Great Song Super Scholar

Chapter 640
Without siege weapons, the [-] army could not attack the city. That night, the [-] soldiers wrapped themselves in sheepskins and rested on the grassland. By the early morning of the next day, there was no news of the supply fleet. Wang Mengye began to feel a little uneasy. The army only brought dry food for four days, and now three days have passed, and the dry food can only last for one day, and the food ship has not arrived yet, so something big will happen.

Wang Mengye kept sending people to urge the grain ship, and at noon, there was still no news from the supply fleet, and even the person sent there had no news, Wang Mengye finally realized that something was wrong.

He hurriedly ordered the army to withdraw to the west. The [-] army complained and cursed and was about to set off. Fan Ning watched the Xixia soldiers start to retreat from the top of the city. He turned back and asked Yang Wenguang, "General cavalry bring back a few days' dry food?"

Yang Wenguang thought for a while and said, "According to my experience in dealing with the Xixia Army, they have regulations that if a large army launches a battle, the army must carry at least [-] days of food. They have to bring dry food for half a month. Like them, there is a convoy following them, and they usually carry three days of dry food, up to four days, and no more than four days. They have to carry weapons, armor, water bottles, and luggage, and food is impossible. Take more, even the Song Dynasty and the Liao Kingdom also stipulated this."

Fan Ning thought for a while and said: "It took them three and a half days to kill them, even if they brought five days of dry food, they could only last for one and a half days at most, so besides killing horses to satisfy their hunger, is there any other way? "

"Either it is hunting or eating grass roots, but the Xixia army will not kill horses until the end of the mountain. Horses are the private property of soldiers. Once killing horses to satisfy hunger, it will seriously shake the morale of the army."

Fan Ning nodded with a smile and said, "Let's wait and see!"

At this time, Yang Wenguang suddenly pointed to a special army in the distance, "Master, look at that army!"

Fan Ning looked in the direction of his finger, and saw that there was a conspicuous team in the Xixia Army. The other soldiers were all on one horse, but they were on two horses. They were carrying heavy burdens on their horses, and a servant was in charge of leading the horses.

Fan Ning changed his mind and asked, "Could it be the iron kite?"

Yang Wenguang nodded, "I suspect that the horses are all big, and they were obviously specially selected. The other horse should be carrying heavy armor."

Fan Ning looked at it for a while. He felt that the iron kite was deified, and it was nothing more than heavy armored cavalry. In fact, there were also Song Dynasty. The Jingsai Army in Song Dynasty was heavy armored cavalry. The Hepishi Army is also a heavy armored cavalry, as is the Iron Buddha of the Jin Dynasty in history.

On the contrary, because of the weak national strength of Xixia, there is not so much pig iron to support it, so there are only 3000 iron kites.

"Sir, do we want to follow and chase?"

Fan Ning stared at the enemy for a moment and said, "Wait a little longer, when they fall into pieces, our chance will come."

In addition to fifty steamships, Fan Ning's naval forces deployed in the Hetao area also had more than five hundred thousand-stone warships. Thousands of sentinel ships, after the main force of the [-] Xixia Army went deep into Hetao, all the warships appeared, and their task was to cut off the retreat of the Xixia Army.

The warships of the Song Army were mainly deployed in the northern, middle, and western sections, controlling the five hundred miles of the Yellow River waterway. Among them, more than a thousand sentry ships were the most active. They patrolled the river and monitored the crossing points of the Xixia Army.

That night, the Xixia army ran out of food, but they were still more than a hundred miles away from the Yellow River, and there was still more than a day's journey. There was no news from the logistics team, and the [-] Xixia army began to fall into panic.

Wang Mengye also realized that he had made a big mistake of aggressiveness. He was anxious and flustered, but he never allowed any criticism of himself. Sin beheaded.

After the strict orders were passed on, the [-] troops dared not speak out. From the generals to the soldiers, they all hated this stupid and ignorant prefect.

Early the next morning, what the soldiers ate were pots of boiled wild vegetables without even salt. The [-] army exploded immediately, and the soldiers realized that they had run out of food.

The soldiers ate boiled wild vegetables, but the treatment of the generals and the iron kite cavalry was not bad. The soldiers hunted dozens of deer, and the venison was boiled into minced meat soup.

The news spread quickly, and the angry Xixia soldiers showed strong emotions of war weariness and slack. Wang Mengye also realized that the army's morale was shaken. At noon, he ordered hundreds of old and weak horses to be slaughtered and matched with wild vegetables to relieve the soldiers. Hungry, but Wang Mengye also knew that the consequences of killing horses were very serious, but in order to feed the soldiers, he didn't care about it.

The horses and armor of the Xixia Army are privately owned by the soldiers. Only the armor for logistics supplies is made by the government. The same is true for the Liao soldiers. For the Dangxiang people and the Khitan people, the horses are their brothers and comrades-in-arms. Will not eat horse meat.

Wangmeng blackmailed horses to feed their hunger. Although it solved the imminent hunger problem, this move caused hatred and panic among Xixia soldiers. After two meals without food, the Xixia army began to flee on a small scale.

As long as any army flees, it is a sign that the morale of the army has dropped to a freezing point.

Wang Meng had no choice but to force the army to march faster. When night fell, they finally reached the bank of the Yellow River.

The tired and hungry Xixia soldiers rushed to the river to start building the pontoon without waiting for the commander's order. At this time, a mile or so away on the river, more than a dozen small boats were moored quietly in the middle of the river. Several big ships, they are quietly waiting for the opportunity.

The leather raft pontoon bridge was built very quickly. In just an hour, a pontoon bridge with a length of one and a half miles appeared on the river. The pontoon bridge was being fixed on the shore at the end. Without a sound, it got under the pontoon bridge.

"Cross the bridge!"

A rocket rose from the other side of the pontoon bridge, which indicated that the pontoon bridge had been completed. Wang Mengxi immediately ordered: "The former army crosses the river!"

The soldiers of the Xixia Army who had already lined up on the bank immediately ran to the pontoon bridge. Many soldiers found that there was a dark, viscous liquid under their feet, and it also gave off a pungent smell, but they didn't care about it and just ran to the opposite bank. In just a moment, thousands of soldiers rushed to the pontoon bridge.

At this moment, a rocket appeared on the river in the distance. The bright rocket shot straight into the night sky, and there was a crisp crackling sound in the air: 'Crack! '

Wang Meng felt something was wrong, and immediately ordered: "Stop going on the bridge!"

But without his order, no soldiers dared to go on the bridge. The front, middle and back sections of the bridge were all ablaze, and the flames spread rapidly, engulfing the soldiers on the bridge in an instant. jump to.

Soon, the pontoon bridge broke and overturned, and soldiers who were not burned fell into the water one after another. The fire gradually engulfed the entire pontoon bridge. Only a few hundred soldiers passed by the south bank, and nearly [-] soldiers fell into the Yellow River.

All the soldiers on the shore were stunned, and most of them understood that the Song army had cut off their retreat, and their logistics should have been destroyed by the Song army in this way.

Wang Mengxuan was angry and anxious, and ordered sharply: "Build four more pontoon bridges, and build them at the same time!"

The generals persuaded him one after another, "General, it is useless to build more pontoon bridges. They will definitely be destroyed. We have no advantage on the water."

Wang Meng turned around and roared angrily: "Then what should we do! Are we waiting to die here?"

All the generals were silent, and one general couldn't help complaining in a low voice: "I shouldn't have rushed into Hetao in the first place!"

Wang Mengyu was furious, rushed up and stabbed the general with a sword, and stared at everyone fiercely, "Who else is not convinced, just say it!"

The generals all retreated one after another, this Wang Mengyu has gone crazy, if he wants to die, let him die!
The generals underestimated Wang Mengye's greed for life and fear of death, and also underestimated his cunning. Wang Mengye found that the Song army would not attack the pontoon bridge immediately, and the outer pontoon bridge would block the middle pontoon bridge, slowing down the time for the Song army to destroy the pontoon bridge, just like Like the hundreds of soldiers who fled to the other side at first, they could use this time difference to escape with their lives.

The four pontoon bridges had just been built, and Wang Mengye led his soldiers to rush up the third pontoon bridge first, and rushed to the opposite bank. The Xixia soldiers on the shore realized that the coach was going to escape first, and they also rushed to the pontoon bridge. .

At this time, two steamships of five thousand shi rumbled forward, and their hard collision heads directly smashed the pontoon bridge into two sections. Destroyed, more than [-] soldiers fell into the water, many of whom were squeezed off the pontoon bridge by their own people, including nearly a thousand iron kite cavalry, who were also buried at the bottom of the river.

However, the coach of the Xixia Army Wang Meng led three hundred soldiers to escape the Yellow River and fled to the south without looking back.

At dawn, the news that the commander had abandoned them and fled quickly spread throughout the army. The main force of the Xixia army, who was suffering from hunger and extremely low morale, began to flee across the board.

At this moment, [-] Song Army cavalrymen came from behind and began massacring Xixia soldiers who were starving and cold on the banks of the Yellow River and unable to resist.

(End of this chapter)