Chapter 229: The Ming Army That People Can't Understand
While Wang Zhitan and the others were trying to delay time, Su Jiakang on the other side looked at the small valley where the puppet Tang rebel army was located a few miles away with determination on his face, and thought to himself: Tonight, no matter what, Li Xuan must be killed.
Take it.
Otherwise, if time dragged on for a long time, Li Xuan would have gone somewhere long ago. Without Li Xuan's head in hand, and without defeating the main force of the puppet Tang rebel army, it would be difficult for him to deal with the aftermath later.
And being unable to deal with the aftermath is not a good thing for Su Jiakang!
But he didn't know that he didn't take the lives of warriors like Wang Zhitan seriously. The warriors like Wang Zhitan also didn't care about annihilating the puppet Tang rebel army and capturing Li Xuan alive. They even started fighting to delay time.
Notice.
Similarly, today's Li Xuan does not know that there are already many conflicts within the Ming army. At this time, he is still thinking of using a defensive battle to cover the evacuation of the baggage train.
In this battle, he didn't expect to kill many Ming troops, and he didn't even plan to hold off the Ming troops for long. As long as he bought enough time for the baggage team, he would lead his troops to evacuate without hesitation.
Anyway, the large amount of baggage that was slowing them down has been taken away by the baggage team in advance. When the main force retreats later, they can completely retreat lightly, and the speed is very fast.
Time passed bit by bit. Although it was night, the distance between the two sides was already very close, especially the forwards and peripheral troops of both sides, and a small-scale battle soon broke out.
The reconnaissance cavalry and peripheral scouts of the New Army of the Tang Dynasty wanted to get close to the main force of the Ming army and find out their situation in advance so that the main force in the rear could prepare accordingly.
As for the Ming army, they also sent a lot of scouts to inquire in detail about the situation of the new army of the Tang Dynasty.
Even though Wang Zhitan and the others didn't want to fight and wanted to delay, they also didn't want to ambush, so they sent out a large number of scouts and patrols.
In the process of frequent contact between the scouts of both sides, both sides inevitably suffered casualties. However, the scale of these casualties was very small, and the number of casualties was single digits, which was not enough for the main battle between the two sides.
will have any impact.
The scouts on both sides gradually retreated as the main force gradually approached.
When Li Xuan and his men prepared defenses, the main forward of the Ming army finally arrived in this small valley. This forward was not many in number, only about a hundred people.
These Ming troops seemed extremely cautious and stopped hundreds of meters outside the valley. Li Xuan thought they were looking for his own weakness, but he had no idea that the main forwards of these Ming troops were
Wang Zhitan's army and its hundreds of households were Wang Zhitan's confidants.
The reason why they stopped was to delay time, and on the other hand, they really didn't want to fight the puppet Tang rebels.
Su Jiakang's forwards at the back stopped moving when they arrived at the puppet Tang rebel army's formation, with a hint of anger flashing across their faces.
Wang Zhitan nodded secretly. His subordinate did not disappoint him and fully understood his order to 'act with caution'.
Seeing that Su Jiakang's face was not very good, Wang Zhitan comforted Su Jiakang and said: "Master Su, now the vanguard has arrived. We only need to wait for our main force to go up later, and we will be able to capture the puppet emperor Li Xuan alive!"
After hearing this, Su Jiakang nodded slightly.
Since the puppet Tang rebel army did not turn around and flee, Su Jiakang would not be in a hurry. He would wait for the main force to go up and kill the puppet emperor Li Xuan in one go.
On the New Army side of the Tang Dynasty, Li Xuan was also discussing in a low voice with Zeng Ziwen.
"What's going on with these Ming troops?" Li Xuan looked at the Ming troops who stopped in the distance. At first, he thought these Ming troops were being cautious or looking for their own weaknesses, but soon he discovered that the Ming troops were
Everyone was already sitting on the ground, and many people even lay down directly.
Zeng Ziwen also frowned slightly and said: "I don't understand. According to common sense, these forwards should launch tentative attacks to test the weakness of our army, or go around to find the weaknesses of our army to prepare for the enemy behind.
The main force is preparing for the attack, but now they have stopped, and your Majesty, you can see that they are obviously exhausted, otherwise they would not lie down directly regardless of the formation!"
"Didn't these Ming soldiers have any rest along the way? How could they hold on?" Although he had known that the Ming army would be exhausted after chasing all the way, Li Xuan estimated that they should have rested on the way.
Otherwise, why would a night attack be launched?
But now it seems that the physical exhaustion of these Ming troops is much more serious than I expected!
"It doesn't matter if they don't attack, it can just delay the time. Now that the baggage team has almost left, we only need to buy another hour for the baggage team, and then we can evacuate directly!" Qian Mengjiu at this time
He also said: "But the Ming army spent so much effort to catch up, I'm afraid they won't give us an hour!"
Qian Mengjiu's prediction was correct. Wang Zhitan and other Ming army generals wanted to delay time, but Su Jiakang wouldn't let them!
When Su Jiakang arrived with the main force of more than a thousand people, although he did not order the troops to attack immediately, but instead asked the troops to take a rest, he only gave the soldiers a quarter of an hour to rest!
This was not because Su Jiakang didn't want his soldiers to rest for a while, but because he looked at the puppet Tang rebel army in front and already noticed something was wrong.
The number of these pseudo-Tang thief troops in front of us seems to be smaller, only more than 300 people. Judging from yesterday's situation and the spies' report not long ago, the pseudo-Tang thief army has more than 500 people, and they also carry
A lot of baggage.
But now there are only more than 300 Puppet Tang rebels here, and two hundred people have disappeared. Looking at their baggage, he has also disappeared. After a moment of thought, he knows that part of the Puppet Tang rebel army has already brought the baggage with them.
Escaped first.
The pseudo-Tang rebels in front of them were obviously planning to hold them back for a while, so as to buy time for the pseudo-Tang rebels who were carrying their baggage to evacuate.
How long will this take?
It can take as little as half an hour, and as long as one or two hours.
Once the puppet Tang rebels retreat, it will be even more difficult for them to pursue them, because at this time, Su Jiakang already knows that his soldiers no longer have enough physical strength to continue the pursuit.
When the time comes, Su Jiakang can only watch helplessly as the puppet Tang bandits escape!
While there was still time, Su Jiakang planned to fight first. Even if he couldn't win, as long as there was a fight, these pseudo-Tang rebels would not be able to escape smoothly.
As for what to do if the soldiers are not strong enough after the fight and their combat effectiveness is greatly reduced?
What else can we do? Let’s serve it cold!
Besides, Su Jiakang was not stupid. He led the Ming army in pursuit. Although his side had no rest time, which caused the soldiers to consume a lot of physical strength, the puppet Tang rebels in front were no better.
They had either been running all day and could only rest in the valley for an hour, or they were forced to get up to fight.
Now both sides are physically exhausted, and no one can say who is wrong.
The only trouble is that the soldiers of the Ming army are physically exhausted, but this is nothing to Su Jiakang, because he has an absolute military advantage!
More than a thousand people faced off against only 300 puppet Tang rebels. The advantage in strength was enough to make up for the disadvantage in physical strength.
A quarter of an hour later, he looked around, and then said to Wang Zhitan and the others: "Let's get started!"
When Wang Zhitan heard this, he sighed inwardly!
But what he was thinking in his heart would never be revealed in front of Su Jiakang, and he immediately said: "I will obey your orders!"
Immediately Wang Zhitan strode out, leading a group of generals to prepare for the attack. Looking at the way he strode out, people who didn't know better thought that he was eager to fight.
But outsiders would never know that Wang Zhitan was determined to continue delaying for as long as he could.
In order to delay the attack, he made quite detailed preparations for this attack. Not only did he give orders to each hundred households and deputy thousand households, but he also personally walked into the ranks of the soldiers and greeted them one by one.
They checked whether the armor was well worn and whether the steel swords were sharp.
Even when he encountered a soldier whose armor was not neatly worn, he personally helped the soldier take off his armor and then put it on again. After putting it on, he did not forget to smile and pat the soldier on the shoulder, saying:
: "This armor is not worn neatly, but it will affect the battle. Please pay attention to it in the future!"
Seeing this scene in the eyes of many soldiers, their favorability towards Wang Zhitan increased several points.
This is a good general. He personally greets the soldiers and boosts their morale. He also inspects them so carefully that he even puts on their armor himself!
Even if you are not impressed by this, you are still considered a soldier under General Wang!
But no one knew that it took Wang Zhitan five minutes to put on the armor for this soldier!
Furthermore, no one carefully calculated how much time Wang Zhitan spent checking the soldiers' preparations. If someone had held a stopwatch, they would have discovered that Wang Zhitan spent a full thirty-two minutes and twenty-four seconds.
After Wang Zhitan helped the last soldier fasten his shield, he reluctantly came out of the queue and returned to the front of the formation.
At this time, he turned back and glanced at Su Jiakang behind him, knowing in his heart that he could not delay it any longer. Su Jiakang would go crazy if he delayed any longer.
That's why he ordered the soldiers to formally come forward!
The soldiers followed the pace of Wang Zhitan and other mid-level officers. Not surprisingly, these Ming army generals, who had already been discussed, all walked very slowly, and their speed was not much faster than a tortoise crawling.
.
Although the speed was slow, the Ming army finally arrived. For this, Fang Dongquan and the others on the opposite side were all prepared, and even many officers shouted loudly:
"Prepare!"
"Cheer up, everyone!"
"Musketeers, light the match!"
But just as they finished speaking, they found that the Ming army on the opposite side stopped. They walked about a hundred meters and then stopped.
Why did they stop?
The enemy is right in front of you. The distance between the two sides is only more than 200 meters. You actually stopped. Why don't you stop? Just shout and charge forward!
Li Xuan looked puzzled at the stopped Ming army, and Su Jiakang, who was watching the battle from behind, also looked puzzled! 19