Chapter 158 Enemies everywhere

Chapter 158 Enemies everywhere

On the plateau, flames shot into the sky and the sound of killing filled the field. Li Tai waved the sword in his hand and slashed it down. The broken arm of the Hu soldier in front of him flew out, but the power of the sword did not delay for a moment. He flipped his wrist and cut off his head with another slash. .

This is already the third time Hu Zu has organized a breakout since evening. Broken limbs and broken arms were scattered everywhere around Tucheng. The enemies were mainly strong soldiers at the beginning, and now even Jihu women have joined in.

This breakout lasted for more than a quarter of an hour. As the sound of killings gradually faded, and seeing that there was no hope of breaking out, the barbarians retreated to the Tucheng.

"Although the earthen wall is not high, it is always an obstacle. Why are these barbarians eager to cross the wall to die?"

Li Tai was also a little surprised when he saw the corpses of many new soldiers on the battlefield. Since they landed on the plateau, they have not yet had time to organize an attack on Tucheng, and they have not shown much ability to attack the city. However, these Jihu, as if they expected that the city would be difficult to defend, kept breaking through and dying.

"What they are afraid of is not just our king division. They are ruthless and cruel. They not only torture the villagers, but also kill their own kind and annex to enrich themselves. The land here is beautiful and the reserves are rich. If the Hu tribe in the near future discovers that their power will be harmed, , will also attack in groups. If they stay here, they will definitely die! "

Lu Chuan, who was well aware of the situation in this area, came forward to explain, pointing to the blazing fire on the top of the plateau and said: "The war here should have been alerted by the Hu tribe nearby, and they may have been sharpening their swords, feeding their horses, and preparing to come." "Jie. I just don't know the situation of the power battle, so I keep a close eye on it."

"So that's the case, it's a bit difficult to handle."

Li Tai frowned when he heard this. The main goal of his trip was to gather Jihu's war horses. The most advantageous situation was undoubtedly to quietly attack these tribes through guerrilla warfare, leaving them unprepared. Get enough horses.

A thousand war horses can be said to be too many or too few. A Hu tribe of similar size would have to handle at least two or three before they could count. Exposing it too early will add many unpredictable variables to subsequent actions.

What's more, there is also a Hu chief Liu Zhenqiang who has returned from the Eastern Wei Dynasty. The size of his power is unknown. He may have gathered a lot of people secretly. If they meet head-on, it will be exciting.

But having said that, if all the Ding Zhuang soldiers from the nearby Hu tribe are attracted here to take advantage of the situation, the remaining forces will inevitably be insufficient. If they can avoid frontal fighting, the robbery will naturally be smoother.

In short, this situation is a coexistence of crises. There are definitely risks, but it is not worth worrying about.

After repelling Jihu's attack, the city fell into a dead silence. It seems that there were too many casualties and they were a little discouraged.

But Li Tai didn't want them to be too comfortable. After the team took a short rest, they began to prepare for the attack.

Outside Tucheng, there were many slaves that Jihu had no time to gather, about three hundred people. There were not many real Han people, and there were also many Di and Qiang people. However, these mature beards that have been attached for many years are no different in Jihu's eyes, and they are all called Han slaves.

His own subordinates still wanted to maintain their fighting power, and Li Tai did not display the spirit of boundless love and asked the rescued slaves to work harder, cutting down trees in the southern plateau and building some simple siege equipment.

These slaves are also very active in this regard. Jihu does not treat them as human beings at all. He has deep hatred in his heart and wishes that all Jihu would die in the city.

What's more, although Li Tai also enslaved them, he also let them fill their bellies and eat freely the cattle and sheep scattered around. Many slaves never dreamed that they would have the opportunity to have meat in their mouths for the rest of their lives.

Everyone was busy cutting and building, and soon built two long ladders. When the long ladder was erected on the top of the earthen wall, it seemed as if oil had fallen into the fire. The city suddenly became chaotic, and many barbarians gathered here.

After Li Tai saw this, he was no longer in a hurry to attack the city. Taking advantage of the increasing number of barbarians gathered here, he had people throw torches into the wall. There was a louder commotion inside the wall, and the smell of burnt food was clearly audible. .

The rescued slaves were overjoyed when they saw this. Without waiting for Li Tai's further instructions, they carried the long ladder and ran to another section of the city wall. When the barbarians were attracted, they took the initiative to set fire to it.

After several such encounters, the barbarians in the city also learned the lesson and began to pour oil on them and take the initiative to set fire to the ladders. For a time, firelight flickered on sections of the earthen walls, illuminating the area like daylight.

After Li Tai saw this, he simply had Ji Hu's body collected and thrown into the fire, and he actively added fuel to the fire.

This approach had a huge impact on the morale of Tucheng. Seeing the flesh and blood of their loved ones being swallowed up by tongues of fire, Jihu in the city was frightened and their hatred also surged.

Not long after, another group of Jihu soldiers came out from inside. This time, Li Tai no longer sent people to fight with them, but sent twenty cavalrymen in horse armor to kill the thieves.

The twenty cavalrymen were like gods of death. There was no need to dodge the Jihu Yadao. They swung the horseshoes in their hands as hard as they could. It was no longer a battle, it was a one-sided massacre!

These Jihu soldiers were originally motivated by resentment and were quite ready to fight to the death. However, the bows and swords in their hands were extremely weak at this time, and their desperate slashes were not enough to break the armor. On the contrary, they themselves were injured when touched.

Such a huge gap makes people despair, and the so-called desperate desperate efforts only mean death, because what they are facing is no longer the unarmed Han and Hu slaves who are being slaughtered, but the real powerful soldiers.

There were a lot of barbarians rushing out this time, but no matter how fierce the crowds were, they were only broken into pieces by the waves hitting the rocks. The twenty armors were still advancing steadily.

Seeing that more and more of their companions were dying, the Hu soldiers began to flee to the left and right, but what greeted them was ruthless killing again. Li Tai led the rear, with Gu Jia as the vanguard, and stopped and killed all the fleeing Hu soldiers. For a while, even the land in front of the city gate became muddy under the water of flesh and blood.

The armor crashed directly into the city gate, and the light cavalry and infantry from behind also rushed in. The Jihu men and women who were left behind in the city were even more panicked and confused.

"Split up and kill!"

Li Tai led a dozen men and rushed directly to a place where the Hu soldiers were still gathering to resist, slashing several people and killing them and scattering them.

After the city was broken, the barbarian soldiers were completely desperate. Many people tried to escape over the wall, but were surrounded and killed one by one by the rangers outside the city and the rescued slaves. Only a few could escape from this killing field.

The warehouse stacks in the city burst into flames. This was because some barbarians set fire to the supplies when they saw that there was no hope of escape. The fire pointed out the location of the enemies entering the city. People from all sides gathered and used bows and knives to force the remaining Hu people to throw themselves into the sea of ​​​​fire, preventing the spread of the fire and salvaging some supplies.

Less than half an hour later, the resistance in the city was completely suppressed, and the remaining people were gathered together. There were originally a tribe of more than 3,000 people, but now there are only four to five hundred people left, most of whom are old and weak, women and children, and most of the strong soldiers died in the battle.

Jihu's fighting spirit was not so tenacious, but the attack was too sudden and the best opportunity to escape was missed. Li Tai did not try to recruit prisoners at all, leaving them with no escape and no hope of survival.

After fighting for most of the night, the men and horses were exhausted. The rescued slaves were responsible for cleaning the battlefield. Li Taixian and his troops rested for a while, interrogating information and counting the seizures.

This Jihu tribe is not considered weak. Among the population of more than 3,000, there are only 700 or 800 young adults. This is considered a very healthy population structure among the Jihu tribe. This is why they are qualified to occupy Woxiong Ridge. This is a resting place with excellent resources.

There are also a lot of supplies stored in the city. Although part of the city was burned when it was destroyed, several large warehouses of grain, grease, fur and other important supplies were still left.

During the battle just now, Li Tai discovered that the elite Hu soldiers had many leather and iron armors, and the combat effectiveness they displayed was also considerable.

The people and horses are strong and strong, and a lot of supplies have been accumulated this year. If Li Tailai hadn't accidentally attacked and wiped out the tribe in late autumn, the tribe would have ushered in a period of rapid development this winter, and might even have grown. An upper-middle-class tribe.

The Jihu tribe has no account books and has no time to carefully count the supplies. Judging from the size of the stables, there are approximately three to five thousand cattle and sheep. As for the most important horses, there are nearly 500, and there are also nearly 300 that have strong teeth and feet and can be used as war horses.

Thinking about how he had to fight with the county government over dozens of cattle and horses when he came to his hometown last year, Li Tai suddenly felt proud and proud. Sure enough, the only way to strengthen yourself is to support war with war. He came too late!

Although the harvest is gratifying, it is unrealistic to take it all away. He is currently going deep alone, without the support of local forces or the cooperation of friendly forces. Being too greedy will only put himself in danger.

Naturally, horses must be brought along, which can greatly increase transportation capacity and mobility. In addition, he also brought more than two hundred cans of grease and some cheese for food, as well as some furs and fodder that were easy to carry. The remaining cattle, sheep, grains, etc. are not easy to carry.

However, Li Tai did not intend to take advantage of the Hu tribe who was surrounded by spies. He first sent the horses, supplies and 200 tribesmen to settle nearby to avoid being dumped. The remaining supplies in the Tucheng were carried by cattle and sheep and driven down to the plains, allowing these livestock to escape in all directions.

As for the rescued slaves, he was unable to give them more care. He could only leave them with some horse power supplies, distribute some of the bows and knives collected from Jihu, and let them move west to the Luoshui River.

The remaining Jihu prisoners, young and old, all had their thumbs chopped off and distributed to the Han and Hu people together with women and children. They could kill or keep them as they pleased.

After everything was taken care of, it was already dawn. After the group made a stove on the plateau and had breakfast, they added more firewood to increase the power of the stove, and then went down to the plateau. After the two places met, they headed north.

During the interrogation of the prisoners last night, we learned that there were five or six large and small Hu tribes coexisting within a few dozen miles of Woxiong Ridge, and they were all nominally under the command of Chief Hu Hao of this territory. Most of these Hu tribes are distributed between the east and south areas of Woxiong Ridge.

However, Ji Huyou is a escapist, so these information may not be accurate. Although Li Tai and others deliberately took a detour, more than ten miles northbound, they encountered a Jihu team with more than 300 people.

When the scouts from both sides met in the wilderness, they were both a little surprised and embarrassed, and then they went back to report. Although Li Tai and his entourage were short of men and horses, in line with the spirit of defeating the enemy, they directly rode up to chase them, but they only saw the smoke and dust of the barbarians escaping in the field.

This is one of the more annoying aspects of the Jihu hunt. If they can't stop them at their lair, they can sneak away half of their pursuers.

"Go back to Woxiong Ridge, let's guard the ditch and fish!"

After pondering for a while, Li Tai ordered again. The purpose of leaving before was to avoid the war and rest for a while, but the activities of the nearby Jihu soldiers were so frequent, and they were not familiar with the geography. Instead of passively fighting the battle while traveling, it was better to stay in a place and wait for work.

Now there are nearly one man and two cavalry in his troops, which greatly increases their mobility. Unless Jihu's thousands of troops surround him on all sides, it is still possible to fight and escape.