Yuan Shao, the father of Fanghua in the Three Kingdoms

Chapter 1117 Blockage
When Ma Chao rode through the battlefield, he saw the charred bodies of the Xiliang soldiers, curled up in a ball, as if they had been burned to death in the fire.

However, the few bodies of Yuan Xi's army had obvious sword wounds, and there were no signs of fire on the surrounding ground. This left Ma Chao puzzled. Why was this so?

Can this fire only burn the soldiers from Xiliang?
For some reason, the words "divine punishment" suddenly popped up in Ma Chao's mind. He was then shocked and quickly drove the thought out of his mind.

Soon Ma Chao's question was answered. When he arrived at the center of the battle, he saw Pang De who was already surrounded.

Of the more than a thousand soldiers and horses led by Pang De, only less than three hundred were left. Now they were surrounded by an enemy force that was several times larger than his. Pang De was covered with wounds. He personally charged and tried to break through several times, but was always blocked. Now his hair and beard were charred and he looked in a miserable state.

When Ma Chao saw this, he didn't say anything and immediately led his troops to charge in. It seemed that Yuan Xi's army did not expect Ma Chao to come so quickly. Their rear formation was attacked by Ma Chao, and their formation was reopened for a moment, so they were forced to disperse to both sides.

Ma Chao led his troops to Pang De and said, "Why are you so careless? Where did the enemy come from?"

Pang De also had a hard time speaking out. As he rushed out with Ma Chao, he said, "I don't understand. The spies clearly didn't find anything wrong, but suddenly the enemy appeared out of the ground and surrounded me!"

Ma Chao snorted coldly, "We are very close to Yijing now. I don't know what Xionghu is up to. Let's quickly find a way to go north. Once we enter Youzhou, we will fight to support the enemy and turn the world upside down!"

Pang De was about to say something when suddenly his face turned pale and he yelled, "General, be careful!"

He said this hurriedly. When Ma Chao looked around, he did not find any trace of the enemy. He thought to himself, what are you shouting about? Why are you asking me to be careful?
The next moment, the camouflage on several mounds on both sides of the road was suddenly pushed away from the inside, revealing a hole about a foot square.

A long iron pipe stretched out from the dark hole, with a flickering flame on the top.

The next moment, the flames suddenly surged more than ten feet and turned into a thick pillar of fire, spraying towards Ma Chao and others!

Ma Chao had been reminded by Pang De, so he reacted quickly. He exerted force with his arms and suddenly lay down on the horse. Almost at the same time, the sweeping fire snake flew past his head.

Ma Chao only felt an abnormal burning sensation on his back and knew that he was burned by the flames. However, his brain seemed to be at a standstill at this time. He had never seen such a phenomenon before. Why could the flames spray so far?

With nothing else to do, he could only hold on to the horse's neck tightly and pass through several consecutive flames, but he was still hit on the arm by a flame. Although the arm armor blocked it, the pain still spread.

But this was already considered lucky, as his subordinates were hit by flames on vital parts of their heads and faces, and they fell off their horses with screams. Moreover, the flames stuck to their skin and bodies and did not go out, but continued to burn!

When Ma Chao saw this, he felt a chill all over his body. He finally knew how those Xiliang soldiers died before. Pang De didn't tell him in time!

In fact, this is not Pang De's fault. After Pang De encountered an ambush, he encountered Yuan Xi's army's endless tactics, and his mind was in chaos. Just when Ma Chao came to rescue him, he naturally followed and fled first. How could he have the time to explain?

Ma Chao came to his senses, drew the longbow behind him, aimed at the cave entrance and shot an arrow. The arrow went straight into the small hole. The pillar of fire paused for a moment and then shrank back.

Just as Ma Chao's soldiers were cheering a few times, the flames grew stronger again, enveloping several people who were close to them and burning them into firemen. Seeing their companions on fire and rolling on the ground screaming, the others were all terrified and rode their horses to avoid them. However, these mounds were on both sides of the road, so how could they be easily avoided?

Ma Chao walked around the mound and found that there was no way to enter. He was frustrated and cursed. Pang De came and said, "This is a fortification built by the fierce tiger from underground. We can't find the entrance. There is no way to deal with it!"

"I was ambushed earlier. It's also possible that the Tiger Army hid underground and deceived the scouts!"

Ma Chao cursed in his heart, why didn’t you tell me such an important thing earlier?

Hearing faint shouts and cries of killing from behind, Ma Chao knew that the pursuers were catching up, so he had to order his soldiers to retreat in the opposite direction.

Little did he know that his every move had already been clearly seen by the balloons in the sky. Several rockets were immediately fired, and several teams in the surrounding area of ​​dozens of miles surrounded Ma Chao like sharp arrows, surrounding him in the direction of his escape.

Ma Chao only felt that the enemy troops were attacking him in increasing numbers, and people were constantly shot and fell off their horses. Moreover, the people who were trying to stop them were extremely cunning. They did not engage in a head-on battle with Ma Chao's army, but only fought with bows and arrows from a distance.

Most of Ma Chao's men had already shot all the three full pots of arrows on their backs. Seeing that the enemy's arrows were still endless and they could only be sitting ducks, the morale of many of them had dropped to the lowest point.

Some people were unwilling to give up and tried to charge into the ground formation on horseback with spears in hand. However, as soon as they got close, they were shot into hedgehogs by the dense rain of arrows.

Seeing this scene, some people finally broke down and cried out, "It's over, the fierce tiger is going to kill us all!"

"He hated us for massacring the whole village, so he took revenge on our family. Now he will never let us go!"

The words shook the army's morale. Ma Chao raised his spear and stabbed the man who had spoken to him off his horse, shouting, "Now the only way to survive and take revenge is to charge out!"

"Those who don't want to charge can stay and surrender. See if the fierce tiger can spare you!" His words really worked, and immediately aroused the ferocity of the Xiliang soldiers. They roared, "The general is right. Let's fight them!"

"Yes, fight them to the death!"

Just as they were about to rally their troops, an army came out head-on and shouted, "Zhang He of Hebei is here, where is Ma Chao?"

"Fight me to the death!"

Pang De heard this and rode forward, "You are just an unknown person in Jizhou. You have to get past me first!"

The two men collided with each other, swords and spears clashed, and they immediately started to tumble and fight.

Ma Chao secretly cursed Pang De in his heart, saying that it was already too late and he still wanted to fight him in a duel. What kind of morality was he still talking about at this critical moment?
He immediately drew his bow, drew his arrow, and was about to shoot at Zhang He. Then another army rushed out from the side and shouted, "Ma Chao, let me, Zhang Liao, meet you!"

Ma Chao deflected the arrow and shot it at Zhang Liao, but it was deflected by Zhang Liao's spear. Seeing that he had no time to shoot a second arrow, Ma Chao had to draw out his spear to meet the attack.

The two men collided. Ma Chao's spear skills were extremely fast, and the first few spears almost hit Zhang Liao. This made Zhang Liao extremely careful. He held the crescent halberd in front of him and turned it a few times, gradually neutralizing Ma Chao's subsequent attacks.

Although the crescent halberd has a slow attack speed, it is good at entanglement. After more than ten moves, the branch of the crescent halberd has locked Ma Chao's spear tip. The two of them pulled each other and it became a pure contest of strength.

Under normal circumstances, Ma Chao would naturally not be afraid, but at this moment he understood that Zhang Liao's intention was to consume his strength. Unfortunately, Zhang Liao had not revealed any flaws so far, leaving Ma Chao with no way to fight back, and he became more and more anxious.

After several struggles, Ma Chao felt his strength gradually depleted. What was most troublesome was that the Xiliang soldiers were outnumbered by the armies of Zhang Liao and Zhang He, and people were constantly being killed on the ground.

But at this moment, another army rushed out, and the leading general ran straight to Pang De, raised his gun with shaking hands, and stabbed Pang De in the back of the head.

Pang De quickly dodged to the side. When he looked up, he saw Gao Lan whom he had met before. He immediately shouted, "How dare you do this, you despicable villain!"

Gao Lan sneered and said, "There is no need to talk about morality with you guys. You will all die here today!"

Seeing Gao Lan stabbing again, Pang De knew that it was a matter of life and death. He roared and used all his strength to resist the killing moves of Zhang He and Gao Lan.

Ma Chao over there had already begun to think of retreating. The attacking generals were all famous generals in the world, some even more famous than Ma Chao. Although Ma Chao thought that he was not inferior to anyone in terms of martial arts alone, he was now surrounded. If he continued fighting like this, he would be in great danger!

Thinking of this, Ma Chao frowned and a plan came to his mind. He and Zhang Liao pulled the spear back and forth a few times. Based on the direction of the force, he suddenly exerted force quickly, pulled the spear tip out of the twig, then circled and stabbed straight at Zhang Liao's horse's head.

When Zhang Liao saw this, he quickly moved down to block, but he didn't expect that Ma Chao's move was a feint. He turned his horse's head and rushed straight towards Pang De, while pointing his spear at Gao Lan's back, wanting to take the opportunity to knock him off his horse.

Zhang Liao was unable to catch up and hurriedly shouted a warning. Gao Lan saw it out of the corner of his eye and tried to jump out of the circle, but Pang De would never give him the chance. He risked being stabbed by Zhang He and held Gao Lan tightly.

Gao Lan cursed in his heart. Everyone knew that he was the easiest to bully among the three. Now he was really in trouble!

At this moment, another general rode his horse faster than thunder and blocked Ma Chao's way, shouting, "Ma Chao!"

"A few years ago, you and I were evenly matched, but today we are done with it!"

When Ma Chao looked closely, he immediately wanted to turn around and run away, because the general coming was Zhao Yun, whom he had not seen for several years!
At present, four of Xionghu's generals appeared here at the same time, which made Ma Chao's scalp tingle. Why would Xionghu mobilize so many generals to surround him?
Doesn’t he guard against Cao’s army?
Two against four, this side has no chance of winning. If we don't act decisively, we will lose no chance of escape!

Looking at the surprised and doubtful Ma Chao, Zhao Yun thought that the other party was really courting death as the military advisor had predicted. After Ji County was destroyed, he not only did not retreat to seek revenge in the future, but wanted to retaliate immediately and attempted to go north to Youzhou for revenge.

But Ma Chao didn't know that Yuan Xi was stationed in Yijing and his generals were all in the city waiting for orders. Ma Chao's move was like walking into a trap.

Seeing Zhao Yun rushing towards him, Ma Chao no longer had the heart to fight. He shook the reins with all his strength and broke through diagonally, shouting, "Ling Ming, this is impossible. Let's break through together!"

Now it was Pang De's turn to feel his scalp tingling. He was already tightly entangled by Zhang He and Gao Lan.

go?
Can you leave now?

(End of this chapter)