Late Tang

(Thanks to Upside Down, Bright Color Shell, No. 6 Sky, and Mizuki Xiaoxiao for their monthly support and rewards. Thank you everyone. This is the fifth update. Muzi continues to work hard to see if there is Chapter [-]!)

The Shatuo people were packing their luggage and preparing to evacuate when the imperial army arrived.

Li Siyuan reported to Li Keyong that his patrolling cavalry spotted Tang Bing's scouting cavalry about fifty miles away from Daluo Town, south of Jincheng.They followed the scouts of the Tang soldiers and discovered the Tang army's camp. In the La River Valley, there were [-] infantry stationed.

La River Valley is still [-] miles away from Jincheng, Li Keyong is not too worried.On the [-]th day of the first lunar month, the first group of Shatuo officers and men's families, escorted by Li Siyuan and Li Sizhao with [-] cavalry, marched northwest.There are more than [-] family members, old and weak, women and children, including Li Guochang and the Liu family.

The direction Li Ke used to retreat was northwest, because the Qingpo road in Yunzhou to the north had already been occupied by the townsmen, and the road to the east from Weizhou to leave the army from Duxing and enter the fortress was also because there were not only townsmen on the other side. *Soldiers and horses are guarding Weizhou, and soldiers and horses from Youzhou are guarding Guizhou. He sent troops to Guizhou before to capture this retreat channel, but unfortunately he was defeated by Li Keju's Youzhou soldiers.

Now there is only one road left to go in the northwest direction. Go northwest and enter the Shanyu Dufu Mansion of the Zhenwu Army from the northwest corner of Shuozhou.Shanyu Duhu Mansion was in the Sui Dynasty, and this place was also called Dingxiang County, and Shanyu Duhu Mansion was Dali City.Crossing the Jinhe River to the north is the famous Baidao Passage across Yinshan Mountain.

Although the Zhenwu Army has now fallen into the hands of the officers and soldiers, Zhenwu Jiedu Envoy Yu Jian and Tiande Army Jiedu Envoy He Lianduo have both led their troops to come. , Breaking out from here is undoubtedly the best.

After the first batch of more than 3 people left the city, Li Keyong sent his adoptive son Li Sien. Li Siben led the newly recruited 1 old and weak horses, along the Sanggan River, to the northeast first into Yunzhou, and then to Weizhou. go.The main purpose of this line of soldiers and horses is to serve as a pawn to cover the real retreat route of the West Road, so as to confuse the Tang army.Secondly, the march to Yunzhou is also to prevent the townsmen of Yunzhou and Weizhou from coming to Shuozhou.

These ten thousand old and weak are bait, dead chess, basically, there is no return.Li Sien and Li Siben understood this in their hearts, but they finally accepted the task.After the soldiers and horses from the east and the west had left, Li Keyong persisted for three days before leading the last [-] soldiers and horses to evacuate.

Although there are [-] soldiers and horses, only [-] Shatuo cavalry are the real elite, and there are also [-] infantry who have been stationed in the three hills and four towns of Jincheng. They have been trained for a year.The remaining [-] infantry were all recruits recruited by the Liu family during this period.Compared with the ten thousand taken away by Li Sien and Li Siben, although they were young and strong, they did not have much combat experience.These people are the seeds of the Shatuo people's comeback, and when necessary, these people will also be the last cannon fodder to resist the Tang army.

Li Ke marched westward with 2 horses. At this time, [-] cavalry from the five tribes of the Tang Army suddenly appeared and quickly approached Li Keyyong. The distance between the two sides was less than [-] miles.

Shatuo's army stopped advancing and began to form on the spot, ready to fight.But when they unfolded their formation and waited quietly from sunrise in the morning to sunset in the evening, the cavalry of the five tribes had no intention of attacking at all.The cavalry of the five tribes continued to advance slowly, thirty miles away, these twelve thousand cavalry actually walked for a whole day, and saw him and their front sentry cavalry at noon, but at dusk, they still only saw their formation in the distance shape.

Li Keyong was furious and ordered an attack on his own initiative.Fifteen thousand infantry spread out a huge steel phalanx in the middle, and five thousand cavalry spread out their wings, advancing slowly like five tribal cavalry.

To be honest, Li Keyong didn't want to fight Tang soldiers here, wasting his troops in vain.He set up an array to fight, mainly because he wanted to scare off the cavalry of the five tribes with his momentum before the infantry of the Tang soldiers arrived.If these cavalry want to fight, then he doesn't have to worry.He was not too worried about the cavalry of the five tribes without the coordination of infantry.Maybe, they can defeat this cavalry unit in one fell swoop.

Sure enough, the cavalry of the five tribes didn't know whether they were afraid of the reputation of Li Keyong's crow army, or worried about the [-] infantry that Li Keyong was carrying.When the Shatuo army slowly pressed forward, the cavalry of the five tribes began to retreat slowly.

After advancing for a certain distance, Li Ke ordered to turn around and continue westward.But when they walked less than ten miles, the cavalry from the five tribes chased them up from a distance again, and hung behind a distance of four or five miles.

Li Keyong ordered to turn around to meet the enemy again, and they turned around and withdrew again.

This kind of process happened repeatedly, and for three days in a row, Li Keyong seemed to be stuck on a piece of dog skin plaster, and he couldn't get rid of it no matter how hard he tried.Anyway, these cavalry are like rogues, Sha Tuo's army advances, and they follow up.Sha Tuo's army turned around, and they retreated.After walking for three days, Li Ke could only advance a hundred miles, and he hadn't even left the territory of Shuozhou.

In fact, on the first day, Li Keyong had already realized that these were definitely not the style of the cavalry of the five tribes. They were all barbarians, and they had fought countless times for the Tang Dynasty with each other, and they knew each other very well.

All Hu cavalry are very brave in battle, but their style is more like fighting and charging, what is lacking is formation strategy.But now, these cavalrymen are sticking like dog skin plasters. This is definitely not their style. This is the general of the Tang army commanding behind.

I have met the most difficult opponent, and the opponent has already seen through his eagerness to return home.These chasers did not intend to fight with themselves, but to hold themselves back. It is conceivable that there must be more soldiers and horses coming behind, and they are trying to surround themselves.

Looking at the mountains, rivers and rivers on the map, Li Keyong had almost guessed the enemy's intentions.

Sha Tuo's army wanted to go to Baidao and cross Yinshan Mountain, first they entered the territory of Zhenwu Army. On their way forward, there were two big rivers, one was the Zihe River and the other was the Jinhe River.The enemy general must be preparing to ambush himself in Zihe.When your soldiers and horses are halfway across the river, attack at that time, and attack halfway, it will be fatal.

All military strategists know that when an army is crossing a river, it is the most vulnerable moment: not only are the troops at both ends of the river bank unable to look at each other, but the soldiers' psychology is also the most vulnerable at this time. If they are attacked by the enemy at this time, it is very The whole army is in disarray.If the Shatuo army wanted to cross the river safely and retreat, they had to eliminate the threat behind them first.

Gai Yu looked at the map carefully, and said after a long time: "After staying, the current situation must solve this troublesome tail before reaching Zihe. I have an idea, there is a dense forest not far ahead, and I will take the lead after staying tonight." Three thousand cavalry are lying in ambush in the forest. Tomorrow I will lead a large army through, and after the enemy cavalry catch up, the general will charge out from behind, and then we will attack back and forth, and the enemy will be defeated."

Li Keyong was very happy, and that night he led [-] cavalry to hide in the forest by the roadside.The next day Gai Yu led his troops through, and the enemy cavalry caught up.Li Keyong waited for the opponent to pass, and then led his army to attack from behind, and Gai Yu also led his army back to attack.

A melee broke out between the two sides, but the cavalry of the five tribes did not love to fight. After discovering the ambush, they quickly left the battlefield. Although Li Keyong won, he could only kill less than a thousand cavalry.Waiting for Li Keyong to go on his way, the cavalry behind him hung far away again.However, after suffering a loss, they learned a lot this time. They followed behind, but sent countless scout cavalry to search along the road, and the ambushes used by Li Ke were found several times.

Li Keyong was anxious and angry. It wasn't that he couldn't defeat the cavalry of the five tribes, but that the other party knew that he was eager to go west, so they seized his weakness.And there is another critical point. Since the withdrawal of troops, he has only seen the cavalry of the five tribes of the Tang army, and has not found any other troops.

The eight towns of the Tang Army have a total of 3 soldiers and horses. After the last battle, the Tang Army lost about 5000 people. In addition, Li Jing still has 4 people in Yunwei Erzhou. After calculation, there are more than 1 people.Now there are only 2 tribal cavalry, and the opponent has at least [-] cavalry, including Li Jing who took his Shanyang City.

The sound of the cavalry's horseshoes surprised Li Keyong from his sleep. He touched the horizontal knife and drew it out of its sheath. "What happened?"

There was a cavalry of tens of thousands of people behind him, which made Li Ke sleep in the middle of the night and couldn't sleep well.

"After staying, a group of messengers arrived and were discovered by the scout cavalry of the Tang army behind. A battle broke out. Our cavalry went up to support and rescued several people." The guard reported loudly.

"Where's the messenger?" The messenger must have brought important news when he arrived at this time.

"From the east!" replied the guard.

Li Ke was relieved to hear that it was not from the west. "Bring people."

When the messenger came in, he was covered in blood and had multiple injuries.Seeing Li Keyong, he immediately stepped forward to salute excitedly. Li Keyong supported him, "You are injured, so there is no need to salute. Where did you come from, and what news do you bring?"

Xin pressed his hand tightly on his left shoulder, which was pierced by a Tang Qi scout, and the blood has not completely stopped yet.Blood continued to soak out through the fingers pressing on the wound. Apart from this wound, he had several wounds on his body, and half of his face was still covered with a thick layer of blood scab.

After taking a few breaths and calming himself down, the messenger said: "I am General Li Sien's personal soldier. We follow the intention of staying behind and march eastward with ten thousand soldiers. But we have just passed Huanghualiang before entering Yunzhou In the territory, it turned out to be in Qingdaopo, where a large army was ambushed. Our army was ambushed, and the two generals Li Si'en and Li Siben led the brothers to fight bloody day and night, but they were still unable to break through. Thousands of horses were wiped out."

Hearing the news, Li Keyong gritted his teeth, but didn't make a sound.When he sent this army back then, he had already thought of this result, but now the result came a little too fast.

"Where are Sien and Siben?" Li Keyong thought of his two adopted sons.

"The two generals led more than a hundred cavalry to break out of the siege. We returned to Shuozhou all the way, but Jincheng and Sangang and the four towns were all occupied by the Tang army. The two generals were seriously injured and are now hiding in Shenwuchuan Mountain. The two generals sent me Come here, there is an important news for Liu Hou. It is Li Jing's town commander who ambushed us in Yunzhou, but it is not the cavalry he personally led, but the soldiers and horses of Yunzhou and Weizhou that have been stationed all the time. There are only a small number of Tang troops stationed in Jincheng, we captured a few Tang army scouts, interrogated and learned that Li Jing, Zheng Congxuan and other Tang troops entered Yunzhou a few days ago and passed the Jingbian army."

Hearing this sentence, Li Keyong turned pale.The Jingbian army is in the west of Yunzhou, intersecting with the Zhenwu army, and the location is on the north bank of the Zihe River! (To be continued.)