The city's garrison consisted of 500 infantrymen and more than 4,000 auxiliary troops. Now half of the 500 infantrymen have been killed, and more than 700 of the more than 4,000 auxiliary soldiers have been killed. Three of the four city walls have fallen into the hands of the Ming army. The elite soldiers of the Xi Army were heartbroken and secretly thought that the fort they were holding on to was about to be undefended.
That Xiao Tianma suddenly remembered a legend from the year before last. It was said that when the Baizhao envoys entered Dagou City in Cangzhou the year before last, they encountered a troop full of firearms. The army defeated Yeli Hongguang who was attacking the city. In the end, Yeli Hongguang gave all the warriors from hundreds of soldiers to the Song army for military exploits, and only a thousand miscellaneous soldiers fled back. Could it be that this Song army was what he encountered? As he thought about it, Xiao Tianma Jing became afraid.
How could the flesh and blood bodies of the Khitan soldiers withstand the intense fire of muskets? After leaving more than 500 corpses, the Khitan soldiers did not dare to fight back against the southern city wall. They hid near the northern city wall and tried to make a last stand in panic. Waiting for them were ten thousand soldiers of the Tiger Division holding rifles. Soldiers from the Huben Division rushed to the top of the city one after another, holding rifles in hand and pressing towards the Khitan soldiers on the north wall.
There are no battlements on the inside of the city wall, so the Khitan soldiers who gathered densely on the north wall became the best target for the soldiers of the Huben Division. The soldiers in the front row of the Selection Regiment were the first to enter the shooting range, raising their guns and shooting from 200 meters away. Just one volley from more than two hundred people in the front row killed more than a hundred Khitan soldiers who tried to defend the northern city wall.
Seeing that all four walls were occupied by the Song army. When Xiao Tianma, the leader of the Khitan soldiers, saw the Song army's devastating offensive, he no longer had the confidence to fight despite being trapped. He shouted "Retreat!" and jumped off the north wall. After rolling around on the ground, he got up and ran away to the north.
Seeing their leader escaping, the Khitan soldiers' fighting spirit collapsed. In just one morning, more than a thousand Khitan soldiers died at the hands of the Ming army. How to fight this battle? As soon as the leader Xiao Tianma escaped, the Khitan auxiliary soldiers and servants lost their fighting spirit. Although these auxiliary soldiers and handymen had a sense of superiority against the Song army, their morale was extremely limited in the face of the heavy blow of facts. The army was defeated like a mountain. More than a thousand Khitan soldiers on the north wall lost their flags, drums and horns and jumped down after Xiao Tianma. When the more than two thousand Khitan soldiers in the camp saw Xiao Tianma escaping, they no longer resisted. They rushed up the north city wall, jumped off the wall, and fled outside the city.
The Khitan army all jumped off the five-meter-high city wall like a group of penguins jumping into the sea, rolled on the ground several times, got up and chased Xiao Tianma. Outside the fort is soft soil, not as good as the cement floor of later generations. Khitan soldiers would not fall to their death if they jumped from a height of five meters. However, there were still some unlucky Khitan soldiers who broke their legs and fell to the ground screaming.
The soldiers of the Selective Front Regiment kept pressing forward and kept firing at the fleeing Khitan soldiers. At first, only a few hundred soldiers from the Selective Regiment entered the firing range, but soon the soldiers behind them ran up. They rushed to the north of the east and west walls and shot at the fleeing Khitan troops.
During their escape, the Khitan army was attacked by the vanguard group on the city wall, which made them even more panicked. The fleeing Khitan army was like a swarm of ants, with people constantly being shot and falling down. The people behind were still rushing towards the city wall, hoping to escape from the north wall. However, the width of the stone steps leading up to the city wall was limited, and only three people could pass at a time. The Khitan soldiers were crowded under the stone steps, making them the best target for the soldiers of the Selection Front Regiment.
More than a thousand Khitan troops who were standing on the city wall jumped over the wall and all escaped. Most of the more than 2,000 Khitan troops who fled quickly climbed up the city wall and jumped down. The thousand Khitan soldiers who were still shooting at the front selection group in the south of the camp were not so lucky. The width of the stone steps leading to the city wall was limited. They squeezed under the stone steps and could not get up. The soldiers of the Selected Front Regiment shot them down one by one.
Blood flowers were like fireworks, blooming continuously on the crowded Khitan soldiers. This is no longer war, this is massacre. As the soldiers of the Selection Corps fired, the piles of corpses became thicker and thicker under the northern city wall. Finally, there were two or three layers of Qing corpses piled on every patch of ground. The blood flowed together, like a stream, flowing under the corners of the city wall.
Four thousand Khitan soldiers threw eight or nine more corpses under the north city wall, and only three thousand people escaped from this small fort. In the end, all the Khitan soldiers who had not escaped from the city wall were killed, and the battlefield became quiet. Yang Bamei climbed up the city wall, looked at the battlefield, and shouted: "The vanguard group is on horseback to chase down the defeated troops!"
The two thousand soldiers of the Selection Regiment immediately took action, returned to the south city wall, climbed up from the ladder, and found their horses behind the artillery position. They galloped towards the north and pursued the Khitan army, which was defeated. The vanguard group galloped north and divided into ten groups to search for the Khitan's defeated troops. After chasing for two quarters of an hour, a group of cavalry met the Khitan army who was following Xiao Tianma and escaping to the northeast.
The soldiers of the Selective Front Regiment wanted to rush forward and attack with horseback, but the Khitan auxiliary soldiers turned around and started shooting arrows, forcing the soldiers of the Selective Front Regiment back. The cavalry stopped their horses a hundred meters away, loaded their rifles, and fired at the Khitan soldiers. There was another scream from the fleeing Khitan soldiers, and more than a hundred Khitan soldiers were shot to death. The Khitan soldiers were so frightened that they no longer dared to organize themselves and escape, so they dispersed one after another. The soldiers of the Selection Regiment laughed loudly, jumped off their horses, cut off their heads, and hung the heads on their saddles. Then they chased the defeated soldiers on horseback and shot the fleeing Khitan soldiers one by one with rifles.
Another massacre. Finally, when more than two hundred cavalrymen stopped chasing and rode back to the camp with their heads hanging on their heads, they had already chased and killed more than eight hundred Khitan soldiers. After the cavalry returned, all the heads of the Khitan soldiers in the city had been cut off. Yang Bamei counted the heads and found that in this battle, 2,441 Khitan soldiers were killed and 342 wounded Tatars were captured.
This is a big win.
On Yang Bamei's side, thirty-seven people were slightly injured, seventeen were seriously injured, and fourteen were killed. These casualties were all caused by the archers of the Khitan soldiers. Yang Peng looked at the casualties and comforted Yang Bamei, secretly saying that after returning from this battle, he would ask the blacksmith to build stronger armor for the soldiers to reduce the casualties in the exchange of fire with the Khitan soldiers.
Yang Bamei handed the wounded to Shen Yuji's medical team and asked the military doctors to seize the time to treat the wounded. Shen Yuji's surgeons quickly mobilized to clean up the houses in the fort and set up a field hospital.
Yang Peng asked the soldiers to open the south gate and led the troops to ride into the fort. The military households of the Song Dynasty in the fort had probably been killed by Khitan soldiers, or had been looted. At this time, the fort was empty. Yang Peng found the granary and found bags of grain. The grains were packed in linen bags and were obviously looted by Khitan soldiers. They were piled up like hills in the granary, weighing at least 20,000 stones.
With this food, Kou Zhun's 30,000 troops and horses will not go hungry. Yang Peng checked in the fort and found another silver vault. Opening the bank, Yang Peng found boxes and boxes of silver of various colors piled up in the room. The silver included silver ingots and broken silver, which were all trophies of the Khitan soldiers. Yang Peng asked the soldiers to count and found that there were 236,000 taels of silver in the warehouse.
Yang Peng secretly thought that the money should not be cheap. He sent an order to reward each soldier of Huben Division with ten taels of silver. The two thousand cavalrymen of Yang Bamei's charge were rewarded with twenty taels of silver each. The remaining silver was collected by the baggage soldiers, and after returning to Tianjing New City, they would also reward the disabled and the families of the fallen in this battle.
After receiving the reward from the imperial edict, Kou Zhun distributed the internal money rewarded by the officials to the entire army, leaving only five taels of silver for himself to make a wine glass as a souvenir. Although the thirty thousand soldiers did not receive much money, they were all very excited when they learned that Master Kou was like this. Now that the army has sufficient food and pay, in the evening, a celebration banquet was held in the Hanjiazhuang Administrative Hall.
When Yang Peng entered the tent, generals from all walks of life were already filling the hall. Yang Peng saw an empty seat next to Shi Pingzhang among the Huaihua generals. He was about to sit in when he saw Kou Zhun's general Chen An, who was sitting at the top of the generals, stood up and said loudly: " Lord City Lord, take my seat!"
Yang Peng was stunned, and said with cupped hands: "The general is just a city lord, let's sit at the bottom!" The other generals laughed, and Shi Pinghu said: "It's all thanks to the city lord that we have food and grass to eat, what else can we do? Humble?" Other generals also said: "The Lord of the City has won a series of great victories in the past few days, but we have not made any achievements! If the Lord of the City does not take the first place, we will not be able to eat and drink!"
Shi Pingzhang also cursed loudly: "What kind of generals are there? Yang Peng's troops are much stronger than our general soldiers!" Yang Peng looked at Kou Zhun, and Kou Zhun also nodded and said: "The city lord has made outstanding contributions, but Rank first!" Yang Peng then walked up to Chen An, bowed to Chen An, and sat in the first position.
Sitting in the first place, he felt like he was being valued. Yang Peng felt that the generals looked at him with a little more respect. When Shi Pinghu saw Yang Peng sitting next to him, he patted the table and said, "The other day the city lord said he wanted to attack Hanjiazhuang. I still don't believe that we can capture Hanjiazhuang within four days. If I had known that the city lord's men were so good at fighting, I would have definitely followed. , also chased and killed dozens of Khitan soldiers! Get some military exploits!"
Shi Pingzhang smiled and said: "I didn't believe that the Lord of the City could capture Hanjiazhuang at the beginning. Who knew that it only took two days to break the city! With such brave horses as the Lord of the City in the army, I really am not afraid of the Khitans anymore!" Shi Pinghu He said loudly: "When I heard about Lord City Lord's military exploits, all the sergeants under my command were greatly encouraged. They thought it would be easy to kill the Khitans. They were all eager to fight, and their morale was completely different!"
While the generals were lamenting there, Captain Zhang Yan suddenly said: "Your Majesty, Lord of the City, formed an army with firearms. May I ask the key to it? I want to imitate Lord Lord of the City in his organization, how should I start?" Hearing Zhang Yan's words, all the generals stopped. With emotion, everyone looked at Yang Peng. Yang Peng's troops and horses were so powerful that all the generals were eager to learn from him.
Kou Zhun was also very interested in this topic and turned to look at Yang Peng. Yang Peng secretly said goodbye to being asked about the secret of his rifled rifle by these Song generals. He thought about it and said: "The key to firearms is precision! The key parts of my fire blunderbuss are all made of fine steel. It has a flint ignition and a firing rate of 9. Cheng Duo, a fire gun costs fifteen taels! And my soldiers practice fire guns every day, so that they can hit 80-90% of the time on the battlefield. With such intensity of training, a fire gun will be destroyed every three months pistol!"
Hearing Yang Peng's words, the generals were stunned. According to Yang Peng, the monthly maintenance cost of the fire blunderbuss for light training is five taels of silver per person. What is burned is not a fire blunderbuss, but silver. ! Other generals of the Song Dynasty sometimes couldn't pay their soldiers even one tael of silver a month. How could they have so much money to maintain such a firearms army?
Yang Peng was so rich that he used private property to support his troops, so he could play like this. The money Yang Peng spent raising 10,000 soldiers and horses was enough for other military attachés to raise 30,000 soldiers and horses. If other Song generals learn from Yang Peng's method of raising armies, what will the court say when it comes to select soldiers and horses? That I raised elite soldiers? Who believes it? Doesn’t Yan Guan want to participate in your book and get paid for free? After listening to Yang Peng's words, everyone no longer wanted to imitate Yang Peng's firearms army. They all raised their glasses and said, "Drink!"
On November 3, Kou Zhun and Yang Peng's troops arrived at Jinghai Town and encountered a Khitan army. There were about 15,000 Khitan troops on that road. The middle army was holding a gold-woven dragon banner high and was besieging Jinghai City. The traps and holes outside Jinghai City have all been filled up by the Khitan army's chariots. The defenders in Jinghai City struggled to hold on, and the city was breached in only one or two days. Kou Zhun's reinforcements came at the right time. In a few days, they would have to collect the corpses of the city's defenders.
Seeing more than 20,000 Song troops approaching, the attacking Khitan army reluctantly abandoned Jinghai City and set up a formation under the city to face the Song troops. The Khitan army has rarely failed against the Song army in recent years, and one thousand Khitan troops can often chase two or three thousand Song troops. Although the Khitan army under the city was only more than half of the Song army, it was obvious that the Khitan army believed that the Song army was vulnerable and useless in large numbers. They felt that they could defeat the Song army of more than 20,000 people.
Yang Peng captured a few Tatar prisoners, pointed to the Khitan army flag in the distance and asked them: "Which Khitan army is that?" The general translated Yang Peng's Chinese into Khitan, and the prisoners looked at the Khitan army in the distance. After looking at the Khitan army flag for a while, he replied: "That is the flag of Hu Yuan, the training envoy of Youzhou regiment!"
Li Zhi asked again: "How many vests and infantry does Hu Yuan have?" The prisoners said: "Now the Khitan soldiers are all divided into three major camps. During war, troops and horses are distributed from the camps to Commander Hu Yuan as needed. The troops are all temporarily allocated, and we don’t know how many horse armors and how many infantry armors there are on this route!”
Yang Peng asked his men to give these Tatars a few whips, beating them alive until they were bloody and painful. However, these Tatars screamed and screamed, but they still did not change their words.
Yang Peng then let these Tatars live and asked the soldiers to take them under custody. Yang Peng rode up to Kou Zhun's central army. Kou Zhun and three generals were discussing the strategy of defeating the enemy in front of the map. Seeing Yang Peng coming, Kou Zhun said happily: "Your Majesty, the city lord has arrived just in time. We are dividing the flanks and discussing how to defeat this Khitan army!"
Kou Zhun thought for a while and then asked: "The city lord has captured many prisoners. Do these prisoners know who the Khitan general opposite is?" Yang Peng raised his hand and said: "A living confession, the Khitan leader opposite is Hu Yuan, the training envoy of Youzhou regiment!" It turns out to be Hu Yuan!" Shi Pinghu said loudly: "I heard that Hu Yuan is considered to be brave and good at fighting in the Khitan clan, but because his mother was from a lowly background, he has only been made a regimental envoy, not a noble."
Kou Zhun nodded and said: "Hu Yuan is leading the army on the opposite side. It should not be underestimated. It is a tough battle." Yang Peng handed over his hands and said: "The last general is willing to be the east wing and attack the Khitan's right flank!"
When several other generals saw Yang Peng's request, they also said: "We are willing to guard the right flank of the army for the west wing."
Kou Zhun nodded and said: "Okay, then I will lead the standard army as the central army!" Kou Zhun stood up and said loudly: "Everyone, we will go into battle to kill the enemy! You are all high-ranking officials and nobles, and your rewards will be great. Emperor's En, this is the moment!" Shi Pingzhang and others shouted loudly: "Here!"
Everyone returned to the military formation, asked the soldiers to put on their armor, grab their bows and knives, and enter combat mode. The 25,000 Song army soldiers and horses were like a huge machine, moving slowly and forming a formation. Yang Peng rode on his horse and observed Kou Zhunbiao's military camp in full gear. He felt that the four thousand soldiers were quite tough. At first glance, they looked like veterans who had seen blood. Most of these soldiers wore cotton armor with iron plates inside. Each of them held a broadsword and fought in formation. They seemed to have good combat effectiveness.
These soldiers are all professional soldiers who receive military pay. In terms of fighting skills, they are not inferior to the soldiers of Yang Peng's Huben Division. Even against the Khitan army with the same number of people, these soldiers can sustain themselves for a period of time. Of course, compared with the Huben Division who used rifles and crossbows to kill enemies, their combat power seemed very bleak.
Yang Peng rode in the middle army of Huben Division and called Huyan Chijin. "You lead 2,400 soldiers and horses to guard the westernmost flank of our Huben Division, bordering the Governor's Biao Army. You ask the 1,000 and 200 people closest to Kou Zhun's Biao Army to release the Khitan soldiers a hundred steps away. Shoot, don’t let Lord Kou discover that our rifles can hit one hundred and forty steps!”
"The remaining 1,200 people are a few hundred steps away from Master Kou's troops. Master Kou cannot see clearly. He can fire at one hundred and forty steps!" Huyan Chijin said in confusion: "It takes only one hundred steps to open fire. The firepower is insufficient. What should I do?" Yang Peng said: "Don't be afraid, I will place fifty powerful crossbows in your formation. When the time comes, I will use the powerful crossbows to kill the Khitan soldiers. How can the Khitan soldiers withstand it?"
Huyan Chijin then replied: "My subordinates obey!" Yang Peng nodded and asked Huyan Chijin to arrange the arrangements. The fifty strong crossbows of the Selection Group quickly heard the order and were deployed in Huyan Chijin's army, scattered among various companies. As soon as Yang Peng arranged his troops, he saw Kou Zhunzhong's military command flags waving in the distance. Kou Zhun ordered all the troops to advance and force the Khitan army under the city.
Yang Peng also asked the flag to be raised and the whole army moved forward. When the Khitan army saw that the Ming army was coming from the left, center and right, they also came over from the left, center and right. Hu Yuan saw that the Song army had many people on both wings, so he placed 6,000 people on the west wing, 6,000 people on the east wing, and left only 3,000 people in the middle. Those who challenged Yang Peng's east wing of the Song Army were six thousand soldiers from the east wing of the Khitan Army.
Yang Peng raised his telescope and looked around, and saw that the Khitans were all riding horses, about a quarter were in horse armor, a quarter were in infantry, and the remaining half were auxiliary soldiers. The Khitan soldiers jumped off their horses in front of the formation and stepped forward to fight. The Khitan are a fishing and hunting people. Although they have many horses, they are best at fighting on foot. Whether it is a Khitan spearman or an archer, their combat effectiveness is much stronger when they are on horseback than when they are on horseback.
But they didn't understand that Yang Peng's side was full of firearms, and the slow sprint speed of the infantry would turn the two hundred meters in front of the formation into a Shura hell. Yang Peng asked the entire army to form a four-row deep horizontal formation, preparing to launch four rows of rounds.
Kou Zhun's central army blew the horn of attack, and each army moved forward to kill Hu Yuan's army in formation below the city. Not to be outdone, Hu Yuan's 15,000 Khitan troops also blew their horns and pressed against the Song army. At a distance of six hundred meters, five hundred meters, and four hundred meters, the two armies were approaching quickly. The distance was 300 meters, 250 meters, 200 meters. The Khitans rushing over from a distance were already very close. Huyan Chijin could already see the ferocious expressions of the Tatars clearly with his naked eyes. The Khitan soldiers seemed to despise the Song army led by a woman in front of them. They rushed up quickly, howling, and many of them even had evil smiles on their faces.
Yang Peng's one hundred and forty six-power crossbows fired. One hundred and forty powerful crossbows spurted out tongues of fire and shot more than a thousand long arrows at the ignorant Khitan soldiers. The damage caused by these long arrows is devastating. With the sound of the crossbow, a storm of blood and water immediately erupted in front of the Khitan army's formation. More than a thousand long arrows swept through everything in the front row, piercing the bodies of the Khitan soldiers with or without armor, and shot out the bodies of the Khitan soldiers who thought they were strong, and the armor they were proud of. It's as fragile as a piece of paper. Passing through the body of the first row of Khitan, the long arrow can even kill one Khitan soldier and then continue to pierce back, killing the second Khitan soldier in the back row.
The blood was like flowers that bloomed collectively in June. They bloomed suddenly in front of the Khitan army. The flowers connected one by one and formed a surface, like a red picture of beautiful flowers. It was extremely gorgeous, but it suddenly disappeared. Taking the lives of a thousand Khitan soldiers. Thousands of Khitan soldiers in the front row suddenly collapsed and fell to the ground, screaming or not screaming, dying or screaming. Broken limbs and pieces of meat were everywhere, and pieces of intestines and various organs were scattered on the ground. Blood burst out from the corpses and flowed out in the lowlands in front of the battle, forming countless streams. The Khitan soldiers behind were immediately stunned.
After all, what happened next will be explained later.
