"This thief." Di Meng cursed angrily when he saw the densely packed Timur army in the distance and the conspicuous black banner on the rock mountain.
"It came quickly enough."
Even if Timur could break through the trenches with heavy infantry through the snow, to be fair, it was still a clumsy method of advancing step by step. There were still dozens of densely packed trenches between the Ming army and him.
No one could have imagined that Timur would catch up so quickly.
Zhu Su also put down the telescope with a serious face, secretly thinking that he was lucky. Fortunately, Ma Heima, a soft persimmon, fell into the trap. Fortunately, Ma Heima was frightened last night and did not choose to continue fighting with the Ming army. Fortunately, the Yanshan camp had all the food, grass and baggage, all of which gave the Ming army an advantage. Fortunately, he was not in a hurry to retreat into Keishi City and avoided being chased by Timur.
"Your Highness." Cao Tai, Tang Li and other generals came to Zhu Su. They lowered their heads and looked quite remorseful. "Your Highness, it is our incompetence that failed to withstand the march of Timur's army."
"Please punish me, Your Highness."
"It's okay." Zhu Su stretched out his hand to help them up. "You've done a great job. Timur is so desperate that we don't have to fight them to the death."
"Let me tell you what the damage will be like after the battle is over."
Cao Tai and others were comforted by Zhu Su, which lifted their spirits a bit. He opened his mouth and reported: "Your Highness entrusted us with one hundred and fifty Ming soldiers. Fifty-eight died in battle, twenty-one were injured, and seventy-one were still able to fight. Ten thousand poisonous vassal troops, the rest About five thousand people..."
"Half of them were actually killed?" Di Meng asked in surprise.
"Guard Commander Di didn't know something. Not many people died in the battle, but there were many who lost heart and fled randomly. There were even some who surrendered before the battle. If these poisonous people were not so useless, we could at least survive again. He blocked Timur for ten days." Speaking of this, Cao Tai was full of resentment.
Zhu Su was speechless after hearing this. Just like these poisonous vassal troops, the Persian vassal troops he brought with him last night also collapsed at the first touch, almost ruining the important task of luring the enemy.
"What's the loss on Timur's side?" Zhu Su asked.
"About a thousand people. This is because Timur was in a hurry to march and exposed many flaws. Otherwise, the losses would have been even less." Cao Tai looked a little ashamed.
It seems that even if they are equipped with the firearms of the Ming army, the combat effectiveness of these vassal armies cannot be relied on. Moreover, Timur was able to conquer Europe and Asia in his original time and space, and his army should not be underestimated.
"In that case, send people to contact Keshi City. First use this rock mountain as a formation to block Timur's pursuit, and then slowly retreat into Keshi City." Zhu Su said.
His strategic goal has been achieved. Next, he only needs to preserve his strength and use the two powerful horns inside and outside the city to weaken the spirit of Timur's army, so that he can keep Thirst City safe.
The defense of Keshi City not only represents the success of dividing the territory of the Timur Empire into two halves, the northwest and the southeast, but also means that the Ming army can gain a firm foothold in Persia and Shendu to deal with the Timur Empire. It can be said that Timurid Er's dragon vein will be cut off in two parts.
Naturally, Timur also knew the stakes. In the next few days, Timur mobilized his army and continuously attacked Zhu Su's base camp. He must drag Zhu Su here. Although Zhu Su had a small number of troops, he occupied a favorable position and blocked it. The enemy is looking for an opportunity to escape.
Timur's army was very sophisticated, and the army's offensive was like the waves crashing on the shore, which lasted endlessly, which gave Zhu Su a headache. He is good at using cunning strategies to defeat the enemy, but he is not good at arranging troops and generals in subtle ways. Therefore, although the Ming army is still nailed to the rocky mountain, the situation is gradually becoming less optimistic.
What made Zhu Su even more worried was that the army's gunpowder and other supplies were gradually running out. These gunpowders were all transported thousands of miles from the mainland of the Ming Dynasty by ships. Once they were used up, they were finished. It was extremely difficult to replenish them.
If they lose their firearms to rely on, how can the Ming army compete with Tamerlane, who has tens of thousands of troops?
But on this day, Zhu Su, who had been fighting fiercely on the rock mountain for a long time, saw a glimmer of victory.
The heavy snow had stopped early at this time, and although the snow on the ground was still thick, a large area of open space had been cleared out at the foot of the rocky mountain during several days of fighting. Di Meng personally led two thousand warriors to resist the enemy Timur's offensive at the foot of the rock mountain. The vanguard of the two armies was fighting in full swing, but they saw snow dust suddenly rising from Timur's rear army.
Then, hundreds of war horses galloped out from the flank of Timur's army.
"Cavalry!" Di Meng, who was fighting, was horrified. In the past few days, although the heavy snow gave Timur the opportunity to break through the trenches, it also made it impossible for the cavalry of these nomadic countries to use their sharp weapons. However, now that the sky has stopped snowing for many days, and the continuous fighting has made the snow on the battlefield no longer thick, these cavalry finally have a place to use again.
Zhu Su on the rock mountain also used a lookout to see Timur sending out his cavalry. In fact, according to common sense, these cavalry are the real main force of the Timur Empire, and Zhu Su has not yet faced off against these cavalry... Even if the soldiers can retreat to the rocky mountains, the cavalry will be useless. But if you go up the mountain and hold on, Timur's cavalry will surround the rock mountain. How can you escape?
While he was thinking hard about how to break the situation, Zhu Su accidentally caught a glimpse of a flag waving in the south direction. He quickly put up his lookout tube to check: he saw snow and dust flying in the south, and it was obvious that a large army was marching towards this place. The first banner is very eye-catching, with a huge Han Chinese character on it: Zhang.
Chinese character! It's reinforcements! Zhu Su was determined.
This army was so powerful that Timur seemed to have noticed them, and he quickly mobilized his cavalry to prepare to swallow up the thousand men led by Di Meng first. However, this team came very quickly. The leader, a general, was carrying a copper stick and the huge Buddhist beads around his neck attracted attention. His eyebrows were white, but he had tremendous supernatural power in his hands. He hit him with a stick while running, and actually killed a cavalryman and his horse under Timur.
"It's layman Zhang Dingbian!" Zhu Su was overjoyed!
Zhang Dingbian's men are not regular troops, but Jianghu people who are determined to serve the country. They don't have uniform clothes, and even their weapons, some use knives and some use spears, and there is no customization. But these guys who look like a miscellaneous army are all proficient in riding skills and can move like flying on their horses. They came at a gallop. The front team was already out of touch with the rear army. Under the leadership of Zhang Dingbian, they still had no fear. They roared loudly and rushed into Timur's cavalry. In the blink of an eye, these elite Turkic cavalry The man who was killed fell on his back.
Then the rear troops continued to break in, and the Turkic cavalry that was running immediately fell into a melee.
"What a fine cavalry!" Zhu Su praised highly and immediately started to blow the charge horn. The Ming army on the rock mountain shouted and all made a move to kill down the mountain.
Timur saw that there was no advantage to be taken, so he immediately returned to the army to defend himself, but he did not reveal any big flaws. Zhang Dingbian was not a mediocre general, so he immediately restrained the Jianghu people from pursuing him, and then followed Di Meng up Yanshan Mountain to meet Zhu Su.
(End of chapter)
