Fenghou

Chapter 824 Fierce Battle
The first row of the Song Army was not crossbowmen, but heavy shield soldiers. There were about a thousand heavy shield soldiers in each phalanx, and they were all in the first row, protecting the spear soldiers behind them.

This is the experience and lessons learned by the Song army in actual battles. The crossbowman is at the front, and when retreating, it will more or less affect the army behind. Anyway, it is only a few dozen steps away. Affect the formation, not worth it.

If the spearmen in the first row were not protected, they could easily be shot down by the enemy cavalry. It was only later discovered that most of the spearmen in the first row had been shot down by arrows before the enemy hit.

Therefore, placing the heavy shield troops in the first row is of great benefit to reducing the death rate of soldiers.

The soldiers of the heavy shield army stood with their shields. This kind of large shield was made by referring to Xi Ren's heavy shield manufacturing method by the Song Army Military Department, combined with the Han people's oil immersion method. Large shields, each large shield is four feet high and three feet wide.

The Ordnance Department of the Western Army has absorbed all these advantages, and they also made it out of a dense whole piece of wood. Cover with a layer of armor cloth.

Armor cloth is also made by dipping oil. Each piece of cloth is extremely tough and difficult for swords and arrows. It is specially used to make cloth armor, and finally covered with two layers of cowhide. Each shield weighs [-] catties and requires two hands to operate.

The Ordnance Department spent two years making [-] heavy shields and equipped [-] soldiers. These soldiers with heavy shields were in the first row, followed by soldiers from the spear army. Each spear was two feet long. Made of jujube wood, it is extremely hard. The soldiers of the Spear Army squatted on the ground, and the spears were angled upwards at [-] degrees. Thousands of spears formed a dense forest of spears.

Behind the spear army is the short spear army. Simply put, the spear army is a defensive army, but the short spear army is a combat army, which is more flexible and changeable, and pays special attention to cooperation. A cavalry fights.

Behind the short spear army is the three thousand crossbow army, all god-armed crossbows, and further back, in the center of the formation, are the flying dragon army and the chariot army.

The Flying Dragon Army is thrown with fine steel short spears. It is extremely lethal to a small group of hundreds of people at a short distance. It is a new type of army developed during the Xixia War.

The chariots are pulled by horses, and there are about [-] chariots in each square. Its axles are made of iron and are not easily damaged.

There is a small trebuchet installed in the carriage, which can throw five catties of iron fire thunder two hundred steps away, but the iron fire mine has just been developed and has not yet been popularized. At present, it is still mainly barrel gunpowder, but there are also two or three An iron fire thunder.

The Xizhou Army is the Uyghur Army, and their combat habits are the same as those of the Uyghurs back then. The [-]-strong army seems to be overwhelming, but it is not chaotic. They form a team of a hundred people, led by a centurion, and then a thousand people form a large group , led by the commander-in-chief.

At this time, the Xizhou cavalry did not see the crossbow formation of the Song army, which made them even more excited. The cavalry became faster and faster, running and shouting.

The distance gradually shortened, [-] steps, [-] steps, [-] steps. At this moment, the crossbow arrows of the Song Army's god arm suddenly fired,
Fifteen thousand crossbow arrows were fired from the five army formations at the same time, forming a slightly thinner dark cloud in the sky, shooting towards the galloping cavalry like raindrops.

Feng Di was ruthless, and the tide-like cavalry group suddenly turned on their backs, causing countless casualties.

Tens of thousands of cavalry suddenly rushed to the front of the formation, the sound of horseshoes was like thunder, and the cavalry surged like a stormy sea, as if the raging waves were rushing towards the mountain-like Song Army phalanx.

"Don't be afraid, stand with a spear!"

Xue Jinyong, the commander of the fourth phalanx, shouted at the top of his lungs. He could feel the fear of the soldiers. Every soldier around him was shaking, but they had no choice but to fight to the death.

A huge wave like overwhelming mountains and seas fell, and countless Xizhou cavalry rushed into the Song Army's phalanx in an instant. Like a wave, wave after wave came.

The first round of the most powerful impact was over, and the soldiers with heavy shields quickly retreated, but a small part was too late to retreat and was swallowed by the Xizhou cavalry. It is no longer clear whether it is the Xizhou Army or the Song Army.

The phalanx of the Song Army with tens of thousands of people was knocked down by hundreds of people under continuous repeated impacts, but immediately filled up with soldiers, each spear formed a forest, withstood the impact of the cavalry, and the two sides fought in the wilderness. In the fierce battle, swords flashed, weapons clashed, men and horses screamed, and screams kept coming and going.

Bi Angui didn't press on all of them, he wanted to see how sharp the phalanx army trained by the Song army was, but the impact of the [-] troops on the two wings did not achieve the effect he wanted at all, and they couldn't rush into the phalanx. Also suffered heavy casualties.

Bi Angui could no longer procrastinate, and he immediately issued a second order, "The main force of the Chinese army will attack and attack the enemy's two wings."

The remaining [-] Xizhou Army cavalry also mobilized. The troops were divided into two groups, one on the left and the other on the right like two giant dragons, attacking the two wings of the phalanx. , but the two wings of the Song Army phalanx seemed to be very weakly protected, and the weakness of the two wings was exposed to the attack of the cavalry cavalry of the Western Cavalry Army.

The two cavalry rushed forward fiercely, like two huge knives slashing at the waist of the Song army at the same time.

Unexpectedly, there were hundreds of steps away from the two wings of the Song Army, and two Song Army cavalry went up to fight, intercepting the Xizhou Army cavalry from the side, and the two sides fought fiercely in front of the Song Army's formation.

This is a tactic of showing weakness, deliberately exposing weaknesses or loopholes to the opponent, luring the opponent to come and swallow the bait.

The cavalry of the Xizhou Army really swallowed the bait, and used the main cavalry to attack the two wings of the Song Army's large formation.

The consequence of being fooled is that when they were intercepted by the Song Army cavalry, their backs were exposed in front of the Song Army's large formation.

The Song army's formation turned to deal with the main force of the enemy army. The crossbow arrows were like raindrops, and gunpowder barrels were thrown from twenty carts.

With dense arrows, continuous explosions, and poisonous nails, the Xizhou army was killed and injured, and there was a scream. The Song Army cavalry held down the enemy troops who were about to leave the formation several times. The tragic killing caused more and more casualties of the cavalry of the Xizhou Army.

.........

Chen Qing was commanding the battle on a cart in the third army formation, surrounded by [-] heavy armored infantry guards. He watched the situation changes on the battlefield. As the Song army's super-large formation split into five large formations, the battlefield The situation also began to become clear.

Eighty thousand against eighty thousand, or one-on-one, fifty thousand cavalry against five large formations, thirty thousand cavalry against thirty thousand cavalry of the Song Army.

"Change formation!"

Chen Qing gave an order, and the flags were waved on the high podium, and the various formations began to change. They opened wide openings, and the enemy cavalry who had been looking for a breakthrough rushed in one after another.

The Song army began to encircle and cut, and small killing formations were formed in the ten thousand square formation.

At this moment, the Flying Dragon Army displayed its bravery. Thousands of fine steel short spears were thrown together, piercing with cold light, unstoppable, and with a scream, hundreds of enemy soldiers fell off their horses one after another. nailed to the ground.

These are small waves, but for the big winds and waves where hundreds of thousands of people are fighting fiercely, these small waves are nothing?
It's just that the balance of victory was slightly in favor of Song Jun, and Song Jun began to gain the upper hand slowly.

Bi Gui'an was so anxious that he led [-] cavalry to look for the location of the enemy's commander. Suddenly, a soldier pointed to a square in front of him and shouted: "There!"

(End of this chapter)