Volume 1: Birth! Seven time travelers Chapter 174: Fateful Sarhu (IV)
"Get out of the way! His big stick is just a cover, the big shield is used to kill you! Hey~~ Look, the big shield really smashed your brains out, right?
This idiot, why is he standing there stupidly after being stabbed? Hurry up and draw your gun and find the next one!
This guy is also a fool. He is holding a big thing like a saber and standing so close to his comrades. When the Jiannu come, how will you swing the sword? "
On a small mound on the south bank of the Hun River, Du Song, the general of Liaodong, held tightly in both hands the binoculars that had just been produced by Fangshan Laboratory, his eyes fixed on the tube, while he kept shouting.
Not only him, but all the 40,000-strong army, officers above the rank of lieutenant general were holding binoculars, and lower-ranking officers were holding monoculars, nervously watching the battle situation of the Kaiyuan Army, which was the first to engage the enemy on the river below the mountain.
The Hun River is about 600 meters wide in the Sarhu section, and with the addition of some tidal flats along the coast, the entire river is an extremely flat section of 800 meters. With such a distance, it is impossible for the Kaiyuan Army's 10,000 soldiers to line up in a row. Even if they were to arrange the troops in a high- density formation with one person standing per meter, they could only put more than 700 people in the front line.
Therefore, Marin's army did not only have chariots on the front line, but also stacked four or five layers of chariots. The only difference from the first layer was that the chariots in the following layers did not have the divine arrows stuffed inside.
After the Bordered Blue Banner paid a small price and successfully engaged in hand-to-hand combat with the Kaiyuan Army, in less than 20 minutes, the Kaiyuan Army's first line of defense was breached, and the casualty exchange ratio between the two sides was very ugly. The Ming Army officers watching the battle on the high ground on both sides saw clearly that it took almost seven or eight Ming Army soldiers to fall before one of the other side fell.
"Hiss~ I didn't expect the Jiannu to be so powerful. It seems that His Highness' repeated emphasis on us not to underestimate the enemy is very foresighted."
"Yes, these Jian slaves are much better at close combat than the Tartars I have faced in Datong over the years."
"Well, the Jiannu are strong, but in my opinion, they are only as strong as the two or three hundred strong men wearing two layers of cotton armor in the front. With these guys as the vanguard, the fighting power of the Jiannu behind them is invisibly magnified ."
"General Zhang is right. These heavily armored Jiannu are probably equivalent to our retainers, right? Marin, the miser, should send out his retainers now!"
The generals on the mountain were secretly criticizing Marin's stinginess, and if Marin on the river knew what his colleagues were thinking at this moment, he would probably cry out in injustice: he brought a total of 500 servants with him on this expedition, and 200 of them were on the front line!
No matter what Admiral Ma was thinking, the Kaiyuan Army was beaten back soon after the battle. Fortunately, Admiral Ma had a strong sense of defense, and there were five layers of chariots on the river. Therefore, although the Kaiyuan Army was not fighting well at the moment, the defense line could always be maintained.
After looking through the telescope for a while, Du Song saw that the Kaiyuan Army's second line of defense was also crumbling, so he spoke up: "General Chai, we can't wait any longer, we have to attack."
In this battle, Zhu Youdong simply deployed a battle array, but before the battle, he fully delegated power to the generals of each unit and let them play freely: A 100,000-man army, do you want everyone to micromanage? He is not a peanut, so he doesn't have this ability.
"Okay, it's time for us to attack, but Coach Du, should we move forward together?"
"Yes. General Chai, what I mean is that you and I should split up into two groups." Du Song put down the telescope and pointed his finger at the Manggurtai Zhenglan Banner troops that were advancing from the riverside mudflats (which were all ice at the moment) at the side of the mountain, trying to get around to the rear of the Kaiyuan Army. He said, "It seems that the Jiannu are trying to attack the Kaiyuan Army's flank. General Chai, please lead 5,000 cavalry to charge out from a high position, destroy this group of Jiannu, and then support Lieutenant General Ma from the front. I will lead 35,000 soldiers to charge directly through these hills."
"Okay, that's it. Take care, Du Shuai. See you later."
"Hahaha, Chai Shuai, you and I will definitely meet again in the future."
After Du Song's troops on the south bank of the Hun River started to move, Li Rubai on the north bank also put down his telescope and said, "General Liu, that reckless Du Laiqing has started to move. Should we also start to move?"
"Okay! We can't fall behind that reckless guy Du Song. Men, pass the order down and attack with all your forces!"
Following the orders of generals Du Song, Chai Guozhu, Li Rubai, Liu Jing and others, the entire Ming army along both sides of the river, totaling 56,000 people, began to attack together!
Correspondingly, on the side of the Later Jin, the white banner led by Chu Ying and the two red banners led by Daishan and Huang Taiji also began to advance rapidly. The entire battle line, which was four or five kilometers wide, suddenly entered a state of full-scale engagement! Originally, there were only bursts of fighting sounds on the river, but the battlefield seemed inexplicably silent. Suddenly, people roared and horses neighed, and it became extremely boiling!
In the Zhenglan Banner on the south bank of the Hunhe River, Manggurtai was leading an army of more than 6,000 people and was struggling forward, trying to bypass the chariot defense line of the Kaiyuan Army. Unexpectedly, Amin, who was fighting head-on, made progress too fast, so that the Ming army on the mountain rushed down less than half an hour after the head-on battle started . This made Manggurtai a little overwhelmed.
"Master, the snow on the mountain is flying so high. It seems that there are many cavalrymen coming from the southern barbarians."
"Hmph! Never mind. Listen to my orders. The whole army will rush up the mountain and use trees and rocks as cover. Once the southern barbarian cavalry rushes over, we will chop them down from behind!"
“Scum!”
"return!"
"Master, do you have any other instructions?"
"No armor in front, white armor in the back."
“Scum!”
Following Manggurtai's order, the rear army, which was almost entirely composed of infantry, quickly advanced from the river to the hill, and the two armies approached each other rapidly.
"Bang, bang, bang~~" After the soldiers of the Later Jin Dynasty could be seen with the naked eye, the Ming cavalry fired the Rumi guns in their hands, then turned the Rumi guns over and pressed the trigger to reveal the blade hidden under the handles of the Rumi guns.
The cavalry roared past, and this cavalry unit from Shanhaiguan quickly inflicted heavy casualties on the Later Jin soldiers who failed to hide behind trees or piles of rocks in time.
But this advantage only lasted for a short while: countless fearless Later Jin unarmored soldiers bravely raised their swords and formed a dense formation. Although such a human wall was quickly hit by the Ming cavalry, their internal organs were bleeding everywhere, and many people died in the air. However, many Ming horses were stabbed by the blades, or the smart horses slowed down after seeing the gleaming blades, and were then hit by the horses behind... As a result, the initial momentum of the Ming cavalry was significantly weakened.
"Good opportunity!" When Manggurtai saw that the speed of the Ming cavalry was slowing down, he quickly shook the reins and personally led the white-armored soldiers to charge.
Although cavalry is a god when running, but a scum when stopping, the so-called Liaodong Iron Cavalry is not only effective when on galloping war horses. After the speed of their own war horses slowed down, at the call of officers at all levels, the cavalrymen turned over and dismounted, and quickly formed a battle array to engage in foot battle with the Later Jin soldiers of the Zhenglan Banner!
Just as Chai Guozhu led the cavalry to rush down the mountain, the hot-tempered Du Song had already led an army of 35,000 to quickly approach the White Banner led by Chu Ying, which had only 8,000 people.
"Archers, fire three volleys!"
Standing behind the barricades, watching the Ming army rushing in like a tide, Chu Ying, the great prince of the Later Jin Dynasty, showed no fear at all. On the contrary, his eyes were filled with enthusiasm. After ordering his own archers to fire in unison, Chu Ying took out a hard bow, put on the bow and arrow, pulled the bowstring to its full length, and aimed at the Ming general who was wearing half-body armor, carrying a broadsword on his back, and running in front hundreds of meters away.
The arrows whizzed through the air, and Du Song shouted loudly: "Don't fire the bird guns, get closer, get closer, so close that you can see the white air coming out of the opponent's nostrils... Ouch!"
An arrow hit Du Song's forehead with great force, but unfortunately there was a hard helmet made of alloy steel produced by Fangshan Laboratory to protect it. Although the arrow was very powerful, it successfully left a mark on the helmet. But that was all: the helmet with countless prismatic protrusions on the surface eventually bounced off the arrow, and the owner of the helmet, Du Song, was only brought to the ground by inertia, and his cervical vertebrae made a sound.
"Huh~~" Du Song, who had fought for half his life, was helped up from the ground by his own servant. He took off his helmet and looked at the deep mark on it. He felt a sense of fear: "Damn it, luckily I got the new uniform from His Highness this time and got this new helmet. If I still used the helmet from the Ministry of Industry, I might have died for my country this time!"
Quickly putting on his helmet again, Du Song separated the guards and said, "Brothers, continue to follow me and charge forward!"
"Roar, roar~ The Marshal is mighty!"
Under Du Song's encouragement, the 35,000-strong Ming army from Shanhaiguan, Datong, Jizhen, and Xuanfu fought bravely and rushed to the front of the Later Jin White Banner's chevaux de frise.
"Now, fire!"
After a series of loud bangs, the Later Jin soldiers in the front of the Bordered White Banner retreated one after another: at this distance, the Ming Dynasty Ministry of Works' bird guns could finally kill people.
