Tibet.

Chapter 1424 Encounter at Sea
"Ouch——"

The cries of the elephants rose one after another, and finally they rushed out of the woods. The overwhelming elephant herd was huge, and behind them were 30,000 short, dark-skinned Linyi Nationalist soldiers.

The elephants were getting closer and closer, less than three miles away from the Tang army. Zhang Boyi shouted, "Fire! Shoot!"

The Tang army ignited the kerosene. Five hundred barrels of kerosene were ignited and immediately burned fiercely, with red flames rising and thick smoke billowing.

Immediately afterwards, four thousand heavy crossbowmen fired together, and two thousand arrows and lightning bolts were shot out, exploding in the wilderness. The people of Jiaozhou also had experience in dealing with herds of elephants, which was to scare them by beating gongs and drums. Elephants are afraid of light and noise, especially strong noises.

Sure enough, amid the loud explosions in front, the herd of elephants began to slow down, and the hundreds of elephants in front began to turn around, but the herd behind continued to run forward.

Then, the second, third, and fourth rounds of arrows and thunder exploded violently. The tens of thousands of elephants that had already run to a mile away from the Tang army finally collapsed completely and scrambled to run backwards.

Zhang Boyi shouted, "Cavalry attack!"

Five thousand cavalrymen rushed out and followed the elephants, constantly shooting explosive arrows at the elephants. The exploding sound and pain of the explosive arrows drove the elephants to flee even more frantically.

Elephants have always been a double-edged sword in warfare. If they are well controlled, they can defeat the enemy. For example, Lu Zhenla used an army of 30,000 elephants to defeat Shui Zhenla. If they are not driven well, or if they are defeated by the enemy, the elephants will turn around and cause a tragic backlash.

The 30,000 Linyi soldiers behind were caught off guard, and countless of them were trampled or hit to death by the elephants that rushed back frantically.

The Tang army's cavalry and infantry chased and killed the Linyi soldiers all the way, leaving corpses all over the ground and blood flowing like a river. Countless people surrendered.

This time the Tang army did not massacre the prisoners of war. These prisoners could be used for farming. The prisoners of war in the south were different from the nomadic peoples in the north. The nomadic peoples in the north were fierce and undisciplined, and would fight back and retaliate if they had the chance.

Therefore, the best way to deal with the northern nomadic peoples is to kill them all and take no prisoners.

Although the southern prisoners of war are ungrateful and do not know how to be educated, they will retaliate once you are weak. However, they have one advantage, which is that they are more servile. Once you are stronger than them, they will be honest and obedient. As long as you give them food, they will never dare to rebel. Dozens of soldiers can manage thousands of people, so it is best to use them to farm.

Five thousand cavalrymen cut off the retreat of the Linyi army, and all 30,000 troops surrendered. They were also frightened by the Tang army's firearms.

The Tang army began to clean up the battlefield, and many elephants took the opportunity to escape into the primeval forest, but there were still more than 4,000 elephants left. They had lived with humans since they were young and were no longer used to the forest.

Thousands of bodies that had been trampled to death or killed were also cleared out, but the king of Linyi was missing.

Finally, two of the King of Linyi's personal soldiers brought the Tang army to a muddy ground, gently pushed away a layer of loose soil, revealing a man who was crushed by an elephant. It turned out that this was the King of Linyi.

The soldiers found the golden crown and scepter, which had also been crushed, and put them into bags. The king's body was also taken away and piled together with the bodies of other soldiers. They were doused with kerosene and burned to ashes in a raging fire.

The Tang army did not stay on the battlefield for long. Chen Boyi left two thousand people to guard the prisoners of war and led the army to attack Champa.

Champa had already heard the news and closed the city gates. The 1,000 soldiers who stayed behind looked at the Tang army in horror and fled back into the city, abandoning their weapons and armor.

Still, hundreds of Linyi soldiers opened the city gates and surrendered to the oncoming Tang army.

The Tang army rushed into the city and occupied the capital of Linyi Kingdom, but soon discovered something unusual: all the nobles in the city were gone and the treasury was empty.

A palace steward was dragged before Zhang Boyi, and he knelt down and begged, "They all fled, especially a dozen princes who divided up the wealth in the treasury and fled south."

"When did he run away?" Zhang Boyi asked.

"He escaped this morning!"

Zhang Boyi calculated in his mind that it would only take half a day.

He turned around and said to the general Wei Yulin: "General Wei, lead 5,000 cavalry to chase them. They can't run far. All the noble men must be killed!" "Yes, sir!"

Five thousand cavalrymen rushed out of the South City at lightning speed and chased towards the south.

The order Zhang Boyi received was to destroy the country and completely annihilate the Linyi Kingdom, but Zhang Boyi also knew that it was not easy to destroy a country. It was easy to conquer the lower-class people, but it was difficult to conquer the middle and upper classes, as well as the writing and history of the Linyi Kingdom.

Zhang Boyi made up his mind that if all else failed, he would conquer them with knife and fire, kill their bodies and burn their writings. He, Zhang Boyi, would be the evil man.

The next morning, the Tang cavalry returned, escorting long ox carts filled with wealth and ragged, crying women. Zhang Boyi sighed in his heart, there was nothing he could do, it was a blessing that the soldiers did not loot and massacre the city.

After a short rest of three days, the Tang army continued to move south. Zhang Boyi sent two thousand cavalrymen to escort more than 20,000 prisoners of war back to Jiaozhou to reclaim paddy fields, and left two thousand soldiers to guard Champa.

The army still divided into two groups and marched south, targeting the Zhenla River Delta.

The Chenla River Delta is now the Mekong River Delta. It has a dense water network, fertile land, and sufficient light and heat all year round, making it the most suitable place to grow rice.

This place was originally the territory of Water Zhenla, but the land and sea confrontation between the two Zhenlas caused great damage to Water Zhenla. The Linyi Kingdom and the Chola Kingdom jointly sent troops to inflict heavy casualties on the Zhenla army. A large number of Zhenla nobles were slaughtered before they could escape. The Linyi Kingdom plundered a large amount of wealth. The Queen of Water Zhenla fled to the old capital, Balatiba, with a small number of troops for a final resistance.

The soldiers of Chola and Linyi looked very powerful, but that was because they encountered the weaker soldiers of Zhenla. However, once it came to the siege, the weak nature of the soldiers of Chola and Linyi was exposed.

Without siege weapons, they used big trees to hit the city gates. However, when the boiling oil and huge rocks fell from the top of the city, the attacking soldiers fled in panic. After a few times, the soldiers of Chola and Linyi did not want to attack the city anymore. They no longer cared about the city of Balatiba. The soldiers began to plunder and enslave the people of Zhenla everywhere and began to enjoy the glory of being the occupiers.

At this time, the commander of the Linyi army, the eldest prince Hu Lin, received news that the Tang army was coming from Jiaozhou and the Linyi Kingdom was in danger.

Hu Lin was horrified by the news and immediately asked Chola for help. He said that as long as the Chola army was willing to follow him north to rescue Champa, Hu Lin would donate the wealth of the national treasury to Chola.

With such a good thing, how could the commander Rajinder not agree? Rajinder did not take the Tang army seriously at all. He immediately led 10,000 naval forces and hundreds of large ships and marched northward in a mighty manner.

In the morning, the Tang army's fleet was sailing on the sea, cutting through the waves. The biggest feature of the Linyi Kingdom was its narrowness and length. Although it was not large in area, it was really narrow and long. It was two thousand miles from Champa to the city of Paratiba.

Although the wind was blowing from the southeast, the Tang army's warships all had paddle wheels. Dozens of soldiers pedaled on the paddle wheels, turning the paddle wheels and driving the ships south.

Suddenly, a lookout soldier shouted from the mast: "There is a fleet ahead!"

Li Chengshi walked to the bow, looking into the distance with a telescope in his hand, and vaguely saw countless black spots dozens of miles away.

They were all very experienced, and from the distance and the size of the black spots, they could judge the size of the enemy ships. They were all large ships with a capacity of more than 3,000 stones, and there were dozens of them. There was no doubt that they must be the navy of the Chola Kingdom.

Li Chengshi felt a little excited. It had been a long time since he had fought a naval battle. He immediately ordered, "Order the entire army to prepare for battle!"

A big red battle flag was raised on the commander's ship, and the warships behind followed suit. This was a symbol of battle, and all the soldiers were excited.

Li Chengshi gave another order: "Order the left army to move south and cut off the enemy's retreat!"

The command flag was hoisted, and General Deng Feng led more than 30 battlefield ships to leave the fleet and head east. They were going to take a detour to the south to cut off the enemy's retreat.

Then the fleet changed its formation from a long snake formation to a "品" formation, that is, a one main and two wing formation.

Du Huan stared at the enemy's warships and said to Li Chengshi in a deep voice: "The enemy's warships are good at fire attacks. It's best not to get close. It's recommended to sink the enemy from a distance!"

This sentence reminded Li Chengshi, and he immediately ordered: "Fight at a long distance, use arrow mines and explosive arrows to deal with the enemy!"

(End of this chapter)