First Minister of the Tang Dynasty

Chapter 340
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The rumbling flood poured down, and its sound was so loud that it was unstoppable.

Liu Heikai's expression changed immediately, he looked in the direction of the sound, and suddenly looked at the river in front of him, his pupils dilated, and hurriedly reined in his horse and shouted: "Back back, back quickly", almost breaking the sound.

"Water, big water is coming".

"Ah, water, run quickly."

As soon as the words fell, the turbulent and swift torrent appeared in front, and the waves were more than ten feet high.

This scene was so frightening that the Eastern Han Army who were crossing the river and chasing after them fled in a hurry.

"Your Majesty, retreat quickly," the personal guard grabbed Liu Heita's reins and hurriedly retreated.

The flood was merciless, a torrent rushed through, and it rushed the soldiers of Eastern Han to their backs, and the sound of shouting was endless.

"Enough ruthless", I don't know whether it was shock or anger, Liu Heita's mouth was trembling, and he gritted his teeth and said: "Withdraw the army, withdraw to the north, order Fan Yuan and Dong Kangmai, and quickly withdraw to the north."

"Your Majesty, why don't you withdraw to the capital?" the general asked in surprise.

"If you go back at this time, you will be the turtle in the urn, and there is no room for turning around. Abandon the city and withdraw," Liu Heitai said resolutely, looking at the south bank with resentment.

"Shubao, Wu'an, go around quickly, don't get away from Liu Heizai." Li Shimin looked at the torrential water with a serious face, and immediately ordered: "Command Mao Gong and Li Yi, the whole army to attack, drag the bandit army ".

The Tang army quickly began to expand the results of the battle. Under the leadership of Qin Qiong and Zhang Shigui, the cavalry circled from the upper reaches, chasing and killing all the way, and surrendered a lot.

In the direction of Mingshui City, Dong Kangmai lost his position when he heard that the Chinese army was defeated. Li Shiji seized the opportunity and defeated Dong Kangmai.

As for the other side, it was exactly the same, not far away. When the news of the defeat of the Chinese army came, Fan Yuan hurriedly retreated, and Li Yi took advantage of the victory to pursue.

When Liu Heikai retreated to the camp on the north bank, Dong Kangmai and Fan Yuan led the army to arrive one after another, and the three sides joined forces, but there were only more than [-] soldiers left.

Facing the imminent encirclement of the Tang army, Liu Heitai made a bold decision: to break out of the siege and defect to the Turks.

"Your Majesty, how can we, the heroes of the Central Plains, defect to Hu Yi?" Cao Dan asked loudly, quite ambitiously.

Liu Heitai's face darkened, "If I have to, how could this king be sent under the fence?

Now that the land is lost and the army has been defeated, we can only temporarily attach ourselves to the Turks and use their troops to make a comeback.”

"I think Your Majesty wants to emulate Liu Wuzhou and Liang Shidu and be the puppet of Hu Yi," Cao Dan immediately angrily reprimanded.

"Bold", Fan Yuan was furious, pointing at Cao Dan and scolding: "How dare you disrespect the king?"

"Cao Dan followed King Xia in order to overthrow the tyranny and establish a peaceful world. He has no intention of turning to the barbarians," Cao Dan said angrily, and then looked around at the generals. , let’s go on our own.”

After the words fell, Cao Dan turned around and went out of the tent, knelt facing north, looked up to the sky and cried out mournfully: "King Xia, my minister is here", and then drew his sword and killed himself.

Everyone watched quietly, Liu Heita's expression was heavy.

"My lord, the Tang army has come up..." The soldiers rushed to report.

"The whole army broke through to the north," Liu Heitai took a deep look at Cao Dan's body, and got on his horse.

Liu Heikai personally led the army and charged to the north. There were Li Shiji in the west, Li Shimin in the south, and Li Yi in the east.

With Liu Heita leading the charge, he soon broke through the weak blockade and headed north all the way.

"Your Majesty, we still have three or four thousand soldiers. Even if we go to Turkic, the Turkic Khan would not dare to despise us," Dong Kangmai said proudly.

Liu Heitai was preoccupied, and looked around cautiously, "Don't be careless before leaving Hebei."

"Your Majesty is worrying too much. The Tang army has few soldiers. They are all in the south, and there is no one in the north." Dong Kangmai said indifferently: "In my opinion, it is better for your majesty to continue to raise the banner in Hebei. Come and attach."

Liu Heikai was also a little moved when he heard the words. After all, Datang's control over the land of Hebei was indeed vacant, but looking at the dejected remnant army behind him, Liu Heikai shook his head and said: "I can't block it, first go to the Turks to borrow troops and regroup." It's not too late."

While speaking, he reached a pass, Liu Heita cautiously ordered the scouts to explore the way, only to see the scout galloping forward, and before he could react, he was shot with arrows.

Tang Jun rushed down from the pass in a mighty way, covering the sky and covering the earth.

The remnants of the Eastern Han army were suddenly panicked, and Liu Heikai was also shocked. Then he took a closer look and shouted loudly: "Brothers, don't panic, the ones here are just auxiliary soldiers and civilians. They are vulnerable to a single blow. Let me kill you!" ah".

Liu Heita took the lead and rushed forward with a spear in his hand.

These Tang troops were the Jueyan auxiliary troops led by Gao Jifu.

As Liu Heikai said, the auxiliary soldiers are indeed vulnerable, and fighting with the soldiers is not at the same level at all.

Rao is Gao Jifu who took the lead and deployed properly, but the auxiliary soldiers are auxiliary soldiers after all, and they are doomed to have neither the combat effectiveness nor the execution ability of the soldiers.

Liu Heitai quickly rushed across the pass, his blood was surging, and he was about to continue the fight, when Fan Yuan hurriedly stopped him, "My lord, it is important to break through the siege, don't be entangled by him."

Liu Heitai suddenly came to his senses, and immediately ordered, don't love to fight, and continue to walk north.

Gao Jifu hated him so much that he ordered the pursuit. As long as he entangled Liu Heitai so that Tang Jun who was chasing after him could follow up, that would be a great achievement.

To put it cruelly, if you can entangle Liu Heita, even if all the more than ten thousand auxiliary soldiers are killed here, it will be worth it.

But the auxiliary soldiers had no courage and no horses, so they were quickly thrown away by Liu Heita.

"Counting the casualties", Liu Heikai was in an extremely upset mood, because Gao Jifu's auxiliary soldiers did not complete the threat to his life, but after a big battle, his already few remaining troops were further depleted.

"Your Majesty, there are still 3000 people left," Fan Yuan said with his head bowed.

Dong Kangmai clutched his arms and yelled, "Zhiniang thief, is there no one to use Tanggou? Even the auxiliary soldiers have been sent out."

"That should be the person who broke the weir to release the water," Liu Heita said angrily.

Hearing this, Dong Kangmai was even more angry, and his mouth was crackling, which was output.

"Where is the thief running away?" Suddenly, there was a stern shout from the front, the voice was very vicious, "Liu Heita, I want you to pay with blood, kill."

Liu Heitai and the others were shocked. When they looked up, they saw a tall general leading thousands of people rushing from the side of the mountain.

"Cheng Mingzhen!" Seeing this person, Fan Yuan exclaimed, "Your Majesty, he is Cheng Mingzhen."

At that time, he also served under Dou Jiande's command, and Cheng Mingzhen was appointed as the magistrate of Pule County. Fan Yuan also knew each other.

"Don't love to fight, go north to break through."

As soon as he saw the posture of the Tang army, Liu Heitai knew that he was invincible.

Although there were only a thousand or so members of the Tang army, they were solid Tang army elites. Following Cheng Mingzhen, they broke through four prefectures, burned countless grains and grass, and their combat strength was strong and their morale was high.

(End of this chapter)