novelapdf Chapter 257 Crossing the Long River
Chapter 257 Crossing the Long River
A few days later.
In the county town, a large flag bearing the character "Wang" fluttered in the wind.
Beneath the city walls.
In a vast wilderness, the brown soil on the ground has been stained with mottled blood.
Many places bear the marks of burning, leaving behind charred siege equipment.
In some places, large piles of ashes are found, and when the wind blows, charred skulls occasionally roll around.
Clearly, several fierce battles had already taken place on this land.
The Shun Dynasty soldiers relied on the city walls to form a haphazard large square formation, which was further subdivided into more than a dozen smaller formations.
They were roughly divided into three groups: front, middle, and rear.
The cavalry was relatively elite, numbering around two thousand, and at least they were fully armored and armed.
However, the infantry were in a terrible state.
The thousands of soldiers in the first few formations didn't even have uniforms; they wore all sorts of different clothes, including cotton, hemp, and silk, making them look like a group of ordinary people.
There were scholars in Confucian robes, gentlemen in silk robes, and ordinary people in coarse cloth headscarves and hemp clothes.
They ranged in age from young boys to white-haired old men, and the weapons they carried were all sorts of different kinds.
From rakes and sticks to cleavers and hammers, there wasn't a single proper weapon. Some people even carried chopping boards and baskets as shields.
Anyone who saw them would think they were a rabble. Before the battle even began, sobs and cries could be heard from within the ranks, a great lamentation.
Further on, there were several more square formations.
They were barely wearing a uniform, some even had half-body armor, and were carrying knives and spears.
These soldiers were mostly young and strong men, but they were all pale-faced and their legs were trembling, so they were obviously not regular soldiers.
In the rear.
They assembled over a thousand soldiers, all of them muscular and full of energy, but carrying a variety of weapons.
Some carried guns, knives, axes, and hammers; others were clearly unsuitable for use in battle, such as the Emei dagger, the Mandarin Duck Axe, the Bagua Round Wheel Blade, the Face-Blocking Nail, the Chicken Claw Sword-Sickle, and the Double Flying Talisman.
These people were all wearing armor of different styles, but at least they had complete protection from head to toe.
But they could only cobble together a few square formations, neither horizontal nor vertical.
This was the makeshift army of over ten thousand men that General Wang had managed to assemble by intercepting all able-bodied men and travelers passing by on the river within a few dozen miles of the area.
About a mile away.
The enemy troops opposite them were also arranged in a large square formation.
Several flags of varying sizes were flying, some with embroidered characters, some with handwritten characters, and others a suspicious brown color, seemingly written in blood.
The words written on it are "Hun Shi Wan", "Zuan Tian Zhe", "Yi Gui Feng", "Hei Sha Shen", etc.
Each flag was flanked by over ten thousand people, arranged in a simple formation of footsteps followed by horses.
The infantry in front formed a haphazard square formation, and the cavalry behind them were also not well-organized, but each of them exuded a murderous aura. Before even engaging in battle, they spurred their horses and galloped through the formation, making strange noises.
These are the various rebel kings who have gradually gained power.
Strictly speaking, the bandits in front of General Wang were only generals under various rebel kings, and could be considered a detachment.
Because of the great victory, the government troops captured a large amount of armor and even directly recruited the surrendered government troops.
Strictly speaking, in terms of armor and equipment, these bandits are actually stronger than the government troops.
In the ranks of officers and soldiers.
The front line is full of the old and weak, pure cannon fodder to exhaust the enemy's strength and equipment. Sending them to the front line is just to let them die.
The middle formation consisted of young and strong men with decent physical strength, but they were all ordinary people who had never practiced martial arts, so most of them were not wearing armor and had only so-so weapons.
The rear guard consisted of the elite of this makeshift army, all of whom were martial artists with a foundation in martial arts. As a result, they all used their preferred weapons, making the formation appear chaotic and disorganized.
Of course, the temporary army a few days ago was several times larger than this; these were survivors after several days of continuous fighting.
And after each of the three formations: front, middle, and rear.
Each unit had several hundred elite armored soldiers, armed with bows and swords, acting as rear guards. Their weapons were pointed forward, clearly to prevent those in the front lines from fleeing without a fight.
Especially after the second half.
A dozen or so crossbows were lined up in a row, their bolts already loaded and ready to fire at any moment. Only in this way could they suppress those unruly warriors.
After these three battles.
There were also two thousand infantrymen, fully armored and neatly arranged, who were the troops that General Wang had managed to gather from the defeated government soldiers.
A lookout vehicle stood among the soldiers.
Standing in the back of the wagon was a long-bearded general in full armor, none other than General Wang, the very same General who had been cursed countless times for his ancestors.
Behind the general stood a soldier, with five-colored flags planted all around him, and pointing to red and blue flags in his hand, to convey the general's personal orders.
On each side of the infantry formation were two regiments of cavalry.
The cavalry on the left, numbering over a thousand, also carried the Wang banner. They were personally led by the young master of the Wang family, and the main force consisted of the general's personal guards. Each of them was well-armored and exuded a murderous aura.
The cavalry on the right flank also numbered four or five hundred, with a ghost-character flag flying above their heads.
The guerrilla leader who had blocked the river was standing on horseback at the front of the team.
Besides his hundred or so personal guards, his cavalrymen behind him rode horses, donkeys, mules, and even oxen.
These cavalrymen were fully armored and armed with long weapons, some carrying spears, some with swords, some with halberds, and some with forks. They were grouped together in groups of forty or fifty.
They all had bulging temples and gleaming eyes, clearly elite martial artists.
One of them is under the banner of Li.
Chai Qingyi stepped onto the saddle, looked across at the other side, his brows furrowed.
He led this temporary cavalry headquarters, mainly composed of镖师 (bodyguards) and 趟子手 (escorts) from the Yuanwei镖局 (escort agency), plus other martial artists, totaling over a hundred men.
Furthermore, three masters, Guo Laogan, Wu Tiechuan, and Yang Silang, were appointed as deputy commanders and led three teams.
After several days of continuous fighting, the infantry always charged first. Once the cannon fodder could no longer hold out and were exhausted, the cavalry would attack to stabilize the formation and block the enemy's cavalry from pursuing them, so as to prevent the entire formation from collapsing.
In such a chaotic battle involving tens of thousands of people, casualties are inevitable. His cavalry commander has already suffered more than twenty casualties, a considerable loss.
"Deputy General Li..." Old Guo took a deep drag on his cigarette and said in a low voice, "You're a veteran, fighting like this every day, when will it ever end?"
"Can we win?"
"More than ten of my good lads from the escort agency have recently been killed."
Wu Tiechuan, standing next to him, also looked exhausted.
"Deputy General Li has been charging into battle for several days in a row, and each charge lasts for half an hour."
"You have to charge in three or four, or even five times a day."
"By the time we returned to the city, my true energy was almost completely depleted. I managed to sleep for one night and took some pills before fighting again the next day."
"And those general's personal guards were just there to hold the line from beginning to end; they never really contributed anything..."
Yang Silang looked at "Deputy General Li" and said something simple.
"General, if this continues, we'll just be high-ranking cannon fodder."
"The enemy has a large and powerful force. We are defending this isolated city without any reinforcements. Sooner or later, we will perish here."
"Do you have any ideas?"
After several days of fighting, repeatedly leading his team into battle and getting surrounded, he had already grasped the threshold of the indomitable and ruthless spirit of the Killing Spear.
Now that I've mastered the essence of spear fighting, what's the point of staying here? If not now, when? I can't just work for the government for nothing. I'm not a real military officer, why should I risk my life?
Although he asked questions, he mostly focused his attention on the strategist Yin who was standing next to Chai Qing.
Although everyone was just a patchwork of miscellaneous soldiers.
But Chai Qing must know this strategist, because when he speaks, he can't help but steal glances at the strategist's face, his waist unconsciously slumps, and he hunches his back.
Yang Silang was all too familiar with this posture.
Isn't this exactly how Shu Miaosheng and She Nu talked to me?
He strongly suspected that this Yin strategist was no ordinary person, but rather a high-ranking member of the White Lotus Holy Cult.
Furthermore, as the people were being forcibly conscripted, they were not trusted by the officers and soldiers at all, and they camped outside the city at night.
Chai Qing had a tent, and a woman was going in and out of it, calling him his new wife.
Coincidentally, Yang Silang also knew this lady; she was none other than the courtesan Ren Ruyan who had almost kicked Tong Baisui into an abyss of no return.
When she and her maid Susu disappeared, it was later proven that Tong Baisui had been bewitched and had his essence extracted, so she was undoubtedly a member of that evil cult.
Yang Silang was simply curious as to why these people were also on the boat.
Thinking back to the White Lotus Holy Sect's past misdeeds at Jinghe Mausoleum, he suspected that they had also come for Emperor Jinghe, but had mistakenly followed the wrong person.
Faced with everyone's questions, Chai Qing first glanced at Yin Ciyou, who nodded slightly.
He dismounted and casually sketched the surrounding terrain with his hand on the ground.
"Our livelihood still depends on this river."
"Now the rebels have blocked the river, but in turn they have also kept the government troops out."
"Every time we were ordered to charge into battle, yesterday the furthest we ever got was only a mile or so from the river."
"If we give it our all and push through this last mile or so, we'll reach the river."
"I see that the bandits' supply ships are moored on the river, and the guards are few and lax. We can seize the ships and sail downstream."
"The problem is that capturing the ships wasn't going well; there are still trees they cut down for the siege."
"With our strength, it shouldn't be a problem for us to grab a log, jump into the river, and use it as a boat."
"So? Are you in or not?"
Yin Ciyou and Ruyan are both Daoist cultivators and do not practice martial arts. In this kind of large-scale formation, the most effective means to restrain them are to prevent their divine souls from being released smoothly.
Seeing the soldiers teetering on the brink of collapse, the two men naturally took advantage of the chaos to escape, neither willing to remain in this deadly place.
"Let's do it..." Yang Silang said in a deep voice, "I'll lead the way!"
His killing intent had already taken root, just waiting for an opportunity to burst forth. He could use himself as the spearhead to hone this deadly weapon.
Wu Tiechuan nodded as well.
Guo Laogan took a deep drag on his cigarette and tapped the pipe.
"Yuanwei Escort Agency, they've done it too!"
The real cargo he was escorting was actually stored in a storage bag on his person.
The goods on the cart were not particularly valuable, so it was fine to just discard them.
If he stayed here any longer, he feared that his entire escort team would be wiped out.
The group reached a consensus and decided to take action today, and they all began to make preparations.
Yang Silang noticed that Ruyan had changed into armor at some point and was leading Chai Qing's horse, indicating that they had already decided to escape today.
woo woo woo...
At that moment, the bugle sounded.
The earthquake trembled.
The two armies advanced towards each other. A moment later, the bandits' battle cries filled the air as the hastily conscripted civilian soldiers clashed together, splattering blood everywhere!