Chapter 1004: Blood tempering

Chapter 1004: Blood tempering

  Chapter 1004 Blood Fire Tempering

  Li Chengqian laughed wildly, galloping his horse.

I have heard countless stories about the emperor's southern and northern wars before, and I often heard how Qin Lang, Duke of Wei, came to the world as a **** of war and was invincible. Invincible.

  Now, it is finally his turn.

  Five thousand light cavalry raided two hundred miles a day and night, fighting with five thousand against one hundred thousand for half a day. His shoulders were sore from the weight of the armor weighing dozens of kilograms on his body, and his arms were sore and numb from holding the eight-foot horse, but his heart was still hot.

  The more you fight, the more excited you become.

   There are no less than ten feathered arrows stuck in his body, and even a few armors have been cut and dented, but Cheng Qian didn't realize it.

  It was already afternoon.

  The sun was a cloud of gray in mid-air, unable to feel the slightest heat and majesty of the past.

  The north wind howled and the snow was blowing.

  The Tuyuhun people were fleeing in all directions, and Chengqian rode his horse in pursuit.

  Liang Jianfang, Gao Kan, and Gao Zhensheng led the army one after another, and they completely smashed the last hope of the Tuyuhun people to make a comeback.

  Murong Cheng is not Murong Fuyun after all, he doesn't have those decades of experienced experience, although he is unruly, he lacks the experience of real blood and fire, facing the opportunities again and again, but always misses them. And the Tuyuhun army here is no longer the strong army under Fu Yun's command that could grin at the Central Plains at every turn.

  After being slashed time and time again by Qin Qiong, Qin Lang, Chai Shaocheng, Jin Xue Wanche, etc., it is long gone. Back then, many people from the vicious Tuyuhun army were either killed by the sword of the Tang army, or their big toes were cut off and sent as slaves after being defeated and captured. Some even had their thumbs cut off. They were cut off, they couldn't run fast, and they couldn't hold their swords and guns firmly anymore. Many people even left Qinghai forever and were sent to the four sides of Datang, or under the mines, or in the sugarcane gardens, day after day After a day of repeated work, even the horse has no chance to step on it again.

There are also many Tuyuhun herdsmen who did not suffer the pain of amputated toes and fingers, but were also relocated to other places. They either garrisoned the south of the Lingnan border for the Tang Dynasty, or herded horses in western Liaoning, or fed cattle in the Central Plains, or went to the Western Regions. Tuntian.

There used to be a million Tuyuhun. After several major conquests and defeats in the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the population loss was serious. Although it quickly recovered a lot of population at the end of the Sui Dynasty, and took advantage of the chaos in the Central Plains, it came from Hexi Longyou and other places. Absorbed and even robbed many Han people, but since Zhenguan, they have suffered repeated defeats, causing their population to drop sharply.

First, the Dangxiang Qiang and other Qiangs who were originally attached to Tuyuhun, hundreds of thousands of them left Tubo one after another, and even the Qiangs of Bailan, which was once the core of Tubo, fell to the Tang Dynasty, let alone Xiqingshan in the west. The Qiangdi in the mountainous area, a large number of Qiangdi tribes broke away from Tubo, causing them to lose at least one-third of their population.

Immediately after several Tang army crusades, there were no less than 100,000 young and strong people who died in battle. After the defeat, they were captured as slaves, and the tribes who were relocated afterwards, plus the hundreds of thousands of people in the east who were directly cut off by the Tang Dynasty. The various tribes on the ground caused Tuyuhun to directly lose about half of its population.

Although Tuyuhun has been established for hundreds of years, it is only a nomadic tribal alliance after all, and the geographical and climatic conditions in the Qinghai area are not as good as the Turks in the northern grasslands. This makes Tuyuhun suffer such a large population reduction. Already hurt.

   But Murong Cheng couldn't see these, or didn't care about them at all.

  Wars are fought against the population. Even if it is a nomadic tribe, the whole people can be soldiers, and the old, weak, women and children can fight together, but the main force of the battle must be young and strong.

  Tuyuhun's young and strong losses were too serious. Murong Cheng claimed that there were 100,000 people gathered here, but in fact there were less than 20,000 young and strong soldiers, and with the young and old, there were only 30,000 to 40,000.

  But Tuyuhun at this time had a serious psychological shadow on Tang Jun.

   They have been defeated by Tang Jun too many times.

   However, there was a lot of clamor before the battle, but once the real confrontation between the two armies, especially when they were caught off guard by a surprise attack, and they couldn't even figure out how many Tang troops were on the opposite side, Tuyuhun became even more messed up.

  From the beginning to the end, Murong Cheng's poor command level dealt the Tuyuhun people the heaviest blow, making them unable to even display their basic combat effectiveness.

  These Tuyuhun people are like fish on a cutting board, ready to be slaughtered by Tang Qi.

  From sunrise to sunset, hunt for a day.

  Sunset and dusk.

  Dark clouds covered the sky, and the wind was strong.

  Gao Kan caught up with Cheng Qian and held his horse, "Your Highness, I can't chase anymore."

  The soldiers have all been killed so far in one breath. At this time, there are not many people left to chase. Many soldiers have fallen behind, and many horses have fallen directly.

  The Qinghai Cong under Chengqian is a good breed of Persian Sasanian horse and Qinghai local horse. It has good endurance and explosive power, but he has changed horses halfway, and his horse is already exhausted.

   "It's going to be dark soon."

  Gao Kan reminded Cheng Qian that it was very dangerous now, they chased all the way, and chased for dozens of miles, Murong Cheng fled all the way, it was very difficult to catch up.

After chasing this way, within tens of miles, there are Tuyuhun's defeated soldiers everywhere, especially their families, wives, daughters, parents, etc., who are all fleeing. In addition to those scattered cattle, sheep and livestock, the entire source of Huangshui West This mountainous area is in a mess.

  There are people and livestock everywhere, Tang Jun and Tuyuhun people are all mixed together.

   Right now, Tang Jun's pursuit of the enemy has been too scattered. After dark, there is no guarantee that there will be no more accidents.

   "Your Highness, there are not only people in this valley of Tuyuhun, there are also dozens of tribes within a hundred miles nearby, and there are still no less than 200,000 people in total."

  Murong Cheng has come to fight with all his country this time, bringing all the active ones with him, which makes their victory today not the final victory.

   "We have to gather our soldiers and horses immediately while it's dark, and while stepping up our rest, we must defend on the spot to prevent the Tuyuhun people from killing their carbine!"

  The 50,000 troops in front of the Tang army are less than half of them, and there are still about 30,000 behind. Although I don’t understand why Tuoba Chici and the other generals’ horsemen haven’t arrived yet, if they haven’t arrived, they haven’t arrived.

  Hou Junji's 50,000 rear army infantry have not yet arrived.

  Their 20,000 riders are exhausted and must rest.

Cheng Qian looked at Murong Cheng and the others who were still fleeing in a panic in front of him, and the Tuyuhun people everywhere, and felt unwilling, but when he looked behind him, there were less than a hundred riders left in the three hundred Luben , Not many other Tang Qi followed up.

  Now that they have shown their momentum, more than a thousand people insisted on chasing tens of thousands of Tuyuhun people and ran for more than ten miles. If Murong Cheng had any courage, they should all shoot back. It's hard to say who will win.

"All right!"

   Chengqian thrust his horse into the ground, "Stop chasing."

  The precious Qinghai Cong suddenly neighed and fell to the ground. This steed had reached its limit, and it would fail when it stopped.

   "Your Highness!"

   Gao Kan exclaimed.

   Chengqian was also tired and exhausted. The horse suddenly fell down. He didn't have time to react. He wanted to take off the stirrup and jump on the horse.

Seeing that the war horse was about to crush Cheng Qian under the horse, Gao Kan let out an angry roar, jumped off the horse, and then hugged Cheng Qian's horse's neck. Catch a falling horse.

  Chengqian finally came to his senses at this time, and quickly threw off the stirrups, and he fell to the ground. The horse was caught by Gao Kan, and his body was half-tilted on top of him, and he was about to be pressed down.

   Regardless of the ice, snow and mud on the ground, the lazy donkey quickly rolled and rolled out of the snow.

  Gao Kan over there finally couldn't take it anymore, and fell into the slush with his horse and man.

   "Governor Gao, are you alright?" Cheng Qian rushed over, Gao Kan fell heavily, his face was a little swollen, he took a breather, waved his hands, "I'm fine."

  The green horse Cong lay in the snow and was still struggling to get up, but blood foam spewed from his mouth and nose.

   Gao Kan got up, looked at the horse that almost hurt Chengqian, and angrily drew his sword out to finish him, but Chengqian stopped him.

   "Wait a minute, Commander Gao, it didn't mean to, it couldn't hold on any longer, and today it accompanied Gu to charge into battle, and it did a great job."

  Chengqian stepped forward, squatted in front of the horse, took off his gloves, and stroked the horse's face with his hand, "You have worked hard."

  The horse neighed twice, two lines of tears flowed out of its big eyes, and slowly closed them.

  Chengqian couldn't help crying suddenly.

   "Your Highness?"

   "Oh, it's okay, I splashed something in my eye just now, it's okay."

   Standing up, looking at the motionless beloved horse, Cheng Qian sighed.

   "Your Highness, why don't you let someone bury it?"

   Chengqian looked around and shook his head.

   "This is a battlefield, and it is a war horse. It is an excellent war horse, a meritorious horse. If he is a warrior, everyone will ask him to be honored!"

   "Give a war horse the final return it deserves. The stewed horse meat will be shared with the soldiers, and the horse hide will be intact. It is only necessary to bring it back to Chang'an."

  Gao Kan looked at this handsome horse, "Why don't you bury it, after all, it is His Highness's favorite horse."

"When the Duke of Wei once taught the art of war, he said that any resources on the battlefield are precious, especially edible things. I like this horse. When I return to Chang'an in the future, I will definitely find a skilled craftsman for it. Set up a statue to commemorate, but now, let’s not waste it, slaughter the horse and eat stew, remember to give me a bowl of horse blood, drink it to warm up, it’s too **** cold.”

Gao Kan looked at the prince, and didn't know whether to say that the prince was ruthless or calm and calm. He could only say that what the prince showed at this time, whether it was personally charging into the battle, or killing his beloved horse to eat meat, made him secretly heartbroken. shock.

  In the place where Chengqian lost his horse and stood up, the Tang army began to gather, set up camp, and light a fire for cooking.

  The sky was gloomy with heavy wind and snow.

In the snow in the valley, Tang Jun slaughtered and wounded horses. He couldn't find enough dry firewood, so he warmed up with hot horse blood first, then cut fresh horse meat into thin slices, and then cut them into thin shreds. Eat it raw like that.

Although the taste is very bad, but in this icy and snowy place, after running day and night and fighting for a day, even if it is ice and snow on the ground, they can grab a few mouthfuls, warm horse blood and fresh horse meat are enough to eat up.

  Chengqian drank the horse blood of his beloved foal, and then chewed the horse meat, gobbling it up.

  Gao Kan, Liang Jianfang, Gao Zhensheng, and Xi Junmai are all grabbing horse meat to eat while making arrangements. Although the fighting has stopped, they don’t just sit back and relax. On the contrary, they are very dangerous now.

  For some reason, Hou Junji, Tuoba Chici and the others have not yet arrived, but there are still Tuyuhun defeated soldiers everywhere around here, danger is everywhere.

  On the one hand, they asked people to use spears and horses to erect a simple horse-repelling wall, and on the other hand, they asked people to use snow shovels to pile up a snow wall.

It is also necessary to arrange people to scout and guard, arrange people to guard, and arrange people to go to the field to **** the scattered Tuyuhun cattle and sheep, and even collect some tents, vehicles, hay, dry dung, etc. that the Tuyuhun people have not taken away or lost in time. In this world of ice and snow, these are good things.

   It is necessary to arrange people to guard the captured prisoners, and to arrange people to rescue the wounded in time...

   They kept busy, busier than they were during the fierce battle just now.

   "Have you sent someone to look for Tuoba Chici, Xifeng Bulai and Hou Junji?"

   After Chengqian drank a bowl of warm horse blood, he finally felt his body recovered.

"Several teams of Qingqi have been sent out. They may have lost their way and went in the wrong direction, or they may have encountered other Tuyuhun people. I think it is more likely that they encountered and fought with other Tuyuhun people. Otherwise, they should have arrived long ago. .”

   "Are we safe here?" Cheng Qian asked again.

"This valley is relatively narrow, and the ministers sent people to block the two ends. They used spears as walls to resist horses, and snow walls as ice walls. Archers were also arranged on the hillsides on both sides..." Gao Kan introduced defense.

  (end of this chapter)