Three Kingdoms: I am not Liu Bian

Chapter 97: The two armies fight and finally defeat the Yellow Turbans! (3K)

In the winter of the sixth year of Guanghe, on December 21st, at the first quarter of the morning hour.

The morning light was like a sword, breaking through the lead-gray clouds of deep winter. A golden-red halo spread from the sky, coating the plains on both sides of the Yangshui River with a thin layer of gold.

This year's winter has been quite strange. Qingzhou suffered severe cold snaps, and Hebei province endured heavy snow for over a month. Yet, during the twelfth lunar month, the coldest days of the year, temperatures rose instead of dropping, making it unusually warm.

The thin ice on the river surface quietly cracked under the warm sun, and the crisp sound mixed with the whimpering of the north wind seemed like the death knell sounded in advance by God for all living things on earth.

With the help of eunuchs such as Zhao You, Liu Bian put on an exquisite iron armor. The flame-like red armor was matched with a red dragon-shaped cloak, and he rode a Ferghana horse, like a ball of winter flame.

In fact, he was reluctant to dress like this. He preferred black armor and cloak. Besides, black and white winter clothes were more in line with the season.

But all the generals said that the Han Dynasty was of the fire virtue, and the prince's red clothes were like the ever-lasting fire of the Han Dynasty, which made people feel heroic.

Liu Bian was puzzled, but he didn't mind following suit on such a trivial matter of clothing that was insignificant to him.

After all, today is the date set for the battle between the Han Army and the Yellow Turban Army. Not only did the Han Army receive Huangfu Song's army of more than 40,000 men, but the Yellow Turban Army also received 20,000 reinforcements from the third-in-command of the Yellow Turban Army, General Zhang Liang.

The two armies agreed to fight a decisive battle on the south bank of Yangshui River. The Han army had 56,000 good family men, the Northern Army had 6,000 men from five schools, 3,000 Yulin cavalry, 2,000 Huben guards, 2,000 guards from the Prince's Palace, and 10,000 soldiers from the counties and states, totaling 79,000 people.

The Yellow Turban Army had nearly 170,000 men, but the most elite among them were the 70,000 left behind by Zhang Jue. Zhang Bao's troops were short of armor and weapons, and Zhang Liang's troops were a weak and exhausted army that had suffered repeated defeats.

When the Han army marched to the plain on the south bank of Yangshui River and formed their respective battle arrays, both armies sent out scouts to investigate each other's deployments.

However, the Yellow Turban Army lacked cavalry. There were only about 2,000 cavalrymen out of nearly 170,000 soldiers, and their combat effectiveness was extremely low. Many cavalrymen could not even ride horses properly, let alone shoot arrows or wield swords on horseback.

The scout teams with poor riding skills had not yet approached, so after obtaining permission from the central army, Liu Bei, Guan Yu and Zhang Fei each led 400 Changshui cavalry to attack them.

The Changshui Cavalry were mostly Wuhuan cavalry, skilled in mounted archery, and they defeated several Yellow Turban scouts without even engaging in close combat, forcing them to flee on horseback. The Han scout camp, however, successfully found out the Yellow Turban Army's formation.

Zhang Bao actually imitated Han Xin's formation of back-to-the-water battle formation!

This is the consequence of reading military books without understanding them thoroughly.

Those who have won the battle of back-to-the-water formation in ancient and modern times are either brave generals like Xiang Yu or wise generals like Han Xin.

But whether it is the former or the latter, victory is based on one premise, that is, the army under its command is elite enough.

If they were not elite troops, even if the Chu army wanted to follow Xiang Yu's footsteps and kill the enemy, they would be unable to do so.

If they were not elite troops, even if Han Xin had the strategy to capture the flag, he would not be able to hold out the army with its back to the water until it could successfully capture the flag.

If it weren't for the elite troops, the Yangshui River behind them would be a natural grave for the Yellow Turban Army, causing the army to panic and easily collapse.

Liu Bian turned his head slightly, exchanged glances with Lu Zhi and Huangfu Song, and then, as the commander-in-chief of the army in this decisive battle, waved his banner and shouted, "Beat the drums, order the front troops to advance!"

"Swordsmen and shieldsmen advance slowly, shields raised, bows and crossbows fire from behind to provide cover!"

Lu Zhi and Huangfu Song were unwilling to submit to each other, and no matter who led the army, the other would not be happy.

As the virtuous prince of the Han Dynasty, he naturally could not bear to see his "wife" and "concubine" quarreling over the position of commander-in-chief, so he simply took over the position of commander-in-chief.

Similarly, this is also to protect Lu Zhi and Huangfu Song.

There will be more big battles to fight in the future, and he will not be able to lead the army personally like this time.

In history, Huangfu Song made great contributions, including suppressing the Yellow Turban and Qiang rebellions, but was eventually demoted and his fiefdom was taken away on the pretext of something.

Following the prince's order, the war drums suddenly sounded, and the sound shook the whole area.

The drummer on the drum cart beat the drums to signal the advance of the front army. When the commander of the front army, Dong Zhuo, heard the drums, he shouted in a rough voice, "Men, forward!"

In the front row, good family men holding shields slowly moved forward under the arrows shot from the Yellow Turban army, protecting the spearmen behind them. Although some of them were hit by arrows from time to time, the sword and shield men were all wearing black armor, while the spearmen behind them were all wearing leather armor.

Arrows fell from the sky like raindrops.

However, the Yellow Turban Army's archers began shooting at the Han army from a distance of one hundred and twenty steps, which was quite like a weak crossbow that could not penetrate the silk cloth. Even if there were occasional arrows that penetrated the iron shield and landed on the black armor and leather armor, most of them could not penetrate the armor.

The Han army's archers only started shooting after they advanced to a position of about eighty steps. The Yellow Turban army's rain of arrows was incomparable to the rain of arrows shot by the Han army's archers, both in terms of scale and power. In addition, the Han army had a 100% armor rate, so the damage caused by the two sides to each other was simply incomparable.

The Han army's vanguard was under the barrage of arrows, and the area within which one arrow could reach, which was 120 steps, was reduced to less than 60 steps in an instant.

Fifty steps...thirty steps...twenty steps...ten steps!
The sword and shield soldiers in the front row held their shields in front of them and slammed into the Yellow Turban Army's formation. After the spearmen in the back row raised their spears and stabbed out, the soldiers in the third row holding ring-handled swords also rushed forward with roars, buying time for the sword and shield soldiers and spearmen to adjust their status.

The moment two armies come into direct contact, the outcome of the war is actually decided.

The 50,000 well-equipped former subordinates of Zhang Jue, under the command of the general Zhang Liang, were shaken by the 20,000-strong Han vanguard. Although they still held on, their defenses were breached one after another.

Dong Zhuo ordered Li Jue to launch a relentless attack, ultimately forcing a breach in the Yellow Turban army at the cost of six hundred casualties. He then ordered Xu Rong to lead over a thousand Flying Bear troops through the breach and charge into the Yellow Turbans. Thousands of Liangzhou warriors tore through the Yellow Turbans, gradually dismantling Zhang Liang's formations.

At the same time, three bundles of red helmet tassels fluttered in the wind. Lu Bu, holding a lance, rode a red Ferghana horse and came roaring with 1,200 Yue cavalry. Following closely behind were the Changshui cavalry led by Liu, Guan and Zhang.

Perhaps the three most valiant generals in the entire Han Empire were galloping almost side by side with their lances in hand. Led by these three brave generals, 2,400 elite cavalrymen broke through Zhang Liang's vanguard formation.

However, they did not disrupt the enemy's formation like Xu Rong did, but went straight to Zhang Liang, who was under the banner of the vanguard army, "Ren Gong General Zhang".

It has to be said that being hunted down by three such powerful generals is probably a rare experience in ancient and modern times.

Zhang Fei took out a throwing halberd from the side of his horse's belly. From a distance of more than thirty steps, his body twisted and tumbled with the horse's shaking, and he threw the halberd with force from his right arm.

Zhang Liang suddenly saw his personal guards rushing towards him. He did not understand what was going on, but suddenly felt a pain in his stomach. A halberd pierced his abdomen and nailed him to the ground.

Lu Bu and Guan Yu, who were less than twenty steps away from Zhang Liang, saw that Zhang Liang was killed by the unsportsmanlike Zhang Fei, so they had no choice but to turn their horses around and charge towards the Yellow Turban army.

On the other side, the left wing army gradually showed signs of decline under the attack of Zong Yuan, the General Protector of Wuhuan.

Almost all the elite troops of the Yellow Turban Army were concentrated on the front. The defense line of the left wing was basically useless and was only relying on the stacking of numbers. The Han army also concentrated forty crossbows on the left wing in order to tear a hole from the left wing and go straight to the center army.

When Gao Shun and Huang Zhong's heavy-armored infantrymen, together with the archers from the Shooting Captain's unit, joined the battlefield on the left wing, they opened a gap in the Yellow Turban Army's left wing defense line and held on for a while. Then, Zong Yuan's large left-wing force also arrived here and completely tore open the gap in the army formation.

Zong Yuan defeated the left wing of the Yellow Turban Army with almost no pressure, and attacked the center of the Yellow Turban Army before Dong Zhuo's vanguard army.

Sun Jian's 1,200 cavalry and the 3,000 Yulin cavalry led by Cao Ren and Xiahou Yuan also broke into the center of the Yellow Turban Army. The 6,000 Sanhe knights also rushed to launch an attack, and all of them went straight to Zhang Bao in the center of the Yellow Turban Army.

At this moment, Zhang Bao, who was in the central army, was wearing iron armor and standing on a temporary earthen platform. His sallow face was reflected in the morning light, making it look gloomy.

Seeing that the front army was about to be unable to hold out, the left wing completely collapsed, and his younger brother Zhang Liang was also killed by the Han army, he became more and more sad and angry.

Fight to kill the Han prince?

The last glimmer of hope that Zhang Jue held on to before his death was obviously impossible to realize.

"Those who retreat will die, kill them!"

However, despite facing an inevitable defeat, Zhang Bao still tightly gripped the hilt of the knife at his waist, and a hoarse growl came out of his throat.

Since Zhang Jue died of illness, he has been restless day and night. At this moment, his eyes are full of bloodshot, like the madness of a trapped beast before death.

He knew he was doomed to fail, but he was too lazy to run away.

His eldest brother and third brother were both dead. What was the point of him living alone? He might as well go find his two brothers early so that they could keep each other company in the afterlife.

When the front army and the left wing army were broken through one after another, the central army began to disintegrate without fighting.

Behind them was the Yang River, and no one wanted to be pushed into the river. Immediately, the Yellow Turban soldiers dropped their weapons and knelt on the ground to surrender to the Han army beside them.

The disintegration spread like an avalanche, and in just a moment, the central army was completely defeated.

Seeing that there was no hope, Zhang Bao could not help but roar to the heavens: "Oh, great heaven, how can you be so unkind to me!"

After saying this, he drew his sword and committed suicide.

At 3 p.m., with Zhang Bao committing suicide and Zhang Liang dying in battle, the war drums on the battlefield gradually stopped beating.

Under the protection of Dian Wei, Xu Chu and two thousand guards from the Prince's Mansion, the Prince stood on a pool of blood and looked around the battlefield.

The remaining flag was stuck diagonally beside the pile of corpses, and crows were already flying over the dead bodies to peck at them.

In this battle, 30,000 people were beheaded, 20,000 people died by jumping into the river, and 90,000 were captured. The remaining 20,000 or so people either fled into the mountains or jumped into the Yang River and escaped, so they were not a threat.

After more than five months, the rebellion of hundreds of thousands of Yellow Turbans spread across eight states and thirty-six regions was finally successfully put down.

Although there were still scattered Yellow Turban troops entrenched in the prefectures and counties, the main force of the Yellow Turbans had been wiped out and no longer posed a threat to the Han court. The local county governors could easily pacify these remnants of the Yellow Turbans.

Afterwards, Liu Bian ordered his men to break into Zhang Jiao's coffin and mutilate his body. After beheading him, they sprinkled lime over his head along with the heads of Zhang Bao and Zhang Liang to preserve them. After returning to the capital, they would be hung up for public display.

(3219 words)
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PS: I still haven’t finished writing the last update in time, mainly because I didn’t expect that this chapter with a quick transition to the Yellow Turbans could reach 3,000 words.

After this chapter, the plot will return to the intrigue and power struggles in Luoyang City.

(End of this chapter)