Guiyi Fei Tang

Chapter 258: Zhengping Victory
"put!"

"Boom bang bang-"

On the ninth day of the twelfth lunar month, amidst the commotion outside Zhengping County, more than 30 catapults, operated by civilians, launched an attack on the north gate of Zhengping.

Heavy stones hit the top of the city wall, the parapet collapsed, and the strong men and soldiers defending the city rushed forward.

Seeing this, Wu Wei on horseback looked at Zhu Huai, who drew his sword and ordered: "Fill up the river!!"

At his command, tens of thousands of civilians captured by the rebels began to charge forward carrying sand and soil, trying to throw the sand into the moat and fill it up.

"He shot the arrow only fifty steps away. Think about what happened to Taiping County and the people outside the city!"

"If you are afraid of death, it is your family members who will be slaughtered!!"

On the city wall of Zhengping County, Wang Chongrong, the defender of Zhengping and the commander of the cavalry and infantry army, was standing in front of the city wall and giving orders calmly.

He is not very old, only about twenty years old, but of medium to strong build.

He stood in front of the gate and did not avoid the stones thrown.

When the soldiers and able-bodied men guarding the city saw him like this, they took courage and shot arrows at the people who were trying to fill the river.

Even though some people were too timid to show up, Wang Zhongrong did not mock them. Instead, he walked up to them, snatched the bows and arrows, stood there openly shooting arrows, and then threw the bows and arrows to those cowardly people.

"The enemy army is nothing but this, why should we be afraid?!"

With his encouragement, even the cowardly ones dared to show their heads and shoot three arrows.

Because of this, the people driven by the rebels were unable to fill the moat.

Seeing this, Wu Wei lost his temper and looked at Zhu Huai: "Send all the civilians, anyone who retreats will die!"

"Yes!" Zhu Huai bowed and responded, then rode his horse and said, "I will personally lead the soldiers to supervise the battle!"

Wu Wei did not stop him, but watched Zhu Huai ride out on his horse and lead two thousand armored soldiers to supervise the battle.

Tens of thousands of civilians in the army were driven away, and they would die if they advanced or retreated.

In a short period of time, countless people died between the two armies, most of whom were civilians in plain clothes.

Thousands of people were killed, and the remaining civilians retreated when they saw this, but were hacked to death by the supervision team.

"There are so many corpses ahead, idiot! Charge forward with the corpses!"

"Um..."

There were cries and shouts of curses in front of the battle. The helpless civilians had no choice but to move forward under the rain of arrows, in groups of several, trying to block the arrows with their dead bodies.

However, at such a distance, a corpse could not block the arrows at all.

An armored soldier drawing a bow of seven dou could often shoot through two or three unarmored civilians with one arrow.

The corpses piled up more and more, and countless corpses were poured into the moat, finally dyeing the moat blood red.

"put!"

"Boom bang bang-"

The catapults were still attacking, and the rammed earth city walls were always so fragile when facing the Helong catapults.

The siege lasted only an hour when several sections of the parapet in Zhengping County were knocked down and the city wall also collapsed.

Just as Cui Yu thought, Zhengping County was not a strong city, not to mention that the rebels outside the city were more than ten times the number of defenders inside.

"Armored soldiers, follow me and throw the bodies into the moat!!"

Seeing that the common people could not accomplish anything, Zhu Huai immediately led the soldiers forward and threw the thousands of corpses into the moat.

"Fire the arrow! Fire the arrow!!"

On the top of the city wall, Wang Chongrong was nearly hit by a stone, but he remained calm and still stood in front of the city wall to command the defenders to counterattack.

Arrows rained down, and occasionally an unlucky armored soldier would be shot and dragged down, but most of the armored soldiers continued to throw their bodies into the moat under the cover of the armored soldiers holding shields.

As the moat was being filled up, Wu Wei in the rear did not delay any longer and immediately raised his sword:

"Charge car, cloud car!"

Under his command, those civilians who had managed to escape, driven by the supervising soldiers, had no choice but to push the siege equipment to launch an attack.

Zhu Huai led his troops to retreat and continued to advance with the help of siege equipment.

The crossbows and catapults on the city walls continued to fight back, but only a few siege weapons were destroyed.

With a loud bang, the cloud chariot was hit hard against the city wall, and the ladder was knocked down and hooked on the parapet.

The surviving civilians became victims. They were driven to attack the city, and the defenders had to keep throwing down stones and rolling logs in order to defend the city.

The rebels used the lives of the people to consume the city's defense equipment, but they did not think there was anything wrong with this and were very excited instead.

Tens of thousands of civilians were killed, tens of thousands died, and rivers of blood flowed.

Even in the cold winter, the air inside and outside Zhengping County still reveals an indescribable smell.

Wu Wei sent out elite cavalry to continue capturing the surrounding civilians, while Zhu Huai used the corpses of the civilians to build a "ladder" to attack the city.

The catapults ignored the casualties among the people and kept bombarding a certain gap.

Many stones hit the city wall, but even more civilians were killed.

They were just doing their normal farming at home when they were forced to come by the rebels, and their lives ended hastily on the battlefield because of an arrow or a stone.

The same was true for the civilians in the city. They lived an honest life in the city, but when the war broke out, they were conscripted into the army and forced to do the work of shooting arrows and throwing stones on the city walls. In the end, they were killed by arrows or catapults from the rebels below the city.

"Dang Dang Dang..."

From early morning to noon, as the rebels sounded the retreat, tens of thousands of bodies of civilians were left outside the city of Zhengping County, and thousands of able-bodied men died in the city.

Almost every family in the city was in mourning, but this did not stop the government troops from conscripting able-bodied men to defend the city.

At first, each household levied one ding (male) tax, but now it has become two ding (male) taxes per household.

If the rebels cannot be repelled, even young men and able-bodied women will be forced to go up to the top of the city walls to defend it.

"Beep--"

Along with the sound of the horn, there was also the sound of whistle in the west.

"Damn it, I knew it!"

On the battlefield, Wu Wei's face turned pale. He thought that Li Chengxun would pretend to be confused and then attack them by surprise, but he didn't expect that Li Chengxun would wait until they were retreating from the siege before sending out his troops.

"Six Flower Formation!!"

Wu Wei turned his horse around and led the central army to move first.

Soldiers from all over the country began to wave flags, and light cavalry also began to rush around to convey military orders.

The Hu soldiers were not proficient in the Six Flower Formation, so Wu Wei asked them to guard behind the Tianping old soldier.

As long as the old soldier does not move, the Hu soldiers in the back row can counterattack.

It’s just a pity that Wang Shouwen left too few old soldiers for Wu Wei.

Among the three thousand elite cavalry he took with him, two thousand were Tianping elite cavalry and one thousand were Hu cavalry.

Wu Wei had only 700-odd veteran soldiers left, and 700 veteran soldiers were clearly not enough to hold their own in a war of this scale.

"Lord, the Six Flower Formation cannot be formed!"

Zhu Huai had just withdrawn from the battlefield, and seeing that his camp was still in chaos, he couldn't help but become anxious.

Seeing this, Wu Wei gritted his teeth and said, "Damn it, head south to the Pu River!"

"Buzz rumbling..."

Before he finished speaking, he saw a large number of Tianping cavalry retreating in the west, and in the distance, dust was rising, obviously a large group of elite cavalry were galloping.

"Zhu Huai, assemble all the light cavalry!"

Seeing this, Wu Wei immediately prepared to abandon these Hu soldiers if the war went against him.

Zhu Huai is a death row prisoner after all. Naturally, he has his own cleverness to be able to sit in this position.

Seeing Wu Wei's arrangement, he immediately knew what Wu Wei wanted to do, so he gathered light cavalry and prepared to break out at any time.

In just a quarter of an hour, the flags of the government troops appeared in the west.

Wang Chongrong in Zhengping County saw this and immediately shouted, "The imperial reinforcements are here, follow me and fight your way out of the city!"

"kill!!!"

A large number of armored soldiers walked down the horse road, opened the north gate and rushed out.

For a moment, the Cheonpyong Army was in chaos, and Li Chengxun rushed towards the rebels without hesitation.

Seeing this, the Hu cavalry of the Pingxia tribe drew their bows and arrows and scattered towards the Tianping army.

The elite cavalry of the Tianxiong Army rushed to the front of the formation thirty steps, drew their bows and arrows, and shot down the Hu soldiers of the Tianping Army who were holding spears, causing a flaw in the Hu soldiers' formation, and then they immediately rushed in.

"Bam—"

“Hiss!!”

"Uh-huh!"

"boom!"

War horses neighed, flesh collided, and spears broke.

Although there are as many as 9,000 Tianping soldiers here, only more than 4,000 of them are armored.

Most of the Hu soldiers holding guns on the periphery wore battle jackets. As long as the spearmen in the front row were knocked down by the cavalry's bows and arrows, the spearmen in the back row had almost no means of counterattack.

As the elite cavalry charged, the unarmored spearmen on the periphery of the Tianping Army were killed or wounded by arrows, resulting in more than a thousand casualties.

Without waiting for the Tianping army's follow-up armored soldiers to counterattack, the government troops and the elite cavalry of the Pingxia tribe quickly broke through and withdrew. They began to circle the Tianping army with bows and arrows, shooting and killing the unarmored soldiers with arrows.

Gradually, the morale of the Tianping Army declined, but Wu Wei was not anxious when seeing this.

Only after all the spearmen were wiped out did Wu Wei order his men to blow the horns and charge out to fight.

"kill!!"

The old soldiers of Tianping followed Wu Wei in an orderly manner, while the rest of the armored Hu soldiers only cared about following the big flag and charging forward.

Seeing that the Tianping Army was fighting desperately, Li Chengxun immediately led his elite cavalry to disperse, not giving the Tianping Army a chance to engage in close combat.

Seeing this situation, Wu Wei ordered his troops to retreat to the Pu River in the south.

The soldiers began to retreat step by step, while the surviving civilians fled everywhere.

Li Chengxun led his elite cavalry to follow and harassed the Tianping army with arrows.

When they retreated to the river, there were only 700 elite cavalry and 3,000 armored soldiers left in the Tianping Army.

The rest either escaped and were captured or were killed, while Li Chengxun's side suffered only about 200 casualties and wounded elite cavalry, leaving more than 4,000 elite cavalry.

"Line up with your backs to the Pu River, and let the cavalry cross the river first!"

Despite the bitterly cold winter, Wu Wei still ordered the crossing of the river.

The Pu River is only twenty meters wide. If it were summer, this would not be a big deal, but now it is winter.

The old brothers of the Tianping Army were a little hesitant, but at Wu Wei's urging, a group of light cavalry quickly jumped into the river on horseback and tried to cross the river.

The water depth of the Pu River is only six or seven feet in winter. It is not difficult for the old Tianping soldiers riding on the tall horses of Liangzhou to cross the river.

As this group of Tang soldiers crossed the river, they immediately drove in wooden stakes, tied ropes, and guided the rest of the Tianping soldiers to cross the river.

At the same time, Li Chengxun, who was watching from a distance, could no longer sit still. He immediately looked at Tuoba Sigong:

"Everyone dismount and shoot arrows with bows!"

"I obey your command!" Tuoba Sigong responded, and then led the remaining elite cavalry to dismount, put bowstrings on the infantry bows, and formed a formation and released arrows from seventy steps away.

"Fire arrows!"

Wu Wei also ordered his troops to shoot arrows, but the army had limited bows and arrows, so they could only defend the Pu River and fight back.

More than 700 elite cavalrymen of Tianping crossed the river first, followed by light cavalry led by Wu Wei, Zhu Huai and others.

These light cavalry were basically Hu cavalry, with their numbers ranging from several hundred to several hundred.

"Why do they have so few cavalry?"

Li Chengxun, who was far away, noticed something was wrong, but Tuoba Sigong said, "They have run out of arrows!"

"No hurry, they only have a thousand or so people left. Even if they want to break out, they can't enter Zezhou!"

As they finished speaking, a large number of armored soldiers were coming from the direction of Zhengping County, and soon they arrived behind the government army.

"Wang Chongrong, the general of the Hezhong cavalry and infantry, is here to meet the envoy!"

Wang Zhongrong was brought before Li Chengxun, who nodded and said:

"I know you, and there is a great achievement waiting for you!"

"Please give instructions to the envoy!" Wang Zhongrong's eyes flickered, while Li Chengxun pointed his whip at the thousands of rebels on the north bank of Pushui:
"The rebels' elite cavalry have already fled to the south bank. Now we will attack them in formation. The rebels on the north bank will naturally be defeated!"

"I obey your command!" Wang Zhongrong knew that Li Chengxun wanted to break the formation by himself. As long as the rebel formation was broken, these thousands of rebels would die.

"Form a six-flower formation!!"

After receiving the military order, Wang Chongrong immediately led more than 500 armored soldiers from Zhengping County to form a battle formation and attack the Hu soldiers.

However, the distance was only a hundred steps, and it only took Wang Zhongrong a cup of tea to reach the rebels.

Most of the rebels on the north bank were river barbarians who were recruited temporarily. They had no training and just wore armor and used it to rob and plunder.

Now without Wu Wei's command, they seemed powerless when facing Wang Chongrong and more than 500 officers, soldiers and infantrymen.

Seeing this, Wu Wei, who had just crossed the Pu River, immediately ordered: "Break out in the direction of Qinshui in Zezhou!"

"But Wang Jie is so handsome..."

Zhu Huai wanted to say something, but Wu Wei shouted, "This is an order from Marshal Wang Jie!"

Zhu Huai was shocked when he heard this, and immediately ordered his troops to follow Wu Wei to break out to Yicheng in the northeast direction.

Li Chengxun on the north bank snorted when he saw this: "Humph, there are only a thousand remnants, can they run away?"

Seeing this, Tuoba Sigong immediately rode forward and said, "Commander in Chief, why don't you let me lead my elite cavalry to pursue them?"

"No need..." Li Chengxun would not give the credit to Tuoba Sigong. He looked past Tuoba Sigong and looked at his nephew.

"Sanlang, lead the Tianxiong elite cavalry to chase them. Remember not to let them escape into Heyang!"

"Yes!" Li Zhiyi, the nephew of Li Chengxun, agreed, and immediately led the Tianxiong Army of less than two thousand to cross the river and led the army to chase and kill Wu Wei and others.

At the same time, the Hu soldiers on the north bank were in chaos. Li Chengxun saw this and raised his knife: "Don't spare any of them!!"

The horn sounded, and three thousand elite cavalrymen of the Pingxia tribe launched a charge. With the cooperation of Wang Zhongrong and other armored soldiers, they killed all three thousand Tianping Hu soldiers on the north bank of the river and captured three thousand armored soldiers.

Li Chengxun led his troops to Zhengping County to rest, ordered Tuoba Sigong and Wang Zhongrong to clean up the battlefield, and he was responsible for writing the victory report.

An hour later, the battlefield was cleaned up. Wang Chongrong brought the documents to the main hall of Zhengping County Government Office, bowed and reported:

"Reporting to the envoy, our army killed 30,000 bandits and 3,000 of them!"

Wang Chongrong obviously counted the civilians killed by the rebels as his military achievements, but Li Chengxun said after seeing this:

"That's not right..."

"Huh?" Wang Zhongrong was a little nervous, wondering if Li Chengxun didn't like doing this.

But he was worrying too much, because compared to him, Li Chengxun wanted military merit more.

"I remember when our army fought the enemy, didn't more than 20,000 of them flee?"

Wang Chongrong was stunned. He didn't expect that Li Chengxun would not even let go of the civilians who escaped.

Seeing this, he immediately nodded and said, "Indeed, more than 20,000 bandits escaped."

"Yes!" Li Chengxun nodded and said, "I'll leave these 20,000 bandits to you to deal with. I remember they are all rebellious bastards."

"Yes!" Wang Chongrong breathed a sigh of relief. If he was only going to kill the Hu people, he wouldn't have any burden.

He bowed and left. As he was leaving the yamen, he looked towards the yamen and seemed to see Li Chengxun sitting in the main hall.

"Massacre of the barbarians is nothing, but I will never massacre civilians!"

The young and energetic Wang Chongrong thought so and immediately assembled his troops. He used the captured horses and soldiers from Zhengping County to go out of the city to hunt down the so-called rebels.

While he was inspecting the troops leaving the city, Tuoba Sigong, who was inspecting outside the city, also returned to the yamen with a frown.

"Commander in Chief, most of the horses killed in the battle outside the city were short draft horses, numbering no more than 2,000. The captured riding horses and military horses were no more than 800."

"The number of elite rebel cavalry that escaped during the day was no more than a thousand, which is not the same as the number of rebels in the inner pass before. You see..."

Tuoba Sigong reported what he had found, but Li Chengxun didn't care. He lowered his head and wrote the victory report while saying:
"The enemy troops came all the way from the inner pass, and I think a lot of elite cavalry were killed or wounded on the way."

"These eight hundred or so horses and military horses, plus the thousand or so elite cavalry that escaped during the day, total just over two thousand."

"Perhaps hundreds or even thousands of elite cavalrymen were killed or injured on the way. Otherwise, how could they quickly capture Daning, Pu County, and Taiping County?"

After Li Chengxun finished speaking, he paused and then looked up at Tuoba Sigong:

"The Pingxia tribe has made outstanding contributions in this battle. This envoy will report the Pingxia tribe's achievements to the imperial court."

"Of the more than 200 carts of money and grain seized today, the Pingxia tribe can take 30% away, but the military horses, riding horses, and draft horses must be left behind."

"Of course!" Tuoba Sigong thought that this man was greedy, but since he still needed him to take credit for himself, he had to agree.

Seeing this, Li Chengxun also nodded and said, "In two days, there should be good news from Yicheng."

"After suppressing the rebellion this time, I will ask the court to set up the Pingxia tribe as a garrison, and appoint you, the young leader, as the governor."

"Thank you, envoy." Tuoba Sigong felt relieved, thinking that this man at least did the job for money.

Seeing this, Li Chengxun blew the written victory report dry and then sent someone to deliver it to Chang'an.

At the same time, he also sent people to tell Cui Yu, Jiang Xi, Zheng Zhu and others in the north that the rebels had suffered a disastrous defeat in Zhengping County and the remaining troops fled to Yicheng.

The infantrymen of the four towns could set up camp in Linfen and wait for the imperial court's order, and then return to their own towns after being rewarded.

After doing all this, Li Chengxun summoned some famous dancers in the city and held a banquet for the generals in the Zhengping County Yamen.

Instead, the light cavalry carrying his military intelligence marched north overnight and delivered the military intelligence to Cui Yu, Jiang Xi and others before dawn.

"How dare you, boy!!"

When Cui Yu and the others saw the military situation, their expressions remained unchanged, but they cursed in their hearts.

Li Chengxun set the location for suppressing the rebellion in Zhengping County, but their more than 18,000 people were between Linfen County and Taiping County.

In this case, even if they have made contributions, they are only insignificant and cannot be compared with Li Chengxun.

Everyone was busy for more than a month, traveled hundreds of miles, and finally achieved very little. Naturally, they were dissatisfied.

But since Li Chengxun had suppressed the rebels, it was useless for them to refuse.

Cui Yu, Jiang Xi, Zheng Zhu and Ma Mingguang were unhappy, but they still told the three armies about the military situation.

The three armies, which had been traveling for more than a month, felt a little uncomfortable when they heard the news, but as long as the court was willing to reward them, this discomfort was nothing.

After a brief digestion, the army accepted the news that the rebels had been defeated, and only the remaining troops fled to Yicheng and would perish soon.

For a while, the military camp's defenses relaxed, and the feeling of uneasiness that weighed on everyone's hearts gradually faded away...

(End of this chapter)