Tibet.

Chapter 1452: Lake Julun
There were several Shiwei cavalrymen following far behind the migrating team. When the migrating tribe was captured by the Bayegu army, several Shiwei cavalrymen immediately turned around and rushed back to report.

A few days later, in a huge royal tent on the northern bank of the Black Water River, the Dashiwei Khan Halder had a solemn expression on his face. The soldiers' reports made him realize that they could no longer migrate westward, as the Bayegu tribe had blocked their passage to the west.

Aluton, the brother of Wusu, the Khan of the Western Shiwei, said, "Khan, what if we give the Kulubo tribe enough benefits and borrow the passage through their territory to go west?"

Halder shook his head. "To the west of the Kulubo tribe is the Zhulong Mountain, which stretches for thousands of miles. There is no way to go. We can only go south along the mountain. We will either enter the territory of the Bayegu tribe or the territory of the Pugu tribe. Each one is more ruthless than the other. Which one will spare us?"

Aludun wanted to say something else, but Khan Wusu waved his hand to stop his brother, "Don't think of anything lucky. The grassland has been divided up long ago. There is no place for us. We can only fight for it through war."

Halder also sighed and said, "It's impossible to go west. You have to go north or east. Actually, going east is also impossible. There are only two ways, south or north!"

Wusu Khan gritted his teeth and said, "Brother, let's fight the Tang army to the death! If we win, we can keep our homeland. If we lose, we will retreat to the north."

Aluton also said: "Khan, if this continues, we will lose all our morale."

Halder nodded. "We can organize a group of people to retreat northward first as pioneers, find settlements, make all preparations, avoid a hasty retreat, and then march south to fight the Tang army to the death."

Halder considered it carefully, and Usu Khan also agreed deeply.
The Shiwei people began to take action, and all of them were asked to pack up and prepare for migration.

But no one knew where they would migrate to. Although no one said it explicitly, every family packed up their things consciously.

The Tang army scouts also discovered the unusual movements of the Shiwei people and immediately went south to report to the commander-in-chief.

Ma Lin had just received news from Bayegu Khan that they had captured a small Shiwei tribe that was preparing to migrate westward. This immediately made the Tang army alert. This was a signal to retreat and the Shiwei tribe had plans to migrate.

Inside the big tent, all the generals stood in front of the sand table to discuss the next move. Ma Lin highly praised Wei Feng's previous judgment. He asked, "What does Wei Changshi think?"

Wei Feng smiled and said, "It's normal to run away if you can't win. The key is where to run. This small tribe migrating westward should be a test. To be honest, I don't think it's realistic for the Shiwei to escape to the west. The grassland has been occupied for a long time, where is there any pasture for them? More importantly, the Shiwei people and the Tiele people are of different races and origins, and the grassland can't accommodate them. If they really want to migrate to the grassland by force, they will inevitably be besieged by the Bayegu, Pugu, Huihe, Sijie and other tribes, and finally be divided up. So I never thought that the Shiwei would evacuate to the west. They are not stupid, they should know what's going on."

Zhang Dian hesitated for a moment and said, "If we don't retreat to the west, then we will retreat to the north or east."

Wei Feng stroked his beard and said, "To the east is our Bohai Prefecture, which is the territory of the Tang Dynasty. They will never go there. In the end, there is only one choice."

All the generals said in unison: "To the north!"

"That's right, I believe Shiwei must want to retreat to the north!"

Ma Lin couldn't help but feel anxious. He thought for a moment and said, "In this case, we should go out and attack. We can't wait any longer. What do you think?"

Zhang Dian and Yu Changyang both supported Ma Lin's decision to launch the attack. At this time, everyone's attention turned to Wei Feng. He was the military advisor and had the power of veto.

Wei Feng pondered for a long time and said, "I believe no one is willing to give up their hometown. The Shiwei people will not move north unless they have no choice. If we go north, we are likely to encounter their army. I am not worried about defeating them, but I am considering annihilating the enemy. Therefore, we need an army to bypass the enemy to the north and cut off their retreat. This army must have no less than 30,000 people, otherwise there will be slips through the net."

"How many troops does the Chief Secretary think the other side will have?" asked Ma Lin.

"Maybe 50,000 or 60,000 at most! After all, 30,000 of them have been annihilated before. They don't have many people, and this includes the 10,000 troops of the Kurobo tribe."

Ma Lin immediately made a decision to leave 10,000 men to guard the Liucheng base, while he and Yu Changyang led 60,000 troops to the north to meet the enemy head-on. Zhang Dian led 40,000 troops to intercept the enemy's retreat, and ordered General Wang Zhao to lead 10,000 troops directly north to attack the enemy's base. The four armies each performed their duties.

Ma Lin and Yu Changyang led an army of 60,000 to the north. At the same time, the 60,000-strong coalition army of the Shiwei tribe also marched south.

The two sides met north of Lake Kulun.

The sky was gloomy and covered with dark clouds these days, and a decisive battle concerning the fate of the Shiwei people slowly began on the grassland north of the Julun Lake. To the surprise of the Tang army, the Shiwei army actually set up a large camp, set up fences around it, and cut a large number of wooden spikes and inserted them within 300 steps around the camp.

The Shiwei people's layout left the Tang army confused. Did the Shiwei people want to weaken themselves by using defense?

In fact, the Shiwei army had no choice but to stay in camp, as the great Shiwei Khan Halder fell ill at this critical moment.

The Shiwei army could only choose to be on the defensive and wait for the Khan's condition to improve before engaging in a decisive battle with the Tang army.

But the Tang army did not have the patience to wait for their Khan to recover from his illness, so that night, the Tang army launched a night battle.

"Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!" The passionate drumbeats rang out in the dark night. Ten thousand soldiers escorted a thousand ox carts and slowly approached the Shiwei army camp. Each ox cart had a swarm launcher and was equipped with five boxes of gunpowder arrows.

A thousand ox carts were quickly arranged in a formation three hundred and eighty steps away. This distance not only avoided the wooden spikes on the ground, but was also out of reach of the enemy's bows and crossbows.

The swarm launcher is made of pig iron and is relatively expensive to produce. The Tang Army's Ordnance Department invested a lot of manpower and material resources and spent a year to produce one thousand swarm launchers. Four thousand soldiers were responsible for operating them and they were used for positioning and firing, which had great lethality.

It is a bit like a multiple rocket launcher. A launcher has eighty-one tubes, which are propelled by gunpowder after being ignited. It can fire eighty-one crossbow arrows at the same time with a range of about six hundred steps.

The gunpowder is tied to each arrow, and there is a bus. When the bus is lit, the fuses of all eighty-one rockets will be ignited.

These are relatively simple. Its highlight is the modular design. The arrow boxes are ready-made and only need to be replaced on site. Just install them directly into the launcher and fasten them. It is very simple.

Four thousand soldiers lined up in front of the ox cart, with four men operating a launcher. They put the arrow box into the launcher and closed the iron door, leaving only the main fuse exposed outside.

A thousand launchers were aimed at the camp fence in the distance, which was brightly lit by torches.

Behind the launcher were 30,000 Tang cavalrymen. The Tang army had opened eight passages, pulled out the wooden spikes planted by the enemy, and sprinkled kerosene on both sides. As long as the kerosene was ignited, eight passages would appear on the ground.

At this time, the Shiwei army camp had discovered the Tang army's intention, and immediately fired thousands of arrows. The sky became even darker, and an overwhelming amount of arrows shot towards the Tang army. However, no matter whether it was the bows and arrows with a shooting range of 100 steps or the crossbows with a shooting range of 150 steps, they could not hurt the Tang army 380 steps away.

"emission!"

Following Yu Changyang's order, there was a sudden sound of rapid clappers, a flash of fire, and 81,000 gunpowder arrows shot towards the enemy camp from all directions like a storm.

Arrows fell like raindrops, hitting the chest or head of the enemy soldiers in the camp, and blood burst out. Soon, the second round of 81,000 arrows came like a rainstorm, and countless screams were heard in the enemy camp.

Wusu, the Khan of Xishiwei, was standing behind the camp fence. A rocket shot past him and hit his horse. The horse screamed and fell to the ground, throwing him heavily to the ground. A dozen of his personal soldiers rushed up, lifted him up and ran to the back along the camp fence.

The gunpowder arrow array of the Tang army was not as powerful as the arrow thunder, but its number was extremely large. Five rounds meant that 400,000 arrows were shot out. It more demonstrated the powerful national strength.

The original intention was to deal with the enemy's charge, but the enemy actually adopted a defensive posture.

Ma Lin then ordered it to be put into use to test its power.

In the darkness, round after round of gunpowder arrows shot into the enemy camp from all directions, and the enemy's casualties were unknown.

After all 400,000 gunpowder arrows were shot, silence fell in the camp.

(End of this chapter)