18. Fight

29. The jackal is coming

On July 6, the fourteenth day of Liao's attack on the Song Dynasty.

Xixia general Weiming Langbu led 80,000 troops to invade Huanzhou. The striker commanded Wei Ming A buried out of Qinggang Gorge, the left-wing commander-wing envoy Baimachuan, and the right-wing commander-wing envoy Liang Ke returned to Dechuan.

There are tens of thousands of horses in the army of the third road, and the banners cover the sky and the sun are murderous. After crossing the Hengshan, they rushed towards the first defense line of Huanzhou.

On this day, Zhao Ze was supervising the battle on the front line near Guideburg. The headquarters was temporarily located on a nearby hill, diagonally facing Guideburg. There were ten earth cannons on the hill, and five at the foot of the mountain had locked the first 100 steps of the grass of Guideburg. The bombardment area almost covered the front line between Qingping Pass and Guideburg.

The position of the heavy machine gun is located in the canopy behind the trench, scattered on the inside of the whole defense line, with a hundred condescending fire strongholds. The gunmen in each stronghold are the cronies who came out by Zhao Ze himself. In a group of two, Zhao Ze gave them the order was to listen to him when the Xixia army launched a general attack and approached the trench 50 steps. The order is to fire uniformly.

In order to train Zhao Ze, the elite among these elites, Zhao Ze asked each group of machine gunners to shoot 50 rounds in the early exercise field, which consumed a total of 5,000 rounds of ammunition, which made Zhang Zai, Sima Guang and others very distressed. They thought that it was enough to train the shooting posture, shooting essentials, and empty guns, but Zhao Ze persuaded them and said Unlike other personnel, the heavy machine gunmen of the musket team will inevitably have problems on the battlefield if they are not well trained. Fortunately, with the experience of live-fire shooting, these heavy machine gunners will show their power in future wars.

After noon, the Xixia army carried out a tentative attack. The attacking troops were all slaves of the tribes of Xixia, with a number of about 10,000, and began to attack the defense line around Guidebao in Huanzhou.

Zhao Ze issued an order to attack with an arrow rain through a loud army name. All the soldiers who participated in the war aimed their bows and arrows at the Xixia slave army outside the land of three arrows. When they rushed into the land of one arrows, the overwhelming rain of arrows fell down. In an instant, they shot over a large area of the running slave army, and then surged. The slave army held the shield and continued to attack, and then stepped into the range of a hundred steps and fell into the trap of more than three people. There were sharp bamboo guns standing there, and there was no doubt that they would die.

According to the statistics of Huanzhou civil servants who were in charge of contact on the front line, those traps alone killed nearly 3,000 Xixia slaves, and only a thousand people rushed to the front. All of them were killed by Yang Wenguang's cavalry before the battle, and the casualties of our army were zero.

The bloody massacre lasted for nearly an hour. When the last escaped slave soldier was killed in front of the battle by his own men, the Xixia people began the second wave of shield advance.

This time, the Xixia army sent a capture army with about 20,000 people. It was divided into twenty phalanxes with a heavy shield of nearly 5,000 people on the front, holding a wolf tooth shield more than one person high, covered with animal fur. Zhao Ze could see clearly from the monoculars. It was estimated that ordinary bows and arrows could not be shot through at all.

At the beginning, they advanced very fast, almost shouting and running. When they approached the land of two arrows, they stopped. Under the supervision of the officers of various arrays, they set up twenty airless tortoise shell arrays and slowly moved towards the front line of Guideburg.

This time, Zhao Ze ordered the catapulter in Guidebao to launch 20 catties of stone bombs, and the giant in the battle building fired a one-long chisel-headed heavy arrow to attack the approaching Xixia army from the right. At the same time, Liu Hu sent an army of Huanzhou prisoners who trained 6,000 to shoot alternately outside the land of two arrows with divine arm crossbows.

When Zhao Ze raised his monoculars to watch the battle, his expression was as surprised as if he were watching an ancient war film.

Several 20 catties of stone bullets roared and hit the front of the Xixia Army's array. With a bang, the front heavy shield was smashed, and then the rows of shields fell down. Unfortunately, some were hit by the head and suddenly burst to death. Even if they were scraped, their hands and feet would be broken. Such a scene was closer and closer to Guideburg. The more frequently it is born.

When they approached the place of one arrow, the divine arm crossbow in the hands of the army of 6,000 Huanzhou prisoners commanded by Liu Hu began to be powerful. Every platoon shot would set off a bloody storm in the shield array of the Xixia army. Many people were dragged back and knocked down others after being hit by the arrow. The Xixia soldiers who lost the protection of the heavy shield relied with the light shield in their hands. Unable to resist the advanced killing weapon of the Huanzhou Army, the two phalanxes of the right wing alone were killed by the divine arm crossbow.

But there are also many shortcomings of this crossbow. One of them is that the launch speed is slow. The two bows and arrows need to be stepped on their feet. Therefore, the term in the army is also called stepping. Ordinary sergeants have the opportunity to shoot up to three arrows in the place of two arrows.

In order to prevent chaos, Zhao Ze's order is very simple. The person who released the arrow immediately retreats to the trench and does not affect the shooting of the rear team. Therefore, the speed of shooting in turn was very fast, and the suppression of the Xixia army shield array was completed in less than half an hour, delaying it in the land of one arrow.

It's strange to say that the Xixia army seems to be waiting for something this time. After entering the land of one arrow, it will no longer move forward. Instead, it shrinks the defense line and sets out a huge turtle-shaped shield array, which is as high as a wall. Zhao Ze can see it very clearly through a monocular. He said to wait and see what tricks the Xixia army wants to play.

Chen Shun accompanied Zhao Ze with a machete and looked at the copper pot dripping on the wooden table. Three quarters of an hour later, he shouted, "Your excellency cleared the wolf smoke."

Zhao Ze quickly turned around and looked at Qingping Pass. The explosion there was like shooting a thrilling movie. Countless Xixia troops killed along the two sides of the White Horse River. At the front was Xixia's riding shooter. Zhao Ze roughly counted it. There should be more than 3,000 people, but it was strange that they released it. It's not an arrow, but...

Zhao Ze focused his eyes on one of the shooters. He carried a strange thing on his back, which was very much like a huge slingshot, but it was not a slingshot. He could automatically shoot smoke bombs while running at high speed. The area of Qingpingguan was completely shrouded in smoke, and the shouting was shocking.

Zhao Ze suddenly woke up and said, "No, it's Xixia's Poxi Army. They came, which means that the soldiers of Xixia's army are concentrated there!" Hurry up and send a signal to ignite, hurry up"

In this ancient battle, he was most afraid of not being able to see the enemy. Once the close combat depended on courage, force and the number of people, Zhao Ze quickly ordered Chen Shun to light the huge beacon behind the hill. In an in an in anxient moment, thick smoke rolled and rushed straight to the sky.

In the blink of an eye, the earth on the front line of Qingping Pass and Guidebao ignited a fire wall. The fire wall was more than 20 miles long and three miles wide, and the flames rushed to the sky. Nearly 10,000 people of the Xixia army, who were gathering in the array, were trapped in the fire. Zhao, who stood on the hill and supervised the battle with screams. Ze heard it.

Besides, the people who attacked the front line of Qingping Pass. It was the right-wing general Wei Minglangbu's right-wing general Mei Le. Before leaving, Weiming Langbu explained clearly that the Song army lost the border city, and Qingping Pass became the weakness of Huanzhou. As long as he broke through in one fell swoop, his cavalry could enter the hinterland of Huanzhou and start four. Harassment and destruction make Song Jun have no peace forever.

Therefore, a large number of elite soldiers will be put on this line, and 3,000 Po Xijun will be transferred to launch poisonous smoke balls that can burn violently. Qingping Pass was just shot into the city by this poisonous smoke and caused a lot of chaos. Fortunately, the army was well trained and it didn't take long to put out these poisonous smoke bombs.

However, the smoke tactics of the Xixia Poxi Army are indeed good. The shout of killing just now is that Zhang Zai's army is in contact with the enemy in the trench. Fortunately, the reinforcements of He Lin, the breeding army, rushed to kill in time and repelled the striker of the Xixia soldiers who broke through the smoke.

Through this battle, Zhao Ze found that the situation around Qingpingguan was not immersive and could not be adaptable at all. As a last resort, he delegated the power of shooting to Zhang Zai to let him adapt and not let the Xixia army approach.

In fact, it is not necessary for Zhao Ze to say that Zhang Zai had ordered the defenders in the trench to fire back at the beginning of the melee just now, otherwise he would not have repelled the enemy who touched the trench so quickly.

The fire on the front line of Guidebao and Qingping Pass burned for nearly two hours. This insurmountable fire wall blocked the attack of the Xixia army on that day and burned and burned nearly 10,000 people in the siege of Xixia.

When Weiming Langbu, who was sitting at the mouth of the camel, received more than 20,000 casualties from the previous army, he had to order the three-way army to stop the attack, retreat to the foot of Hengshan Mountain, camp on the spot, and wait to find out the reality of the Song army and fight again in the future.

The battle in Huanzhou on that day completely calmed down. There were more than 10,000 Xixia soldiers on the battlefield. The area around the fire wall was particularly fierce. The dead bodies were piled up into mountains, red flesh and blood, white bones, burned, and refined into ashes. The horror was not tolerable by ordinary people.

Taking advantage of the period of time before sunset, Zhao Ze ordered Liu Lu to take people to clean the battlefield and pick up all the arrows that can be picked up. If they are damaged, they will not be needed. And see if they can be caught alive in the dead. If they can be caught, it is best to do a great job.

It would be best to make contributions in Liu Yu's heart, but there were too many people who died that day. His men were not in the mood to find a living mouth. It is estimated that even if he met a living mouth, he would die with a shot. Therefore, Zhao Ze failed to interrogate the prisoner as he wished that night.

I had to send two teams overnight to spy on the enemy camp.

One group was led by Di Ning to the north along the White Horse River, and the other group was led by Zhao Ze himself. The members were Ouyang Chun, Sanmei, Chen Shun and Tang Lin. They lurked along the mountains around Papaya Fort to the mouth of the Guidechuan River. They walked for more than ten miles before they came to the mountain near the Liang Keli camp of the right-wing army in Xixia. Through the moonlight, Zhao Ze saw that there was a company camp in the west of the army. The tent was set up on the top of the mountain. The camp was full of fire soaring to the sky. It was estimated that it was difficult to steal the camp. Unless the generals of Xixia are all fools, there will be a lot of bright whistles, dark whistles, and patrols.

Half an hour later, Zhao Ze drew a drawing, circled on it.

The third sister lying in the grass beside her looked at Zhao Ze puzzledly and asked, "Your Excellency, why are you drawing this?"

Zhao Ze smiled gently and told her, "Topographic map, let's see how the Xixia army camped. It will be useful in the future!"

At this moment, Ouyang Chun suddenly saw a flash of fire on the middle of the mountain, and then a fire flashed in mid-air.

"Adults be careful" Ouyang Chun, Chen Shun and Tang Lin quickly raised their shields to protect Zhao Ze and Sanmei, and the arrow rain arrived in the blink of an eye.

More than a dozen cold arrows hit from the dark night sky and almost shot through the shield. Even so, the third sister dodged a little slowly, and her leg was hit, and she almost cried out in pain.

Zhao Ze quickly pulled half of her exposed body under the shield and reached out to press the place where she was hit by the arrow.

whispered, "Don't move, you have shed a lot of blood!"

A moment later, Zhao Ze hid in a hole behind the hillside with Sanmei in his arms. Ouyang Chun, Chen Shun and Tang Lin went down the mountain first to inquire to prevent Xixia soldiers from lurking in the forest and taking the opportunity to assassinate.

Zhao Ze lit a fire. With the help of the fire, he helped Sanmei take out the arrow, and then quickly sprinkled the disinfectant and hemostatic powder, and then bandaged the wound.

The third sister lowered her head and dared not look into Zhao Ze's eyes, but bit her lips without saying a word.

After a small accident, Zhao Ze's nervous mood calmed down and said, "There is no injury to the muscles and bones, and there is no poison on the arrow. I believe the wound will heal soon."

"Oh!" The third sister felt that her cheeks were hot and a little at a loss. She answered a word mechanically.

After a short break, Ouyang Chun shouted softly outside the cave, "Your Excellency, there is no problem on the way down the mountain. Let's go back quickly!"

Zhao Ze quickly replied, "Okay, the arrow is taken out, and I'll come out!"

That night, when Zhao Ze and his party returned to the Chinese army, it was already after midnight. After a hasty meal, Di Ning also came back. He brought a surprise to Zhao Ze.