Taichang Ming Dynasty

Chapter 301 Fierce Battle and Reinforcements
Jibukeda was hit by a lead bullet on his left chest, but it was not known whether it was due to insufficient charge or because he wore a layer of tanned leather armor under his iron armor. The lead bullet lost its kinetic energy as soon as it penetrated his defense, only slightly creating a bruise on his chest muscle.

The lead bullets hurt Jibu Keda and also infuriated him. With a cry of surprise, he slapped his horse's rump, urging the steed to charge forward with all his might. He intended to take advantage of the Ming army's reloading period to break up the cavalry's formation, thus eliminating the musketeers' threat.

Li Bingcheng, who had been prepared, would not give him this opportunity. As soon as the gun formation retreated, he immediately led his men to fill the gap between the two formations.

Jibu Keda did not give up the charge, brandishing a heavy chain hammer and charging headfirst into Li Bingcheng's army. He wanted to tear open this layer of defense!

Jibukda was incredibly brave, his momentum like a tiger descending from a mountain. His first blow struck a fully armored servant he'd targeted. The servant wore a bowl-shaped breastplate over his chest, padded with a ball of soft cotton. But Jibukda's chain hammer pierced through the breastplate, shattering the servant's sternum through the fine iron and cotton. The blow dented the servant's chest directly within the armor.

The shattered sternum no longer served as a shield; it became an accomplice to the enemy, piercing directly into the heart, which had been suddenly stopped by the force of the blow. The servant died before his internal injuries could even begin to take effect, succumbing to the betrayal of his sternum. The horse continued to advance, but his master could no longer hold his position. The servant collapsed, dying forever in the land thousands of miles away from his home.

As expected of a vanguard led by Bayala! Jibu Keda's army formation was like a slender triangular spearhead, instantly piercing the army led by Li Bingcheng. However, the Ganzhen reinforcements' formation was not broken!
Li Bingcheng was also exceptionally brave. Wielding a long, pure steel spear, he thrust a straight stab through the neck of a short-armored soldier who attempted to force his way through. The spear's tip instantly destroyed the soldier's throat, protruding from the other side of his neck, fitting snugly around the cervical vertebrae. Then, Li Bingcheng yanked the spear's tip free, and blood immediately gushed from the puncture wound. Then, Li Bingcheng swung the spear sideways, delivering a sweeping blow to the back of a Bayara.

Li Bingcheng's spearhead had a short, tapered spike on each side. If it were against an unarmored enemy, his strike would have pierced through skin and into flesh, but every Bayala wore perfectly maintained Ming armor. Li Bingcheng's half-strength strike could only penetrate the gaps between the armor plates, slightly piercing the leather. While the puncture wound was nearly ineffective, blunt force wounds were still possible.

The sweep of the pure steel spear caused internal injuries to Na Bayala, but they weren't fatal. Na Bayala was already in a frenzy of adrenaline, his pain nerves almost completely numb. He instinctively turned and unleashed a chain hammer attack on Li Bingcheng, who was attacking him.

The standard melee weapon of the Bayalas was essentially this simple, inexpensive weapon, yet once properly hammered, it could disregard armor and inflict severe damage. However, the chain hammer had a significant disadvantage: it couldn't be made very long, otherwise its swing would be very slow. Even with a wooden handle, it was only slightly longer than a typical saber. Compared to Li Bingcheng's steel spear, its range was simply insufficient.

Li Bingcheng had anticipated Bayala's counterattack. Having wielded the spear his entire life, he could tell whether a previous attack would be lethal simply by the feedback from the spear barrel. Furthermore, he was constantly monitoring the enemy's movements. The moment Bayala swung his chain hammer, he had already predicted the hammer's trajectory.

In his rage, Bayala didn't strike the larger torso, but instead swung his hammer head at Li Bingcheng's head. He wanted to smash the fool's head into pieces, just like he had done before. The sound of skull and helmet shattering was truly intoxicating.

Li Bingcheng, who was well prepared, moved his lumbar and cervical vertebrae at the same time, tilted his head and turned sideways, perfectly dodging the attack.

The Bayala cried out after missing the first blow. The men who could become Bayalas were not fools, but elite warriors. Li Bingcheng's smooth evasion made him instinctively realize that this man was extremely dangerous. He pulled back his hammer and tried to strike again, but he had no chance.

Li Bingcheng was more skilled. As he dodged, he began to push back with his arms. The moment Bayala's strike missed, Li Bingcheng was already poised for a counterattack. He held the middle of the spear with his left hand, the butt of the spear with his right. Then, Li Bingcheng leaned forward, exerting force with his right hand, and the spear flew out like a dragon!

The tip of the gun was against the steel throat guard and pierced precisely from Nabayala's chin, passing through the lower jaw, into the upper jaw, and into the ventricle.

After this heavy blow, Bayala's eyes went dark and his mind went blank. His brain was damaged and his muscles lost control. He could no longer hold the chain hammer.

Li Bingcheng did not linger on the aftertaste of the killing, and retracted his spear again like a dragonfly skimming the water.

By this time, Jibu Keda's army had been completely embedded in Li Bingcheng's, unable to dislodge itself. This Ming army was completely different from any he had encountered before. Previously, he had only heard of the extraordinary bravery of He Shixian, the commander of Shenyang, but had never imagined that Fengji would also possess such a brave and elite force.

Jibukeda was extremely anxious and smashed the heads of several Ming soldiers, but he still could not lead his men out of Li Bingcheng's army.

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As the two armies clashed, the musketeers who had disengaged had already finished reloading. However, Li Bingcheng did not order his retainers to disengage. He decided to change his tactics. Since this group of slave soldiers was so reckless and dared to charge recklessly, he would simply surround and annihilate them, crushing them to pieces.

After stabbing another short-armored soldier to death, Li Bingcheng retreated to a relatively safe place under the protection of his personal followers. After making sure that there were no slave soldiers around who could threaten him, he placed his spear horizontally on the saddle and then shot a new whistling arrow diagonally into the battle formation.

At this time, shouting was useless because no one could hear them. The only way to convey different commands was to use different sound structures of arrows. And this one meant to surround them.

Upon hearing the order, two groups of light cavalry immediately joined the battlefield, attempting to disperse the Eight Banners soldiers and cut them into small encirclements. However, Jibukeda and his Bayalas were no ordinary men, and how could they allow themselves to be slaughtered by the Ming army?

The more the Ming army clashed, the more the Jin army united.

Li Bingcheng's expression gradually darkened. If he had encountered such an enemy force at any other time, he would have been determined to destroy them. But now, Li Bingcheng had already begun to consider retreating.

You know, the information reported by the guards was that the slave bandits were coming out in full force. It was impossible to arrange only such an elite cavalry to serve as outer cover.

Bang! Another green firework burst into the sky. This was the information sent back by Ma Tan.

This time, Li Bingcheng not only saw the flames of the fireworks, but also heard the sound of the fireworks exploding.

"Oh!!" The Jin army, whose morale had been dwindling due to their disadvantage, was lifted by the Ming army's signal. Even if they didn't know what green represented, they still remembered that the Ming army's cavalry scouts had sent the same signal when they encountered them. The support of the four left wing flags was nearby.

Li Bingcheng knew he couldn't fight any longer. He pulled out a few whistling arrows from his bow pouch and quickly shot them into the glued-together battle formation. These whistling arrows meant the same thing: retreat!
After the signal arrows were fired, the outer cavalry, under the command of their respective captains, began to withdraw from the battlefield in an orderly manner, maneuvering towards the designated retreat point. Meanwhile, Li Bingcheng once again grabbed his spear and charged into the battle line. The retainers needed his command.

After the Ming army's outer cavalry had completely left the battlefield, the heavily armored retainers also gathered around the general, fighting and retreating. From then on, the Ming and Jin camps were completely separated, like oil and water, although they were combined, they did not blend.

"Attack!" Jibu Keda would not allow the Ming army to retreat. He wanted to stick to the Ming army's heavy cavalry and create an opportunity for the supporting friendly forces to encircle them. So, after reorganizing his formation, he immediately turned his horse and rushed forward. "Kill!"

Li Bingcheng was also prepared for this. When the two groups of close-combat light cavalry withdrew from the battle, the group of musket cavalry did not retreat with them.

Previously, the heavily armored formation had shielded them while they reloaded their ammunition. Now, it was their turn to return to the battlefield, using their muskets to slow the enemy, giving the heavily armored formation an opportunity to retreat calmly. The cavalry captain, with his nearly unscathed musket formation, quickly closed in on the enemy's flank, risking a distance of fifty paces between them, remaining relatively stationary. "Fire!"

Jibu Keda was a veteran of many battles. Even after a long battle, he hadn't lost his fundamental ability to see and hear. He noticed the approach of the musketeers. This distance was far more dangerous than the previous volley. Therefore, he could only make a more aggressive evasive maneuver in the opposite direction of the musketeers.

The evasive maneuver reduced the damage caused to the Jin army by the volley, but it also allowed Li Bingcheng's heavy cavalry to escape a distance that Jibu Keda could no longer catch up.

"Huh." Li Bingcheng breathed a sigh of relief. At least he didn't have to send anyone else to die as a cover.

"Ah!" Jibukeda roared angrily, slowed down helplessly, and watched the Ming army withdraw from the battlefield.

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Only a quarter of an hour after the two armies broke off the battle, support from the other three flags on the left wing of the Jin army arrived together.

The reinforcements from the Plain Blue Banner were led by Bayala Jiala'e and Shumulu Buha, while those from the Bordered Yellow Banner were not Jurchen cavalry, but "Han troops" led by Tong Yangzhen, a surrendered man from Fushun. The reinforcements from the Plain White Banner were led by its leader, the Fourth Prince Huang Taiji.

The reinforcements from the Plain White, Plain Blue and Bordered Yellow Banners gathered halfway, and together with the elite cavalry from the Bordered White Banner in Jibukeda's main camp, the number of people exceeded two thousand, almost accounting for more than half of the elite cavalry from the four banners on the left wing.

"I am honored to meet the Fourth Prince." Jibu Keda saluted Huang Taiji on his horse.

"Where are the Ming army?" Huang Taiji asked, waving his hand.

Jibu Keda pointed in the direction Li Bingcheng had evacuated and said, "He fled in that direction."

"Did they fight?" Huang Taiji couldn't help but frown as he looked at the mess on the ground.

"Yes," Jibu Keda said with a bit of shame. "We rushed for a while."

"Du Du sent someone to tell me that the Ming army has only a hundred light cavalry scouts. It seems that there are more than that?" Huang Taiji took a look and saw that the number of dead and wounded lying on the ground was almost more than a hundred.

"Yes." Jibu Keda unconsciously lowered his proud head. "We encountered the main force of Fengji Fort."

"Oh, it seems so." Huang Taiji knew that Jibu Keda was underestimating the enemy and advancing rashly. But he did not rebuke Jibu Keda. He simply said, "Gather the remains of the warriors and then return." Huang Taiji waved the reins and said to the generals of the Zhenglan and Huangqi flags, "Let's go."

"I'm not afraid to go back." Jibu Keda didn't want to go back just like that. The Eight Banners were used to fighting with favorable winds, and they believed that a one-to-one exchange with the Ming army would be a loss. And looking at the corpses scattered on the ground, it was hard to say whether it was a one-to-one match.

Jibu Keda wanted to redeem himself and redeem himself from the shame. But Huang Taiji said firmly, "This is an order. I want you to take the remains and the wounded back to the Bordered White Banner headquarters now!"

"Yes." Although Jibu Keda was a general of the Bordered White Banner, Huang Taiji, as the leader of the Plain White Banner, could not normally give him orders. However, in this operation, Huang Taiji was appointed by Nurhaci as the commander of the left wing, so Jibu Keda had no choice but to obey.

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Jibu Keda collected the bodies of his companions, reduced the surviving Ming soldiers to corpses, and stripped them of their armor and clothing before returning to the Bordered White Banner's formation with the wounded. Dudu had learned of the discovery of the Ming army's main cavalry through the men Jibu Keda had sent back not long ago, but he hadn't yet known that Jibu Keda had already engaged in a fierce battle with the Ming army.

"Why are you back?" Du Du asked.

"The Fourth Prince ordered me to come back." Jibu Keda swallowed.

"Why?" Du Du instinctively thought of last year's controversy over the abolition of the heir and some recent bad rumors.

"Maybe it's because I lost the battle." Jibu Keda was quite honest.

"A defeat?" Du Du was about to ask when he saw the wounded, both lightly and seriously, being brought back. It was then that he realized Jibu Keda was covered in blood. "How did they lose? How many casualties were there?!" Du Du asked excitedly.

Jibu Keda briefly recounted his battles with the Ming army, concluding: "Thirty-one were killed, twenty-four were seriously injured, and forty-eight were slightly injured. Ming army."

"I don't want to hear about the Ming army's casualties!" Before he finished listening, Du Du's anger flared up. He almost roared, "Take off your helmet!"

"What?" Jibu Keda was puzzled.

"I told you to take off your helmet!" Dudu repeated his words in a louder voice.

"Yes." Jibu Keda did as he was told.

Snapped!
Du Du completely ignored the fact that Jibu Keda was almost the same age as Nurhaci. He swung his right arm and smacked Jibu Keda's left cheek. "You bastard, who told you to charge the enemy? I remember I told you to chase the scout away. Are you getting senile? Or did that scout give you a false order?"

(End of this chapter)