The God of War Who Protects the Nation: Starting with Saving a Mother and Daughter in Distress

"We've been tricked!"

Upon seeing Li Jing's appearance, Cao Deren gritted his teeth and spat out those three words.

The moment he saw Li Jing appear, he completely understood what kind of trick Qin An was playing.

Clearly, Qin An's being attacked and chased by Wang Cong was all a scheme to lure him out of the city.

He used himself as bait, handing over the real command of the war to Li Jing.

Upon realizing this, Cao Deren's hand holding the knife trembled, not from fear, but from anger.

He had never suffered such a great loss in all his years of fighting, having been completely outmaneuvered by two young juniors in a single act.

At the same time, he was also shocked by Qin An's audacity.

He actually dared to act out this feigned defeat so realistically.

"Isn't he afraid that it might turn out to be real? Or is he really that confident in this young man, Li Jing?" This question arose in Cao Deren's mind.

However, when he thought about Li Jing's previous behavior, he felt somewhat powerless to refute it.

"Retreat! Retreat to Bridgehead City!" he finally roared, his voice cutting off halfway through, "Everyone, head west! Stop fighting! Move!"

But it was too late.

The 5,000 troops had been broken into more than a dozen small, independent groups, each being suppressed and beaten by the government troops.

Some tried to retreat westward, but they couldn't break through the encirclement; they were surrounded by flashing swords and hoofbeats from all sides.

Some people lost their weapons and wanted to surrender, but in the chaos, no one paid attention to accepting their surrender. Horse hooves trampled them from behind, burying them in the mud.

In such a chaotic situation, Cao Deren's command became completely ineffective, and everyone was like headless flies.

Only the few hundred men around him could hear his commands.

The situation was getting worse and worse, and Cao Deren couldn't care less about anything else.

In such a situation, preserving even a portion of one's strength is better than being completely annihilated.

More importantly, I can't afford to die here.

In that critical moment, he couldn't think of anything else. He led his men and rode westward.

He was followed by hundreds of men who fled with him.

As for the rest, we can only leave it to fate.

Seeing Cao Deren escape, Li Jing had no intention of letting him go easily.

Under his command, government cavalrymen continuously emerged from the shadows on both sides of the official road to intercept them.

For every group that charged out, someone from Cao Deren's side was cut down from their horse.

After running for two miles, only two or three hundred people remained.

"General Cao! This way!" a guard shouted from the front.

Cao Deren spurred his horse and followed, not daring to look back, as the screams and shouts of killing behind him chased after him like a tide.

The night wind blew through the gaps in the armor, chilling it to the bone.

Cao Deren cracked his whip, and the warhorse neighed and accelerated.

After running for an unknown amount of time, the outline of Qiaotoucheng finally emerged from the night.

"Open the gate! Open the gate now!" Cao Deren shouted at the top of his lungs before his horse even reached the city walls.

Someone poked their head out from the city wall and asked something, but Cao Deren didn't hear clearly. He just kept banging on the gate: "Open the gate! It's me, Cao Deren! Open the city gate quickly!"

The city gate creaked open a crack.

When Cao Deren spurred his horse into the gate, he almost fell off his horse, but he held on tightly to the front of the saddle to keep his balance.

The two or three hundred men behind them squeezed in.

Some horses had arrows stuck in their legs and were still bleeding, while others had half of their armor sliced ​​off.

After the two groups of people rushed in, the city gates began to slowly close.

Cao Deren reined in his horse and gasped for breath, feeling as if his chest was stuffed with a lump of burning coal.

He bent down and braced himself against the horse's neck for a few breaths before straightening up.

Before I could even catch my breath, I suddenly heard a series of short, rapid sounds of blades clashing behind me.

Cao Deren turned around abruptly, his pupils suddenly contracting.

Inside the city gate, quite a few of the hundreds of remnants of the army who had just followed him into the city suddenly turned against him.

He drew his sword and slashed at the guards on both sides who were preparing to hold the gate open.

The two men at the front cleaved down the two soldiers guarding the door on the left with a single blow, their blood splattering onto the door panel and leaving two dark stains.

The others then lifted the bolts from the iron rings, and the city gate, which was only half-closed, was suddenly pushed open again.

"You..." Cao Deren's voice caught in his throat as he stared wide-eyed at the group of people.

The man on the right, whose face is half gray, is a veteran who has been with him for three years.

But the big guy on the left is definitely not one of our side.

He immediately understood that the enemy had taken the opportunity to infiltrate his defeated army.

But he was so focused on escaping that he never considered this problem, which led them into the city.

What terrified Cao Deren even more was that the big man smeared the grime on his face haphazardly, revealing a face with sharp, angular features.

He casually tossed aside the knife in his hand, then pulled out a gilded halberd and, with the ease of slicing vegetables, instantly felled all the guards at the city gate.

"Cao Deren, how have you been?" Yuwen Rong's voice struck Cao Deren like a thunderclap.

"Yuwen Rong?!" Cao Deren's voice suddenly shrieked, and cold sweat instantly broke out on his back.

He never expected that Yuwen Rong would also appear on this battlefield, and even mingle with his own troops.

This immediately gave him the feeling that he was hovering on the brink of death.

"If it weren't for the need to capture the city, I probably would have been beheaded long ago, wouldn't I?" This thought popped into his mind, and he felt a little fortunate.

Cao Deren was well aware that with Yuwen Rong's terrifying combat power, if he really wanted to kill him, a few hundred men would not be able to withstand him at all.

As numerous thoughts flashed through his mind, Cao Deren's body had already taken action.

He instinctively spurred his horse, wanting to gallop into the city.

With such a Grim Reaper by his side who could take his life at any moment, he no longer cared about the gains or losses of the city gate; he only wanted to get away from Yuwen Rong.

Fortunately, Yuwen Rong had no time to pay attention to Cao Deren at this moment.

Qin An's task for him was to guard the city gate and welcome the troops into the city.

He only glanced at Cao Deren's disheveled figure before turning his attention to the rebel army that had come to reinforce the city gate.

The rebels reacted quickly, sending a large and continuous stream of reinforcements.

Adding to the remaining troops that Cao Deren brought back, there are probably over a thousand men in total.

On the other hand, Yuwen Rong only had a dozen or twenty men, which seemed to be outnumbered and outmatched.

Faced with this situation, Yuwen Rong was not afraid at all; instead, a bloodthirsty smile appeared on his lips: "You scum? You think you can dance?"

Despite being outnumbered so many, he turned to the dozen or so men around him and said, "You just focus on guarding the city gate; leave the rest to me!"

Faced with numerous reinforcements, Yuwen Rong did not back down at all. Instead, he charged towards the rebel army alone on horseback!

The dozen or so rebel soldiers at the forefront gritted their teeth and charged forward with their knives raised.

Yuwen Rong neither dodged nor evaded, but swept his gilded halberd horizontally.

The first five people to rush forward were like withered leaves swept up by a gale.

The weapon snapped cleanly in two, and the man flew out and crashed into the doorway wall, the sound of bones shattering ringing out.

Such a tragic sound only fueled Yuwen Rong's ferocity.

With a backhand flick, the three spearmen charging from the right were deflected from below by the halberd, their spear shafts shattering and metal shavings flying everywhere.

The three bodies bent backward in extremely unnatural postures.

The remaining few finally realized they had to quit.

They staggered backward.

But the people behind kept pushing forward, and the two streams of people collided in front of the doorway.

Yuwen Rong spurred his horse forward and took a step. Just one step, and a large area that was only a few square steps in size immediately became empty.

These ordinary soldiers were truly like vegetables being chopped down in front of him, posing no obstacle whatsoever.

Despite the bloody scene, Yuwen Rong felt no discomfort whatsoever; on the contrary, he felt an immense sense of pleasure.

"Again!" he roared, his voice echoing through the doorway.

The vibrations made the iron rings on the city gate vibrate, and the hearts of everyone around them skipped a beat.

Intimidated by his imposing presence, no one dared to step forward for a moment.

The rebel reinforcements formed an arc around the entrance, their swords and spears pointed at the doorway, and not a single one dared to cross that invisible line.

Someone's hand holding a spear was trembling, the spearhead swaying like a reed in the wind.

Someone took a half step back, pretending to adjust their posture, but actually gave up half a foot of space.

The dozen or so soldiers in the front row looked at each other, and each of them could see the same thing in the other's eyes: fear.

"He's all alone..." A man who looked like a captain shouted through gritted teeth in the crowd, seemingly trying to convince himself and those around him, "Charge! Take back the city gate!"

His voice was dry and urgent, and he spurred his horse forward half a step.

Then he realized that no one was following him.

He looked back and saw that his usual confidants had all lowered their eyes.

Some people stepped back, some dodged to the side, and some looked down at their knives as if there was something on them worth studying.

"You..." The captain was momentarily dumbfounded, and almost vomited blood from anger.

"He...he's the number one Yuwen Rong in the world!" Someone muttered discontentedly as they met the captain's gaze.

Their attitude was already very clear; they were practically saying, "How much is the salary a month? Why are we risking our lives to be the best in the world?"

Just then, Yuwen Rong, caught up in the heat of the battle, suddenly roared, "Yuwen Rong is here! Come here, and I will grant you all death!"

The captain's horse began to back up.

He himself did not realize that his body had betrayed his will.

The warhorse swayed from side to side as its master tightened the reins, its hooves leaving white marks on the bluestone slabs.

Yuwen Rong immediately stood in the center of the doorway, his gilded halberd held horizontally in front of him, with corpses piled up haphazardly at his feet.

Blood gushed out along the drainage ditches on both sides of the doorway, gleaming darkly in the moonlight.

He was covered in blood, with half a broken knife still stuck in his shoulder armor, yet he stood ramrod straight, like a god of war rising from a pile of corpses.

At this moment, he truly exemplified what it means to be able to hold off ten thousand men!