prosperous age

Chapter 1114 1205 Retreat

In the past few days, the Burmese army has been charging more and more frantically. Whenever the horn sounds, they rush to the city wall regardless of everything, putting a lot of pressure on the Ming army.

Yes, most of the Burmese army are veterans, and all the new recruits died on the way to the charge.

Only the city walls could provide them with a little safety.

Although no one could explain it clearly, the Burmese soldiers discovered without any instruction that when dealing with a tall city wall like the Ming Dynasty's, they could hide under the wall with a large shield in hand. As long as they were not unlucky enough to have a huge rock dropped on their head, the danger was not that great.

At the very least, it is not easy to be hit by the artillery and muskets fired by the Ming army on the city walls.

At the beginning, the Burmese army was actually full of confidence in capturing Baoshan City.

However, when they really started fighting, they found that the defense of this big city was extremely tenacious. Before anyone got close, guns and cannons were fired from the city, and clusters of arrows flew down from the top of the city, making their path of attack full of danger.

The only way to be safe is to run to the city, at least you won’t be attacked passively.

After several battles, many people died and morale was unknowingly dissipated a lot.

This time, the three scattered sieges ended in failure and made no progress.

When they came back and counted the troops, they found that more than a thousand people had died and many were injured.

During the siege over the past few days, tens of thousands of bodies were left in the city, and many of those who escaped were seriously injured and died.

There was a big pit behind the military camp, and I didn't know how many people had been thrown into it.

"You can't fight like this. I've fought twice and more than 500 people have died."

A dependent chieftain complained to the people around him in dissatisfaction.

"I also lost more than 200 people. I can't compete with you. There are only a thousand of us in total. If we continue to waste our strength, how can we win?"

The chieftain of the same tribe as him also followed suit and complained.

"Should we go back and talk to the Burmese king about it? His elite troops have not been deployed in the past few days. He said that they were depleting the morale of the Ming army. I think the morale of the Ming army is getting stronger and stronger, while our own morale has been destroyed."

"Forget it. Wu Yuanhan has lost more than a thousand soldiers. I went to see the Burmese king yesterday and got scolded.

The Burmese king also said that he had sent people to bypass Baoshan City and attack the Ming army's food and supplies. As long as the resistance at the top of Baoshan City weakened, he would send out elite troops to capture Baoshan City in one fell swoop. "

There were all kinds of comments in the crowd.

Today's siege mission naturally falls on these unlucky guys.

“The Ming people have too many cannons, and those archers dare not get close.

But if we don't get close, we can't shoot at the city, and we don't use up their gunpowder, so this battle will be difficult to fight."

Another smart chieftain realized that the Baoshan City they were attacking this time was obviously different from the Tengchong they had attacked before.

The Tengchong defenders had firearms, but not many. They were almost all used up after two or three days. Then everyone fought with real swords and guns.

Yes, there should have been support for the siege, that is, the archers under the city. They would shoot arrows at the top of the city wall to prevent the Ming army's defensive soldiers from approaching.

However, their position was inherently disadvantageous, and they could only stay close to the city wall.

The Ming army's bird guns were somewhat unable to deal with them. After all, they were all projectiles, and their range was actually longer than that of the Ming army's bird guns.

But there are cannons on the city walls, and the power of the Ming army's cannons is evident when dealing with densely packed archers.

In just two days, the Burmese archers were no longer brave enough to approach.

Without the support of archers, the Burmese army's siege would have become a joke, fully proving the saying that the truth is only within the range of cannons.

The Burmese army naturally could not gain any advantage by attacking the city in this way. Not only did they suffer heavy losses, but they also made no progress.

However, Mang Yinglong's idea was achieved, but it would not work if it continued like this. It would cause the army's morale to fluctuate and easily lead to chaos.

Fortunately, Mang Yinglong had no intention of maintaining such an offensive. His goal of weakening the local chieftains had been achieved, so he naturally had to prepare to withdraw to Lujiang City and divide the river with the Ming army.

What surprised him was that the Ming army did not leave the city to fight them, considering that their situation was not good.

The Ming army appeared in southern Myanmar, and he had to rush back to support them. Logically, the other side should have launched a strong attack.

Mang Yinglong also wanted to take advantage of the Ming army's proactive attack and withdraw his troops after repelling the Ming army's offensive.

But unexpectedly, the Ming army in the city just hid in the city and refused to come out, nor engaged in a head-on battle with them.

Therefore, the Burmese generals were unhappy, and in fact Mang Yinglong was also unhappy.

Little did he know that Li Chengliang had already guessed his plan, so he would just stay in the city and wait for the Burmese army to retreat on their own initiative before he would send troops to pursue them.

Because the Burmese army was powerful and had been on the offensive, Li Chengliang had no intention of leaving the city to confront the enemy head-on at this time.

Why not rely on the tall city walls to block the Burmese army and weaken their strength?

At the beginning, the morale of the Ming army dropped seriously due to the repeated loss of cities. The opportunity of defending the city was used to restore the morale of the Ming army.

Whenever the Ming army saw the Burmese army fleeing in a panic, leaving behind a trail of corpses, the Ming army on the city would burst into cheers of victory.

This is exactly what Li Chengliang wanted to see.

A soldier who cannot see victory is a walking corpse.

Only with the desire for victory and the fight for victory can a soldier transform into a killing machine.

Just as Li Chengliang thought, Mang Yinglong could no longer hold on.

"What did you say? Mubang City was occupied by the Ming army?"

At this time, Mang Yinglong did not meet with his generals, but blocked them outside the royal tent and met a messenger in person.

"Your Majesty, the Ming army came from nowhere and attacked Mubang City a few days ago. Your Highness led his troops back but was stopped by the Ming army.

The Ming army is powerful, and the troops led by Your Highness were defeated and attacked several times, suffering heavy losses. Please send troops to rescue as soon as possible."

The messenger knelt on the ground and reported the situation to Mang Yinglong.

It turned out that Mang Yingli retreated to Lujiang City, and after arranging the defense of Lujiang City in just one day, he set off with thousands of elite troops, intending to return to the royal capital, Toungoo City, as soon as possible to provide support.

He also thought that although he could not bring many soldiers and horses from Lujiang City, he could still gather garrisons along the way, and could at least gather several thousand or even tens of thousands of people.

Although the Ming army attacked fiercely in the south, it was reported that its troops numbered no more than 10,000.

That is to say, too many troops were mobilized in the country for the Eastern Expedition, and there was already a shortage of soldiers and generals in various parts of the country, which allowed the Ming army to take advantage of the opportunity. Otherwise, there would be no need for him to rush south to rescue.

Mang Yingli was also reckless, thinking that the Ming army would not be too many. After all, in his opinion, most of the Ming army should be gathered in Shidian and Baoshan City to block the main force of the Burmese army from marching eastward.

Although we don’t know where the Ming army here comes from, we think there shouldn’t be many of them.

So after learning that Mubang City was occupied by the Ming army, he rushed forward with several thousand soldiers, intending to recapture the city in one go.

The result was naturally tragic. The Burmese army had fewer soldiers than the Ming army, but they still attacked and killed all the way.

Although Li Rusong was frightened at first, the Ming army was unprepared after all. Who knew that the Burmese army would come to retake the city just after they occupied it.

However, after the front line was stabilized a little, Li Rusong personally observed the battle and found that the Burmese army had only a few thousand soldiers, which was less than the number of people he led. He was no longer afraid and rushed forward with his servants and cavalry.

After only two charges back and forth, the Burmese army was directly defeated by the Ming cavalry.

If it weren't for the protection of his personal soldiers, Mang Yingli would have died here.

Afterwards, the Burmese army retreated and set up camp, but the Ming army had already seen through the strengths and weaknesses of the enemy forces, so they switched from defense to offense and actively attacked the Burmese camp, forcing Mang Yingli to retreat again and again in a miserable state.

At this point, he naturally knew that he couldn't retreat any further, as if he did, he would reach Hanlong Pass.

If the two Ming armies attack together, we might be surrounded again.

In fact, Mang Yingli was panicking at this time, because he didn't know where this Ming army came from, and his accent didn't sound like the Yunnan Ming army. Yes, Yunnan and Myanmar are closely connected, so there are naturally some Burmese soldiers who understand the Yunnan dialect.

If they don’t understand, then they are definitely not the Yunnan Ming army.

But this made him even more worried, because Toungoo City had been lost, and this Ming army was coming from the south.

Although he found it a little unbelievable, Mang Yingli now believed that this was the only explanation that could make sense of everything before him, otherwise how could the Ming army appear in the south.

According to the information he sent people to collect from the surrounding areas, there was no sign that the garrison of Mengding Prefecture in Yunnan had been dispatched.

Yes, there were also spies planted by Myanmar in Mengding Prefecture to spy on the movements of the Ming army.

This is exactly what Li Chengliang and Mu Changzuo were worried about from the beginning. Myanmar's ambition towards Yunnan was not something that came about overnight, but it had been planned for a long time and had made a lot of preparations.

These preparations included not only secretly lobbying some powerful local chieftains, but also placing spies near the Ming army camps to find out the strength of the Ming army.

Since the troops of Mengding Prefecture did not move, this Ming army was naturally not from Yunnan.

Well, all Mang Yingli could think of was the Ming army from the sea.

He really didn't expect that Li Chengliang would dare to secretly transfer the main force of tens of thousands of people into Mengding Prefecture and hide them.

During the entire process, including the way the Ming army marched westward to Mubang City, all the civilians they encountered were confined to the military camp and served as temporary laborers to help the army carry supplies.

This kind of situation actually happens from time to time in Liaodong.

In order to stay hidden, the army will not let go of anyone they meet on the road.

They were either killed outright or captured and taken away, only released after the battle was over.

It would be fatal if Mang Yingli made a misjudgment, as it would cause Mang Yinglong to make the same misjudgment as well.

Yes, he also told his father Mang Yinglong about his judgment.

Moreover, he found a reason for it.

At this time, Mang Yinglong was considering Mang Yingli's guess, that is, the Ming army in the south might be divided into two routes, one to raid Toungoo City, and the other to bypass the city and head straight to Mubang, trying to encircle them in western Yunnan.

However, Toungoo City did not receive all the intelligence. Perhaps the messenger was captured by the Ming army. In any case, Toungoo City underestimated the strength of the Ming army.

Just think about it, how is it possible for a few thousand people to dare to attack across the sea?

Mang Yinglong sat on the throne in a daze, and it took him a while to come back to his senses.

Walking to a simple map hanging nearby, Mang Yinglong carefully considered Mang Yingli's judgment.

Yes, the Ming army probably set a trap for them to fall into from the beginning, luring them eastward, but blocking them when they were about to enter the plain.

Then, the Ming army in the south advanced frantically, intending to occupy Mubang and Mengmi, so as to encircle his hundreds of thousands of troops in western Yunnan.

Although his guess was wrong, it was basically what Li Chengliang was thinking.

Now, if we want to escape the encirclement of the Ming army, it seems that we can only follow the way we came, go through Lujiang City, Tengchong, Yingjiang and other places, exit Nanyaguan, go through Mengyang, and then go back to Myanmar in a big circle.

After all, that's where his roots are.

If Myanmar was lost, his army of hundreds of thousands would be wiped out in an instant.

How can a rootless duckweed survive?

Mang Yinglong didn't expect that after fighting for so many years, he would lose so badly this time.

Yes.

awful.

From the very beginning, he was inferior to Li Chengliang. Afterwards, he seemed to be in a very good position, but in fact, he was led by the nose by the Ming army everywhere.

Those victories seemed to be traps set for him by Li Chengliang, and he was unaware of it.

Can't wait.

Mang Yinglong finally made up his mind. At this point he could only take drastic measures and preserve as many troops as possible for future battles. This Eastern Expedition was a complete failure.

"Someone is coming."

Mang Yinglong shouted, and as the curtain of the royal tent was drawn up, a personal soldier walked in.

"Give orders to Shidian Baldu to lead his troops to retreat to Hanlong Pass immediately to cover the eldest prince's retreat."

"Yes."

Although the guards didn't understand why, they still bowed and agreed.

Mang Yinglong took out a gold medal from his arms and handed it to his personal soldier. The personal soldier took it with both hands and immediately strode out of the king's tent.

The situation is urgent now, and Mang Yinglong can feel it.

The only option was to sacrifice the chariot to save the king, and let the Shidian Burmese army go to Hanlong Pass to block the Ming army heading north, while he would lead his men out of Nanya Pass and return to Myanmar.

After the personal soldiers left, Mang Yinglong called his personal soldiers again and ordered them to call their trusted subordinates to the king's tent to obey his orders.

After several generals arrived, Mang Yinglong immediately ordered the army to retreat.

"Go back and arrange to move camp and retreat from Nanyaguan to Mengyang immediately."

"Your Majesty, isn't this too hasty? Setting off at night, I'm afraid the army is..."

When the generals under him heard Mang Yinglong's order, they were naturally confused and could not understand the reason.

Although the siege has been unsuccessful in the past few days, it is not to the point where we need to retreat overnight.

Seeing his generals looking at him with puzzled eyes, Mang Yinglong knew that if he didn't explain clearly, there would be trouble, so he had to explain the situation in detail.

"The Ming army has already reached Mubang City and is still attacking Toungoo City"

After hearing Mang Yinglong's explanation, his subordinates didn't know what to say.

Many of their families were in Toungoo City, and knowing that the Ming army had already reached there, it was impossible for them not to be anxious.

And now, the shortest road back to Toungoo City has been cut off by the Ming army. What should we do?
"Your Majesty, we should retreat to Hanlong Pass, defeat the Ming army coming from the south, and then fight our way back to Toungoo City."

At this time, a general strode forward and said.

"Yes, Your Majesty."

Others responded.

According to Mang Yinglong's idea, if they go to Mengyang, what time will it be when they reach the city of Toungoo? I'm afraid all the people in the city will be killed.

"I know what you are thinking, but have you ever thought about this? The road to Mubang is full of gullies and ravines. The Ming army can block the mountain pass and make it difficult for our army to move forward.

If we are trapped in the mountains, we will be stuck in a dilemma and face the risk of being wiped out. "

Mang Yinglong looked around at everyone and continued, "Although it's a bit far to take the Mengyang Road, there won't be any Ming troops blocking us along the way, so we can move faster and the army can be saved."

In fact, this is the fundamental reason why Mang Yinglong chose this route.

He cannot afford to lose any more troops, otherwise he will lose everything even if he returns to Myanmar.

"Then others."

"Let them guard the rear, the Ming army will definitely come out of the city to chase them down."

(End of this chapter)