Volume 2: Soaring! The Overlord of the Region Chapter 413 Differences in Physical Fitness
"Hiss—Siguoyi!"
"Yeah, the firepower of the shogunate army is really amazing."
"No, I'm not saying the shogunate army is powerful."
"ah?"
"The amazing ones are the Ming people. They marched forward under such heavy fire without losing their formation or speed. They are truly an elite army."
Telescopes are no longer rare because of time travelers. At this moment, many of the nobles on Mount Atago are using telescopes to watch the battle below.
During the half-hour battle, many soldiers from both sides fell. But it was obvious that the Ming army, which was attacking from above, had suffered more casualties.
But for those who really know something about military affairs, what they see from such a battle is completely different from that of a mere amateur.
Despite the heavy casualties, the Ming army still marched steadily and resolutely towards the defense line of the Tokugawa army. Both the nobles watching the battle from the top of the mountain and the shogunate officers facing the Ming army from the bottom of the mountain felt a heavy sense of oppression.
Moreover, as the Ming army's artillery continued to advance with the infantry, and finally smashed the shells into the interior of the Tokugawa army's position, the Tokugawa army's front line actually loosened a little.
"Now!" Mao Wenlong, who was commanding at the front line, raised his right hand high and then pressed forward hard!
Several buglers stood up beside him and blew the charge bugle call that is familiar to most Chinese people in the 21st century.
After the charge sounded, the Ming army soldiers standing in the first row were still raising their guns and firing, while behind them, the sound of "clang clang" of the bayonet handles entering the grooves of the gun heads could be heard in unison.
As the "clang clang" sound suddenly sounded and quickly disappeared, officers at all levels on the long battle line shouted at the same time:
"Brothers! Follow me!"
In response to these shouts, there was a wave of even more violent voices:
"Mighty! Long live!"
A thunderous roar rang out, and countless Ming army soldiers wearing yellow-green camouflage and half-body plate armor on their upper bodies roared in unison, quickly changing from walking to running, and sprinting towards the Japanese army, which was only more than a hundred meters away at an extremely fast speed!
"Attack~!"
"Onboard~!"
Seeing the Ming soldiers rushing over, the commanders of the Tokugawa army were helpless: more than a hundred meters away, the enemy rushed over with just one shot from the flintlock rifle. If they did not charge, by the time the enemy rushed over, they would have just entered the rhythm of reloading and that would be the end.
Therefore, even though our soldiers were much shorter than the enemy, they still had to grit their teeth and charge forward.
At such a short distance, in just one or two breaths, the soldiers of both sides fought together. The sharp sound of bayonets hitting each other, the dull sound of metal entering flesh, and the screams of injured soldiers, all kinds of sounds mixed together, quickly forming a requiem from hell.
…
"Huh~" Zhu Youdong, who was watching the battle in the back, let out a long sigh of relief after gently putting down the telescope.
This was the first time in his two lifetimes that he actually went to the battlefield - after all, when he arrived in Siam, the war was almost over, and when Raja Buddha saw that the situation was hopeless, he surrendered very readily.
In the battle of this day, if we say that the Ming army had to take the initiative to attack first due to the slight disadvantage of the terrain at the beginning, and paid a lot for it, when the tall Ming army soldiers did not collapse in the process of advancing and entered the close combat procedure, our side completely reversed the disadvantage and gained an advantage. At this point in the battle, the possibility of our side collapsing is not great. The rest depends on the courage and will of the soldiers.
"General Cao, you train good soldiers."
"They are all loyal to the emperor, so the soldiers are willing to die."
After quickly answering this question, Cao Wenzhao raised a command flag in his hand and waved it violently. Then Zhu Youdong saw on the tower that a team of lightning rods, riding on war horses, began to charge forward vigorously.
When the lightning rod team arrived at the battlefield where the two armies were fighting, they did not continue to charge forward. They all dismounted, drove their mounts to the rear, and then roared in a language that neither side could understand, and rushed into the battle.
"Hahaha, the Jurchens, fake cavalry, real infantry..."
"Your Majesty, if these Jurchens were asked to advance under the fire just now, they would not be able to do it. But if they are thrown in now, it will be like a battering ram!"
"Well, I have said that I will not interfere with the specific command of General Cao. And this move just now, even for someone like me who doesn't know much about military affairs, is a very clever move."
"I thank the emperor for his trust."
"General Cao, what are you going to do next?"
"Your Majesty, our army has gained the upper hand at the moment. Now it is the opponent's commander's turn to make the first move, and then I will make corresponding fine-tuning according to the opponent's adjustments."
Speaking of the enemy commander, the commander-in-chief of the shogunate army at the front line was Tokugawa Yoshinao's confidant, Yagyu Torajiro Munetora - as the family that the current shogun had completely surrendered to when he was still the heir, the Yagyu family was the family that Tokugawa Yoshinao trusted the most. Almost all the young people in the family who were a little bit impressive were officers who directly controlled the new army.
After the two sides started fighting hand to hand, the tiger felt that the situation was not good: the rifles of both sides were almost the same length after being equipped with bayonets, but you can't stand the Ming soldiers' height and long arms! And it's not just the height difference, it's obvious in size, the Ming soldiers are generally taller and stronger than the Japanese soldiers. Such an obvious difference in physical fitness led to the short confrontation of the two sides for less than half an hour, and Yagyu Sotora was surprised to find that the exchange ratio of hand-to-hand combat between the two sides was at least one to three!
(By the way, during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, due to the huge gap in physical fitness, the casualty ratio between Chinese and Japanese soldiers using hot weapons was 1:6. In hand-to-hand combat, the ratio was a heartbreaking 1:10.)
"Damn it! We can't go on like this!" Although our soldiers were still fighting desperately, Zong Hu clearly saw that after the strong barbarian troops with long helmet tassels entered the battlefield, our soldiers fell down more frequently in hand-to-hand combat. If we didn't make adjustments, I'm afraid that within an hour, our front line would collapse.
"Messenger!"
"Hi Yi!"
"First, report the battle situation here to Lord Muneki behind us and ask for tactical guidance. Second, send a signal to Lord Ii's cavalry to attack."
"Hi Yi!"
After these two orders were issued, even the nobles who were watching the battle from Mt. Atago could hear a dense, thunderous, rhythmic sound. The ground beneath their feet was shaking at a frequency that was more obvious than the shaking in the morning.
"The enemy's cavalry is out." Cao Wenzhao muttered while standing on the high platform, but his hands were not slow. He took out another command flag and waved it quickly, and then various response flags quickly followed suit. Afterwards, dense thunders quickly appeared on both sides of the Ming army's battle line!
At 11:20 am, on the left side of this long battle line, countless knights with flags on their backs suddenly appeared on the horizon. They were wearing traditional Japanese samurai uniforms of various types, driving their horses and charging quickly towards the center of the battlefield.
The first few knights were wearing red armor and riding tall horses. Beside the commander, several riders held high the Ii family's Tachibana family crest. Behind them, as the cavalry crossed the horizon one by one, more and more cavalry appeared in the sight of Zhu Youdong and others, until the surging cavalry covered the entire battlefield!
On the other side of the battlefield, led by Man Gui, more than 10,000 Ming cavalrymen wearing half-plate armor, each riding a tall horse and holding a saber, were also advancing hard towards the center of the battlefield.
"Enemy~!"
“Wow~!”
"Brothers, kill!"
“Kill~!”
The cavalry of both sides, totaling nearly 30,000, galloped desperately on the battlefield vacated by the first batch of Ming army's infantry, and then collided with each other quickly and fiercely!
