Great Han Empire

Chapter 37 Yanzhao Fengyun
The weeds on both sides of the Rushui River have basically withered, and occasionally you can see a small piece of light green dotted with a little red.The surface of the river is very wide, and the current is not rushing, but the wind is a bit chilly, and it is very uncomfortable to blow on the sweaty body.The sound of running water was soft, as if afraid of waking up the tranquility of the wilderness.

The soldiers sat quietly on the horse, each one looking very calm.For the upcoming fight and the approaching death, they seemed to be unaware, calm and calm, as if they were one with the world itself.

Li Hong and Xiaodao stood by the river, watching the pursuers approaching in the distance.

"Heizi, you are the best soldier I have ever seen." Xiaodao said suddenly.

Li Hong smiled, "Thank you. Boss, how do you plan to fight this battle?"

"Fight." According to Xiao Dao's idea, 20 people rushed forward to fight.It takes as much time as it can resist.Li Hong stopped him.

Li Hong asked him: "Boss, do you want twenty of us to be rolled into meat by the enemy's cavalry?"

Xiaodao said helplessly: "Is there any way you can save everyone?"

Li Hong laughed, "Of course. But you have to listen to my instructions once."

"As long as you can save everyone's life, you can even take mine." Xiaodao said excitedly.

Li Hong directed everyone to ride their horses to the river.

"Look, from the meadow to the embankment, there is obviously a slope as high as a person between fifty steps. Don't underestimate such a slope. Fifty steps can slow down the enemy's horse quickly and prevent us from hitting us. And we Behind us is the Rushui River. If he charges forward with all his strength, he will inevitably rush into the river under the condition of the speed of the horse once he has no direct contact with us. It is impossible to make the horse reach the fastest speed, and it may fall into the river. In Heli, facing the two dilemmas, the enemy is definitely not willing to take a strong attack."

"We can't rely on horses to attack, we can only attack from a position. We have few people, so naturally we can't beat them. But we can find a way to turn the enemy's advantage of having a large number of people into a disadvantage."

The sound of horseshoes of chasing soldiers in the distance came like a gun, violently.Xiaodao became anxious and shouted: "Heizi, tell me what to do, the enemy is coming."

Li Hong glanced casually, and continued to say to the soldiers around him: "Everyone faces the river with their backs, and arranges eighteen horses in groups of two, forming a semicircular horseshoe formation. The thickness of the horseshoe formation is like this. And the radius is just enough for twenty of us to defend. The enemy attacks, we defend, and see who wins and loses."

Li Hong glanced at everyone and said with a smile, "Do you understand?"

The soldiers probably saw the hope of survival, or drew strength from Li Hong's confident smile. They suddenly cheered up and shouted in unison: "Understood."

Everyone immediately tied the horses together on the embankment according to Li Hong's request, forming a solid fortress.Because of Li Hong's detailed explanation, the soldiers knew the strengths and weaknesses of both the enemy and ourselves, so they were full of confidence, and they were all in high spirits, and they were as lively as dragons and tigers.

Li Hong then said to Xiaodao: "As long as we stay until tomorrow, we will win."

Xiaodao admired him very much.Wen Yan asked in surprise: "Why?"

"Tomorrow their troops will set off from the Red Flower Valley and officially launch a military operation to attack Luronse. By then we are no longer important. If they haven't killed us tomorrow, they will withdraw and follow the army together action."

"How are you so sure they're going to attack tomorrow?"

"Intuition." Li Hong said lightly.

When Xiaodao heard this, he became anxious, "You guessed?"

Seeing his anxious expression, Li Hong couldn't help laughing, "I won't make you lie about the military situation. Of course I have to analyze all kinds of situations."

Xiaodao kicked him hard and cursed, "I was scared to death."

The enemy's horn sounded clearly in the ears of the two of them.The enemy finally caught up.

Karasuma's cavalry stopped suddenly a hundred paces away.Their centurion also saw that the defensive formation these Han people had set up with their backs against the wet water could not be charged with iron cavalry at all.But asking them to give up the advantage of cavalry to fight the enemy hand-to-hand is unacceptable in their hearts.What's more, before approaching that strange formation, the loss of his own soldiers must have been very large. It was a slope nearly fifty steps away.

Karasuma hesitated on the grass a hundred paces away.The soldiers in the horseshoe formation slowly recovered from the initial tension, and the soldiers began to whisper.

Li Hong sat on the embankment, observing the other party's movements from under the horse's belly.

The Karasuma people began to regroup.Soon, they began to advance steadily amidst the blaring of horns.

Li Hong shouted: "Brothers, the Karasuma people are about to attack. Everyone prepare bows and arrows. Remember, two people are in groups, and one person is in charge of each group. Never let them break through the horseshoe formation."

The soldiers were busy for a while, and then they each found a shooting position.

Karasuma was advancing very fast, and there were only eighty steps in a blink of an eye.Xiaodao urged: "Heizi, shoot!" Li Hong shook his head: "We have few weapons, so we need to use them sparingly. Wait until they get closer."

Karasuma has already started firing long arrows.Xiaodao became anxious and shouted: "If we don't fight back, we will be shot as hedgehogs."

Li Hong shook his head resolutely, "Everyone, be careful, if you can't do it, hide under the horse's belly. Hurry up, hurry up." After finishing speaking, he slipped through first.The soldiers moved faster than rabbits, and in a blink of an eye, they all fell under the horse's belly.

The long arrow whistled and made an astonishing strange cry, and it arrived in an instant.I only heard the sound of puffing, puffing, and the sound of arrow clusters drilling into the horse's body continuously.The painful neighing of the war horses continued, and they became restless, and some struggled to escape.But the reins of the horses were tied together and held tightly by the soldiers, so they couldn't run away.The grass on the embankment was immediately filled with long arrows from the enemy.

Karasuma followed up with a second round.Because the distance between the two sides was too close, the power of this round was greatly reduced, and many arrows were shot into the river.

Li Hong was the first to cheer, "It's our turn. Everyone shoots in parallel, regardless of whether it is a man or a horse, they will all be shot down."

Twenty people stood in different corners, drawing bows and nodding arrows.Karasuma tried his best to urge the horse, trying to pass the slope earlier and get closer to the enemy's horse formation, so that the opponent's long arrows would also lose the effective range of shooting.The Karasuma people also wanted to shoot, but facing the tall war horses, even if they shot arrows, they would just be nailed to the horses.A hundred people can't deal with such a small group of people?No one thinks it's wrong.

In the anticipation of everyone, Li Hong finally shouted: "Shoot..."

At a distance of forty or fifty steps, it took the long arrow to reach it in the blink of an eye.The Karasuma cavalry was unstoppable, and immediately fell a large piece from the horse.A few more horses were shot, and the horses suffered from pain and galloped forward, and then they were shot and fell down by more arrows. Naturally, the cavalry on horseback became living targets.

More Karasuma cavalry roared, kicked the horse's belly fiercely, and continued to charge up the slope.

Li Hong shot his tenth arrow.He saw that the Karasuma soldier who was hit by the arrow was no more than ten feet away from him. The beard on the soldier's face was much less than that of ordinary people, and he was probably a young man.He grabbed the long arrow that pierced through his chest with one hand, and waved it in the air desperately with the other, as if he was trying to grab a straw.His body stretched out on the back of the galloping horse, then rose into the air, and fell heavily to the ground.

"The horses in the inner circle lie down..." Li Hong turned around and ordered loudly.Several soldiers standing beside the horses hurriedly pulled the reins and patted the horse's back desperately.The war horse obediently lay down.The enemy will be approaching soon, if the space under the horse is not blocked, the chance of the enemy's surprise attack will be greatly increased.

Li Hong saw the soldiers who died in battle.Three people were hit by arrows and lay on the open space in the middle.Although there were war horses as cover, some brothers died.

After losing more than 30 soldiers, the Karasuma cavalry finally rushed to the periphery of the horseshoe formation.

Karasuma was a little helpless.It was as if they had eaten a piece of beef bone.Although the delicious bone marrow is inside the bone, you need to break the bone with something to suck out the bone marrow and eat it.Now the Karasuma people just don't have sharp tools.They surrounded the enemy's formation in groups, riding back and forth on horses.The two sides occasionally shot two arrows at each other, but there was no threat.

Karasuma hesitated for a short period of time, and then launched a fierce attack on the horseshoe formation.They adopted the tactics of crowds, every ten people in a team, quickly approached the enemy's formation, and then jumped from their horses into the horseshoe formation to fight hand-to-hand with the Han soldiers.

Li Hong had no choice.At this time, it depends on courage and perseverance. Whoever can persist until the end is the winner.Li Hong shouted: "Brothers, kill them."

Xiaodao also shouted loudly on the left side of the formation: "Kill, kill them." The fierce hand-to-hand combat began.

Naturally, the Karasuma people would suffer big losses by jumping from a high altitude to attack.At the beginning of the Han army, two or three people attacked one, and several knives slashed from different angles, and no one could resist it.Li Hong was the fiercest, taking charge of his own side, and the Karasuma people who jumped in from his defensive area all died cleanly in the air without making a sound.

The Karasuma people did not flinch, and continued to advance one after another, continued to approach the formation, and continued to jump in. More and more people jumped, and the crowd became denser, and more and more people gathered in the horseshoe formation.Seventy or eighty people and seventy or eighty horses were all crowded on this narrow embankment, tightly entangled.There were a few Karasuma people outside the formation who simply stood on horseback, instead of firing a few cold arrows to surprise the Han soldiers in the formation.

The battle was extremely fierce.Li Hong has been squeezed away from his defending area by Karasuma soldiers.If there were a few more Karasumas, they could push away the horses standing together and open the gap in the horseshoe formation.The Karasuma people waiting outside can rush forward.Li Hong became anxious, gave up his defense, and attacked with all his strength, no longer caring about his own life or death, like a man-eating tiger, he rushed directly into the middle of the Karasuma people, and stabbed the big man holding the rein with both hands in the back.

With a loud roar, Xiaodao stabbed into the enemy's chest with all his strength, but immediately felt a sharp pain in his own back, and then saw a bloody battle knife point rushing out of his chest.Xiaodao smiled helplessly.The big head was angry, and he shouted heart-piercingly: "Small knife..." He no longer cared about the saber that was slashing at him, and the long sword in his hand directly plunged into the enemy's flank.At the same time, the enemy's knife struck Datou's chest, making a dull bone-breaking sound.And Zheng Xin's sword cut off the enemy's head almost at the same time, blood spattered, and the cry was shrill.

Wu Ba saw his comrades fall down one by one, his anger made him lose his mind, his eyes were bloodshot.The long sword in his hand has no moves, and he clenched the handle of the sword with both hands, just chopping, chopping.The two knives were chopped on his back, but he didn't feel anything, he just stuck his long sword into the enemy's chest.A long arrow shot at him, piercing straight through his heart.Wu Ba fell, along with the enemies he had killed.

Li Hong slashed the enemy who was rushing towards him.He already felt like he couldn't hold on anymore.The ferocity of such Karasuma people exceeded his imagination.They rushed forward completely regardless of their lives, no matter how many people died.In this small formation, there are already corpses lying there, so dense that there is not even a place to plug in.In some cases, several corpses were piled up together.Li Hong saw that Xiaodao was dead, as were the other three corporal leaders, and the remaining four soldiers were still struggling to resist.There are more than [-] enemies outside the formation who are preparing for the final impact.

At this moment, Li Hong heard the sound of horseshoes, the dense sound of horseshoes.Then came the cheers of the Karasuma people.Enemy reinforcements are coming.

Li Hong was desperate.This battle is far from what I predicted.The tenacity and courage of the Karasuma people brought them victory.Even a miserable victory is a victory.They would rather die in battle than guard their prey and give up attacking like cowards.Attacking, attacking continuously, they destroyed the lives of the Han soldiers and also destroyed the fortress of the Han soldiers.

One last blow, one last blow, and it will all be over.

The appearance of reinforcements greatly stimulated the remaining Karasuma cavalry.They were probably afraid that the credit would be taken away by others, so they immediately launched the final blow.

Looking at the enemies who jumped in like a tide, Li Hong shouted to the remaining soldiers: "Go, go, walk through the river."

No soldiers listened to him.Everyone is still fighting fiercely like lunatics.Li Hong stepped back quickly, and he saw Zheng Xin.Zheng Xin was surrounded by three or four enemies and was already in danger.Without hesitation, Li Hong flew out the small axe, picked up a knife from the ground, and killed the two swords at the same time.

"Go, go into the water." Li Hong shouted to him.Zheng Xin nodded subconsciously, and pulled out the long sword from the enemy in front of him, bringing out a pool of blood.Li Hong dodged the slash from the enemy behind him, with sharp eyes and quick hands, the saber in his left hand stabbed into the chest of an outflanking enemy, and the saber in his right blocked a slash from the right.Li Hong gave up the knife stuck in the enemy's chest, pulled the small ax from the corpse of the enemy soldier lying on the ground with his left hand, swung it round, and chopped fiercely on the thigh of the enemy behind him.The enemy howled miserably and flew out backwards.

Li Hong and Zheng Xin were back to back and moved quickly towards the river.At this time, the other three fighters in the formation had been swarmed up by the wolf-like Karasuma people and chopped to the ground.

More than a dozen Karasuma people flew towards them.

"You go first." Li Hong yelled, and suddenly turned around and rushed up.Zheng Xin didn't dare to hesitate. Under the cover of Li Hong, he ran two steps, leaped high, and plunged into the icy river with a "plop".

Li Hong tried his best to show his supernatural power and killed three people in a row.The Karasuma man was even more crazy, rushing up desperately, thinking that he must be killed, and no one else could escape.

It's not that Li Hong doesn't want to escape, he simply can't escape, and these roaring big men wish they could eat him.Li Hong was forced to step back step by step, into the icy river.

Li Hong continued to retreat, retreating faster and faster.

The person from Karasuma realized that this person also escaped by taking advantage of the water.A few soldiers standing on the shore immediately took down their bows and arrows, and shot with them.With a roar, Li Hong threw his saber at the archers on the shore.

The saber roared in the air and flew away at high speed.

As soon as an archer raised his bow, he saw the bloody saber flying towards him. He screamed in fright, but he couldn't dodge it. He watched the saber piercing his body and piercing his chest.

Li Hong sank into the river.

(End of this chapter)