Ji Han Da Sima

Chapter 706 The fox pretends to be the tiger's power
Twenty years ago, Huo Jun wanted to march north to Jianwu, so he formed the Xiongkui Army in imitation of the Beiwei Army. After years of development, it has become a force of 4,000 infantry and 1,000 cavalry.

After twenty years of battlefield experience, the Hun Army is invincible and well-equipped, making it the strongest army in East Asia. Even though a large number of soldiers have retired due to age or injuries, the Hun Army's selection model means that the Hun Army is still full of martial virtue.

As time went by, Jianghuai gradually revived, and the weapons and equipment of the Hunhui Army were also armed to the teeth. Because it was a full-time army, the soldiers' standard weapons were not crossbows but bows and arrows. Iron armor, ring-handled swords, and spears were directly standard equipment.

The cavalry are divided into two types: trap cavalry and ranger cavalry. The trap cavalry's large horses are equipped with vests, while the ranger cavalry's fast horses are equipped with leather armor. Each person is equipped with a horse lance, a soft bow, a ring-handled sword, and a small shield.

It is no exaggeration to say that with the same number of troops, the Hun Army is enough to sweep away all opponents.

Knowing that Ding Feng was the general of Huo Jun's Xiongkui army, Wang Ling cautiously sent Linghu Jun and Guanqiu Jian as vanguards, leading 9,000 elite infantry and cavalry to attack Ding Feng, attempting to defeat the Xiongkui army before the Han army crossed the river.

When he learned that the two generals were coming with their troops, Jiang Ji planned to let Ding Feng lead his troops to block the enemy with a simple camp to wait for Huo Jun's follow-up reinforcements. He also believed that as long as Huo Jun crossed the river, the Wei army would retreat without a fight upon hearing his name.

Ding Feng disagreed with Jiang Ji's opinion. He was keenly aware that the Wei army was coming with ill intentions, and bluntly said that the army needed to bring baggage south and cross the river, and its movement would inevitably be slow. If they stayed and let the Wei army occupy the nearby dangerous places, the army's crossing of the river would be restricted, so they had to attack decisively and defeat the enemy's vanguard.

Seeing that Ding Feng's words were reasonable and closely related to the current situation, Jiang Ji immediately agreed to Ding Feng's suggestion. The two of them had a clear plan, so they led their troops to fight against the Wei army.

The two armies both adopted the current customary formation, with infantry in the middle and cavalry on both wings. Jiang Ji commanded the battle in the middle, while Ding Feng led the cavalry in the confrontation.

The Wei army had a large number of soldiers and Ding Feng was brave, but he was still entangled by the enemy cavalry. Fortunately, the infantry of the Hun army was brave and armored, and they fought back and repelled the Wei infantry head-on. The Wei army wanted to put more strength into counterattack, but it could not repel the Hun army at all, and was repelled by the Hun army again.

After being repelled twice in a row, the morale of the Wei army was low. Jiang Ji took the opportunity to command his soldiers to launch a fierce charge, which immediately crushed the entire Wei army. The first few rows were defeated, and the following rows of Wei soldiers were affected by this and turned around and fled in defeat.

The infantry pursued the Wei army and completely disrupted the infantry formation. The defeated infantry naturally affected the cavalry, and under the conflict between Ding Feng on the left and right, the cavalry was afraid and fled.

Seeing that the Wei army's infantry and cavalry were defeated one after another, Linghu Jun and Guanqiu Jian did try their best. It's just that they were unable to rebuke the fleeing troops. Instead, these troops took their troops away.

Seeing the Wei army retreating, Jiang Ji ordered Ding Feng to lead the cavalry to pursue, while he led the infantry to speed up the construction of the camp to prevent the follow-up Wei soldiers from arriving. However, in order to build the camp as soon as possible, Jiang Ji had to cut down the few trees in the Confucius Forest.

The Confucius Forest in the Eastern Han Dynasty only had one hectare of land, far from the hundreds of acres of land in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. There were not many trees on the ground, but it was better than nothing, and it saved time in a critical moment.

While Jiang Ji was wasting time building a camp, Ding Feng led his cavalry to chase him for more than ten miles until they met the army led by Wang Ling, and were forced to lead their troops to withdraw.

Wang Ling saw that Linghu Jun and Guanqiu Jian were defeated by the Hunhui army and his plan to stop the Han army failed. He almost vomited blood.

The current reality is very different from the ideal, which forces Wang Ling to face the Han army crossing the river!
At the same time, after the Han army defeated Linghu Jun and Guanqiu Jian, Yu Shao, as the vanguard, led a large number of chariots and hurried across the river to meet up with Jiang Ji.

Seeing Yu Shao crossing the river with chariots, Jiang Ji was overjoyed and immediately ordered his soldiers to use the chariots to build a tunnel leading directly to the existing camp so that Huo Jun could cross the river smoothly.

While Jiang Ji was building the tunnel, Wang Ling led the light cavalry and arrived not far from the Han camp.

Wang Ling stopped his horse and looked, and saw a camp built on the previously empty riverside plain, less than a mile away from the Sishui River. Even though the distance was short, there was still a corridor built by chariots connecting to the camp.

There are several floating bridges made of bamboo rafts on the corridor connecting to Sishui. On the floating bridges, Han soldiers have lined up neatly to cross the river. After crossing Sishui, these Han soldiers formed units of Qutun and, under the command of officers, were put on guard in the camp.

On the other side of the river, the baggage was guarded by the old and weak infantry, as well as the cavalry who were not convenient to cross the river first. It was obvious that the Han army wanted to send the elite infantry to the south bank first to increase the protection of the camp on the south bank. The large and heavy cavalry and baggage would cross the river after the situation stabilized.

Seeing this scene, Wang Ling held the reins and sighed.

The follower asked, "General, can we attack the enemy camp now?"

Wang Ling looked at Qian Zhao beside him and asked, "What do you think, Zi Jing?"

Qian Zhao's face was solemn, he shook his head and said: "The enemy's camp is connected to the tunnel, there are no less than 10,000 soldiers in the camp, judging from the defense of the camp, it is difficult for our army to break through."

As he spoke, Qian Zhao pointed to the opposite river and said with a wry smile: "If there is a soldier who can attack the north bank right now, he may be able to defeat the enemy and capture Huo Jun."

Wang Ling looked over and saw Huo Jun's large flag appear on the opposite bank. Due to crossing the river, the defenses on both sides were very weak.

As the commander of the army, Huo Jun planned to cross the river last in order to appease the people. He sat on a Hu chair, looking at Sinan calmly, and he obviously noticed Qian Zhao, Wang Ling and others who were watching the camp.

"Isn't Huo Jun afraid that our army will cut off his food supply?" Qian Zhao couldn't help but ask.

The Sinan Road is a key point, and Qian Zhao and Wang Ling were not unprepared. In the past few days, the Wei army had been on high alert to prevent Huo Jun from sending troops to harass the grain route.

But they really didn't expect that after the two armies had been at each other's throats for months, Huo Jun used a feint to the east and attacked in the west to pin them down. Huo Jun not only harassed their food supply, but also intended to cut off their food supply.

Now Huo Jun swapped places with them, not afraid of the Wei army cutting off his food supply, which made Qian Zhao puzzled. You know, Huo Jun has long relied on the upstream Sishui River to transport food and grass. Now he ran to the downstream, although it cut off their food supply, it also allowed the Wei army to cut off his food supply in a roundabout way. Qian Zhao asked himself again, "Unless Huo Jun can get food from the downstream, or he has more food than our army. But the downstream is all the cities of our Wei State, how can Huo Jun get food?"

Wang Ling frowned and thought, looking at the slowly flowing Sishui River, and said, "The lower reaches of the Sishui River are Gaoxiang, and there is a city called Xiapi. Maybe Huo Jun wants to lead the grain from Xiapi upstream to use as military rations."

Qian Zhao seemed to be thinking about something, and said, "When I lived in Hebei, I heard that there was a boat in the south of the Yangtze River, which had no oars and no passengers, but could be driven. Is there such a boat?"

"That's a car-boat!"

Wang Ling explained: "The chariot boat has two wheels and moves forward with drums. Huo Jun, the water conservancy master, once built chariot boats and poles. The chariot boat can be used when there is no wind, and when there is wind, it can be used as a sailing boat to move faster."

Qian Zhao sorted out Huo Jun's ideas on how to use troops, and couldn't help but sigh: "Huo Jun is a rare talent in the world!"

This move was like a stroke of genius. He took advantage of his own strengths and changed the grain transportation route in a way that broke the routine. By exchanging positions, the original confrontation situation was instantly turned into a situation where he had the advantage. It was bold and steady, and it was hard not to admire him.

However, Wang Ling was able to see Huo Jun's true intentions from the situation, and he truly lived up to his reputation as a man of both civil and military talents.

Wang Ling glanced at Qian Zhao, his eyes full of confusion. He seemed to not understand why Qian Zhao would praise Huo Jun in front of everyone. This involved a question of stance.

Gai realized that his words were wrong, so he coughed a few times and changed the subject, asking: "Wang Cheqi, now that the Han army has crossed the river, how will our army respond?"

Wang Ling pondered for a moment and said, "Given the current situation, I want to lead my troops to approach the enemy camp and challenge them. In addition, to prevent Huo Jun from obtaining food and supplies, I will send messengers to inform the cities on the Si River not to surrender to the enemy. Those who disobey will be executed."

As he spoke, Wang Ling asked, "How much food and rations do we have left?"

"Reporting to the commander-in-chief, our army only has forty days' supply of food left. If no food arrives after forty days, our army may run out of food," the attendant replied.

"Why are the food supplies being consumed so quickly?" Wang Ling asked.

"In recent months, many soldiers and generals in Henan have been ordered to come and surrender, so the loss of food and fodder has increased." said the attendant.

"it is good!"

Not to mention that Wang Ling was worried about the current food supply, Wen Qin, who was in the rear, couldn't help but mock Linghu Jun when he saw him reorganizing the defeated army.

"A fox can only scare away other birds if it gets the power of a tiger. However, the fox does not know where the power comes from and does not know its own strength and wants to fight with the birds of prey. How ridiculous!" Wen Qin came with his personal cavalry and said sarcastically.

Like Zhuge, the Linghu clan is often shortened to the latter character. In the modern text, Qin is criticizing Hu, but in reality he is mocking Linghu Jun for not knowing his own capabilities, and emphasizes that the main credit for defeating the enemy in the night attack was his ability to hold Beishan Fort, not Linghu Jun's bluffing to defeat the enemy.

Linghu Jun was furious and said, "How can defending a fortress be compared to fighting in battle array? The Hun Hu army is the strongest army in the world, how can we easily defeat them?"

Wen Qin sneered a few times and said, "You have your reasons. I defeated the enemy and beheaded him because I relied on the strategic advantage to defend, while you lost your soldiers because of the difference in strength. However, no matter what, I can offer my head to you and be awarded an official title, while you will have to accept the punishment for the defeat."

Linghu Jun was defeated and said directly: "It's a blessing that the king's cavalry didn't pursue your false report of military achievements. It's ridiculous to want to be rewarded now!"

"What do you mean?" Wen Qin asked with narrowed eyes.

Linghu Jun was proud of the fact that Wang Ling was his uncle, and he said, "What do you think I mean?"

"You~"

Before Wen Qin could say anything, Wang Ling came back from the front and interrupted the quarrel between the two men, criticizing them: "With the enemy at hand, you two are quarreling like shrews instead of serving your country. Why?"

Wen Qin pursed his lips and said nothing. In his eyes, Wang Ling was helping Linghu Jun out because of their relationship.

"Jun knows he's wrong!"

In front of his uncle Wang Ling, Linghu Jun was very well-behaved and was the first to apologize.

Wang Ling felt a little headache when he saw the unruly Wen Qin. He ordered, "To prevent the bandit army from surrendering the cities on Sishang, the general will lead his troops to attack from behind to deter them."

"promise!"

In order to stop the two from arguing, Wang Ling had no choice but to separate them.

(End of this chapter)