Chapter 770 Huining Interception
Chapter 770 Huining Interception
After crossing the Yellow River, Li Gui's army entered the Lishui River Valley, which was hundreds of miles long. There were vast mountains on both sides of the valley, but the mountains on both sides were far apart. The widest part was more than a hundred miles, and the narrowest part was twenty or thirty miles. It was difficult to find that it was a valley. In fact, it was more like a basin.
The terrain of this river valley is quite complex, with Gobi deserts, large grasslands, and endless forests.
Although the land here is vast, there is only one county, called Huining County, which was later renamed Yongdeng County. It has a population of several thousand households, and the majority of them are Han people. They farm on the fertile land on both sides of the Lishui River.
Of course, there are Qiang tribes here, but they are in the south. Apart from the people living here, the most common thing you see is the Western Region caravans. This is a must-pass place on the Silk Road, and there are endless caravans coming and going. Merchants must stop in Huining County for supplies and rest, which has also boosted the service industry in Huining County, with many inns, restaurants, supply stations, warehouses, and mule and horse shops.
But the Sui army would not give the Hexi army a chance to enter the city to rest. Li Jing personally led 30,000 troops to prepare to fight the Hexi army, while Qu Tutong led 20,000 troops to ambush in the south, preparing to attack from the front and back.
Since being equipped with arrow mines, the Sui army is now very confident. There is no need to ambush at night. They can directly attack head-on and bomb with arrow mines, which is a complete dimensionality reduction attack.
If we consider it from a practical perspective, arrow mines are much more powerful than simple firearms.
The significance of the musket is not how powerful it is. A row of musketeers may not be able to defeat a row of well-trained crossbowmen. The significance of the musket is that a child or woman who is powerless can easily kill a soldier who has been trained for many years and is brave and good at fighting.
As long as there are guns, everyone can be a soldier, the elderly, children and women can all go into battle, and their fighting power will not be inferior to that of Xiang Yu and Lu Bu, and the era of cold weapons will end.
In the morning, the Hexi Army, which was marching rapidly, received news that a Sui army of about 20,000 to 30,000 people appeared ten miles ahead. Li Gui was immediately shocked.
Didn't Xu Min's army only have 5,000 men? Where did the 20,000 or 30,000 Sui troops come from?
This is the consequence of information asymmetry. If you don't deliberately inquire about the news, you won't know about many things for months after they happen. For example, the Liang division had already been destroyed, but Li Gui didn't even know about it.
Li Gui didn't even know that the Sui army was already right before them.
In the distance, Li Jing had appeared with his army, and Li Gui hurriedly ordered the entire army to form a battle line.
Half of Li Gui's 30,000 troops were Hexi Han troops, and the other half were Qiang people, who were mainly cavalry.
The cavalry was divided into two levels. The most elite cavalry consisted of about 5,000 people and was called the Xiliang Iron Cavalry. This was actually just a nice-sounding name and had nothing to do with iron.
Even if Li Gui was killed, he couldn't gather 5,000 sets of armor, not even 500 sets.
These were 5,000 Qiang cavalrymen with superb riding skills, bravery in combat, and excellent equipment. Li Gui gave all the Ming Guang armor that originally belonged to the Han army in Hexi to these 5,000 cavalrymen, while the Han army replaced them with leather armor.
"My lord, the enemy are all infantry!" A spy rode back to report.
Li Gui was overjoyed when he heard the news. The other party actually used infantry to intercept the cavalry. It was simply a blessing from God to him.
General Li Kuanyu warned: "Your Majesty, how could the enemy be all infantry? How did they get here? I'm afraid it's a trick!"
"You know nothing!"
Li Gui cursed: "They came here on horseback, but can they ride on horseback to the battlefield? You are a general, but you don't even have this common sense!"
Several generals wanted to remind Li Gui, but after Li Gui's scolding, no one dared to say anything. "The cavalry is ready to attack!" Li Gui shouted.
"Woo——"
A low horn sounded on the grassland, and 15,000 Qiang cavalrymen were eager to fight. Their horses' hooves clattered and their spears flashed with cold light.
At this time, the 30,000 Sui troops two miles away were also ready. Li Jing was indeed leading the 30,000 infantry, while the 20,000 cavalry were led by Qu Tutong.
Li Jing received another 3,000 arrow-thunder crossbows, plus the 1,000 he had left. At the same time, 500 arrow-thunder crossbows were delivered, bringing the total number of arrow-thunder crossbows to 1,000, which could be operated by 1,000 soldiers, with another 1,000 to draw the crossbows and ignite them.
The arrow-thunder crossbow is a special crossbow. Since the arrow-thunder is heavy, using ordinary crossbow arrows will cause the crossbow to be top-heavy, so iron crossbow arrows are used to achieve a weight balance as much as possible. In addition, the crossbow body is relatively short, the thunder body is placed outside the crossbow slot, and the arrow body is longer. The arrow is specially made, and the crossbow is also specially made. Moreover, this crossbow is a five-stone crossbow, which can shoot the iron crossbow arrow to explode three hundred steps away.
Since it is a five-stone crossbow, one person certainly cannot pull it, so it is designed as a two-person crossbow. Two people lie on the ground and pedal together to string the crossbow, while the other person also assists in lighting the fire.
"Prepare the crossbow!" Li Jing shouted.
Ten thousand crossbowmen stepped forward, including eight thousand normal crossbowmen and two thousand arrow and thunder crossbowmen. They formed a crossbow formation and were ready for battle.
The low sound of the horn echoed on the grassland again. This was the signal to attack, and 15,000 Xiliang cavalry set off.
Five thousand Xiliang cavalrymen were running in the front, the fierce sound of their horses' hooves beating the earth, and murderous aura bursting from them, like endless black sand whipped up by a strong wind, sweeping towards the Sui army all over the place, or like a raging wave bursting a dam, rushing towards the Sui army with the momentum to destroy everything and rush over everything.
The eight thousand crossbowmen of the Sui army also raised their crossbows and aimed them at the charging Qiang cavalry at a forty-five degree angle. However, the long war had made everyone unusually calm. Everyone's eyes flashed with the will to resist tenaciously, and many people even had an excitement that was difficult to suppress.
Five thousand Qiang cavalry quickly rushed to three hundred steps away. Drums sounded, and eight thousand archers shot arrows at the same time. A torrential rain of arrows shot at the Qiang cavalry. This kind of arrow formation was very lethal to ordinary soldiers, but not to well-trained nomadic cavalry.
The Qiang soldiers hid under the horses' bellies and used the horses to protect themselves. The horses had a small surface area to be shot by arrows, and most of the arrows hit the saddles.
However, some war horses still screamed miserably and fell to the ground. All bows and crossbows were shot at an upward angle, and arrows were thrown at the Sui army. To deal with such arrows, even if they did not hide under the horse's belly, the well-trained cavalry would raise their shields high forward to face the angle of the arrows, blocking the soldiers' bodies and horses' heads. The threat could only be directed at the chest and forelimbs of the war horses, but the threat was also much weakened.
The arrows could not stop the charge of the Qiang cavalry, and after another round of crossbow arrows, the Qiang cavalry suffered less than a thousand casualties, which was insignificant compared to the 15,000 cavalry. However, at this time, the front line of the Hexi cavalry had moved to two hundred steps away from the Sui army, with their horses galloping and murderous aura rising to the sky.
Seeing that the enemy was close enough, Li Jing finally gave the order to attack with arrows and torpedoes.
"Shoot out the command arrow lightning!"
"Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!" The war drums sounded.
A thousand lightning crossbow arrows were fired, and a thousand hissing burning lightning arrows rose into the air and shot towards the dense group of cavalry.
(End of this chapter)