The Ming Dynasty began from Sarhu

Chapter 169: Transcend all sentient beings
The light infantry field guns modified from the falconet guns had good mobility, and this was their first official appearance on the battlefield.

The first round of shelling was quite effective, with three out of six shells hitting the crowd of Smell the Incense believers.

The shells swept through the dead leaves like a violent storm, wiping out the front row of archers.

Several believers who were shooting arrows were blasted with bloody holes by artillery shells, leaving behind a pile of mutilated bodies.

After killing the archer, the three-jin iron bullet still had power and hit the armored Red Turban Army in the back row like a hammer.

These armored members of the Wenxiang Sect were all small leaders, and the fine chain mail and cotton armor on their bodies could not stop the flying shells at all.

A fat leader had a big hole in his stomach caused by a shell, and his intestines and internal organs were dripping out. He did not die immediately, but covered the hole with his hands and rolled around on the ground like a ball.

A dozen steps to the left of the sphere, a surrendered archer from Yanzhou had his left leg severed by a cannonball. He was jumping around like a toad, leaning on his bow in his left hand, and uttering shrill howls. The archers around him raised their bows and fired back aimlessly at the opposite side.

The cannonball that cut off the archer bounced high after hitting the ground, raising a cloud of dust, and jumped towards the believers behind, continuing its killing journey.

Where the shells passed, the followers of the Wenxiang Sect let out screams that were not like human voices. Anyone who was hit by the hot iron ball would either lose an arm or a leg.

Three shells plowed through the dense crowd like the Grim Reaper's scythe, leaving a pile of broken limbs, armor and shattered weapons on the ground.

More than 20 followers of the Wenxiang Sect returned to paradise and went to see the Mother of Mount Lishan early.

An iron ball covered with internal organs and human skin slowly rolled in front of the three-cubine cushion.

"Don't run away! Watch me break the government army's magic!"

Wang Haoxian suppressed his inner fear and shouted loudly.

A strong man carrying a sedan chair ran away. Sangui raised his sleeves and a poisonous arrow flew out, knocking the man to the ground.

The other sedan bearers immediately knelt on the ground and shouted that the Mother of Mount Li had appeared.

Wang Haoxian pointed the duck feather fan slightly forward, and his hand holding the fan was shaking slightly.

"Mother of Mount Li! Stone Buddha Maitreya!"

"Zhu Ming is gone, the fragrance is coming!"

However, the fragrance did not come, but the shells came.

The Kaiyuan Army artillery position two miles away opened fire again. Six four-pound cannons roared loudly, and six shells whistled down to the earth.

Five shells hit the Wenxiang sect members, and amidst their cries and screams, more than 30 of them were killed.

A shell flew over the front row of Wenxiang believers and hit the cushion where Wang Haoxian was sitting directly, and finally hit the arm of the strong man carrying the sedan chair. The strong man screamed and fell to the ground, with blood gushing from the broken arm and the white bones exposed.

The sedan bearers screamed and ran away without caring about the three cabinets.

Wang Haoxian watched as the shells plowed three bloody grooves in the crowd, heard the shrill howls of the believers, and saw that tens of thousands of believers were about to collapse.

"General Ma, General Zheng, and General Zhao, organize the old brothers to stop those archers and kill those who flee!"

Wang Haoxian loudly called out to the leaders of the Wenxiang Sect around him, asking these close friends to block the fleeing archers in front and force them to launch a counterattack against the Kaiyuan army.

The only long-range weapons the Wenxiang Sect possesses are these foot bows. If the archers are defeated, the followers behind them will die even faster.

The front row of flintlock soldiers approached to within fifty steps and could already see the faces of the Wenxiang Sect archers.

The marching drums had not yet stopped, and amid the rapid whistles of the flag captains, the young flintlock soldiers showed nervous and excited expressions on their faces.

Suddenly, a dense rain of arrows arose in front of the Wenxiang Sect's line. Thousands of light arrows hit the iron armor and made a clanging sound. Soon, someone was shot in the face and fell to the ground with a scream.

The musketeers in the back row immediately filled the vacant positions. The battalion bugler was slow to blow the order to fire, so the musketeers could only continue to advance towards death like puppets.

At this time, they were already forty steps away from the Wenxiang Sect archers. Another round of arrow rain came from the opposite side, and several comrades fell around them again.

Yang Tong, a flintlock soldier of the 1st Flag Team of the 3000th Headquarters, felt his heart almost jump out of his throat. This was his first time on the battlefield.

Yang Tong did not expect that the Wenxiang Sect was so powerful that they could still shoot arrows back after being hit by three rounds of artillery fire.

However, their First Battalion was not even afraid of the Jiannu, let alone the group of believers in front of them.

The 3,000th Headquarters had fought bloody battles against the Zhenglan Banner on the south bank of the Hunhe River, killing 1,500 of them and assisting the main force in defeating the two Huang Banners. The First Battalion had a full strength of 1,200 men, but only 317 survived the battle.

Standing in the middle of this honorable army, Yang Tong felt full of strength, and no enemy could stop the flintlock in his hand.

With a crisp jingle, a light arrow landed on Yang Tong's helmet. It was so light that it had no killing power. A comrade on the right was hit in the eye by the arrow and rolled to the ground with a scream.

The team was not affected and continued to move forward to the sound of rapid drums.

Only thirty steps away from the Wenxiang believers, the archers on the opposite side all showed expressions of fear. They had never seen such fearless Ming soldiers.

Many archers stood there, not knowing what to do. Facing the double-layer armor of the flintlock soldiers, their light arrows were basically useless.

Some archers hurriedly switched to heavy arrows and shot, while others tried to escape in both directions.

The central army flag finally tilted forward, and the flags of each thousand headquarters and flag team also tilted forward, and the bugler blew the attack horn.

Cheng Liang, captain of the first flag team, raised the command flag and shouted at the top of his lungs.

"First flag team, raise your guns!" "Aim."

"shooting."

Yang Tong suddenly pulled the trigger of the flintlock, and the hammer hit the steel sickle of the firing pin, making a crisp click. Amidst a shower of sparks, the gunpowder in the barrel was ignited, making a loud bang, and the huge recoil hit the musketeer's shoulder.

Yang Tong stepped back slightly, and the flintlock in his hand was like a fire dragon rising from the clouds, spewing out orange-red flames and white smoke.

Amidst the dense roar of musketry, clouds of white mist rose above the heads of the first row of flintlock soldiers, forming a white fog wall hundreds of meters wide, which spread to the two wings of the formation in the morning breeze.

The improved flintlock rifle had a longer range and higher accuracy.

Countless lead bullets whistled towards the chaotic group of Wenxiang Sect archers, like hail hitting a melon field, making crackling sounds.

A dense blood mist suddenly rose in front of the Wenxiang Sect's formation, like a bloody rain falling from a clear sky, and the archers' faces and bodies were splattered with the blood of their companions.

Many people had their hands and feet broken by lead bullets. They suffered severe pain as the lead bullets stirred their internal organs and bodies. They fell to the ground, struggling in agony, rolling and crawling.

The tranquility of the countryside in Dengzhou was broken. Under the reflection of the burning village, the land seemed like a Shura hell.

Out of more than a thousand archers, five to six hundred fell in an instant. Those who were not killed could no longer bear it and fled screaming to the two wings, where they were surrounded by cavalry.

The leader of the Wenxiang sect, who was leading the battle from behind, saw that the situation was not good, and shouted "Mother of Mount Li" while leading his armored followers to rush towards the flintlock soldiers.

They carried heavy swords or long axes, wore chain mail, and shouted loudly in the crowd, similar to Bayala of the Jiannu.

The flintlock rifles sounded again, and the Wenxiang sect thugs who were at the forefront fell down again.

The Wenxiang Sect's elite troops, who had just advanced a few steps, paused in their attack. Seeing their comrades being pelted by lead bullets, blood and intestines spilling out onto the ground, emitting a nauseating stench, their morale completely crumbled, and they retreated back to their own formation.

The cavalry on both wings also rushed back and drove the Wenxiang sect members who tried to escape to the wings back to the core of the position.

The lead bullets fired from the Kaiyuan Army's flintlock rifles swept in like a torrential rain, smashing the Wenxiang Sect's formation into pieces.

After the Kaiyuan flintlock soldiers completed three rounds of shooting, more than 2,000 corpses fell on the opposite side, and 50,000 to 60,000 Wenxiang believers completely collapsed.

Wang Haoxian finally couldn't bear it anymore, jumped off the mat, and fled in panic under the protection of his confidants.

A long trumpet sounded, and the front row of flintlock soldiers retreated one after another, and the pikemen pushed forward with their guns.

These spearmen were also on the battlefield for the first time. Under the orders of the captains of each flag, they kept thrusting their spears and killing the Wenxiang Sect thugs who had fallen to the ground but were not dead.

The sharp spears harvested the followers of the Wenxiang sect who fell behind. Some of the surviving believers desperately waved their swords and axes, trying to split the spearman line. They were soon stabbed with blood and fell in a pool of blood.

All the Wenxiang Sect members in front immediately dropped their weapons and ran away screaming.

Even the bravest thugs were frightened by the forest of spears that was constantly devouring lives, and no one dared to step forward to fight the Kaiyuan Army.

Some quick-reacting believers fled to the wings. After barely avoiding the cavalry's hacking, they had no time to rejoice before they were swallowed up by the soldiers in the Mandarin Duck Formation.

The mandarin duck formations on both wings drove the believers towards the center, further compressing their space for movement.

The fleeing people huddled together, and some archers began to shoot arrows again.

The flintlocks rang out again, and hundreds of believers were killed. A volley of flintlocks at a distance of thirty steps could penetrate most armor, whether it was chain mail or fish scale armor.

The flintlock volley ended and the pikemen moved forward again.

~~~~~
On that day, the Kaiyuan army killed more than 5,200 members of the Wenxiang Sect, and the remaining 40,000 members all fled. The cavalry battalion drove them to the southwest, which was the direction of Yanzhou Prefecture.

Liu Zhaosun ordered the new recruits from each battalion to take turns in the battle. The cavalry hacked and hacked, the combat soldiers chased and killed, and the artillery bombarded fiercely. Most of the new recruits killed people, and even the artillery soldiers rushed forward to grab heads.

Compared to the bloody battle at Hunhe, this battle was child's play, and the entire process was very easy. However, it did give the new recruits a rare battlefield experience, which would be of great importance for the fierce battles they would face in the future.

~~~~~
The third cabinet leader Wang Haoxian escaped before the collapse. He led the Wenxiang Sect rebels to burn down Wendeng County and massacre thousands of civilians.

The mob killed all the women who could not be taken away in time, leaving only more than a thousand people alive.

Liu Zhaosun rode his horse along the Wendeng official road, which was littered with corpses, heading towards Yanzhou Prefecture. His horse was blocked by the piles of corpses on the ground and could not move forward.

Liu Zhaosun was shocked by the brutality of the Wenxiang thugs. He had never seen such atrocities against the Later Jin soldiers.

Beside the post road, a pregnant woman's belly was cut open and her dead baby was thrown into the weeds...

Liu Zhaosun originally planned to drive the Wenxiang thugs to Yanzhou Prefecture, so as to take the opportunity to march into Yanzhou and occupy Jining, a key city along the canal.

This is the strategy of driving the tiger to devour the wolf. It is to turn the tables in Shandong, forcefully control the canal, and thus force the court!

This was also the real purpose of Liu Zhaosun's trying his best to lead his troops into Shandong to quell the rebellion.

However, now, he is changing his plans.

"Order Burhanggu to lead the cavalry south to pursue and kill the Wenxiang Sect members. Do not allow them to return to Yanzhou. Kill them all, leaving no one alive."

Kang Yinggan frowned and wanted to persuade someone, but when he saw the dead baby covered with ants in the grass, he sighed and shook his head.

(End of this chapter)