As night fell that evening, Tumen Khan's troops and Abadai Saiyin Khan's troops also joined forces. The location was very coincidental, and it was also by a river. However, it is not the same river as the Manchu-Mongolian coalition forces of the Ming Dynasty. The river where the two Khans met is called the "Animal Raising River". Compared with the Manchu-Mongolian coalition forces of the Ming Dynasty, the specific location where they met is two kilometers to the north of the coalition forces. Fifteen miles away.
The current situation on both sides is that the Chahar and Transkalkha coalition forces are in the north, the Yangmu River is adjacent to the south, and the ribbon lake formed by the tributary of the Kuhezi River twenty-five miles to the south is the Mingman River to the south of the lake. Mongolian coalition station.
Twenty-five miles is not far for the cavalry. It is reasonable to say that it is within the reach of the Ming, Manchu and Mongolian coalition forces. However, there is a very special situation here: the north of the livestock raising river is a desert, and only those closest to the river are There is a very small area in the north with green coverage, probably only a few square kilometers - the two khans met here.
Since there is a large desert to the north of the Yangmu River, the Horqin cavalry, who were familiar with the local situation, did not think that there would be a large army there. In addition, it was already late when they arrived here, so they just walked towards the other side of the Yangmu River casually. After taking a look at the area known as "Har'erige Gacha" in later generations, they greeted each other and looked to the west. While shouting at each other, a strong smell of alcohol came out of their mouths.
Burihatu pushed aside the long grass by the river that had begun to turn yellow but was still standing tall, and hummed softly: "These Horqin people were able to get drinks after joining the Ming people. It seems that the Ming court has indeed accumulated a lot over the years." family property."
Tumen Khan wrapped himself in his cloak and said calmly: "Didn't the Ming army not allow drinking in the army?"
"It is for the purpose of laboring the army. It can also be said that it is carried to win over the Horqin people." Abadai Saiyin Khan interjected: "The people under the small Khan captured some Horqin people, and they brought a thousand jars of strong liquor to the army. It’s all to reward the brave warriors of the Mongolian and Manchu armies who have made meritorious service in battle.”
Tumen snorted lightly and said no more. Burihatu said: "The Ming army has become more and more aggressive in recent years, which shows that the financial situation of the Ming court is improving. The two khans, there is not much time left for us Mongolians. If we do not seize the opportunity, , this battle is bound to be even more difficult to fight in the future.”
Abadai Saiyinhan raised his chin slightly, squinted his eyes and looked at Horqin Tanma, who was running further and further away, and said: "The fighting power of the Horqin people is not very strong. They are so-so when fighting with the wind. Once they are attacked by a stronger attack It will collapse. Ben Khan has already tested this out.
Among the three Manchurian tribes, the Jianzhou Youwei men were braver, but their numbers were too small to play a big role; the Hada tribe was just a handful, and their performance was worse than that of the Horqin men. As long as Meng Gebulu did not come forward in person, they seemed unwilling to accept any orders; the Yehe tribe was somewhat beyond the Khan's expectation. Although their courage was similar to that of the Horqin people, Ben Khan found that they were wearing The armor seems to be exactly the same as that of the Ming army, but the color of the base coat is different. "
He paused for a moment and asked Burihatu with doubts on his face: "Originally, I didn't think much about it when I heard that Ye He was a rich Jurchen, but now it seems... they are actually rich enough to be able to give Thousands of people are equipped with Ming army armor? That armor probably costs seventeen or eighty taels of silver per set. Do they have that much money?"
Burihatu shook his head and smiled, and said: "Seventeen or eighty taels of silver per set. That is the price we buy in the private market. The Ming army internally calculates it at twelve taels of silver per set."
"But twelve taels is not a small number. I see that their east and west cities should have three thousand cavalry each. That's six thousand sets of armor, which costs more than seventy thousand taels of silver." Abadai Saiyin Khan Still very unbelievable.
"Khan, I haven't finished speaking yet." Burihatu said with a smile: "The Ming army internally calculates according to twelve taels of silver, but there is someone who can sell it to Ye He for seven taels of silver a set, and at all There is no limit on quantity... Khan should be able to guess who has such great ability, right?"
"Master Gao?" Abadai Saiyin Khan frowned, but he nodded: "Yes, I heard that almost all the Wang's arsenal that provided armor for the Ming army used his iron. There are so many iron factories, so it’s reasonable to be able to get the cheapest armor... But why did he sell it to Ye He so cheaply? Is the princess of the Ye He family so charming that she is so favored by him? "
Burihatu shook his head slightly: "According to the information I have received, this Grand Master Gao is not a heroic and short-tempered person who loves his children. He said that he would look at the Ye He family very highly for a woman. , I don’t believe it at all. In my opinion, he looks at Ye He in a different light just because Ye He is very valuable in his eyes.”
"For the six thousand cavalry of the Ye He family, or the so-called 'twenty thousand elite soldiers' of the Ye He family?" Abadai Saiyin Khan chuckled: "These six thousand cavalry are still so-so, and the so-called twenty thousand Elite soldiers... I don’t believe their boasts.”
Burihatu did not respond directly to these words, but said: "Yehe is close to Horqin to the west, not far from Chahar, to the south is Liaodong of the Ming Dynasty, and to the east is the entire Manchuria. His cavalry team is the strongest. The Jurchens, and because of their business connections, were the formidable enemy that Nurhaci, the left guard of Jianzhou, had to face. With Grand Master Gao supporting Ye He, he could use just one Ye He to check and balance many forces. It can be said that he spent a small amount of money to do big things. ...For Grand Master Gao, why not do it? You know, he is the best person in the Ming court who is good at leveraging others."
"Borrowing power, Ben Khan admits this, just like he can firmly control Tumut... Speaking of which, Ben Khan still can't figure out why Han Naji is so content with being Grand Master Gao. The housekeeper dog."
Burihatu said calmly: "There is a saying in the Ming Dynasty: The prosperity of the world is for profit, and the hustle and bustle of the world is for profit. In recent years, Grand Master Gao has already taken control of Tumote's destiny. Tumote As long as a person is still reluctant to give up his huge wealth of millions of taels a year and his comfortable and happy life, then he has to obey his orders and be his housekeeper dog."
"A million taels per year?" Abadai Saiyin Khan asked with his eyes widened, and his eyes rolled involuntarily.
Burihatu felt something in his heart and smiled slightly: "Yes, Tumut is rich now, but unfortunately he has become weaker... If not, how could the Great Khan achieve such a great victory this time?"
Abadai Saiyin Khan laughed dryly: "That's true, that's true. The Great Khan is brave, and the warriors of Chahar are invincible in the world."
Tumen Khan glanced at him and smiled lightly, but still said nothing. Burihatu sighed: "Actually, if the Ming court can put aside its prejudices, we can't stop fighting with them and rest. We have even asked the Ming court to pay tribute to the city many times. Unfortunately... the Ming court thinks that there is someone under its command. Tumut is enough, as for the other Mongols, in the eyes of the Ming court, there is probably no need to live."
Abadai Saiyinhan's face froze and he gritted his teeth: "They will regret it."
"Yes, they will regret it." Burihatu pointed to the south across the river and took a deep breath: "Tonight is an opportunity, but after all, there are two rivers blocking us. We can't go straight like this, we have to go around a little bit. road."
Abadai Saiyin Khan waved his hand and said: "It doesn't matter if we take a detour. It's twenty-five miles. Even if we make a fifty-mile detour, we can still arrive before dawn."
Burihatu shook his head and said: "That's not possible. If we rush all night and launch an attack immediately, it will definitely affect the performance of the warriors. We must set off immediately, arrive in the middle of the night and cross the river, and then hide quietly and wait for a few days' rest. An hour later, the attack will be launched before dawn."
"Then what are you waiting for? This Khan will go and order the warriors to prepare the sheepskin rafts, and then cross the river and hurry up." Abadai Saiyin Khan said immediately.
Burihatu glanced at Tumen Khan. The Mongolian Khan nodded slightly, reached out and patted Abadai Saiyin Khan on the left shoulder and said: "Go, Buddha will bless Mongolia."
The muscles on Abadai Saiyin Khan's face twitched slightly. Fortunately, he was not conspicuous in the night. He lowered his head and bowed: "Yes, Khan." After that, he turned and left.
As soon as he left, Tumen Khan had already shown no expression on his face and asked calmly: "Burihatu, do you think Abadai has other intentions?"
"It doesn't matter whether he has dissent or not. What's important is that he won't turn his dissent into rebellion at the moment." Burihatu said: "The Ming army's chief general Xiao Ruxun was just the deputy commander-in-chief of Liaodong. Aba Dai's previous battles Zhongya has suffered nothing from him and will not devalue himself and surrender to him."
After a pause, he continued: "Tumote paid tribute back then, and the Ming court gave Altan Khan (Anda) such high courtesy. Although Abadai knew that he could not compare with Altan Khan, he must have I don't want to be too far off... If I were him, I might plan to make a name for myself with a big victory first, and then find ways to contact the Ming army or the Ming court, in the hope of becoming a king in the future. "
Tumen sneered: "Then he is just talking nonsense."
"What the Great Khan said is absolutely true." Burihatu nodded and said: "Today's Ming court is no longer the Ming court in the past. At that time, the Ming court was weak. Except for Chahar, any Mongolian tribes who are willing to follow must be The Ming court is willing to win over.
However, to this day, many problems of the Ming Dynasty have been solved, and the national power is booming. Not only Tumut still follows him, but Ordos has also become honest after being beaten. This time, through Ye He's relationship, Horqin was deceived into his hands. In fact, he has completed the encirclement of Chahar on three sides...
The current situation is such that I, Chahar, have to prepare for the worst and have the strongest will to prepare for the worst. What is the strongest will? That is to say, abandon all expectations of reaching reconciliation with the Ming court, but be prepared for a life-and-death battle. What do you mean by planning for the worst? That is to say, consider defeat before thinking about victory, so as to ensure that there are no surprises on the retreat to Helin. "
Tumen took over the conversation and said: "In short, we want to ensure that the Outer Khalkha tribe is always under the control of this Khan, right?"
"That's right." Burihatu said with a serious face: "The Ming court is so powerful that no one can guarantee that they will be able to take their thunderous blow in the future. If the worst situation occurs, at least we must ensure that we can transfer into He Lin left behind the capital for Mongolia's recovery."
"I know." Tumen closed his eyes, paused for a while, and then ordered: "Go and prepare to cross the river. Ben Khan wants to rest for a while." Burihatu did not say much and took the order.
The river for animal husbandry is not wide, and the sheepskin rafts carried by the Mongolian cavalry were quickly assembled. Although the total army numbered more than 70,000, and there were some cattle and sheep in addition to the horses, it only took less than half an hour to cross the river quickly. , quite similar to the elite style of the Mongols when they swept across the world three hundred years ago.
Perhaps seeing that their own military was so elite, the entire Mongolian army seemed quite excited. Everyone from top to bottom felt that this battle would be won and another "Qingcheng Victory" would surely be repeated.
Although the weather in Saibei has turned colder, the weather has been very good these past few days, and it happens to be approaching the 15th day of the month, so the moonlight has become the best street light for Mongolians. Under the silvery light, it only took Chahar and the Waikakar-Mongolian army an hour and a half to arrive about ten miles east of the lake to the north of the Ming-Manchu-Mongolian coalition station, and once again crossed the river on sheepskin rafts.
This unnamed tributary of the Kuohezi River is narrower than the Livestock River, and it takes less time to cross the river than before. Although Burihatu expected that the Ming army would not put the main direction of exploration in the east (the Ming army was chasing from the east), he still very cautiously sent exploration horses across the river and expanded the scope of investigation, especially It was to find out the situation of the Ming army ten miles away that the army was driven across the river.
The news brought back by Tan Ma was mixed. The good news was that the Ming army had indeed rested, but the bad news was that the Ming army was very particular about setting up camp, and arranged enough night sentries to keep watch, and also prepared a lot of deer and firewood to keep the horses away.
The two khans and Burihatu had a brief discussion and decided that there was no more strategy to think of now. They could only fight quickly and slowly, trying to quietly approach the distance suitable for launching a charge and start a battle directly. . Although those deer, firewood and horses are of some use, after all, we have enough troops and most of the opponent's army is asleep. As long as we fight fast enough, it shouldn't be difficult to break through.
How could the Ming army, which had just climbed up, resist the defense line composed of deer, firewood and horses? Although the Ming army was strangely divided into two layers, as long as the main force of the Ming army on the outermost layer was defeated, how could the Horqin and Manchu troops in the middle withstand it?
After all, it was night, and the Mongols' scouting horses could not see clearly. They only noticed the Ming army in the outer circle, and they also discovered Jinghua's Shujian flag. Therefore, they took it for granted that the outer circle was the main force of the Ming army, and the inner circle was the Horqin and Manchurian coalition forces. They had no idea that there was a group of Ming troops in the inner circle.
Although Burihatu and the three of them also felt that this situation was a bit contrary to common sense, the "facts" were in front of them, and they had to believe it even if they didn't believe it. The reason was not important, so they ordered the rest ministries to hide and seize the time to rest until dawn. Normal people would launch sneak attacks when they are most sleepy. Only Tan Ma still had to pay close attention to the movements of the coalition forces, lest the enemy suddenly come over and discover them.
However, a little surprise happened at this moment: a group of seemingly ordinary Ming army scouts came from the direction of Laoniushan towards the coalition camp. The Mongolian coalition forces immediately reported the incident to Burihatu and woke him up to tell him the story.
Burihatu didn't take it seriously at first, but suddenly he came to his senses and asked: "He's from the south...and it's the Ming Army's horse inspection, not Horqin's horse inspection?"
"Yes, in power." Tan Ma affirmed, and added: "Oh, they are still flying the book sword flag."
Burihatu's sleepiness suddenly disappeared, and he stood up suddenly: "Wake up the two khans quickly!"
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