When the team set out from Taiyuan Prefecture, there were less than 1,600 people in total including the personal soldiers of Liu Ling and Hanasanlang Zhao Er. When they returned, not counting the personal soldiers of Liu Ling and Zhao Er, the team had less than 1,600 people.
There are still 1,346 people left.
It lasted less than two months. Before the Chinese New Year, the team headed off into the prairie to train for battle. It was already the first month when they planned to go back. The Shura camp passed behind Di Gan's cavalry and followed the same route as before.
After walking through it all, when Di Gan led his men and horses to join Mu Li's remnant troops and vowed to cut the Khitan cavalry into thousands of pieces, Liu Ling's Shura camp had already arrived not far from the burned camp of the Tiande army.
You can't go more than a hundred miles to the southeast before you can return to the territory of the Han Dynasty. Now the Xixia cavalry is still circling on the grassland hundreds of miles away, and there are no Xixia soldiers stationed nearby. As long as you bypass the patrols of the Xixia border guards at night,
There is no more danger.
Liu Ling ordered the team to rest on the spot. Although the Tiande Army's station was completely burned by fire, the terrain here is relatively high. If Xixia soldiers approach, they can easily find it. Ranger scouts have been arranged, and Liu Ling
I sat down on the ground with several major generals to discuss how to replenish the team and how to proceed with the next step of training after returning.
The soldiers boiled water and cooked dry food and sent it to Liu Ling and the others. While they ate, they summarized the gains and losses of this military training.
Half a day has passed before you know it, and the sky has turned completely dark. Liu Ling waved his hand and motioned for everyone to go and have a rest. He will set off early tomorrow morning. He will be back in Han Dynasty before the sun sets after noon. It is estimated that there will be no more war.
, several people also relaxed. In the past two months, there have been no less than 30 to 50 battles of various sizes, and the soldiers are indeed a little tired.
Liu Ling saw that the sky was getting dark, so he asked everyone to disperse and rest. Everyone needs to have a good sleep now and set off early tomorrow morning. After noon, they can enter the territory of the Han Dynasty in an hour's walk.
Just as he turned around, a voice suddenly shouted from behind: "Report!"
Liu Ling turned around to look. Under the dark sky, a scout galloped over. The man was more than ten meters away from Liu Ling and jumped down without restraining his horse. His movements were clean and neat. He
He ran in front of Liu Ling, performed a standard military salute, and said, "Report to your lord, a large group of cavalry has been discovered thirty miles southeast!"
Liu Ling's expression suddenly changed. He frowned and asked, "Is it the Xixia cavalry?"
"Look at the flag, it's not Xixia cavalry, it's Khitan wolf cavalry!"
The scout said firmly.
Zhao Er grabbed the scout's arm and asked loudly: "Have you seen clearly? Is it really the Khitan Wolf Cavalry? How many men and horses are there?"
The scout was in pain from being caught by Zhao Er, but he still said with certainty: "It was still very bright when we found them. They were indeed Khitan wolf cavalry. I recognized the wolf head on their banner! It looked like there were at least 30,000 to 40,000 people in the team.
, I saw at least three camp flags!”
Liu Ling asked: "Have the Khitans discovered you?"
"No! We didn't dare to get close. The Khitan didn't have many scouts on the flanks. As soon as we saw them, we retreated. We were at a high place and heard the sound of the march. We didn't ride horses, so we climbed over to observe.
."
Liu Ling nodded and said: "You did a good job. Go back and keep watching. If anything happens, come back and tell me immediately!"
The scout responded, gave another military salute and turned around to leave.
"It seems that I won't be able to sleep tonight. Tell the soldiers to assemble, dismantle the tents, extinguish the fires, and pull the troops up to that low mountain!"
Liu Ling ordered.
Hanasaburo was surprised and asked: "Does the prince want to fight?"
Liu Ling shook his head and said: "We can't fight. The opponent has tens of thousands of cavalry, and the Khitan Wolf Cavalry are all light cavalry that come and go like the wind. Our speed is not as good as the other party. If we really fight, we may be able to take advantage by being surprised at the beginning, but once the Khitan Wolf Cavalry is attacked by
It will be difficult to escape once the knight bites you. The Shura camp has been established with great effort, so there is no need to fight to the death here."
He pointed to the short mountain and said: "Gather on the top of the mountain first. If the Khitan wolf cavalry comes towards us, withdraw immediately and we will take a detour back. It seems that the Khitan people are going to take Chen Tiao Xian's escape route."
, I didn’t expect Ye Luxiong to move so quickly, and under the guise of returning to Beijing, he took his troops to take a detour to Datong, and then entered Daxia from the direction of Datong.”
Zhao Er was stunned for a moment and asked: "My lord, are you saying that this Khitan cavalry was personally led by Emperor Yelu Xiongji of the Liao Kingdom? He is quite courageous!"
Liu Lingdao: "Based on the analysis of the information we have received before, it is nine out of ten that the leader of the army is Ye Luxiongji. As far as I know, this person is a guy who can't lose. If he tries to win back after suffering a loss, he will
I couldn't sleep all night. When I heard that he had no choice but to retreat, I was thinking, how could Yelv Xiongji retreat so easily? He took away 100,000 troops at once, leaving only Yelv Zhen.
How could he make such a stupid move when he led an army of 100,000 to confront Chen Tiaoxia? It seems that our Datong sent it at the right time. Maybe the moment His Majesty's messenger saw Yelv Xiongji, Yelv Xiongji had already
I’ve thought of this step.”
Huasanlang said: "Twenty thousand horses from Xixia went around to the territory of Daliao, burned, killed and looted. They were defeated by Yelv Deguang a while ago and retreated. It seems that Yelv Xiongji is also a man who must retaliate, and he will retaliate in his own way.
He personally led the troops this time. Firstly, he wanted to take Chen Tiaoxian's retreat. It was best to attack from both front and back to destroy Xixia's main force in one fell swoop. Secondly, even if he could not defeat Chen Tiaoxian, he still wanted to capture Xixia's territory.
But after struggling for a while, Datong can retreat anyway, so he doesn't worry about the way out."
Liu Ling had already inquired about the name Chen Tiaoxian from Zhou Yangong. According to Zhou Yangong's understanding, this Chen Tiaoxian was a sixty-year-old veteran and definitely not the muscular and sturdy man Liu Ling described.
.On the contrary, the Great Xia Emperor Wei Ming was named Wei Xiao, and his physical features were very consistent with those described by Liu Ling. Zhou Yangong speculated that Liu Ling's sworn brother in Yuzhou was definitely not the veteran Chen Touxian, but perhaps Wei Ming who visited incognito.
Xiaoxiao!
After listening to Zhou Yangong's statement, Liu Ling also felt that this was very possible. At that time, Liu Ling also lamented that he would actually become brothers of the opposite sex with the emperor of Daxia. This was really a bit dramatic. But Liu Ling knew about this era.
In fact, we don't attach much importance to sworn vows. There are many examples of people who become sworn brothers today and turn against each other tomorrow. Moreover, in this era, men are martial and brave. When meeting like-minded people, becoming sworn brothers is as common as eating and drinking.
In the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, the story of the three sworn sworn brothers in Taoyuan is, after all, the only one without a semicolon. In Water Margin, it is purely bluffing to show such sincerity after the sworn sworn vows. In history, there are many people who have used sworn sworn ties to build relationships, and only a handful of them are really so sincere.
Count. Xiao Feng and Yelu Hongji were sworn brothers in The Eight Tribes of the Dragon, and Xiao Feng died in a more aggrieved death than anyone else. Genghis Khan and Jamukha, the genius of Mongolia, were sworn brothers, and they killed Jamukh without blinking an eye. Back then, the Sui Dynasty and the Turks
The Ashina family also claims to be a nation of brothers, but wasn't it beaten to a bloody pulp later?
Therefore, Liu Ling really had no feelings for this cheap sworn brother. He also believed that as long as he led his troops and killed nearly 10,000 Xixia soldiers in Xixia territory, it would be strange if his sworn brother did not want to kill him.
Zhao Erdao: "Now Chen Touxian had a pot of old wine to drink. Because of us, he must have firmly believed that the cavalry that was causing trouble behind him was just a cavalry of more than a thousand people. He was waiting for Yelu Xiongji's tens of thousands of cavalry to suddenly kill him from behind.
It's strange that Chen Tiaoxian was undefeated in the past. With an army of 160,000, being clamped in front and back by Khitan wolf cavalry and beaten violently, it's unclear how long they can survive."
After he finished speaking, Liu Ling's eyes suddenly lit up, as if he had thought of something.
Seeing the prince's expression, Zhao Er and Hua Sanlang both knew that the prince had some shocking thoughts. The two looked at each other, waiting for the prince to say something earth-shattering. Sure enough, after waiting for a moment, Liu Ling waved his hand and said
: "Inform the scouts to monitor the movements of the Khitan cavalry at all times. Let's go back and continue to cause trouble for the Xixia soldiers!"
"Isn't that right, Your Majesty?"
Zhao Er widened his eyes and said: "We have just come back, why should we go back? Those Xixia soldiers have been beaten by us, and the men and horses in our Shura camp are also tired. We really need 1,400 people to deal with the six or seven thousand Xixia soldiers."
The gain of mourning the soldiers outweighs the loss."
Liu Ling smiled and said, "Who told you that I was going to have a head-on confrontation with the Xixia soldiers?"
"That is?"
Zhao Er and Hanasaburo asked at the same time.
"Zhao Er, you take all the heavy armored cavalry and take a detour home. Don't delay. Remember to wait until midnight before entering Taiyuan City. The people in Shura Camp cannot see the light for the time being. Sanlang, follow me and take all the troops with you.
Use your Qingqi to lure the Xixia soldiers over!"
Zhao Er and Hua Sanlang suddenly understood Liu Ling's intention, and Zhao Er immediately shouted: "Your Majesty, do you want the Xixia soldiers and Ye Luxiong to fight? But in this case, wouldn't Chen Tiaoxian know that there is a large group of Khitans behind him?
Has the Wolf Rider come around?"
Liu Ling said with a smile: "I just want Chen Touxian to know! Since we have no way to notify him, we can only let them find out by themselves. If Chen Touxian doesn't know that someone has taken advantage of his back, the Xixia army will definitely be defeated. No.
With 160,000 strong troops, it will be difficult for Xixia to regain the situation."
Hanasaburo said: "Isn't this what we want? Xixia has lost its troops and will be unable to covet our territory in a short period of time. We can take the opportunity to train our troops and gain time to have the strength to compete with Xixia and Liao?"
Liu Ling shook his head and said with a smile: "We can't let Xixia be defeated so quickly. The longer this battle lasts, the more beneficial it will be to us men. Once Xixia is defeated, the Liao Kingdom will occupy a land thousands of miles north of Xixia, and we men will be on three sides."
We are surrounded by the Khitans. In addition, Datong has now become the Xijing of the Khitans. At least half of the 100,000 troops that Ye Luxiongji took away will remain in Datong. The Khitans will not know about the deal between us and Xixia.
, after letting the Khitans defeat Xixia, there is no guarantee that Yelu Xiong will not take action against the Han!"
"This battle must go on. Xixia cannot be defeated! It is best to fight for three to five years and let these two evil wolves choke both sides."
Zhao Er and Hanasaburo suddenly realized, and they looked at Liu Ling with more and more admiration. In their eyes, Liu Ling looked like an old fox who had practiced for thousands of years and became a master. (To be continued)
