Chapter 446: Living Towards Death

The northwest wind was raging, dust and sand were flying, and a team of more than 200 light armored cavalry were eating dust.

The horse bounced its hooves briskly and trotted forward. Behind the team, there were still people driving more than a hundred unrided horses, wrapping them up and marching with the team.

The horse ridden by the first person is extraordinarily tall and fat, making him stand out among the group. His armor is also different from others, with a unicorn belly, dark gold arm guards, phoenix wings, and a dark red cape tied around his shoulders. The colors on the cloak are different, some are dark red, and some are bright red. It is not difficult to see that it was originally bright red, but it was dyed darker by blood and dust.

He raised one hand and supported the zhangba Ma Shuo on his shoulder, the short sword on his waist, and the long saber tied to the horse. The armor leaves moved with the ups and downs, making a unique sound of armor, and the bright red cloak danced with the strong wind. Flying. The knights behind followed suit, imitating the leader's carefree attitude. No one spoke, only the horses' hooves and the wind.

At dusk, in the distant sky, a firework exploded in the sky.

Wang Yan didn't say anything. The person behind him took out a fire stick, took out a tubular object from his horse pocket, lit the fuse, and held it high in the air. Within a moment, there was an explosion, and a larger firework exploded in the sky.

Looking up at the fireworks, Wang Yan pinched the horse's belly fiercely, and the horse speeded up and headed towards the destination. The people behind automatically divided a hundred people to follow, and the rest protected the eunuchs and civil servants in the team, still advancing at the original speed.

As the horses galloped wildly, hundreds of people continued to join Wang Yan's team, skillfully controlling the distance and setting up a charging formation. After running at high speed for a quarter of an hour, more than two thousand riders had gathered behind Wang Yan in a mighty manner.

The team kept charging forward, and after running up a fairly high mound, Wang Yan reined in his horse and stopped.

In front of them was a large open space, and a team of more than 300 cavalry were running towards them, followed by thousands of cavalry chasing them with arrows. Further away, there were small groups of hundreds of troops, merging into a team of thousands of people, gathering from all directions.

The thousands of cavalrymen who were chasing them also stopped chasing after them when they saw the mountainous cavalry team appearing on the slope. Without saying a word, the front army turned into the rear army, turned around and ran away.

Wang Yan shook his head, forgetting his memory, and waved his hand boredly. The knights around him said nothing, holding up the spears on their shoulders and clamping them under their armpits. They held the reins in one hand and clamped the horses' belly with a roar. He shouted and rushed down.

This is the northern part of Xixia and belongs to the hinterland of Xixia. However, the map of Xixia is not good. Most places are not wealthy, and the population is only about three million. Most of them are concentrated in the areas bordering Song and Liao, where the big cities are. But there are not no people in the nearby places, they are all farming and grazing. These two items are pillar industries. What he does is destroy the ecology. If you look at the cattle and sheep, you will kill them, if you can drive the horses, you will drive them away, and if you enter the farmland, you will trample them.

The population of Xixia is complex, including Han people, Dangxiang people, Uighurs, and some Mongolians. But the people of a place that has not been conquered are not the people. Being starved to death or hacked to death had little to do with him.

Besides, all the people in Xixia are soldiers, and any adult man can wield a sword or a gun, even if he doesn't kill them. However, the killing was not in vain. As long as they were armed, men, women, old and children were all chopped down, and those without weapons were not left alone. However, this was not implemented well, because they had been killing people in Xixia territory for a year, and there were always people who took up arms to resist. After arresting people for questioning, I found out that they had a bad reputation and were said to kill people wherever they went. This aroused people's desire to resist. After all, it was death anyway, so it was better to resist fiercely and bite the flesh off even after death.

Of course, that's true, but if you can live, you don't want to die. They all moved south and became refugees, gathering outside the big cities everywhere, and there was no sense of security in the small cities.

This was also controlled by Wang Yan intentionally. He came here for two purposes, one was to train troops, and the other was to find opportunities to destroy Xixia. So when they first arrived, they went to slaughter and destroy farmland outside Xixia Dacheng, and then lured Xixia pursuers to run around and destroy their territory. Consciously driving Xixia people southward, increasing the burden on big cities. At the same time, the Song Dynasty closed its forays and stopped doing business with it. It deployed 400,000 soldiers to sharpen their troops and sharpen their swords. They did not dare to pursue and suppress the cavalry with large forces, so they could only send out small-scale troops to block the attack.

But this is useless. What Wang Yan is least afraid of is fighting guerrillas. Nurhaci and Huang Taiji are examples of this.

Of course, it is impossible to fully recruit the full strength of the Northern Army. There are not that many qualified horses and there are not that many qualified soldiers. Even the cavalry equipment is funded by the national treasury. Wang Yan's factory takes over the work and is under supervision. It was built by Liu Shui. Otherwise, in two years, it would be basically impossible to equip 40,000 cavalry according to the weapons he made. Therefore, affected by this, the entire army only had more than 42,000 people.

Among them, there are 6,000 heavy cavalry, which cannot be used as guerrillas in the field. After all, the equipment of the six thousand heavy cavalry requires thousands of carriages to drag them, so they can't come and go like the wind.

Everything is mutually reinforcing and mutually restraining. Heavy armored Mo Dao soldiers can fight against cavalry, but it is difficult to fight against heavy cavalry. And heavy cavalry, when confronting light cavalry, is like cutting melons and vegetables. However, due to the weight of the equipment and the physical strength of the horses, it is difficult to deal with the cavalry kite because it cannot catch up. If it can catch up, then of course it will be slaughtered one by one. So the six thousand heavy cavalry are on the front battlefield to contain the enemy and are responsible for picking up Wang Yan and others. After all, Xixia also has hundreds of thousands of troops. If they are really desperate, they must have a way to retreat. Six thousand heavy cavalry can poke a hole in a mountain of people.

So the troops that Wang Yan actually brought to Xixia were only 36,000. His tactics were also simple, just like what was being staged in front of him now, that is, small groups of troops dispersed. At the beginning, one side was a unit of 2,500 people, divided into ten teams of people and horses, and dispersed twenty miles apart, killing and looting everywhere, and killing large groups of enemy troops behind the enemy. Then little by little, two thousand people, one thousand, five hundred people, one thousand, five hundred, until now one hundred people are one group. Even if there were several thousand casualties, there were still more than 20,000 people, divided into more than 200 teams of 100 people.

Each team was separated by 15 miles. If the distance was calculated in a straight line, it would be more than 15 kilometers, which was a carpet-style push. Of course, it was definitely not possible to do that in actual execution, because we had to consider the speed of assembly for support and the fatigue of the troops during assembly. So there was a dispersion in front, back, left and right, covering an area of ​​more than 5 kilometers in radius. In addition, there was a 20-kilometer scout team sent out. Once a large force attacked, they would immediately assemble to meet the enemy. If not, they would become a small force and slaughter everywhere.

In this year, they fought from the border between the two countries to the territory of the Uighurs, and then fought back to the south, driving everyone to the south.

It was also because of their wanton destruction, coupled with the driving of people south, that the pressure on major cities increased greatly. Because there were people destroying in their own country, they still needed food and supplies, and there was no trade outside, and they could not exchange materials. They could not eat, and even if they were guarding a mountain of gold and a sea of ​​silver, the food and drink of three million people would not last long.

This time, it is really impossible to do business. Whoever collaborates with the enemy will be exterminated. Wang Yan reported to the emperor, and Zhao Ji approved it and directly confiscated the property.

This is also the reason why prices in Xixia are rising and people's livelihood is exhausted. Seeing this situation, Wang Yan predicted that Xixia would be difficult to sustain. After all, the losses from the previous war with Song Dynasty would not be recovered much even after three years of recuperation, because Xixia's plate is too small, its potential is too low, and its location is not too good. This time, he has purposeful destruction, so it will not last long. So he sent a memorial to Zhao Ji, who was on a tour and furious, to explain the situation and said that he would do his best this time.

Zhao Ji is not ignorant, otherwise he would not be furious. Because he always sits in the palace, imagining that he is rich in all the lands, but when he arrives at the place, he sees that everyone is pale and thin and looks like they are starving to death, which makes him feel guilty, not to mention that he is the emperor of the Song Dynasty. He was still thinking about being a great emperor through the ages with his literary and military virtues, but this situation was nothing like being a great emperor through the ages, it would be strange if he could be happy. He originally came out to have fun and watch the excitement, but he ended up being embarrassed.

He was the emperor, and the emperor's travel, although not as grand as Yang Guang's, was also not small, with 10,000 imperial guards and hundreds of people serving, and the food and horses along the way were also not small expenses. However, compared to the northward expedition to Liao, Wang Yan would rather Zhao Ji spend money at home, the cost was too much.

Of course, he had to hesitate to come out, but Zhao Ji had dealt with Gao Qiu and Cai Jing in succession, and he was powerful, and the newly appointed prime minister Wang Fu also strongly supported him, so he was reluctant to go.

It was no secret that Zhao Ji went on a tour of the world, and the local officials knew what was going on in various places, and of course they also whitewashed the peace along the way. But Zhao Ji was not stupid, and he didn't want to follow the big army. In the words of his good son-in-law, it was unnatural. So he always disguised himself, was escorted by people, wandered around and looked around blindly, and he saw the truth.

The suffering in writing and the difficulty in words are far less stinging than what he saw. Zhao Ji was stung, embarrassed and angry. He went to Yanggu County and Wangjiazhuang, and saw with his own eyes how rich it was. When he went to other places, the difference was really shocking.

So along the way, he took many local officials, raided many homes, and made a lot of money. There was no shortage of officials. After all, they were redundant to the point of endangering the survival of the country. Some were idle, so he promoted a group of them seriously.

But this was not what the court officials wanted to see, whether it was the new and old parties in the court, or the honest officials and corrupt officials. Anyone with a brain knew what this would arouse. So an uprising broke out again in the local area, and the officials said that the journey was dangerous and advised them to return to the court. Zhao Ji certainly understood it, and honestly returned to Bianjing, as if nothing had happened.

Faced with Wang Yan's memorial to fight Xixia again, he agreed. The reasons were sufficient, and there was indeed an opportunity, so all the civil and military officials in the court agreed. Besides, if he had no intention of fighting Xixia, he would not agree to Wang Yan taking the Fubei Army to Xixia for training.

The current situation is that the Western Army of the Song Dynasty outside the Great Wall is suppressing Xixia, and Wang Yan leads the Fubei Army to destroy the enemy's rear. Xixia is struggling to support, and is in danger, like a candle swaying in the wind, which will go out at any time.

The battle in the field is getting farther and farther, because the enemy has no will to die. Although this is the rear, it is already close to the main town of Xixia, so they have something to rely on, as long as they can run back, they can survive. This is normal. No one wants to die unless they are in a desperate situation. Especially when facing the Fubei Army, an army that makes them tremble with fear.

So the Xixia cavalry ran in front, and the Fubei Army soldiers chased them desperately, constantly shooting. As time passed, the scattered hundred-man teams began to gather here, gradually forming an encirclement.

But they did not charge against the Xixia cavalry. As long as they found that the Xixia cavalry charged desperately, they would switch to offense and defense. In such an open field, they had several times the enemy army, so why bother to charge and fight for their lives? Just kite.

Until the team ran farther and farther, tens of thousands of people became a big black dot, and the battle formation could not be seen clearly standing on the hillside, and the hundred-man team behind caught up. Wang Yan then took the lead again, chewing hard beef jerky while slowly riding his horse towards the battlefield in the distance.

"My husband, how many enemy troops have come this time?" A dusty eunuch rode up to Wang Yan and asked. He was the new military supervisor eunuch appointed by Song Huizong, and also a confidant, who came to stare at Wang Yan.

There is also an unlucky civil servant behind him. Although he cannot be considered as Zhao Ji's confidant, he is also willing to promote him. It is Zhao Ji's test for him to eat dirt on the battlefield.

Unlike unlucky civil servants, eunuchs come here because they are ambitious. Although this is a hard job and there is a risk of losing their lives, it is actually a lucrative job. Not to mention the military merit, there is also the opportunity to get close to Wang Yan, the god of wealth, and Zhao Ji's expectations for the Fubei Army. As long as he can go back alive, he will definitely be several levels higher. Tong Guan, Yang Jian, and Liang Shicheng are all their role models.

However, it is worth mentioning that Tong Guan was not used in this battle against Xixia, because Tong Guan was in the same group as Cai Jing. If Cai Jing fell, he would definitely be implicated. This time, Yang Jian, who was recommended by Wang Yan, was in charge of the overall situation. The generals of each department are still the original local snakes of the Western Army such as the Zhong family and the Zhe family.

With his relationship, Yang Jian is much stronger than in history. After leaving his post in the palace, he was directly transferred to the military supervisor of the Northern Army. He has never made any mistakes in all these years. The army is well trained and the people's livelihood has not been damaged. He has never been a local governor and a disaster to the people. He was fed by Wang Yan and was quite obedient.

So this time, although the war against Xixia was named Yang Jian, the basic direction was remotely controlled by him. This is the benefit of being favored by the emperor. Doesn't Zhao Ji know that Yang Jian is his man? Of course not. The problem is that Zhao Ji went out once and didn't know who could be used. The battle against Xixia cannot be delayed, and the Fubei Army is really good at fighting and the tactics are no problem, so he recommended Yang Jian and transferred him.

"It is estimated that there are three to five thousand people."

"These Xixia people really don't have a long memory. They have been besieged so many times and the front line is fighting again. They dare to send so many cavalry to die."

Wang Yan did not reply. This is a very simple truth. At this time, there are still 4,000 people coming out to die. It must be that they have been prepared and want to lure the enemy deep. Perhaps at this time, the road behind them had been cut off.

When they arrived, the battle was over and more than 20,000 people had already gathered. There were corpses of soldiers and horses everywhere, and no one cared about the dark red ground stained with blood. Even the unfortunate civil servant was used to it, let alone Wang Yan, who was still eating beef jerky.

Seeing Wang Yan and others coming, Lu Junyi hurried over: "General, all 4,000 enemy soldiers have been killed, and none of our soldiers died. Only horses were shot by arrows, and several brothers were injured. There were also dozens of brothers who were knifed during the fight, which did not affect the battle."

This kite was not released in vain, and the battle for more than a year was not fought in vain. Now they are more elite. Of course, we have to be elite. There are more than 30,000 people, but now there are only more than 20,000 people left. One third of them were killed or wounded. The rest

Wang Yan nodded: "Okay, let's take a break and eat something quickly."

Lu Junyi has been following for a long time and has some experience. He frowned and asked: "Are we surrounded again?"

"The scouts from the north, east, and south have all missed the time to report."

"Then we go southwest?"

"Southwest?" Wang Yan shook his head and smiled, and ate the remaining small piece of beef jerky in his hand: "It's just a way to survive. Whether they deliberately let it go or the encirclement is not in place, we can't afford to gamble. Go east, break through them, and go to Xing Qingfu's troops are just a feint, bypassing the Helan Mountains, crossing the Yellow River to the north, and returning from the Hedong Road. "

"But over there..."

"True and false, real and fake. I guess Xingqingfu is already heavily garrisoned, so there must be fewer troops this time. They won't think that we dare to march into the capital of Xixia with only a few tens of thousands of troops, so we will do the opposite and attack Xingqingfu. The front line is tight, and my Song army has already fought to Huaizhou and headed straight for Xingqingfu. The chances of them sending heavy troops to the east to intercept us are not high. If I'm wrong, I'll die. "

Half of Xixia's current situation is caused by him, and now it's close to the battlefield, and it's behind them, so there's no reason not to deal with him.

There's a way out in the west, no matter if it's a real way out or not, he won't go, because he can't bear the cost of misjudgment. Going north, there are countless experiences that have told them, so they won't let them go north again. Now the war in Xixia is not going well, so they have to consider retreating. Going south, that's the battlefield between the two sides, and the back must be protected. But if he went east, he was sure of the chance. If he went the other way, he thought the chance was small.

As he said, there were already heavy troops stationed there, and they were not afraid of his 20,000-plus people. This was what he could think of, and what the Xixia side could think of. This was naturally a dead end, so he chose to go to the dead end.

Lu Junyi nodded, said nothing more, and turned to give the message. The soldiers were also familiar with the style, and without saying anything, they took out the dried meat and ate it with water. After filling their stomachs, they didn't know whether they were dead or alive.

After resting for half an hour, more than 20,000 people set out and headed east...

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