The day after Geerhan led Chechi's army back to the royal court, the situation on the Metasequoia battlefield changed dramatically again.
The Metasequoia garrison, which had been relying on city fortifications and adopting a defensive strategy before, suddenly came out of the city again after King Loulan and King Chechi left one after another, set up a formation in the wilderness, and advanced towards the camp of the Western Xinjiang coalition forces.
At this time, the person guarding the camp was none other than the Marquis of Durham, the Turkic deputy marshal, and he held 10,000 Loulan soldiers and 5,000 Chechi soldiers.
Faced with Li Jiangyao's bold provocation, the arrogant and arrogant Durham could no longer suppress his anger. He immediately issued an order for all the coalition forces to mobilize and prepare for the battle in front of the Metasequoia Army. He vowed to make this remnant of the Metasequoia City soldiers good. Have a taste of the power of the Turkic "victorious general".
In the blink of an eye, on the plain outside the camp, a mixed army of 15,000 metasequoia infantry and cavalry launched a large-scale frontal battle with 15,000 Western Xinjiang coalition forces.
Flying arrows filled the sky, and swords and spears were like a forest. The soldiers on both sides came and went, tit for tat, fighting inextricably. Although both sides invested much less troops than in the previous war, the intensity was no less intense.
Objectively speaking, the Marquis of Durham does have pride.
As Ashina Zhijin's favorite general, Durham, who was born in the Turkic royal family, is worthy of the title of "good at fighting" in terms of courage, bloodiness, and command quality.
The Western Xinjiang Allied Forces, which performed mediocrely in the hands of Alekjiang, transformed into an elite division after a short period of training and dispatch by Durham. On the battlefield, the entire army has a well-established advance and retreat, and is both offensive and defensive. Even when faced with a group charge from the White Robes, they are able to hold their formation, resist desperately, and gain opportunities for friendly forces to deploy defenses and counterattack, without being as useless as before. To collapse in one blow.
The soldiers and horses on both sides showed the momentum of a decisive battle, fighting from dawn to dusk. The battlefield was littered with corpses of soldiers, and blood gradually formed streams. In the wilderness between Metasequoia City and the Allied Forces Camp, there seemed to be two giant beasts covered in bruises, panting and roaring, entangled with each other, but unable to swallow each other whole.
Li Jiangyao looked at the setting sun falling into the clouds on the horizon, turned around and ordered: "Brothers, our comrades have been working hard all day, it's time for us to take action!"
At this time, he was leading five hundred elite soldiers of the Ghost-faced White-robed Army, hiding in the dense forest behind the Western Xinjiang Allied Forces camp. The nearest camp gate was only about a thousand steps away.
On the frontal battlefield, the experienced Xu Youchang, Du Jian and others were fighting to the death with Durham's main force. Their task was to hold the opponent back. Li Jiangyao took advantage of his advantage in surprise operations and partnered with Lin Feng. Sneak behind the enemy's back and look for opportunities to steal camp.
Seeing that the time was ripe, Li Jiangyao gave an order, and Lin Feng took the lead, leading seven or eight soldiers dressed as Che Chijun, galloping out of the dense forest and towards the distant coalition camp.
"Urgent report! Urgent military report from His Highness Geerhan!"
There are many local warriors in Metasequoia City. They speak pure Chechi dialect and shout loudly at the top of their lungs while galloping on their horses.
The coalition soldiers guarding the gate of the camp saw clearly in the dim light that there were not many people coming from the other side, and besides, they were transmitting an urgent military report from King Gerhan, so they hurriedly opened the gate and moved away without even thinking about it. Resist the horse and make way for a passage to welcome this small group of messengers into the camp.
Li Jiangyao saw the village gate open from a distance in the dense forest. He shouted happily, then immediately urged his horse to jump out and commanded the assault troops to start sprinting.
At the same time, Lin Feng's team arrived at the entrance of the camp. They did not advance further into the camp, but suddenly dismounted and pounced on the surrounding guards. In the blink of an eye, more than a dozen Chechi soldiers fell to the ground bleeding, while the rest fell into panic, not knowing whether to resist or flee.
The distance of nearly a thousand steps was only a blink of an eye for the cavalry. The commando team led by Li Jiangyao rushed all the way. By the time they arrived at the gate of the camp, Lin Feng and the others had already ended the battle and firmly held the gate.
Originally, the coalition forces responsible for guarding the gate had an advantage in strength. They only needed to persist for a moment to suppress or even kill Lin Feng and others. However, when they saw the white cloak floating from a distance, they immediately gave up the idea of resisting and ran away as if they had seen a ghost.
Li Jiangyao led five hundred white-robed troops and broke into the center of the Western Xinjiang coalition camp. At this time, the main force of the coalition forces had already gone out to fight with Durham. The only ones left in the camp at this time were either wounded soldiers or the old and weak. How could they stop the powerful white-robed army?
Whoosh—pop!
A firework rocket soared from the camp of the Western Xinjiang Allied Forces. In an instant, it shot into the sky and exploded into a large group of bright fireworks. The numerous shining light spots stay in the dark sky and complement each other with the fiery red sunset in the distance. It is really beautiful.
Not long after, the contiguous tents in the camp were ignited with blazing fire, as if the sunset was pulled down from the sky to the ground by an invisible giant hand, emitting a brighter and dazzling light.
Immediately afterwards, large plumes of thick smoke quickly rolled in from the upper wind and went straight into the battle formation of the Western Xinjiang coalition forces, quickly causing uncontrollable commotion.
"Master Marquis, it's not good, the camp is burning!"
"It's broken, it's broken! The way back has been cut off!"
"Run quickly! It's full of fire over there!"
Durham turned his head quickly when he heard the sound, and couldn't help but feel a thump in his heart: It's going to end!
Seeing that the camp was already on fire, it goes without saying that the Metasequoia garrison must have sneaked around to the rear and took the opportunity to make a surprise attack.
Durham was immediately angry and resentful: Most of the originally more than 80,000 people from the coalition's crusade had been taken away by Alekjan and Geerhan, leaving only 15,000 men and horses, all of which were used to resist. The enemy on the front seems to be stretched thin, so where is there any remaining strength to secure the rear?
Li Jiangyao from Metasequoia City saw this, so he took the initiative to send troops out of the city to challenge. Then he saw the opportunity, attacked the east and west, and successfully attacked the camp.
At this time, the two sides had been fighting fiercely all day, and both sides were exhausted. A sudden fire in the backyard at the critical moment was tantamount to the last straw that broke the camel's back, draining the fighting spirit of the Western Xinjiang coalition forces on the spot.
The front line has begun to panic and commotion, and the terrible situation of military morale collapse may break out at any time!
At the critical juncture, the experienced Durham immediately ordered that the phalanxes in the front row take up positions on the spot and were not allowed to retreat even half a step without orders; the four phalanxes in the second row quickly retreated 300 steps. Regroup and prepare to support the retreat of the front army. The four thousand-man cavalry phalanx deployed at the rear has been transformed from a strategic reserve into a mobile response team, deploying defenses in the direction of the camp, ready to block the Metasequoia Army that may surprise attack from the rear at any time. The remaining troops quickly broke away from the battle and withdrew from the battlefield in batches.
Fortunately, the person commanding the battle here was Deputy Marshal Durham of the Turks. Although this guy has a bad temper and is arrogant and domineering, he is by no means a fool when leading troops to fight. On the contrary, he is very capable. If it were Alike Jiang or Geerhan here, he might just be in mourning.
Although the entire Western Xinjiang coalition was panicked due to the attack on the main camp, under Durham's calm deployment, they still basically maintained a complete formation system and gradually withdrew from the crisis-ridden situation and moved to a safe area. .
Li Jiangyao and Xu Youchang looked at each other's well-organized formation and knew that there were no major flaws to exploit. In order to avoid unnecessary casualties to the soldiers, they decided to stop as soon as possible and temporarily let Durham and others retreat.
Since the allied camp was completely burned down and all the supplies and supplies of the army were destroyed, Durham did not dare to delay here anymore and decided to lead his army back to Chechi Palace overnight and wait until the troops and horses were regrouped. Come back to attack Metasequoia City.
-
"Your Highness, the sons and daughters are all impatient with waiting!" Heishan, wearing a leather vest and showing two muscular arms, asked Kuliban angrily: "Tell me, is Colonel Li reliable? Is it reliable?"
Prince Shenhua Kuliban stared at the darkness in front of him and said firmly: "Chief of Black Mountain, you must have witnessed Mr. Li's methods on the top of Metasequoia City a few days ago. And earlier, I also I have witnessed the miracle of Mr. Li leading hundreds of troops to surprise tens of thousands of enemy troops. Tell me, how many such heroes can there be in the world?"
Heishan showed a sincere expression: "Well, His Highness is right, that Mr. Li is indeed a hero! But..."
"But what?" Curliban turned to look at him.
"However, this time he asked us to go around Chechi Wangting for several days, and now he has come here to set up an ambush. It really makes me confused."
"Lead the snake out of its hole, surround it and call for reinforcements. What's wrong with this?" Curliban said with a relaxed tone, "What? Are you worried that the enemy won't come?"
Heishan is a real person, nodded and said: "That day, Geerhan led his troops back to the king's court. Why didn't we take the opportunity to ambush him halfway?"
Kuliban smiled lightly: "I don't know Master Li's plan very well. But according to my guess, it's not that I don't want to, but that I can't. Geerhan returned to the army after receiving the news from Chechi Wangting asking for help. In In that case, he must be like a frightened bird. He must be vigilant and take precautions at all times to avoid falling into our strategy of encircling the point for reinforcements. Therefore, it is not easy to ambush him. "
"But we've been waiting here all day. It's midnight, where are the enemy soldiers?" Heishan couldn't help but ask.
"Calm down." Kuliban said: "Master Li once said that in front of two armies, victory will always favor the calmer side."
Heishan scratched his head, still a little unconvinced: "Your Highness, I don't understand what you are saying. I only know..."
The next second, Heishan suddenly closed his mouth and stared straight into the distance with a pair of big copper-ringed eyes. In that direction, a large number of torches suddenly appeared.
