Murong Shun left with five thousand cavalry. In addition to carrying him 10 days of dry food and the strongholds of the horse thieves, Li Ke also gave him several places to replenish supplies and food. In these places, Li Ke would station personnel, which would later develop into Several small towns became the main supply points on the southern route of the Silk Road.
"Go, let people prepare. Based on their progress, five days is enough to wipe out these horse bandits. We will be ready to take action in five days." Looking at the back of Murong Shun and others leaving, Li Ke said calmly.
"It's Your Highness!" Huo Gang behind him immediately saluted and prepared to make arrangements.
The horse bandits strongholds in Tuyuhun are not large-scale horse bandits. The largest wave may only have three or four hundred people. With Murong Shun's strength, there will be almost no casualties in annihilating these horse bandits.
In fact, Li Ke's guess was basically good. After Murong Shun led his team to leave, he studied the maps in his hands with several of his generals. Based on these maps, Murong Shun directly formulated relevant cleaning plans.
After spending a day first, Murong Shun asked his thousand cavalrymen who had learned the drag-knife fighting method to hand over this fighting method to others. He said it was to teach, but in fact it was just a demonstration several times to make sure that they all remembered it and then it was done. .
As for the rest, in the eyes of people like them, how to learn to fight is a matter on the battlefield. What is the use of just teaching?
Play a few more games and you'll be fine.
After completing the research, Murong Shun directly asked his generals to divide the five thousand cavalry into five teams according to the number of one thousand each, and then swept directly according to the target on the map. In just four days, Murong Shun directly defeated Tuyuhun, oh , no, to be precise, all the horse bandit strongholds in Xizhou were wiped out.
According to His Highness's rules, no, it has nothing to do with His Highness, it's his Murong Shun's order! Leave no one behind except the babies! In fact, there are not many babies among these horse bandits. As for whether they have other family strongholds or the like, no one knows. Even if they do, it doesn't matter. Do they dare to seek revenge from the Tang army? Not to mention the Tang army, if they knew their identity as horse bandits, the surrounding tribes would dare to teach them how to behave.
These tribes also suffered greatly. There were some women in the strongholds that Murong Shun had destroyed so far. Murong Shun did not keep them. The identity of these women was unknown. Who knows what kind of disaster they would cause if they were left behind? As for the murder, Murong Shun didn't have any psychological burden.
But what Murong Shun didn't know was that when he was cleaning up these horse bandit strongholds, a group of cavalry was setting up a place with good water and grass in the Hanyang Pass area near Longyou Road in Tuyuhun.
This place was originally the seat of a small tribe, but that small tribe was moved away by His Highness.
"Hurry up and put herders' clothes on their bodies. The clothes of the women's bodies are torn and exposed."
"Here, the tent was chopped with a knife! Leave some horse hoof prints."
"Boss, the bodies of two horse thieves were dragged here for a long time, and their faces were all mangled."
"What nonsense are you talking about? Where are the corpses of horse thieves here? They are all the corpses of herdsmen belonging to Tang Xizhou! If they are broken, then you can continue dragging the corpses around the camp twice to create a fun scene of dragging people to death. "
"Yes, yes, that's it, sprinkle more of the sheep's blood!"
"Has the route of that large caravan consisting of several caravans been determined?"
"It's sure. Our people have been following them from a distance. In half a day, they will definitely be able to get here, because this is the only oasis and water source nearby."
"Okay! After the arrangements are made, put up the flag of the Black Bandits and let's retreat."
"yes!"
A group of cavalry finally planted a flag with a black mountain peak on a white rag and a black letter written on it directly on the ground. Then they got on their horses and left here quickly in one direction. They would choose a Gobi with hard ground. Tan rode around here without leaving any horse hoof prints.
The scene where a small tribe was plundered by the Black Mountain Bandits, the largest group of horse thieves in the Western Regions, appeared here.
It didn't take a long time, but about four hours later, four mounted scouts from this large caravan had arrived here. They saw the flying Black Mountain bandit flag from a long distance away. When they saw that flag, the four scouts' His face turned pale instantly.
However, there were no cavalry nearby. They hesitated for a moment, then quickly rode here. When they saw this extremely miserable and massacred scene, everyone felt a little numb. They all said that the Black Mountain thieves were cruel. Today It was also their first time meeting them. The four scouts did not dare to hesitate and decisively turned around on horseback to report to the caravan.
After they returned to the caravan, the scouts directly found several caravan shopkeepers and reported what they saw to the shopkeepers.
"What should I do?" The faces of several shopkeepers were also a little pale. The Black Mountain Bandits are the largest group of horse thieves on the Silk Road. They have been wreaking havoc in the Western Regions for decades. It is said that there are thousands of horsemen. No one dares to offend the Black Mountain Bandits. Offend the Black Mountain Bandits. All were silenced, even babies.
But as long as you don't offend the Black Mountain bandits and don't offend them when the caravan encounters them, you will obediently give them whatever they want, and the other party usually won't do anything.
Moreover, these Black Mountain thieves are generally not excessive. As long as they have a small amount of property, they will not spend it all. Obviously, they also know very well that they cannot fish in the marsh.
Therefore, Black Mountain bandits have always been synonymous with cruelty and rules in the Western Regions, and almost all caravans traveling to and from the Western Regions know this.
But they didn't expect the Black Bandits to appear here.
"Didn't you hear what the garrison said to the place we were walking to before? His Highness King Qin made it known that any abnormality encountered in the territory of Xizhou must be reported to the garrison! This is now the territory of the Tang Dynasty!" A four-year-old said The teenage shopkeeper said coldly.
"But...if we report it, will there be retaliation?" Another shopkeeper asked worriedly.
"What are you afraid of? The Black Mountain Bandits know who reported it? Besides, you are afraid of the Black Mountain Bandits, not His Highness King Qin, right?" A young shopkeeper added at this time.
"Well... then let the scout go find the army and report to His Highness King Qin." The shopkeeper changed his mind decisively.
No one had any objection at the moment, and the two scouts immediately clapped their horses and drove towards the direction they came from overnight.
However, what these caravans did not know was that while they were going to report, a news had begun to spread to the entire Western Region through Yuelai Trading Company. In the Xizhou territory that had just become the territory of the Tang Dynasty, a small tribe of five or six herdsmen was captured. A group of horse thieves were slaughtered!
As for the timing of this news, Li Ke didn't care at all. This was not more than a thousand years later. The time before and after this news appeared cannot be verified in this world!
"Go, send someone to give an order to Murong Shun. I want all the Black Mountain bandits to die! No matter how big or small, leave no one behind. Cut off their heads and pile them up for viewing in the capital, near the main official road over there! Order Xue Wanche, How can Qibi mobilize five thousand elite cavalry to guard the perimeter, and no one can escape!" Li Ke gave this order with a calm face.
"Yes!" The messenger agreed, turned around and ran straight outside the tent, turned over and rode away!
When Li Ke issued the order, Li Jing was beside him. Even from the beginning to the end, Li Ke did not hide the matter from Li Jing, and Li Jing knew everything.
"Your Highness...the Black Mountain bandits have a thousand cavalry alone. It's not that I doubt that Murong Shun and the others can't defeat them. It's just that the base of these Black Mountain bandits is actually in the Black Mountain Mountains dozens of miles west of Hanyang Pass, but there There must be family members of the Black Mountain bandits, and there must be many women and babies among them. This will damage your reputation, Your Highness." Li Jing said with some worry.
"Are they horse thieves?"
"yes."
"Did they massacre other tribes?"
"yes."
"In this case, he dares to slaughter the tribe of my people of the Tang Dynasty today, then I, Li Ke, will do what I say. Anyone who dares to offend my power of the Tang Dynasty will be killed! As for reputation, no matter how they think of it in the Western Regions, a butcher will be a butcher, as long as As long as the people of the Tang Dynasty recognize me." Li Ke looked calm, as if the "slaughtered" tribe was not arranged by him.
