Go back to the end of the Ming Dynasty to be a soldier

Chapter 204 Bloody Battle at Tiger's Mouth

After hearing this, Li Zicheng didn't express his opinion immediately, but fell silent.

He had no doubts about Hao Yaoqi's combat effectiveness.When Li Zicheng was not famous, Hao Yaoqi was already famous. At that time, he was under King Gao Chuang. At that time, Li Zicheng was still a young general. Hao Yaoqi made many military exploits, especially after Gao Yingxiang died. , How many officers and soldiers were killed?

Two years ago in Fengyang, Anhui, Li Zicheng clearly remembered the scene of Hao Yaoqi fighting He Renlong.He Renlong is known as He Crazy, he is desperate to fight, and Hao Yaoqi is in charge of breaking the rear.That battle was quite brutal, He Renlong and Hao Yaoqi were both injured in many places, and most of the soldiers under them were killed or injured, but they still fought desperately, buying time for Li Zicheng and the others to retreat safely.

Take the present as an example, among the generals under his command, in terms of martial arts, Hao Yaoqi is not the top, and he can't even rank fifth. In terms of bravery and fierceness, Hao Yaoqi is undoubtedly second to none.

"King Chuang, why, can't you trust me, Hao Yaoqi?" Hao Yaoqi's eyes widened.

Li Zicheng knew that Hao Yaoqi had a hot temper, and that he was a bit proud. His biggest problem was that he liked to drink. Li Zicheng's army, Hao Yaoqi's team discipline was relatively poor.

Wherever he went, people were plundered and adulterous women happened from time to time. Li Zicheng proposed strict military discipline many times, and also proposed multiple beheadings. He also warned Hao Yaoqi, but Hao Yaoqi relied on his seniority and was easy to show off. Veteran, he still does his own thing, and sometimes argues with Li Zicheng and argues with him.

Li Zicheng knows his faults, and more importantly, he is brave in battle, and he is an indispensable general under his command. In addition, he has a group of iron buddies under him, all of whom are members of the old eighth team, that is, Gao Yingxiang's subordinates, Li Zicheng I also don't want to fall out with him, otherwise he might pull his gang to set up another hill.

However, this Hao Yaoqi is generally able to obey Li Zicheng's orders except for his poor discipline in the army. Therefore, Li Zicheng is very accommodating to him and does not want to cause division. Now he is employing people, so Li Zicheng often turns a blind eye. one eye.If he had to strictly follow military discipline, Hao Yaoqi would have been killed long ago.

Fearing that he might misunderstand, Li Zicheng shook his head and explained: "No. Waving the flag, you can go to this battle, but you have to remember that since ancient times, arrogant soldiers must be defeated. Lin Yi is not easy to deal with. You don't have to fight fiercely with him. Let Li Guo, let's go with you, so we can have someone to take care of you. The two of you can rush to Danyang in advance. The suspects under your command should stand firm and stop them first. As long as you can persist for ten days, I'll deal with the matter here. Hurry over, and wait for our troops to arrive and fight Lin Yi to the death."

"Obey." Hao Yaoqi agreed with his mouth, is it necessary to say what he said in his heart?You think too highly of the surname Lin.Didn't he just win a few battles?

Li Guo also agreed, and the two went down, ordered 10000 soldiers and horses, and left.

Now Li Zicheng's soldiers and horses are not thousands of people. When he took these three counties, there were still 5000 to [-] people.

But it's different now.Three counties were taken down, which defeated Yang Sichang's more than 3 horsemen. In these two victories, thousands of people were collected by the soldiers alone.

Yang Sichang was newly defeated and retreated to Nanyang City with two general officers and more than 1 horses, not daring to fight.

Li Zicheng took advantage of this opportunity to continue to open warehouses to release grain and help the people on the basis of the original three counties.

One of the money and food comes from the spoils of the two wars, and the other comes from the local landlords and wealthy households, tyrants and local tyrants.Li Zicheng killed all these people, took their belongings except for military use, and distributed all the rest to the common people to win people's hearts and recruit soldiers from all over the world, because he saw that this trick was very effective.

The common people rushed to tell each other, and the hungry people nearby came here with hoes. Therefore, in just a few days, Li Zicheng's number of troops has doubled, and now his total strength has exceeded [-]. People come to join them every day, and the momentum has sprung up like mushrooms after rain.

After Li Guo and Hao Yaoqi left, Li Zicheng immediately divided his troops and sent generals. He planned to use more than 2 soldiers and horses under his command to storm Nanyang.Now it is different from a few months ago, when there were only a few thousand troops, he did not dare to attack Nanyang, and tens of thousands of officers and soldiers followed closely.

Now he has to take Nanyang, because when Lin Yi's troops arrive, the Henan army will move over and join the Nanyang army, which will form a siege for him.

More importantly, he must replenish money and food as soon as possible.Because there are so many soldiers and horses under his command, how much does it cost to eat horses and feed them for a day?Landlords and wealthy households in the three counties have limited money and food reserves, and the food and salaries captured by the two victorious battles are also limited. In addition to food and drink for the army, they are also distributed to the common people, which is almost exhausted.Only by taking Nanyang can his troops get more money and food supplies.

Therefore, Li Zicheng stepped up his planning, and planned to take Nanyang within a week at the latest to solve this worry, and then concentrate his efforts on dealing with Ji Dong's men.

Li Zicheng's men are at most two days away from Danyang.Danyang here refers to the area around Danyang Town in Dengzhou City, Henan Province in later generations.

Therefore, Li Guo and Hao Yaoqi's 10000 troops quickly arrived in Danyang. After checking the favorable terrain, they set up camps, began to build fortifications, and sent out horses to spy on Lin Yi's military situation.

In fact, the terrain they chose does not require much construction.Because this is a typical landform between two mountains and a ditch, the name is Tiger Mouth.

There are rolling mountains and forests on the left and right sides. This is the only way. If the officers and soldiers don't go here, they have to go back according to the original road and make a detour, which will take at least a few hundred miles.

So they chose this place to stop Ji Dong's men.

Tiger Mouth, just by hearing the name, you can tell how dangerous this place is.There are mountains on both sides, and a winding mountain road in the middle.

Although the mountain here is not high, and it is a mixed mountain of earth and rock.But as long as they guard the mountains on both sides and seal the mountain pass, no matter how many people want to pass, they will never want to pass through the mountain road in the middle.

Many people are easy to work, Li Guo commanded his soldiers, and quickly blocked the road in the middle with rubble and felled trees.

But when the officers and soldiers come, they are likely to attack the mountain.Take down the hills on both sides, and then clear the obstacles in the middle of the mountain road, so what they need is to hold the hills and stop the officers and soldiers.

Therefore, although the mountain road in the middle was stuck to death by stones and branches.

But what they need to do is to pile up a large number of stones on the top of the mountain, and cut down trees to use as rolling logs to guard the mountain. This thing is more effective than bows and arrows. These boulders and rolling logs were lowered to prevent officers and soldiers from attacking the mountain.

Li Guo was in charge of getting rocks up the mountain and logging all by himself, and he also chose the terrain.Hao Yaoqi didn't care about it at all, he was drinking and eating meat, and when he was full, he slept in the camp.

Li Guo didn't bother with him either, the commander was sweating profusely here.

It wasn't until he was all ready that Li Guo called out Hao Yaoqi, and the two each led 5000 soldiers to guard the hills on both sides.

Hao Yaoqi looked at the stones and trees piled up on the mountain road, as well as the huge boulders and rolling logs piled high on the hills on both sides.

"You boy is really strong. The brothers are all exhausted. Is this necessary? Do you think it is necessary? Really. It is enough for the officers and soldiers to come over and kill them directly. Kill the one surnamed Lin. What is Fei doing?"

Li Guo smiled, "Uncle Waqi, I know you are very good at fighting, but the art of war says that if you have will, you will use your will, but if you have no wisdom, you will use your strength. It will be much easier for us to guard above than to fight with the officers and soldiers."

"I don't care so much. When the officers and soldiers come, I'll go down and kill them. Otherwise, my hands will be itchy. Just take someone to guard them. Anyway, they won't be able to get through these dog days." After finishing speaking, he led the people gone.

On the third day after they were ready, Lin Yi's forward troops arrived at the foot of the mountain. This was Lin Yi's fourth battalion, and the battalion officer was Jiang Xingyuan.

More than 3000 horses saw the situation and stopped no matter how far away they were.

Someone rushed to report to Jiang Xingyuan, and Jiang Xingyuan rode a horse and carried a big shovel, and came to the front of the team to have a look.The mountain road has been cut to death, and the tops of the mountains on both sides are full of thieves, archers, rolling logs, and large and small stones are piled up on the top of the mountain.

"Damn it, these thieves are really wicked. They fight wars when they fight, and what are they doing blocking up the roads. See what this means is not to let them pass."

Then Jiang Xingyuan scolded on the mountain: "Smelly thief, come down if you have the guts, what kind of a man is hiding on the mountain and playing this game?"

"Damn it, come up if you have the ability and fly over!" Li Guo's men fought back from above, and the soldiers on both sides began to scold each other up and down the mountain.

The two sides had just scolded a few times, and a team rushed down from the hill on the right. The leader was a general, tall and thick, with a golden flagpole on his shoulder. It was Hao Yaoqi, followed by 2000 people.

When Jiang Xingyuan saw the people coming down from the mountain, he felt happy, "Brothers, give me a push to occupy the hillside on the right!"

"Kill me!" Hao Yaoqi rushed down and rushed to Jiang Xingyuan's team first. The two sides shouted loudly and fought in a scuffle at the bottom of the hillside.

Li Guo on the hillside on the left shook his head, "Uncle Waving the Flag, it's good to be guarding up there, they can't get through, and they can't fly up, why go down and waste that..."

But you can't control Hao Yaoqi. According to his seniority, he has to control Hao Yaoqi and call him uncle. Now he can only watch the scuffle between the two sides on the left hillside.

More than 30 miles away, Lin Yi and Zu Keyong commanded the main force of the Chinese army and were walking forward when they suddenly got a report that at Tiger's Mouth, the Pioneer Battalion had already caught up with the bandits.

Lin Yi said: "Brother Jiang is also impatient, hurry up and speed up."

Half an hour later, Ji Dong's troops arrived near the battlefield, and the battle between the two sides was going on fiercely.

There were dead and wounded everywhere on the ground, and the blood stained the rocks red. I don't know how many tug-of-wars they fought.

Ji Dong looked again at the mountain road that had been stabbed to death and the mountaintops on both sides. There were densely packed flags of thieves, and the mountains that were about tens of feet high were piled up with bows, arrows, stones and logs. It seemed that this was a battle. tough battle.

Ji Dong was immediately at a high place, only a few hundred meters away from the battlefield. He glanced at the terrain here, and then his eyes fell on the battlefield of the scuffle.

At this time, Jiang Xingyuan's team had already been defeated. Jiang Xingyuan was covered in blood and was chased behind.

"Let me go!" General Zu Keyong said and took off the big axe.

Ji Dong nodded, "If you win, remember not to chase, the terrain here is dangerous, don't fall into the tricks of the thieves."

"General, the subordinates know." Zu Keyong said, leading hundreds of cavalry to press up.

(End of this chapter)