Everyone's eyes were turned to Liu Daogui, showing an eager look. Only Zhu Chaoshi was smiling. Liu Daogui's eyes also swept across everyone's faces, and finally stopped on Zhu Chaoshi's face. He smiled knowingly and said: "Little Shitou, do you have anything to say?"
Zhu Chaoshi nodded and said calmly: "Then I will show my shame. I will try to analyze the reasons why he did this from Brother Daogui's perspective. If there is anything wrong, please criticize and correct me."
Tan Daoji laughed: "Little Shitou, tell me, I think you can know Brother Daogui's thoughts, because you were the first to rush to the battlefield, and you made the same choice as Brother Daogui, which was to stand still."
Tan Zhi also followed up and said: "Yes, you still advised me not to attack. I was just wondering. Brother Daogui also sent a signal. Please tell me your reasons."
Zhu Chaoshi looked at the enemy troops retreating, took a breath, and said: "This demon thief is very cunning, and Xu Daofu is a famous general who has experienced hundreds of battles. Although he concentrated all his strength to attack for a day and night, the losses were very heavy, but the hand There are still reserve troops on the mountain, that is, the barbarians from Lingnan and his blue-clad general's guard. These two troops are not used, just to prepare for a possible counterattack by our army. This counterattack is mainly cavalry."
"So the flanks of the demon thieves seemed undefended, but they fought here for a whole day and night, especially at night. There were not enough torches lit by the Chinese army. They could only see the attacking troops in front. Fighting at night, if nothing else happens, they must have made a lot of arrangements here, such as traps, trenches, etc., which are used to launch a large-scale counterattack against us."
When he said this, the sergeants in front suddenly shouted: "Everyone, be careful, there is a trap here."
Everyone's eyes were cast forward, and they saw more than a hundred soldiers holding spears and spears, sweeping the ground with these long weapons as they walked. Suddenly, they stopped in one place at the same time, and more than a hundred spears and spears were gathered together. Under the thorns, a piece of floating soil and dead grass collapsed one after another, and on the ground, a trench more than two hundred paces long and five or six feet wide was revealed, which was almost exactly the same as the trench dug by Tan Daoji on the north side of the rear army.
Fu Hongzhi's expression changed: "They have indeed set up a trench trap, but does this deep trench only face our flank? Doesn't it face the front of our Chinese army?"
Tan Daoji sighed: "The Chinese army has their army in front. Even if our army counterattacks, they are not very afraid. Moreover, if we dig a hole in the front, our own people in front may fall into the hole when they retreat, which will not prevent the enemy." , the direction of the front army is where they came from, they don’t have to worry about our army coming out from there, and the rear army is where our army may counterattack, either by setting up heavy troops to defend the flanks, or by deliberately setting traps.”
Zhu Chaoshi nodded: "Brother Daoji is right. When we came, their flanks were almost completely defenseless. So my first reaction was that the demon thieves must have set a trap here, waiting for our army to fall." It’s a trap, so at this time, you must not attack rashly.”
Tan Zhi smiled and said: "But if we don't attack, why do they want to retreat? Are they deliberately tempting our army to attack?"
Zhu Chaoshi shook his head and said sternly: "If our army only has about a thousand cavalry, then Xu Daofu should think so. His reserved troops alone are enough to deal with our small number of cavalry, so he put out those The Lingnan barbarians pretended to defend against our army's surprise attack, and even pretended to be panicked and retreated in a hurry to lure our army to take the initiative to attack. However, when they saw that our army's follow-up infantry continued to attack, there was no news from his rear army. , he knew that our army was not only the reserve cavalry counterattack of the Jingzhou Legion, but also reinforcements. Although he did not know where the reinforcements came from, he saw that thousands of infantrymen joined the battlefield, and soon in the direction of the rear army After destroying his attacking force, our rear army will also attack him, and he has no chance of winning."
Tan Daoji smiled and said: "That's right. If his 20,000 troops attack the central army alone, or face the troops coming from the rear of our army alone, it should be enough, but if he wants to deal with it from two directions at the same time, These two powerful forces are beyond their capabilities. Just relying on five thousand Lingnan barbarians and more than a thousand generals and guards can block the impact of at least five thousand of our infantry and cavalry. Even if we add traps, it will be impossible. And if we are deployed to attack us If the troops from the army within the army come to strengthen the flank defense, not only will all the previous efforts be wasted, but they will also face a full-line counterattack from Brother Daogui's guard troops."
Fu Hongzhi laughed loudly and said: "That's right, and the enemy army itself has been unable to attack for a long time and has become exhausted. At this time, when we saw our army's reinforcements arriving, the thousands of soldiers and horses who attacked the rear army were completely wiped out, which made us even more motivated to fight. Total loss, if faced with a full-line attack at this time, will collapse. Therefore, Xu Daofu decisively chose to withdraw his troops, and then after the Lingnan barbarians broke off, the entire army took turns to cover and evacuate. This time he was not trying to lure our army into a trap. "
Tan Daoji nodded and looked at Liu Daogui: "Brother Daogui, is this what you think?"
Liu Daogui smiled slightly and said: "Little Shitou spoke my mind. It's a pity that Lu Zongzhi's troops did not arrive in time. Otherwise, if they could move from the north to the east, they would have blocked the demon thieves' retreat to Wulindu. , then we can really annihilate Xu Daofu."
Tan Zhi said solemnly: "I don't think we should give the demon thieves this opportunity. They can dig trenches here at night to set up an ambush, but they can never set up an ambush on the way back. Moreover, they are all infantry. We have two here." As for the three thousand cavalry, they have an advantage in speed. If they can continue to harass and chase the enemy, they will definitely be defeated."
Liu Daogui looked at Tan Daoji with a smile: "Daoji, do you agree with your third brother's view?"
Tan Daoji pondered for a moment and shook his head: "I think now is not the best time for a decisive battle. Although the demon thieves were hit hard and suffered heavy losses in this battle, with as many as 30,000 casualties, the main force is still there. Now we can break the rear with elite troops. The whole army withdrew towards the direction of Wulindu and wanted to board the boat. At this time, they were united. If our army attacked, they would resist desperately. This time the evacuated demon thieves also left with some props. What I saw were horses, antlers and other things, as well as some carts and other baggage. I saw that they were well prepared to deal with the cavalry assault. The number of cavalry in our army was only one-tenth of theirs. We only relied on cavalry to defeat them. It may be difficult to harass or even defeat the demon thieves. Even if the infantry kills them, we still don't have an absolute advantage in numbers. We should have no problem defeating them, but it may be impossible to annihilate them all without paying too much of a price." (End of chapter)
