"It's not that you don't report that the time has not come! You can't run away when the time comes! Damn it, it's finally time to collect the bill!"
The old herdsman returned home on horseback, taking his bewildered Mongolian wife and his son and daughter with him. The family began to move firewood and cow dung for the winter.
For herdsmen, firewood and cow dung for the winter are the life of the family. My wife can't even speak a few words in Chinese. When she saw that the man was trying to take away all the fuel for the winter, she suddenly became anxious.
But he never expected that the man who had never shed tears in his life would go crazy today, with tears streaming down his face and the horse whip hitting a woman for the first time.
"Move! Move them all to Changliuwei! Anyone who dares to talk nonsense should get out of this house!"
The head of the family was really angry, and the wife and children did not dare to make a fuss. They drove their horses and piled all the fuel in the house into the ruins.
The old man knelt beside the ruins of the beacon tower, kowtowed three times to the east and lit the beacon smoke. The Changliu Guards of Hami, who had been silent for a hundred years, once again played his military role.
The chess pieces laid by our ancestors on the land of the Western Regions can still reverse the chess game even if they become ruins a hundred years later!
"My child...my child, please remember...the Central Plains east of Xingxing Gorge is your hometown. It is your ancestral home! Your ancestral home..."
A Mongolian woman from Northern Xinjiang who had never been to the Central Plains in her life also knelt beside the beacon fire with the man, "You are the daughter-in-law of the Central Plains...remember you are the daughter-in-law of the Han family!"
Beacon smoke suddenly lit up in Changliuwei, Changsheng Dun and Geziyan Dun also suddenly erupted in beacon smoke. The three warning beacons finally alerted the rebels in Hami City.
Four thousand rebels gathered in Hami City. The sentries on the city wall were the first to notice the billowing smoke from the south and east. The frightened soldiers urgently sounded the alarm, and the city's fast-horse sentry team quickly went out of the city to investigate the enemy's situation.
The whole Hami was in chaos. In a small town with a population of 50,000 to 60,000 people, any disturbance would immediately spread throughout the city, and no one knew what was happening.
"What's going on? What happened... There's smoke coming out of the city!"
"Beacon smoke? Wasn't that built by the Han people? Could it be that..."
The sound of rolling horse hooves sounded on the street, loess flew up into the sky, and all the chattering people did not dare to speak and fled home!
"Curfew... the whole city is under martial law... no one is allowed to leave the city, everyone must go home..."
The Hami rebels were not fools. One look at the beacon smoke and they knew something big was going on in the east. Four thousand rebels gathered urgently and before the sentries returned, the large troops had already started to set off.
Just ten miles out of the city, they encountered two cavalrymen covered in blood and fled back, "Qing Yao... Thousands of Qing Yao... have already reached the grid smoke pier!"
"Sixteen sentries from our team escaped from just two of us..."
"What? Thousands of Qingyao came to Geziyan Dun?" The Hami rebel leader was shocked. "How did they get here? Did they fly here?"
"Didn't Xingxing Gorge be defended? How is this possible..."
Believe it or not, the wolf smoke does not lie. The furious rebel leader pulled out his sword and roared, "We four thousand warriors, can't we eat these thousand clear demons? Kill them...take back the Xingxing Gorge..."
"Kill..." The four thousand Aguba rebels rushed toward the southeast along the post road, and the sky was covered with darkness.
The rebels did not expect that Xu Zhanbiao's Shu army would be so cunning. The purpose of the three-pronged attack was not to fight decisively but to attract the enemy's attention.
The middle route army who reached Geziyandun didn't want to fight at all when they saw the enemy's main force. They relied on the superior performance of their Spencer and retreated after just one round of shooting. They stopped and walked around without engaging in a decisive battle with the enemy.
In an era when breech-loading guns were not yet popular, cavalry combat still relied heavily on bows, arrows, scimitars and spears, because loading ammunition on fast-moving horses was a technical job and impossible without several years of training.
The real widespread popularity of cavalry rifles will have to wait until bolt-action rifles begin to be installed, so that bullets can be loaded quickly while moving at high speeds.
The weapons in Agub's hands were even more backward than those of Tsarist Russia. Not to mention breech-loading guns and bolt-action rifles, even front-loading Mini rifles were not popular.
This group of cavalry was unlucky when they encountered the famous American gun Spencer. They couldn't catch up or hit them. Except for the bows and arrows shot down the wind, which could cause some casualties, they could only be passive. Get beaten.
In the Gobi desert, these Shu troops were playing with the rebels like walking dogs!
The two sides fought from noon to five o'clock in the afternoon. In the evening, the harassing Shu army on the south road suddenly made a left hook from the Kushuitang area to the flank of the battlefield, catching the enemy off guard.
More than 700 of the four thousand rebels died in battle on this day, and the distressed leader screamed!
It was not until six o'clock that the two thousand cavalry reinforcements from Hami joined the main force. The rebels had an absolute advantage. However, they did not expect that these Shu troops had no sense of military honor at all.
He turned around and ran away, directly back to the Xingxingxia defense line!
Only after the main force of the rebels saw the Xingxingxia defense line did they realize that the situation was over!
More than 30 fortresses have all flown the flag of the Qing army. Many fortresses actually sounded the sound of cannons, bombing the cavalry ranks. One cannon can kill dozens of lives!
"We can't move forward... Qingyao has arranged a new type of flower run! Damn it, damn it..."
"Pass my order and ask the defenders in Zhenxi Mansion, Barkol Lake, and Laoye Temple to assemble towards me! Hami City must be defended!"
"How could this happen...how could this happen...Why would the Qingyao attack in winter? Aren't they afraid of freezing to death..."
Who can not be afraid? Doesn’t Xu Zhanbiao feel sorry for his brother? After a day and night of bloody fighting, thousands of brothers suffered frostbite. Their hands and feet were red and swollen from the cold, and pus would ooze out in a few days.
The non-combat attrition is too serious. The bitter cold in winter in the Western Regions is simply unimaginable. Yesterday's night attack was an eye-opener for God, but it was only more than ten degrees below zero. In half a month, the nighttime temperature in the Hami area will reach minus twenty or thirty degrees or even lower!
"It's not the season for a decisive battle at all! We are here this time to give hope to those brothers in the Western Region who refuse to surrender!"
Hope is in the beacon smoke! The beacon fire in Tianshengdun has arrived in the Hexi Corridor after a day of development!
The beacon fires in Xingxing Gorge were also lit, and then Anxi Prefecture, Daquan Yu, Hongliu, Baidunzi...these beacon fires that had not been lit for hundreds of years were all lit.
The people in the entire Western Region and the Hexi Corridor area were stunned. This was a warning of war passed down from generation to generation. Who had seen it? They have only heard of the legend and never seen the lineup.
The beacon smoke formed a line on the earth, getting closer and closer to the Central Plains faster and faster!
The beacon fire in Guazhou City was lit, and the capital of Anxi Prefecture was in jubilation! Immediately afterwards, the beacon smoke continued to the west, Xiaowanyu, Luanshanzidun, Bulongji... until Yumen Pass!
The spring breeze did not pass through Yumen Pass, and the defenders of this thousand-year-old pass could see the wolf smoke in the west at a glance. "My ancestors! I have really seen the wolf smoke warning in my lifetime! It's so fucking spectacular!"
"Let's order too! Send a message to the commander!"
The beacon smoke of Yumen Pass is burning, Chijin Gorge, Caohu, Baiyang River, Qingtou Mountain Pass... after passing the mountain pass is Jiayuguan Pass!
Zuo Zongtang woke up suddenly in the middle of the night. Before he had put on his shoes, Liu Jintang rushed in from outside with a cry!
"Commander...the beacon fire in the Western Region has been lit!"
