Because Zhang Fei and Gan Ning share similar tastes and have worked together for many years, the relationship between their offspring is also very good.

At this moment, Gan Gui looked back at the dark horizon and said, "The prime minister's strategy is too obvious. If I were the enemy, I would definitely suspect fraud."

Zhang Bao smiled and said: "The prime minister said that he wanted to use the enemy's ignorance to lure the enemy to pursue him. You said that because you already knew the prime minister's strategy, but the enemy didn't know it. All the signs only show that the prime minister can't use troops. Who would have guessed?" The Prime Minister has a plan already?"

"It seems to be the reason."

After Gan Gui thought about it, she turned her head and looked at the slightly chaotic rear formation in the distance, and couldn't help but sigh: "The prime minister is really good at using troops. We have 5 people. How did he manage to arrange it so meticulously? Everyone and every general can be in order."

Zhang Bao said: "Even if the whole country is well-governed by the prime minister, there are only tens of thousands of horses. The chaos in the army is caused by the collapse of soldiers and horses, and the soldiers cannot find officers, and the officers cannot find soldiers. The prime minister even assigned tasks to the Every Sima and Qu Junhou will naturally allow the soldiers to perform their duties."

The two are chatting.

There was a sudden change in the torch dragon in the distance, and soon the officers' scolding, the soldiers' moving, and the sound of running and clashing weapons came continuously.

It turned out that the chaotic queue in the rear was responsible for pretending to be an army. Due to long-term strict training, they unconsciously and instinctively began to rearrange into a neat formation. The team of 5000 people is actually relatively large, and it suddenly becomes neat and easy to spot. .

Therefore, Zhuge Liang, who was watching from the chariot, quickly noticed this, and sent messengers to disrupt the formation over there again, and redistributed the formation of each song and even each team.

Zhang Bao and Gan Gui were shocked by such an exaggerated micro-manipulation ability. They saw that the soldiers became chaotic again in a short period of time according to the deployment.

However, if you look closely, you will see that the soldiers are only a little uneven in the original formation. In fact, dozens of hundreds of soldiers in each team follow their commanders. Once the battle starts, they can immediately take their positions and reorganize Formation comes.

This scene made the voice of doubt no longer. Tens of thousands of Han troops spread all over the wilderness like this. The front and end of the team were seven or eight miles long, and the long dragon of torches seemed to ignite half of the sky.

Rumble!
Just as everyone was on their way, the north suddenly heard a low thunder.

It was quiet at first, but then it got louder.

The faces of all the Han soldiers changed suddenly, because everyone knew that it was not the sound of rolling thunder, but the sound of tens of thousands of horses galloping.

"Woooooooooo!"

The desolate horn resounded throughout the wilderness. It was just at the beginning of dusk, and the sky hadn't completely darkened yet. It was only night and night, and the bright silver light sprinkled on the ground, allowing people to see clearly the situation a mile away.

The Han army at the back has already seen countless shadowy figures appearing in the distant night, and they are rushing towards them at an extremely fast speed.

It just so happened that the Han troops in the two phalanxes were still in the process of changing their formation. When the enemy came, the formation did not change all of a sudden, which caused the false chaos to become real chaos. All kinds of miscellaneous voices intertwined all of a sudden. On the war zone.

Zhang Yun, who was leading the cavalry in pursuit from a distance, naturally also saw that scene from a distance. As a veteran on the battlefield, he could tell at a glance whether the enemy was in real or fake chaos.

The distance between the two sides is getting closer and closer. Even though Zhang He didn't intend to let the cavalry charge directly, but stopped on the outside and used the traditional cavalry to fight the infantry. The army made a mistake in the rush, and the generals in the rear anxiously scolded the soldiers to assemble quickly.

"Prime Minister."

At this moment, among the troops in the central part of the Han army, Wang Ping, the general of this part, stood on the chariot and looked out. Under the light of the fire and the moonlight, he saw the enemy chasing and the rear army in chaos. He was startled and said: "Let's There seems to be something wrong with the timing of the change."

Zhuge Liang stared at the past, shook his head, and said, "No, it's the right time. If the formation change has been completed, the enemy will see through it. It just so happens that this chaos makes the enemy think it's a real chaos."

"Then what should we do, should we rush to help the past now? If we don't rush to help, the rear army may be finished."

Wang Ping felt a little uneasy.

If the enemy is inserted into the rear formation like this, if the rear formation is directly defeated, pretending to become a real defeat, and forming a rollback, it will inevitably implicate the three armies.

Zhuge Liang thought for a moment, then said, "Use the wind."

"Wind gust?"

Wang Ping was stunned.

The world does not know that Zhuge Liang has been training soldiers for Liu Bei as early as when he was in Jingzhou.

In the battle of Pingting and the confrontation with Cao Jun, Zhuge Liang served as the commander. He changed his formation several times and resisted Cao Jun's attack.

Therefore, the elite soldiers under Liu Bei's command have actually received Zhuge Liang's training and have a certain military foundation.

Zhuge Liang studied Qimen gossip and had a very high understanding of military formations. This time he went north, he had temporarily arranged for formation changes and made certain commands.

Among them, the wind formation is to let the Chinese army spread out from the left and right, forming thicker wings, like a concave formation, separating the center, allowing the enemy to enter the formation and outflank it from the left and right sides.

But using this formation is tantamount to giving up the rear army, which shocked Wang Ping.

Zhuge Liang said in a deep voice: "Use the wind gust, and then let the rear army retreat southward, lure the enemy into the ambush circle, and hold them back."

"Yes"

Wang Ping hesitated for a moment, but had no choice but to obey.

Since the sky was already dusk and it was almost night, Zhuge Liang could not use the five-color flag to communicate, but could only communicate through the horn.

After a while, the melodious sound of the horn came. The generals of the Han army in the center and two wings who were already ready for battle heard the sound, hesitated a little, and immediately acted according to the deployment.

Soon the Chinese army spread out, revealing a huge gap.The chaotic rear army was already fighting Cao Jun at this time. After several rounds of arrow rain from Cao Jun, the Han army fled in embarrassment, from fake chaos to real chaos, rushing towards the main formation in a panic.

If Zhuge Liang does not change his formation, then it will be his Chinese army that will suffer.Once the rear army forms a rollback, the 2 army will be overwhelmed by the enemy's more than [-] cavalry in an instant.

But at the critical moment, Zhuge Liang changed the formation without hesitation, and dispersed the three divisions in the middle, with about 1 people, so that when the rear army retreated, they directly retreated to the central open space, without threatening the formation. Safety.

But Zhang Yun over there obviously didn't notice that he was still rushing to kill in the chaotic army. Most of Cao's army had already dismounted at this time, chasing the defeated Han army and rushing into the center formation. No one in the chaos noticed the Han army at this time. The two wings of the sky are silently enveloping slowly.

In an instant, fighting and shouting continued, more than 2 cavalrymen and more than 3 Han troops were entangled together, and the killing was inextricable.

There were shouts, shouts, and sounds of weapons wanting to touch in the darkness.

Zhang Yun led dozens of personal guards to pursue the Han army. After defeating a small army formed by more than a hundred Han troops, he wiped his face and looked around.

I saw that the sky was completely dark at this time, and countless torches formed a long dragon under the night, and there were enemy soldiers fleeing or fighting everywhere. The Han army seemed to have no formation, as if they were fighting fiercely with Cao's army.

"General, it doesn't feel right."

Looking from a distance, a personal guard found that the Han army had actually achieved an anti-encirclement, and said to Zhang Xi: "Their formation is not in a mess to the point of defeat."

Zhang He also naturally discovered this, frowned and said: "The Han army is elite, we should not be underestimated, see if we can withdraw first, and wait for the arrival of general Xiahou's help, we can win."

As he said that, he turned his horse's head and prepared to go back and evacuate the encirclement first.

But when he gathered the attacking soldiers everywhere and retreated, he found that the encirclement circle on the two wings of the Han army had begun to close, and the retreat route was cut off.

It wasn't until this time that Zhang Yun realized that something was wrong, and quickly sent a signal, asking all the ministries to gather at him immediately.

However, the Han army and the Wei army were fighting together, and it was obviously impossible to leave the battlefield in a short period of time. Therefore, after the Wei army was surrounded by a pass, it quickly fell into a disadvantage.

At this time, the two sides are actually still in balance.

Because Zhuge Liang's rear army was also defeated by Zhang Yun's army, the Han army even suffered more losses than the Wei army on both sides.

But after Zhuge Liang's army collapsed, the two wings shrunk the encirclement, and the situation suddenly reversed, making it difficult for Cao Jun to break through the encirclement from the inside.

Fortunately, Zhang Xi also deployed cavalry on the periphery. Under the cooperation of the inside and the outside, he wanted to forcibly kill a breakthrough from the north and rush out.

This got into a bitter fight.

The fight lasted from early dusk to three o'clock in the evening, which was only half an hour. It coincided with Xia Houba leading another part of the cavalry to rush to help and joined the battlefield without stopping.

This is already all the cavalry of the Cao army, about 4 people, launched a surprise attack from the flanks, breaking the outer encirclement of the Han army at once.

After Zhang Yun rushed out, he joined Xiahouba and started to counterattack again.

Because the main force of the Cao army arrived immediately, with the arrival of Xiahouba at this time, the Cao army itself was already in an advantage. After the main force arrived, their chance to defeat the Han army was at hand.

At this moment, Zhuge Liang was still scanning the entire battlefield situation.

After the wind gust changed, they failed to encircle Cao's army, and were rushed out by them. There were soldiers and horses fighting between the enemy and us scattered all over the battlefield.

It's just that the two sides have entered the entanglement stage.

Seeing this situation, Zhuge Liang did not change the formation, but only ordered the Chinese army to gather again, reorganize the defeated rear army, and put it on the battlefield again.

With the drastic changes in the situation, the difficulty of temporarily readjusting has also increased exponentially, so there is no need to make further changes.

In the night, the two sides fell into a fierce battle.

In Ziyun Mountain, Gan Jing, who was old and had a white beard but still had strong muscles, quietly watched the messy battlefield below.

As the left-wing general of the Han army, he has always strictly abided by Zhuge Liang's military orders.

Never attack without a signal.

It’s just that waiting all this time is also anxious. He was like an ant on a hot pot, sweat slipped from his forehead, stared at the battlefield, and said to Pang Tong beside him, “Shang Shuling, should we do something?”

"Need not."

Pang Tong was also looking at the battlefield, but he couldn't see anything clearly from a distance, he could only see countless fire dragons waving.

In the wilderness, many people even discarded their torches when they were fighting, causing a fire in the field. Flames rose everywhere on the battlefield for more than ten miles, making the whole situation even more chaotic.

"Then when are we going to wait?"

Gan Ning asked.

Pang Tong raised his head and looked at the sky. It was already midnight, and today was a fine day, with no dark clouds, only the moon as big as a disc hanging above his head, illuminating the earth as if it were daytime.

Farther to the north, there are cavalry running back and forth from time to time. It is obvious that Cao Jun's scouts are constantly conveying changes in the battlefield situation to the main force behind.

"It won't be long, wait a little longer."

Pang Tong reassured Gan Ning and said: "Cao Jun is entangled with us now, and it is difficult for both sides to leave the battlefield quickly. When their main force arrives, they will definitely attack immediately. We will attack from the flanks and cooperate with General Zhang's cavalry. Can defeat Cao Jun."

"Ok."

Gan Ning reluctantly responded, and could only continue to watch the changes in the battlefield situation.

Zhuge Liang's side continued to invest in reserve forces to resist the Cao army's attack. The two sides almost won each other. In some places, the Cao army was superior and the Han army was defeated.

The melee of nearly 10 people is not a complete failure with a small defeat of a few thousand people, but a situation of criss-crossing and constant see-saw on the battlefield as long as more than ten miles.

Cao Wei is obviously very satisfied with this situation, because their task is to entangle the Han army and wait until the main force from the rear arrives.

This is exactly the same as when Cao Cao's cavalry chased and killed Shen Chen.

However, it was beyond Cao Jun's expectation that the Han army was not defeated immediately. In fact, Xia Houba and Zhang Xi had faintly felt that something was wrong at this time.

After all, the reason why they attacked was that Zhuge Liang lacked military experience and could not take on the important task of commanding the three armies.

But since the opponent's general is an idiot, why can the Han army persist for so long?

It's just that this thought just flashed by.

In the current situation where the two sides are entangled, there is not much time for them to calm down and think, so they can only bite the bullet and continue to attack.

After another two hours, at the end of the cock crowing and the beginning of Ping Dan, the sky gradually became brighter.

On the northern horizon, countless figures appeared.

Cao Jun's main force is here!

Cao Jun on Zhang He Xiahouba's side was exhausted, and when he learned of this, he was refreshed and stepped up his offensive immediately.

However, they didn't know that Zhuge Liang was also refreshed and issued a new order.

(End of this chapter)