Bright Spring

"The last general waits for orders!"

After daybreak, as expected, within a few miles around, there was a hustle and bustle.Military music, drums, and the noise of people and horses mixed together, and the world seemed to be shrouded in "buzzing" noises, and the nearby voices were loud and harsh.

Zhu Gaoxu rode his brown horse and guarded near the Chinese army's banner, personally grasping the enemy's situation reported from the front.

As expected, Wu Gaojun had already begun to climb the mountains in the west, and all signs seemed to confirm Zhu Gaoxu's prediction.Because Zhu Gaoxu's prediction was the best attack route; if Wu Gao didn't cross the long mountain range first, he had to use a large army to attack the ridge from the south, which is really not a good thing.

The supply team of the King of Han's army had already dispatched to the east in advance with a large number of vehicles; all the soldiers in the army also organized their queues one after another, waiting for the military order.

More than a dozen generals surrounded Zhu Gaoxu on horseback, with various expressions on their faces, listening to the news reported before and after.

When the round Chaoyang appeared on the top of the eastern mountain, Wang Yu's personal soldiers reported new news.Most of Wu Gao's army has already crossed the mountains, and the vanguard cavalry is approaching the army of the King of Han!

Upon hearing the news, Zhu Gaoxu immediately issued a military order.After hearing this, all the generals performed their salutes one after another, left in all directions, and returned to their respective barracks.

After a while, the vigorous horn sounded in the barracks.On the rolling hills and hills, groups of infantry can be seen moving everywhere.The mist and water vapor in the morning have not completely dissipated, and the countless figures are hazy and unable to see the whole picture, but they appear to be more numerous.

The sound of rumbling horseshoes also sounded in the distance.A large group of cavalry from the King of Han army came out of the camp, but marched in the opposite direction from the main force.

After a stick of incense, there was the sound of roaring and running on the distant horizon, mixed with the faint neighing of horses.The cavalry of the King of Han Army, who went to monitor the vanguard of the enemy cavalry, seemed to have clashed with the enemy, and horse battles broke out one after another.

Zhu Gaoxu looked into the distance, speculating on the outcome of the horse battle.He is full of martial arts, but now he is useless; now he doesn't even have a long weapon on him, and the waist knife has hardly been drawn out for several months, and its function is only for decoration.

After a long time, a cavalry galloped over quickly, and the knight shouted before he could get off his horse, "My lord, the enemy cavalry has retreated for the time being, and they are turning around to the northwest!"

Zhu Gaoxu responded and ignored the sergeant who sent the order.He kicked his horse straight to turn around, led the soldiers around him to follow the direction of the infantry formation, and rode his horse eastward. .

Chapter 475 The Sound of Cannons in the Mountains

The main force of the infantry of the official army marched continuously for half an hour, covering eight or nine miles.By the time they caught up with the main force of the King of Han's army and could see the opponent's men and horses with their naked eyes, the sun had already reached three poles.

The even and rhythmic leather drums kept ringing, mixed with the military music blowing horizontally, which gave people a faintly cheerful atmosphere.Probably because the blood and flesh flying on the battlefield is often horrible, and the music in the army of the Ming Dynasty has rarely used heavy and grand songs.

The grey-haired Wu Gao has many wrinkles on his face, but the flesh on his arms is exposed in strands from the wrist armor.He patted his horse and climbed up a hilly slope, looking at the enemy's deployment in the distance.

Wu Gao had received a report before and learned about the general situation.Now that he saw it with his own eyes, he quickly saw the situation clearly.

Normally, when Wu Gao fights big battles, he likes to use defense instead of offense, because defense is more stable and it is not easy to collapse suddenly.But right now, Zhu Gaoxu obviously took the lead in using Wu Gao's method!

The officers and soldiers marched from west to east. At this time, the shape of the mountain on the front is like a "concave" falling to the left, and the place where the concavity enters is facing Wu Gaojun.

Almost all the rebels were on the mountains over there. If Wu Gao wanted to attack, he could only attack the hillside.With such a sloping terrain, the physical strength of the soldiers attacking upwards will be several times that of the enemy, which is quite a disadvantage; the shooting of firearms, bow|crossbows is not as good as that of the enemy on the mountain.

Only by attacking westward from the undulating mountains in the south will the adverse trend not be so great.But only attacking from one place on the ridge, the depletion of troops on both sides is too slow; if it is just such an attack and depletion, Wu Gao may not be able to take down the rebels of the King of Han when the rebels from the south reach Pingyuefu.

Wu Gao temporarily began to consider withdrawing troops!

Originally, Wu Gao's idea was to get rid of the King of Han's army as much as possible and go to He County first; until last night, his plan was to go to He County, to defeat the King of Han's army first, and then go to He County.

But now he suddenly changed his mind: Now that the King of Han army has arrived at Pingyue Mansion, why don't I follow the route that the King of Han army came and turn around to go to Guilin Mansion?

If the marching route is changed to go north, firstly, the Shengyong troops on the South Road of the rebel army will have to catch up with Wu Gao, and the distance will be farther; It is a rough idea to move closer to the main force of the Huguang government and army.

At this moment, a burst of thunder-like artillery fire came from the south.Wu Gao looked at the mountain ridge to the south, where the vanguards of the two armies had watched last night, white gunpowder smoke could be vaguely seen rising from the high ground.

"Who ordered the war?" Wu Gao asked loudly immediately.

As soon as the words fell, there was a burst of passionate shouts from the large camp nearby.The officers, soldiers and horses of various ministries stopped in place one after another, and the sound of artillery from the south encouraged their courage.

Seeing this, Wu Gao inevitably hesitated, and did not immediately order to prepare to withdraw the troops.The army has traveled for so many days, and now the two armies are facing each other. If the army retreats and tells the soldiers that they will have to travel long distances, it will obviously damage morale.

None of the surrounding generals acknowledged or issued a military order to go to war in the vanguard.At this time, a general clasped his fists and said: "The last general will send someone over to look at it immediately, and report to Lord Hou when he comes back."

"Go!" Wu Gao said.

... On the ridge to the south, the artillery roared and the shouts shook the sky.Previously, reinforcements from the King of Han's army arrived near the vanguard barracks, and soon took the initiative to attack the vanguard of Wu Gao's army to the west.

However, after a large phalanx of 500 men from the King of Han's army was repulsed, chaos broke out on the uneven ridge of the high ground, and they fled eastward.So thousands of vanguards of the official army took advantage of the situation and pursued to the vanguard barracks of the King of Han army.

The two armies fought fiercely again.

The vanguard battalion of the rebels of the Han Dynasty built simple fortifications. Along the high ridge in the middle and low on both sides, they built a waist-high earth wall and a trench of different depths.The fortifications were obviously hasty, and the earthen walls were low.In most places, officers and soldiers jumped into the ditch and could climb up the ditch and the waist wall with bare hands.

As a result, nearly ten hundred household teams in front of the official army had chased and approached the fortification for about ten steps. They followed the earth wall and besieged the earth wall of the trench from the front and the northern and southern armies.The firearms on both sides kept ringing, and arrows flew in the air.

The officers and soldiers held the sharp guns supervised by the Annan people, which were also a kind of copper fire blunderbuss, and fired with two rows of sharp guns.The front row squatted on the ground and the back row stood. The soldiers held the sharp guns under their armpits with one hand, and blew on the torch with the other to light the fuse.

"Bang bang bang..." There was a burst of explosions, and clusters of arrows hit the dirt wall ten steps away like raindrops.Since an approaching volley didn't have much effect, because the rebel soldiers were all squatting behind the earthen wall, and at most they only shot one head, and the arrow clusters of the sharpshooter were difficult to hit.

The rebels then began to fight back with firecrackers. Their copper firecrackers were a bit strange, with the tails of the blunderbuss facing the soldiers' faces. Everyone held the blunderbuss with both hands, and fired the blunderbuss with only their heads exposed.Gunshots sounded along the earthen wall, and rows of gunpowder smoke rose.

Suddenly, screams came from the crowd of firecrackers lined up by the officers and soldiers, and from time to time someone in the row of infantry fell to the ground screaming in pain.

At this time, the officers and soldiers began to change their guns, passing up the loaded sharpshooters in the back row, and passing back the loaded firearms.Some soldiers in the back row took a few steps forward to fill in for those who were hit and injured.

The second salvo, the rebels were earlier than the officers.Their rotation is not to change weapons, but to directly change people.The person who finished firing the guns stood up and walked back, and the people behind then stepped forward and squatted behind the waist wall.

The two sides fired at each other with firearms twice in a row. Because the rebels were blocked by earthen walls, the method of firing the guns was also very strange, which made the officers and soldiers suffer a lot!At this time, the officers and soldiers directly mobilized their sharpshooters to shoot the outcropping rebel soldiers within ten steps with their bows and crossbows.

After being suppressed by a burst of firepower from the bow|crossbow, the spear and shield soldiers of the official army rushed forward shouting.Some officers and soldiers stepped on the shoulders of their comrades and climbed towards the earth wall, while the rebels stabbed each other with rows of spears. Along the earth wall of the trench, there were screams and screams everywhere, and the sound of killing was deafening.

From time to time, there was a "boom" in the ditch, and the rebels threw the ignited pig iron mines into the ditch below. The screams cracked his lungs.

The artillery trolley that was being transferred from the west turned around and retreated back.Rebel reinforcements are advancing from the north and south sides of the fortifications, and the official army attacking the fortifications in front is retreating; if the artillery is transported up, it will soon be captured by the rebels.

Hundreds of rebels pursued on the uneven ridge of the high ground, and after less than two hundred steps, reinforcements from the government army also came.The two armies approached, and the officers and soldiers bombarded with artillery, bow|crossbow

The sharp guns fired together, and then rushed to kill with gun shield soldiers.The rebels were repulsed again, many people maintained their formation and retreated eastward, and some broke up, running all over the mountain.

At this time, the two sides were only fighting fiercely along the ridge and high ground, the contact area was very narrow, and each had tens of thousands of powerful troops.Such a grappling can't play a big role.

Field battles often rely on pursuit to kill and injure the enemy. However, the enemy has a large number of reinforcements, and the area cannot be deployed. The pursuit cannot be sustained, and it is extremely difficult to achieve great results.Fighting back and forth is nothing more than wasting time and slowly depleting troops.

At this moment, a general came to the army's avant-garde barracks with a command flag, and shouted: "Stop chasing! Who told you to go to war?"

The avant-garde commander of the official army came over quickly and replied: "The rebels attack our army first, and after our army wins, they pursue them to the rebel army camp."

The general holding the command flag handed over the military order, "The commander-in-chief has an order to avoid fighting the rebels and wait for new deployments!" He looked around again, pointed to a high tunnel behind and said, "The whole army retreats to the top. , set up guns at high places to resist the rebel attack."

"Order!"

The general who sent the order left the battlefield and went down the mountain from the north...

At this time, the main positions of the two armies are still not in conflict.Each unit of Wu Gao's army was at least one mile away from the enemy. Unless it was the heavy artillery of Hongwu's cannon, it would not even be able to hit it.Although the rebels were at a high place, they obviously did not carry heavy artillery.

A lieutenant general beside Wu Gao said: "Our officers and soldiers have a large number of generals. After trying to occupy several high grounds, we can attack from several sides. This battle has a chance of winning."

Wu Gao was noncommittal, his mount kicked the horse's hooves a little restlessly, he dangled on the horse's back, and kept observing the scene in the distance.