weaving

Chapter 1211 Heaven Will Not Destroy Zuo Liangyu

Zuo Liangyu was organizing his men to cross the ditch, preparing to break through the obstruction of the bandit general Tian Jianxiu and escape to Xuchang as soon as possible, or even escape to Nanyang in one go.

But it is just as the old saying goes: "Good fortune never comes alone, and misfortune never comes alone!"

Nearly half of the left army had not yet crossed the ditch. Liu Fangliang, who had been following behind, saw the opportunity and was not willing to let it go easily. He took advantage of the fact that most of the left army had already crossed the deep ditch and commanded his 5,000 elite cavalry to launch a series of charges on the left army's rear.

Zuo Liangyu saw that the enemy army was surrounding him from both sides, but did not really launch a fierce attack, but just kept fighting with him. He knew that there must be a conspiracy.

The best plan now is to lead his close followers and servants to escape quickly. The enemy soldiers will certainly not be able to catch up. However, it is not easy to gather his soldiers and horses, so how can he bear to abandon them?

While commanding the generals to reorganize their troops, Zuo Liangyu also commanded the several battalions that had not yet passed through the deep ditch to organize defense on the spot. He also sent his own personal lieutenant general Li Guoying to lead 500 elite cavalry back to the other side of the deep ditch to supervise the battle.

However, "things don't always go as planned". Li Guoying just received the order and ran back to the other side of the deep ditch, when he saw a cloud of dust coming from the northeast, which lasted for a long time. It was obvious that another large group of troops were coming to kill them.

"Marshal, the enemy soldiers are attacking from all sides, it seems we have been ambushed!"

Zuo Liangyu was also slightly panicking, but as the backbone of the army, he had to show his tough side: "Order Ma Jinzhong to hold off the bandit Liu Fangliang's cavalry, and send Hao Xiaozhong and Lu Guangzu to intercept the new bandit soldiers coming from the east.

"I want them to fight and retreat at the same time. I will personally be here to help them retreat safely across the trenches. If they are in danger, I will lead my division to rescue them personally."

The general next to him immediately went down to pass on the order. The guerrilla Zhang Yingxiang had just returned and whispered beside him, "General, do you think Blind Li will come in person?"

"Humph."

Zuo Liangyu replied angrily: "There are still tens of thousands of Xuanda border troops in the north of Zhuxian Town. Although the blind thief hates me the most, I am sure that he will not dare to pursue us with all his strength this time.

Since the bandits are not coming to deal with us with all their strength, the blind bandit will definitely not come in person. I see that since we already have Tian Jianxiu and Liu Fangliang, I am afraid that only the iron forger Liu Hanzi can lead the army to win the support of the people."

He then added, "Maybe this is God's will."

Zuo Liangyu looked at the billowing smoke and dust in the northeast and said to Zhang Yingxiang, "If it weren't for the arrival of Yongning Bo and the Xuanda Border Army to tie down part of the main force of the blind bandits, we would have been in danger of death if we had withdrawn our troops rashly!"

At this point, Zuo Liangyu seemed to have an epiphany, and his mood instantly improved. He said loudly: "Since God will not destroy me, Zuo Liangyu, what else do I have to fear?"

  There is actually nothing wrong with Zuo Liangyu's thoughts and judgments, but these are just his judgments based on normal circumstances. But today is very different from usual!

Although the left army had a large number of soldiers and horses, they were already hungry and thirsty, and they had been fleeing all the way. What were they trying to achieve?

Isn't it just for the sake of survival?

So when they see a deep ditch ahead blocking their hope of survival, they will disregard their lives and try their best to squeeze forward. Isn't it just to cross the ditch before others and save their lives?

  But now, how can they go to meet the enemy with their hungry and tired bodies?

Before the left army was fully deployed to prepare for battle, someone suddenly shouted, "The commander is going to sell us out to the bandits. If you want to live, run away quickly. You won't die if you cross the trench..."

Afterwards, when talking about this matter, everyone suspected that during the withdrawal, the control was not strict, which allowed spies to sneak into the team. Only spies would use such tempting words to incite the whole army to defeat at such a critical moment. Of course, whether there were really spies infiltrating the team, or the generals made up the story to shirk responsibility, these can no longer be investigated, and there is no need to continue to investigate everything.

However, on the battlefield, the left army was indeed unable to resist the infantry and cavalry of Liu Fangliang and Li Guo's rebel army. Just like "a thousand-mile dam is breached by an ant hole", although this sentence only caused dozens or hundreds of officers and soldiers around to flee, the speed and power of its transmission were extremely amazing.

In just a moment, the morale of the officers and soldiers who were already struggling to hold on completely collapsed. They were no longer able to resist. As if a landslide had occurred, they threw away their flags and weapons and turned around to flee for their lives across the ditch...

At this moment, the deep ditch was almost half filled up, and it was filled with dead and wounded soldiers and mules and horses. Occasionally, there were some that were not yet dead and were still wailing and struggling. The scene was not much different from that of the Avici Hell.

As the rear guard of the left army retreated, countless officers and soldiers fell into the deep trench and became corpses filling the trench. However, people often burst out with great energy when they are dying. Those unwilling soldiers kept jumping up from the deep trench. Although most of the time they were struggling in vain, they would occasionally grab a horse leg or a cavalry boot...

Just like that, at the moment of retreat, the infantry and cavalry of the left army's rear team launched a unique life-and-death struggle. They trampled, crowded, and hacked each other on the bridge of corpses and in the deep ditch.

Fortunately, each general was guarded by his own servants and soldiers. They fought their way out of a passage and successfully crossed the deep ditch to the west bank. No one was captured or killed by the bandits.

…………

Although the bandit army had plenty of drinking water, guaranteed food and high morale in the camp, they also rushed all the way in pursuit of the left army and also engaged in the battle without any rest.

In the early days, they relied on their high morale to defeat the officers and soldiers who had not yet had time to cross the deep ditch and whose morale was low. But when they reached the deep ditch, the trouble that was originally intended to create for the left army now became their trouble.

The left army blocked the enemy's attack with a rain of arrows behind the earth wall on the opposite bank, immediately eliminating the morale advantage of the rebel army.

As the saying goes, "Warfare is about courage. The first attack is full of energy, the second is weaker, and the third is exhausted. When the enemy is exhausted, I am full, so I will defeat them. A big country is hard to predict, and I am afraid they may be ambushed. I see their tracks are disordered and their flags are down, so I will chase them."

The left army that did not pass through the deep ditch was eager to escape and had no morale, so they were naturally unable to fight; while the left army that had already fled to the deep ditch had recovered their morale after a short rest. At the same time, they also clearly understood that if they let the bandits cross the deep ditch, they would be on the verge of life and death, so they were fighting for themselves.

In order to achieve his goal of staying alive, he would naturally try his best to prevent the bandits from passing through the ditch.

However, although he prevented the enemy army from passing through the deep ditch, Zuo Liangyu still did not dare to fight. After all, he did not know how many troops were left behind the enemy army, and he did not want to stay here and fight with the enemy.

He made some simple deployment and led the main cavalry brigade to the southwest, where Wang Yuncheng and Tian Jianxiu had been fighting. Although he defeated Tian Jianxiu's bandit army many times, he was always short of troops and was defeated by Tian Jianxiu after he escaped, so he started fighting again.

Although the left army has more than 100,000 troops on the surface, almost half of them are temporarily assembled. When the situation is favorable, they will fight hard so that they can be rewarded afterwards; but once the situation is bad, they will retreat quietly without any scruples.

This is the situation now. When they fled all the way here, there were only 70,000 to 80,000 troops left, and many small groups had quietly left along the way.

Now, when everyone saw Zuo Liangyu leading the elite cavalry to retreat first, they became even more panicked. They just scattered in all directions like a herd of cavalry.

Of course, most of the elite cavalry and infantry were still in the hands of the deputy, assistant and generals, who followed Zuo Liangyu's retreat route...

(End of this chapter)