xymnovel Chapter 56 Who Can Prevent Me from Obtaining Huainan!
Chapter 56 Who Can Prevent Me from Obtaining Huainan!
The opportunity had arrived! The one-eyed officer had witnessed Zhou Jun's pursuit of the final blow. His eyes swept over Li Chongjin's side and behind him, where thousands of warhorses, forced to remain spectators as their masters switched to infantry combat, were now resting in the rear. A hint of regret flashed in his eyes. They were all fine horses. It was a pity they had followed the wrong master.
With practiced ease, the one-eyed officer slid down from the tree and urgently ordered the temporary officers in the crossbowmen: "The battle has reached its most critical moment. The Zhou army is fighting desperately. The lord needs us. We will attack from here, but do not shoot at the enemy. Shoot at the Zhou army's horses from behind."
"When the warhorses are startled, they will run wildly in all directions, but they will not dare to charge us. Once the horses are frightened, at least two or three thousand will rush into the battlefield. If the Zhou army is trampled by their own warhorses from behind, the comrades at Xiangshuitan will surely win!"
Everyone shouted with delight, "Go ahead, shoot their horses!"
The one-eyed officer continued, "After shooting the horses, we'll nock our crossbow bolts and approach the battlefield. The enemy leader is right next to his horse; if the horse is startled, he'll surely be thrown off balance. We'll swarm him, and three thousand crossbows will pin him down!"
The tactic was simple to understand and extremely deadly. The temporary officers present, though not highly trained, were able to grasp it. They quickly returned to their units to prepare.
The one-eyed officer led all the prepared crossbowmen out of the reeds and crept towards the battlefield. Behind them, squads of crossbowmen pushed aside the reeds and followed closely. The crossbow bolts were already loaded, and the arrowheads gleamed brightly in the sunlight.
Two hundred paces, then one hundred paces. Li Chongjin had only two hundred personal guards by his side. They were focused intently on the battlefield, watching any unit that might collapse and retreat. Advancing meant life, retreating meant death—this was no joke. Li Chongjin's military discipline was always ruthless, and these personal guards were the ones who enforced it.
Suddenly, one of the guards seemed to spot something in the fleeting reflection of his broadsword. He turned the blade in confusion and suddenly saw a figure flash across it from one angle.
After a brief moment of stunned silence, the guard broke out in a cold sweat. He turned around abruptly and saw thousands of unfamiliar soldiers with crossbows approaching from less than a hundred paces away. No, those were the enemy soldiers, and they were also wearing white paper armor!
The bodyguard cried out in despair, "General, someone's backing us!"
Li Chongjin and the others were immediately startled. They all turned their heads to look, and instantly felt a chill rise from the soles of their feet.
Even Li Chongjin was stunned for a moment, unable to accept the fact. But the seasoned veteran immediately forced himself to accept it. Countless life-and-death experiences had proven that temper was useless on the battlefield, expectations were meaningless, and facts always trumped everything.
He decisively ordered, "Sound the retreat! You all follow me and charge at these Southern troops. Open a retreat route for the main force!"
However, it was too late. The one-eyed officer only had one eye left, but his vision seemed to have been enhanced. He immediately saw Li Chongjin and his men's actions. The one-eyed officer waved his hand: "Fire arrows at the horses! Everyone fire! Reload the crossbows!"
Three thousand crossbow bolts shot up, piercing the sky as they hurtled towards Li Chongjin and his herd of horses. His personal guards hastily raised their shields to protect Li Chongjin. But the next moment, no bolts fell; only the horses' momentary panic, fear, and ferocious neighing as they were attacked.
Li Chongjin understood the enemy's tactical choice almost instantly. They attacked the horses first, intending to make them go berserk and charge at everything—how ruthless!
But at this moment he was helpless. Because he was right next to the herd of horses, he and his personal guards could not afford to think of anything else, as the frightened horses had already charged forward!
The one-eyed officer was satisfied with the first wave of results; the warhorses had indeed been startled and were galloping wildly in three directions other than his own. The enemy's central banner was teetering on the brink of collapse under the impact of the frightened horses.
The one-eyed officer ordered a rapid advance. All the crossbows were ready; he needed to save time. The enemy was about ninety paces away. If they could advance just ten paces, the enemy's center would be within the crossbowmen's effective range. These frightened horses were buying them time.
Caught off guard by the sudden attack, Li Chongjin's personal guard was thrown into disarray, with even the central army banner toppling over. The flag bearer, unable to simultaneously carry the thick flagpole and steer his horse against the charging frightened steed, was pulled from his horse in the chaos and trampled to pieces by the heavy banner.
Fortunately, the frightened horses only lasted for a short while, and Li Chongjin quickly regrouped his scattered personal guard after the initial charge. While he managed to deal with the frightened horses on his side, the Zhou soldiers on the battlefield were completely unaware of what was happening behind them. No less than two or three thousand frightened horses disregarded the muddy terrain and charged into the battlefield, knocking over any Zhou soldiers they encountered from behind.
The Zhou army behind them fell into chaos, and the Zhou troops at the front received no support, their desperate momentum quickly waning. The decline in the Zhou army's morale and the failure of their rotations were immediately felt by the Yu army infantry who were directly engaged in battle with them.
Standing on the stone platform, Li Jue had an even clearer view. He shouted with delight, "Well done! Pass down the order: reinforcements have arrived! We've won! All troops, attack! Don't let the enemy escape! Come on, take my central banner, let's charge together and fight to the death!"
As the central banner of the Yu army moved forward, all the reserves, all the elite leaping warriors, and even all the crossbowmen charged forward like madmen.
Zhou Jun's infantry at the front were horrified to discover that Yu Jun had gone mad. Their crossbowmen, braving the attacks, rushed to within ten or even six or seven paces of him, shooting him almost face-to-face.
The crossbowmen fell, and so did the Zhou soldiers who outnumbered them several times over. The crossbowmen's desperate charge truly shattered the ranks of the Zhou army. Under the cover of spearmen, the elite leaping warriors, wielding all sorts of armor-piercing weapons, roared and charged forward.
Zhou Jun's will inevitably crumbled. An hour had passed, a full hour of frantic attacks had yielded no results. This was an army of Yu that they simply couldn't defeat!
After finding excuses for their defeat in their minds, they turned and stumbled away. The moment their fighting spirit collapsed, they lost their honor as warriors and were no longer willing to turn back and continue fighting.
Even as they turned around, they saw the vanished central banner, and countless Yu reinforcements were charging in from afar. So that's it! It was a trap, a complete and utter trap; even the commander-in-chief was under threat!
"Yu's army is behind us; this is a trap!"
"The central army flag has fallen; the commander-in-chief is in danger!"
Amidst desperate screams, all the remaining Zhou soldiers who were still holding on collapsed.
They trudged through the muddy, cold riverbed, completely oblivious to the volleys of crossbow bolts raining down on them and the pursuing enemies. Most of them even deftly removed their heavy armor.
Only by reducing weight can one escape the mud more quickly, and only by reducing weight can one escape the battlefield more quickly.
However, the main army behind them preferred the Zhou soldiers who had removed their armor, as only heavy crossbows could threaten their iron armor protection. As the Zhou soldiers removed their armor, many of the militia soldiers carrying bows stopped, took out their bows from their quivers, and quickly nocked and shot an arrow in one smooth motion.
The bow and arrow could fire several times faster than the crossbow bolts. Thousands upon thousands of arrows rained down on the fleeing Zhou army. Countless Zhou soldiers, stripped of their armor, perished in the mud, their bodies becoming one with the filthy river mud in a miserable state.
As Zhou Jun's army on Xiangshuitan crumbled, Li Chongjin also encountered trouble: the trouble of being targeted by three thousand crossbowmen. They suffered heavy casualties from the crossbowmen's harassing fire and were unable to even raise their command flag again.
Enraged, Li Chongjin, relying on the strength of his armor, led his personal guards in a desperate charge towards the three thousand crossbowmen, determined to die a glorious death!
To Li Chongjin's surprise, when most of his personal guards were killed or wounded, leaving only a few dozen men to charge into the crossbowmen.
The crossbowmen actually collapsed at the first charge. After all, they were new recruits who had only been trained for a little over ten days. They panicked and collapsed when faced with even a charge of only a few dozen cavalrymen.
All of this was within the one-eyed officer's expectations; training infantry capable of withstanding cavalry charges was no easy feat. However, he remained calm, because the three thousand crossbowmen were not a single unit, but rather divided into ten formations of three hundred men each. Li Chongjin had only broken through one; there were still nine left.
Under the command of the one-eyed officer, the crossbowmen cleared a path, firing only from the flanks at the Zhou soldiers fleeing the mud pit. Rows of Zhou soldiers, stripped of their armor and weapons, had just escaped the pursuit of the Yu army at Xiangshuitan, only to be bombarded with crossbow bolts. In their panic, not a single one dared to attack the crossbowmen. They all frantically ran towards the lifeline opened by Li Chongjin.
Some fled on foot, while others were lucky enough to ride warhorses that lingered on the outskirts of the battlefield, regardless of who their original owners were.
Unwilling to give up, Li Chongjin led his personal guards to defeat three crossbow formations in succession, but his own guards also suffered heavy casualties, with only a dozen or so men remaining.
Li Chongjin himself was hit by three arrows during the charge, but fortunately he was wearing two layers of fine iron armor, so he only suffered superficial wounds and was out of danger. However, the physical pain could not cover up the desolation in his heart, especially since the crossbowmen collapsed at the first contact, which exposed their true nature.
Li Chongjin cried out in despair, "Why? Why were we defeated by these rotten soldiers? They're not soldiers, they're just civilians! Who gave them the guts? Who gave them the courage? God, are you being reasonable?!"
The guards, weeping, pulled Li Chongjin away, saying, "General, let's go! As long as we're alive, we can always rebuild. We need to gather our remaining troops. There are still 10,000 infantrymen assigned to us by the Emperor to the north. These Yu troops have also been decimated. We'll bring in our infantry to get revenge. As long as we annihilate this Yu army, our Imperial Guard won't have lost too much face."
Li Chongjin laughed bitterly:
"Even if we annihilate this Yu army, we will have lost all face. The Iron Cavalry, the invincible Iron Cavalry, the Iron Cavalry that even the Liao palace troops fear, is finished in my hands!"
"Fine, even without the Iron Cavalry, we still have to complete the mission assigned by the Emperor: to block the enemy forces heading towards Luzhou. You're right, if we can't even complete this task, what face will our Imperial Guard have left to show in Bianliang?"
In this battle, Li Chongjin only took a little over two thousand cavalrymen with him, while Li Jue's army killed more than seven thousand and captured over two thousand warhorses, achieving a brilliant victory. Zhou's elite Imperial Guard Iron Cavalry was utterly defeated and almost destined to withdraw from the Huainan battlefield.
By afternoon, Xiangshuitan had fallen completely silent. After their frenzied cheers, the Yu army began silently assessing their casualties. In a mere two hours of fighting, the Yu army had suffered 1,005 dead and over 2,700 wounded—more than 30% of their total strength of 10,000. As the victors, their morale remained high.
Li Jue climbed onto the official road through the mud, tightly grasped the one-eyed officer's hand, and said, "It's so good, it's so good to be alive."
The one-eyed officer, with tears in his eyes, said, "You're right, sir. It's good to be alive, it's good to be alive."
Li Jue looked at the officers following behind him and said with a smile, "Send men to inform the nearby prefectures and counties. Tell them that our army has won a great victory and that the main force of the Zhou army has been annihilated by us at Xiangshuitan. Ask them to send people to clean up the battlefield and take care of the wounded. We must seize the opportunity of defeating the Zhou army and immediately assemble our troops to head to Bagong Mountain."
The sensational results of the Battle of Xiangshuitan continued to reverberate throughout the surrounding areas. Officials from the prefecture and county, as well as local tyrants, sent people to investigate the truth. They witnessed the horrific battlefield, the small number of militia soldiers left behind, and more than a thousand seriously wounded.
Li Jue was originally the militia commander of the Desheng Army and the prefect of Luzhou. He was highly respected in the surrounding prefectures and counties, some of which were even under the jurisdiction of Luzhou. After confirming the battle report, the seriously wounded were quickly taken to counties within Luzhou Prefecture to recuperate. The county magistrate, in order to impress the prefect, disregarded all decorum and personally came to the scene to direct the operation.
The wounded and the dead, including Zhou Jun's remains, were to be treated and their remains collected—this was Li Jue's specific instruction. Treating the remains of these elite soldiers well would likely yield some benefits in future negotiations; treating them brutally would probably do more harm than good.
Even more encouragingly, a large amount of supplies that the Iron Cavalry hadn't had time to take, along with looted goods, provisions, and thousands of women, were discovered at the site where the Iron Cavalry had previously encamped. Although many of them had been violated, in chaotic times, there were few considerations of chastity, and they were all claimed and taken back by various prefectures and counties, and most returned home safely.
Two days later, unwilling to accept defeat, Li Chongjin led 10,000 Zhou army infantrymen stationed at various land and water nodes and the remaining 1,000 cavalrymen to block Li Jue's troops again at the shore of Wabu Lake.
Bagong Mountain is located right next to Wabu Lake. Looking north from Li Jue's line of sight, the ridge of Bagong Mountain can already be seen. If this battle is won, the goal of establishing a fortress on Bagong Mountain will be achieved.
This time, with no muddy terrain available, Li Jue could only continue to command his entire army to form a battle line with their backs to the river. Due to the victory two days prior, the Yu army's confidence was greatly boosted by their formation with their backs to the river, and with the addition of more than two thousand crossbowmen who had been through the baptism of war, their long-range firepower was extremely fierce.
Over the past two days, Li Jue mixed the remaining thousand-plus experienced crossbowmen from the local militia with over two thousand new crossbowmen, forming twenty independent battalions. Under the guidance of officers who could recognize military flags, they underwent initial integration training.
This newly formed unit of 4,000 crossbowmen played a crucial role in this encounter. Their agile and powerful shooting, combined with their resolute and confident militia training, prevented the Zhou infantry from finding a chance to win.
However, not finding an opportunity often means losing one.
During Li Jue and Li Chongjin's second duel, a naval fast ship appeared on the water behind Li Jue. The naval officers on the fast ship were taking in the spectacular scene before them.
He recognized Zhou Jun on one side, but what was with the white-armored soldiers on the other? Which regular army in our Yu Kingdom wore white armor? Approaching with doubt, the closer he got, the more excited and delighted the officer's face became.
Li Jue looked at the naval officer brought up by his men. The officer suddenly knelt down, saying, "So it's Lord Li. This humble general, Chen Hu, pays his respects to you, Lord Li."
Li Jue quickly stepped forward and pulled him up, asking in surprise, "Chen Hu? Didn't you go to Shouzhou with the garrison troops? The garrison troops were defeated, what about our navy? Is anyone still alive?"
Chen Hu, like a child who had been separated from his parents for a long time, said with a sob in his voice, "The navy is still here, but we were incompetent. On that day, we watched helplessly as the Zhou army stormed into the central command tent of the garrison. We only had time to gather the more than two thousand brothers who jumped into the river. Your Excellency's main naval force is still intact, but we have lost our military governor and dare not return to Luzhou for the time being. We beg Your Excellency's forgiveness and mercy."
Li Jue said irritably, "Where did you lose the military governor? That bastard Liu Yanzhen abandoned his army and ran back to Luzhou. If he had commanded his army to resist tenaciously, how could such an elite army as the Desheng Army have been so easily annihilated by the Zhou army? I want to storm into Bagong Mountain and establish a stronghold. If you come to help, all my past crimes will be forgiven."
Chen Hu was overjoyed and said, "Rest assured, my lord, I will go and call the brothers back right away and give them a good stab from behind." Li Jue was delighted and told him to hurry up and call for reinforcements. Zhou's army fought for a while without any success and had already retreated to rest.
As Chen Hu boarded the ship, the militia officer escorting him back said to him, "Liu Yanzhen has ruined our Desheng Army. We have imprisoned him and supported Governor Li as our military governor. Governor Li has not yet agreed, but we have all made up our minds. What do you say?"
Chen Hu was taken aback, then sneered, "That bastard Liu Yanzhen has ruined us so badly, how dare he still cling to us? I wish I could rip his head off to offer as a sacrifice to our fallen brothers. Commander Li is the father of our Desheng Army, we support him. Don't worry, our navy isn't stupid, we'll do it."
That afternoon, when Zhou Jun and Yu Jun clashed again, an overwhelming Yu Jun navy, a real navy, suddenly appeared on the battlefield where the two armies were fighting—Wabu Lake.
The navy unleashed a barrage of heavy ship-borne weapons at the Zhou army's positions near the shore. Several Zhou army formations near the lake were riddled with bloody trenches by rows of crossbow bolts the size of javelins, each carrying ten arrows in a single shot.
At this moment, Li Chongjin truly understood why the southern armies always preferred to advance by both land and water, and always liked to cooperate with the navy in battle. The southern army, positioned on the water's edge and supported by the navy, was truly invincible and impenetrable.
On the battlefield, the Yu army cheered and launched a counterattack. The elite troops infiltrated from the lakeside and poured into the defeated Zhou army, launching a fierce attack from the flanks towards the central Zhou army formation. Caught in a pincer movement, the Zhou army, under the command of Li Chongjin, struggled to change its formation, trying to shift the battlefield away from the lake shore.
However, when three thousand fully armed soldiers appeared from behind Zhou's army, Li Chongjin's plan collapsed. Thanks to that fool Liu Yanzhen. He was so eager for glory that he delayed the delivery of supplies to Shouzhou, including a large quantity of armor and weapons.
On the day the navy rescued the Desheng Army soldiers who had jumped into the water, they also took away a huge amount of military supplies that had been left on the ship and could not be unloaded in time. These naked Desheng Army soldiers actually rearmed themselves using the supplies on the ship.
Now, they and a group of brave sailors, dressed in their finest armor and wielding the most exquisite weapons, suddenly appeared behind the Zhou army... signaling the end of the second duel between Li Jue and Li Chongjin.
Li Jue led his troops in pursuit, while Li Chongjin commanded his infantry and cavalry to fight back with difficulty, covering each other's retreat. However, Li Chongjin never expected that the terrain of the Huai River basin's rivers, lakes, and waterways would once again trap him.
There was a river on his only retreat route... and a bridge over the river. And this bridge was now in the hands of the Southern navy, which had maneuvered around the area. Li Chongjin watched helplessly as the bridge was set ablaze before his eyes, the surface of the bridge flowing with freshly poured oil, the oil swirling with flames. It quickly engulfed the only road passage for dozens of miles around.
Li Chongjin was led away by his men amidst wailing. They abandoned the infantry and fled along the river with more than a thousand cavalry, hoping to find a bridge to the north in the distance.
The morale of Zhou Jun's soldiers completely collapsed. They jumped into the river in a chaotic manner, trying to swim to the other side despite the naval attack. However, as northerners, they were not good swimmers, and the cold weather and frigid water made them unable to swim without adequate preparation. They could only take a few breaths before they were exhausted.
When Li Jue arrived at the riverbank, Zhou Jun's corpses were so numerous they could almost block the river, and the river was littered with floating corpses.
On November 24th, after fighting for over 200 li and winning two major battles, Li Jue, with the help of the Desheng Army's navy, successfully stormed the Bagongshan camp.
He quickly re-equipped his troops and reorganized his forces, taking over the defeated soldiers of Nadersheng Army and repairing the defensive fortifications left by the old commander. He repeatedly relied on the terrain and fortifications of Bagong Mountain to repel attacks launched by Zhao Quanzhong's forces, firmly establishing the banner of the Yu Kingdom atop Bagong Mountain.
Even the active Yu army's navy frequently transported troops to attack Zhou's weak points. With proper command, the land and naval forces supported by the Huai River network were no longer as foolish as when Liu Yanzhen was in command. They actually managed to break through Zhou's camps and strongholds controlling the river channels one after another, and successfully transported a batch of supplies to Shouzhou Wharf at night using light boats.
They also relayed the good news that Yu's army had recaptured Bagong Mountain and established a fortified camp to Liu Renzhan, the military governor of Qinghuai Army. Liu Renzhan was so excited that tears streamed down his face, and the morale of the Qinghuai Army soldiers soared, greatly increasing their confidence in defending Shouzhou and defeating Zhou's army.
After learning that Li Jue had established a stronghold at Bagong Mountain, the various prefectures and counties in Huainan, which had been ravaged by Li Chongjin and his Iron Cavalry, dispatched local militia and volunteer troops with a large amount of supplies to support and build the Bagong Mountain camp.
At the foot of Mount Bagong, Guo Rong, who had rushed to the front lines in Shouzhou, could no longer sit still. He personally led his men to Mount Bagong for reconnaissance.
Looking at the bustling, increasingly prosperous camp in the distance, Guo Rong lamented, "Who can prevent me from conquering Huainan!"