choke element

Chapter 1026 The Great Tide (Part )

In the early morning, outside the city of Guidefu, located in the lower reaches of the Suishui River, in the fortress called Suiyang City, the soldiers who were preparing their armor and weapons behind a staggered wall were getting restless.

Outside the city, the sound of killing surged in all directions, one after another, as if a huge wave was rolling down from the sky and was about to crush the fortress into dust. In the past few days, the soldiers had almost become numb to such killing sounds. But at this moment, in addition to the roar of the enemy army, the soldiers vaguely heard some other sounds. The sound was fleeting, but it was extremely familiar, as if the army was running, or the sound of a fierce battle.

The garrison commander Zheng Rui suddenly stood up and listened again, but could hear nothing. He tried to look upstream of the Sui River, but because the sky in the east was already bright, the sky in the west seemed even darker and he could not see anything clearly.

Guide Prefecture is one of the most important towns in Henan. Economically, it is known as a place where boats and cars meet. It is one of the three prefectures along with Kaifeng and Luoyang. Militarily, it is one of the three military towns in Nanjing Road, known as Xuanwu Army. When Emperor Guo Ning of the Great Zhou Dynasty attacked Kaifeng, he took Guide Prefecture as his first target.

Kaifeng Prefecture was a large city known for its prosperous industry and commerce. In terms of military strength, the Xuanwu Army was more powerful than Kaifeng Prefecture, with more experienced veterans. The city of Guide Prefecture was also a famous strong city. During the Tang Dynasty, Zhang Xun and Xu Yuan guarded Suiyang and were very famous.

However, Guide Prefecture itself is located in a flat area, and although there are many rivers around it, the water volume is not abundant, so there is actually no strategic location to defend in a major battle. After Guo Alin was appointed as the governor of Xuanwu Army, he worked hard to manage the old city of Suiyang, two miles outside the prefecture, and strived to form a horn with the prefecture.

This ancient city of Suiyang has had military achievements since the Han Dynasty. During the reign of Emperor Jing, King Liu Wu of Liang defended this place and repeatedly repelled the Wu-Chu coalition forces. During the Southern and Northern Dynasties, Liang general Chen Qingzhi sent King Hao of Beihai back north, and Wei general Qiu Daqian also built nine cities here to resist him. However, Qiu Daqian was no match for Chen Qingzhi and was defeated and surrendered immediately.

The old city of Suiyang has been abandoned for a long time, but the foundation of the city is still there. There is a high platform between the hills and ruins, named Litai, because the winding road looks like a snail. It is said that when Murong Chui was the general of the Yan State and the governor of Jingzhou, he commanded the army here.

When the Mongolian army suddenly attacked, the defenders of Guide Prefecture retreated rapidly, but Zheng Rui's troops still occupied the high platform camp.

The camp was not large, with only 500 people stationed there on a daily basis. Because the ruins of bricks and stones were used to build the camp, the materials used were half wood and half bricks and stones, making it very sturdy.

As the terrain of the high platform rises and falls, the outer wall of the camp also twists and turns in an irregular shape. The roads inside the camp are the same as the outer walls, which are all zigzag and looping. This structure allows the camp to rely on the terrain to resist step by step even if it is breached by the enemy, and even use the roads to intercept the enemy in sections.

Zheng Rui had a group of yellow-headed Jurchens under his command, who were generally good at setting traps. They dug holes crazily on the winding road, buried traps, tripwires and other things, turning the seemingly good road into a dangerous one.

In the past few days, although the Mongolian army did not launch a large-scale attack on Guide Prefecture, they thought of many ways to remove the nails outside the city, and the camp of Suiyang Ancient City was the first to bear the brunt. The Mongolians once dispatched two or three thousand-man teams to attack the camp, and also temporarily gathered prisoners and able-bodied men to harass them in turns, but several attacks on the camp were blocked by these arrangements and were eventually driven back by the defenders.

But continuous fighting inevitably leads to fatigue, and fatigue leads to negligence. Just half a minute ago, a group of enemies took advantage of the night, using corpses as cover to approach the camp, and suddenly set up a wooden ladder and climbed over the wall to kill.

Zheng Rui arranged the garrison to focus on the direction facing the city, and from time to time he would launch short counterattacks to respond to the city. Although there were dozens of people defending the other side, there were not many elite soldiers, and the slope here was slightly gentle, so the enemy approached and even climbed over the wall very quickly, so the defense was very difficult.

In just a short moment, after the outer wall, two consecutive roads were breached, and more than half of the guards on this side were killed. Zheng Rui felt that perhaps when the sky was completely bright, that would be the time when they would be completely killed and the camp would be breached.

Of course, he couldn't stand by and watch this happen, so he immediately called fifty of his men to rush over to support. When they were almost there, the antlers in front had been flattened, so Zheng Rui deployed his men behind another wall twenty steps away, waiting for the enemy to arrive and then rushing out.

Although they heard some strange noises while waiting, everyone was slightly distracted and then focused their attention on the enemy in front.

Only one team leader couldn't help but ask, "Could that sound just now be the commander bringing his men back? If the commander hadn't taken his elite troops to Kaifeng, we wouldn't have had to fight so hard these past few days."

"Most of the soldiers in Kaifeng are newly recruited. They can be used to suppress local riots, and are barely enough for defense. In a real war, they are vulnerable and are definitely no match for the elite Mongolian army. If the general does not go to support, I am afraid Kaifeng will be difficult to maintain. If Kaifeng is in trouble, the Mongols will get ten times the resources. How can we, Guide Prefecture, resist?"

Zheng Rui spoke slowly, and then said that the Mongols suddenly attacked, and it was impossible to immediately have the manpower and materials to attack the city. The only real dangerous city was Nanjing Kaifeng Prefecture, which was thin-skinned and big-stuffed. Therefore, stabilizing the situation in Kaifeng was equivalent to stabilizing the situation in many cities below Guide Prefecture. As time went on, the potential of so many cities and strongholds would be brought into play, and there would always be an opportunity for a counterattack, so that they would not be passive all the time.

In fact, everyone understood these principles, and Zheng Rui had explained them to his subordinates before. But he said them again to boost the morale of the troops.

Zheng Rui himself also needs encouragement.

After participating in the ambush against Jebe in Liaodong, Zheng Rui was seriously injured and took more than half a year to recover. He was in Guide Prefecture to retire and did not expect that he would face the Mongolian army again one day.

When soldiers fight, they need to be fierce. As long as they keep their temper, they can charge forward even in the most difficult situations. But Zheng Rui had been angry for a long time.

When he was young, he fought bravely, and his goal was to die early and save trouble, so that he could be reborn in a good way in the next life. But now that his life was really good, with land, property, a wife and children, he began to fear death. He was still tall, but his inner courage and tenacity had declined.

The hard battles of the past few days had exhausted his temporary energy every day. Almost every time he fought, he felt that his physical strength and will were about to collapse. The wounds on his body were getting more and more painful, perhaps because his body was not as strong as before, or perhaps because his spirit was weak and he could not bear the pain?

Zheng Rui kept telling himself that he couldn't collapse. He had to grit his teeth and keep fighting.

Guo A-Lin insisted on leaving Guide Prefecture, which really made the soldiers lose their backbone. But there was a shortage of experienced officers at this time, so there was nothing they could do. Looking at it from another angle, Guo A-Lin was a man with his own ideas. Since he led his troops out to look for opportunities, perhaps he could turn the situation around.

It is true that the garrisons of Nanjing Road were scattered and unprepared, but it is also true that there were a large number of warriors, guards and organized men in the civilian population. As long as everyone reacted, there was still a fight against the Mongols. If they were lucky enough, they might not die.

Just as I was thinking about this, I heard the sound of footsteps coming from the direction of the corridor.

Zheng Rui made several gestures, asking his men to hold steady. When the figure in front of him swayed and the light reflected from the tip of the knife was close at hand, he roared, signaling to release the arrows and charge.

More than 20 arrows flew out, shooting down the enemies at the front in the narrow corridor. Zheng Rui rushed out with his men, still swinging his sword left and right, like a huge rock smashing into the water, not only blocking the flow, but also stirring up the retreating waves.

The person guarding him was still the skinny, yellow-headed Jurchen boy from Liaodong, but now he could be called a young man.

According to the military system of the Great Zhou Dynasty, officers were frequently transferred, and only a number of attendants, determined by their positions, would always follow them. Therefore, the Yellow-headed Jurchen officers under Zheng Rui had been replaced several times, either dead, injured, or transferred, and only the young man had been there.

Since we met, we have often fought together. When in danger, sometimes you block the blade for me, and sometimes I rush in front for you. We have been together until now. In name, we are master and servant, but in fact, it is not an exaggeration to say that we are brothers.

Zheng Rui treated him as his own brother, gave him a Chinese name, hired a teacher to teach him how to read and write, and not long ago he contacted colleagues who did not despise the yellow-haired people and arranged a marriage for him.

It’s a pity that the marriage couldn’t be arranged.

Zheng Rui rushed to the densely packed enemy ranks, not noticing a stray arrow piercing the early morning sky and shooting obliquely. The yellow-headed Jurchen youth shouted and flew in front of Zheng Rui to block him, but the arrow hit him right in the eye, the arrowhead penetrated his eye, and came out from the back of his head with blood.

The yellow-headed Jurchen youth fell on his back and raised his hand with great effort, probably reaching out to Zheng Rui. His hand was raised a few inches before it fell down powerlessly.

Zheng Ruilue stopped and looked at his fallen companion. He saw the tail feathers shaking in his eye sockets, which looked very familiar. He couldn't help but curse.

He noticed that almost all the people who rushed into the fortress this time were Han people, and even the weapons they used were of the standard of the Great Zhou army. It was obvious that the Mongols had not wasted their time in the past few days, and had gathered a vassal army through various soft and hard means, and the source of the vassal army was the Han people from all over Nanjing Road!
It was only a matter of time before some confused traitors appeared among the hundreds of thousands and millions of people on the huge Nanjing Road. Zheng Rui suddenly thought that perhaps the Mongols did not need to take down the big cities at all. What they had gained from the villages and towns was enough to expand their army?
If this continues, it will become increasingly difficult to hold on to one place. We must fight the Mongolian army headquarters regardless of the losses!

But it is unknown whether Guo Alin fought against the Mongols. Could his fighting disrupt the rhythm of the Mongols, and could he cause enough damage to the Mongols to prevent them from further expanding the scope of the war?

Zheng Rui shook his head violently to get rid of distracting thoughts and continued fighting.

The battle became more and more intense, and the sound of killing rose all around him, completely covering up the sound in the distance. So he didn't notice that the sound that flashed in the distance before was getting closer and closer, like thunder rolling in the clouds.

The clouds rolled, the earth shook, and thousands of cavalrymen galloped.

The garrisons in various parts of Henan could not possibly gather such a large-scale cavalry unit, and after the Mongolian army dispersed, it would be difficult for them to gather such a powerful fist.

At the front of the cavalry, the handsome leader was covered in dust. She looked at the battlefield from afar and sneered: "No wonder Guo Ning wants to disband the old Red Coat Army... Surrendering when the Mongols come, is he still a good man? Do you still have any shame? Hey... Guo Ning is also stupid, weakening his own strength, looking for death!"

Behind the leader, dozens of officers from the Red Coat Army were all embarrassed, but no one dared to refute. At this time, no one was more qualified than her to evaluate the Red Coat Army. Because of some rumors, it seemed that her disrespect to Guo Ning was understandable.