A small soldier of the frontier army in the late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 241
On the eighth day of November in the 11th year of Chongzhen, in the territory of Qingdu.

It was the bitter winter, and the cold wind cracked the skin. In a forest not far from the Tang River, there were several Wang Doujun quietly lurking in the middle of the night.They are all wearing felt hats and wearing ordinary folk clothes.Beside them, there were many mules and horses parked, all with bits on their mouths.

At this time, they were looking around cautiously. After crossing the Tang River, Dingzhou City was not far to the south.To the north, Qingdu City is dozens of miles away, and Baoding City is less than a hundred miles further north.Of course they couldn't see Qingdu City and Baoding City from such a long distance.

Looking around as far as the eye can see, it seems that in the world, there are only wheat fields and rivers, and there are only wheat fields except rivers. There is a village almost every few miles.This Qingdu is the Wangdu County of later generations. The Taihang Mountains are in the distance in the west, and the plains in the territory are as open as a stone, with rich soil and beautiful water.

But at this time of winter depression, it seems that there is a yellow and black color everywhere. Riding a horse, not walking on the official road, the frozen wheat field is also very easy to walk.From time to time, you can see some curling smoke rising up, which is of course not cooking smoke, but traces of Qing soldiers raging and burning the village everywhere.

A few days ago, after a few nights without closing the sentry, it was detected that the Tazi soldiers of the brigade showed signs of leaving Qingdu and heading for Dingzhou.However, this does not mean that there are no Tazi soldiers in Qingdu. Yesterday when a few people passed by the Yaomu Temple in the southeast of the city, they saw hundreds of Tazi soldiers gathered there, and dozens of them chased after them.

Fortunately, there were three horses among them, and the Tartar sentries couldn't escape them.Killed a carbine, captured a Tartar infantry soldier, and flayed him alive before venting his hatred for being chased for dozens of miles.

Seeing that there was no movement around, he couldn't help but say to someone all night: "Li Tou, it's freezing cold, how about making a fuss?"

He took out his own pipe from his pocket, took out the fire box, and really wanted to take a good puff.

"No, prevent the fireworks from leaking our tracks."

Li Tou stopped him sternly, and then he sighed: "Brother Yan in our team was discovered and captured by the Tazi sentry. When we found his body...it was so miserable... "

His voice was a little choked up, and everyone fell silent. It is a dangerous job not to pay at night.Since Wang Dou sent troops this autumn, there have been about ten casualties in the army.What's even more frightening is that if the sentry fell into the hands of the Tazi soldiers, it would be impossible to survive or die.

Yebushu Yangong in their team is a lively and cheerful young man who can sing folk songs well. He has always been the pistachio in the team, but he didn't expect to go like this a few days ago.

This Li Tou is Li Youde, the officer of the No-Stop at Night team, a relatively steady middle-aged man. For the team officer.

At this time, Li Youde was playing with a huge grenade, which was the prototype of the later grenade, but it was a bit bigger, as big as someone's head, and the fuse was ignited.There is no way, the black powder grenade is not powerful at all if it is not bigger.

Of course, such a big grenade cannot be used in field battles, because the chances of blowing up friendly troops are greater than the chances of killing the enemy. Generally, the Ming army used it to defend the city.

Shunxiang Fort didn't make a grenade. The grenade was left to Li Youde by a friendly army. After Wang Dou's army joined up with Xuan Da's officers and soldiers, in order to prepare for the next war, all battalions went out overnight.Under the order of the guerrilla general Wang Dou, Li Youde also went out in person, leading a few small teams to go out to spy at night.

In the past few days, he has been very happy to cooperate with the Chen Ying brothers from the Supervising Biaoying Camp. This Chen Ying is about the same age as Li Youde, both 32 or [-] years old.Different from Li Youde's family name in Baoanzhou, this Chen Ying is from Liaodong.

He had a bloody feud with the Tartar soldiers. After entering the customs, he joined Duchen Lu as a family guard. Li Youde admired his skills, not to mention riding and shooting. Feng, a very brave man.

More importantly, the two have a common language. Li Youde looks calm on the outside, but his inner world is rich. The most feared thing is to fall into the hands of the enemy, so when you are in a desperate situation, as long as you have a chance, you can never accept it. They all choose to commit suicide immediately, and the ways of death are different, and each has its own magic method.

Li Youde is always thinking, if he is in a desperate situation, which method of suicide should he choose?After thinking about many kinds, he was not satisfied. In the words of later generations, it was not heroic or romantic.It wasn't until he saw the huge grenade carried in the package of Chen Ying's horse that his eyes lit up.

In Chen Ying's words, if he ignites the grenade when he is in a desperate situation, even if he dies, he will drag a few people to back him up.

Li Youde also thought it was good, he ignited the grenade and turned himself and the surrounding enemies into a rain of flesh.The flying flesh and blood in the fireworks is very sad and poetic.At that moment, he asked Chen Ying for a grenade, and Chen Ying generously gave him one.

While playing with the grenade, he was thinking, this morning he and Chen Ying split up to watch, and seeing that it was time to meet up, why haven't brothers Chen and the others come back yet?

Suddenly he kept shouting all night: "Li Tou, there is movement in the east... Tartar..."

Immediately everyone jumped up.

……

Smoke and dust billowed, dozens of riders were galloping and chasing in the wilderness, the sound of arrows piercing the air and the incomprehensible shouting and cursing of foreigners continued to come.

Chen Ying kept raising his whip, urged the horses, and galloped forward like lightning. As long as he ran to the forest in front, where there were some brothers from Baoanzhou, he would be safe.In front of him, Yu Maoer, the brother who accompanied the sentry, was galloping silently.

He looked back, and the ten Tartar cavalry behind him were still hotly chasing them. They were dressed in pure white cotton armor, but they were the sentry horses of the Tartars who were holding the white flag.While shouting loudly, they drew their bows and arrows, and kept shooting.

Hearing the sound of wind piercing the air from behind, Chen Ying knew that a sharp arrow was shooting towards his back, so he pushed his feet hard and threw himself on another horse beside him.

With a sound of "嗖", another sharp arrow hit, and Chen Ying jumped back to the original horseback.

He jumped back and forth on the two galloping horses, sometimes kicking to hide, his figure was very flexible, the sharp arrows fired by those Tartar soldiers never hit him.

In the blink of an eye, he galloped another mile, and the steed under his crotch was desperately exhaling. Fortunately, General Wang gave the governor a hundred war horses, and they, the guards who sent out the sentry, could have two horses.These horses are strong enough to withstand long runs.Looking at the Tartars, their pursuit seems to have weakened.

Suddenly hearing the rush of hoofbeats, Chen Ying looked back, but it was a Tartar vest chased madly again, Chen Ying saw that this Tartar had opened a large distance from the other Tartars, and secretly called out.He took the bow and arrow in his hand, on the back of the galloping horse, the moment the horse vacated on all fours, he suddenly turned his head.

His body seemed to be completely twisted, "Swoosh!" He shot an arrow, which hit the vest soldier's face.

The tartar screamed and rolled off the pommel horse.

OK, done one!
"call out!"

Chen Ying turned back and shot another arrow, another Tazi soldier got an arrow in the eye, and flew backwards.

"Whizzing……"

Chen Yingji ran to the front of the woods, and shot a rain of arrows from inside. Four or five of the Qing soldiers who chased them fell off their horses immediately, and a crossbow even penetrated the head of a Qing soldier's infantry.

Roaring in the woods, several Ming troops rushed out on horseback, and the remaining three Qing soldiers saw that the situation was not good, so they immediately pulled out their horses and turned back to flee.

"Suddenly!" With a sound, a horse rope flew over like a ghost, and it was precisely put on a Qing soldier's head. The noose was tightened in an instant, and the Qing soldier was pulled backwards and fell off the horse.His mount neighed and fled far away.The remaining two Qing soldiers did not look back, and galloped back on their horses.

Same as them, Li Youde and others didn't stay after they succeeded, they roared and ran in the opposite direction. This forest cannot stay for long.

The Qing soldier was dragged along like this by the crowd, and when he stopped in an unknown woods, he was bloody and inhuman, and his helmet had already fallen off.

He struggled to look, and saw eight people in front of him, all of them were dressed as ordinary Ming people.But judging by their horse equipment, they must be the elite of the Ming army.Seeing these people looking at him with fierce eyes, he felt chills in his heart, and was about to struggle to get up, when he heard a loud shout, a Ming soldier's fist hit him heavily on his lower abdomen, the Qing soldier's eyes protruded, hehe .

Then the Ming soldier strode over, his face was full of flesh, and his voice was as ugly as fingernails scraping on an iron plate.He grinned grimly and said in Manchu: "You son of a bitch, tell me everything you know, and grandpa will give you a good time!"

He grabbed his money rattail pigtail and lifted him up. The Qing soldier was considered thick, and his heavy body was supported by a pigtail, clearly explaining what a close call is.The Qing soldier was dragged behind his horse for an unknown number of miles, his mouth and nose were bleeding, and his face was covered in dust.In addition, being pulled up like this, I felt that my scalp was about to be ripped off, and I screamed.

※※※

Old Bainiu: Damn it, the power went out after ten o'clock in the evening, and it has been stopped until now.

(End of this chapter)