Across the Water Margin: Officials of Ximen

Seeing that the situation was not good, these knights followed a dozen of their companions to break out of the encirclement and galloped back to the camp to report the news.

Along the way, the cavalry of the Chu army chased after them and shot and killed more than ten companions, only a few of them escaped back.

This time the Chu army attacked Lingping Village with 2000 forwards, and there must be a lot of troops coming.It's a pity that these knights have been hunted down, and there is no time to investigate how many Chu troops are behind them.

After Li Liangfu listened to the reports of several Xixia knights, the corners of his mouth curled up into a sneer.

Judging from the battle process described by the few people just now, the combat effectiveness of the soldiers of the Chu army appears to be very mediocre.

The troops Li Liangfu sent to Lingping Village to guard the village were just ordinary soldiers.But they were able to break out from the Chu army, which was ten times larger than themselves, and ran for dozens of miles to escape to the camp outside Pingxia City.

It can be seen that the command of the Chu army is mediocre, and the combat effectiveness of the soldiers is not strong.

In order to verify his judgment, Li Liangfu asked several people in the account how they felt fighting the Chu army.

The knights said that among the forwards of the Chu army was a brave general with high martial arts skills, who was the general who led the team to hunt down and kill them.

In addition, the combat effectiveness of the soldiers of the Chu army is very ordinary.

After hearing this, Li Liangfu slapped the table and laughed wildly.

Chapter One Thousand and Fifteen

The Pingxia City of Huaide Army is located in the middle reaches of the Hulu River, and the terrain of the Zhenrong Army is higher, which is the watershed between the Hulu River and the Jing River.

Therefore, from Zhenrong Army to Pingxia City along the Hulu River, there are only Xiaoping dams in the valleys on both sides of the valley.

It was this kind of terrain that enabled Ximen Qing to set up an ambush and wipe out Brother Li Cha's army.

However, after arriving in Pingxia City, the middle and lower reaches of the Hulu River are a small river valley plain, extending northward to the south bank of the Yellow River.

The open terrain allowed the garrison of Pingxia City to easily pass through Qudou Ridge and enter the hinterland of Xixia Kingdom.

Because of this, when the Song Dynasty captured this place and built Pingxia City, the Xixia Kingdom sent troops to fight for it many times.

The convenient communication between this place and the hinterland of the Xixia Kingdom meant that Li Liangfu and his [-] troops could easily withdraw their troops.

In order to stabilize Li Liangfu and prevent him from running away, Ximen Qing also tried his best.

When ambushing Brother Li Cha's army, Ximen Qing specially sent people downstream to intercept them, so as to prevent the corpses of the Xixia army from drifting outside Pingxia City and startle the snakes.

When seizing Lingping Village in the south of Pingxia City, Ximenqing asked Yue Fei to take the weak brigades of the Western Army to attack, and intentionally released several Xixia Army warriors.

This move was to confuse Li Liangfu, a general of the Xixia Army, and make him misjudge the combat effectiveness of the Ximen Qing Army.

After some false performances, Li Liangfu was really fooled.

When Ximenqing's infantry and cavalry troops arrived outside Pingxia City continuously, and the total number was [-], Li Liangfu had no scruples and opposed the generals with a smile: "The Chu army sent tens of thousands of fat sheep."

Li Liangfu could see clearly from the camp that the newly arrived Chu army consisted mostly of infantry, with only a little over 1 cavalry.

What Li Liangfu himself brought was [-] fine cavalry, and together with the troops of Ren Dejing Army and Zhenrong Army of Xi'an Prefecture who counterattacked Pingxia City, the strength reached as many as [-] to [-].

When the strength of the two sides is evenly matched, the comparison is the strength of the soldiers and the superiority of the arms.

The Xixia army is dominated by cavalry, and here is a river valley plain, which is suitable for cavalry operations.

Li Liangfu's army was transferred from the Hetao area on the Xiajin border, equipped with the best Hequ horses and the best cavalry in the Xixia Kingdom.

In Li Liangfu's view, with his [-] fine cavalry, even if there are [-] Chu troops on the opposite side, they can all be trampled into flesh!

Furthermore, His Royal Highness Li Cha, King of the Jin Rong Army, will definitely follow and attack him back and forth.

With all these advantages, in Li Liangfu's eyes, isn't Ximen Qingjun a fat sheep that fell into his mouth?

Of course, Li Liangfu's arrogance was what Ximen Qingzheng could only wish for.

After deliberately showing weakness, Ximenqing calmly led the [-] army outside Pingxia City, and set up a camp two miles away from the Xixia army.

The two armies confronted each other, and the rangers on both sides maintained the traditional friendship, and there were sporadic battles where you chased each other.

At the same time, the envoys of the two armies also negotiated, claiming that Pingxia City is an inalienable territory of their own country, and denounced the other side's aggression.

Both Ximenqing and Li Liangfu solemnly warned each other that they must surrender immediately and apologize for the aggression, otherwise they will be hit by the justice of the army and suffer disaster.

All in all, don't say that you are unpredictable!

Ximen Qing and Li Liangfu are playing this boring diplomatic game here, naturally they have their own little calculations.

For Ximen Qing, after the battle last night, although there were no casualties among the soldiers, they needed to rest and recover their physical strength and energy.

In addition, the guns and ammunition of the main gun battalion in the army also need to be carefully checked and prepared.

Therefore, after Ximenqing arrived in Pingxia City, he did not immediately set up a formation to fight the Xixia Army, but set up camp to let the soldiers rest.

The exchange of envoys with Li Liangfu, the coach of the Xixia Army, was just a strategy for Ximen Qing to further show weakness.

The more Ximenqing scolded, the more Li Liangfu believed that the Chu army was a bluff.

Only in this way can Li Liangfu and his [-] army be firmly attracted outside Pingxia City, waiting for the decisive battle to annihilate them in one fell swoop.

Li Liangfu was able to scold Ximen Qing patiently, also to delay time.

According to Brother Li Cha's battle plan, when Li Liang's auxiliary army besieged Pingxia City, the Chu army would be allowed to go to rescue the siege.Then Brother Li Cha will send a large army to chase after him, and Li Liang's auxiliary army will attack and surround the Chu army's reinforcements.

Therefore, Li Liangfu and Ximen Qing scolded each other, in fact, they were waiting for Brother Li Cha's army to quietly take their place, completely cutting off the Chu army's retreat.

After a day of swearing and chasing by rangers, the coaches of the two armies seemed to have lost their composure, and they agreed to a decisive battle outside Pingxia City the next day, and the victory or defeat would determine the ownership of Pingxia City.

That night, the moon was dark and the wind was high, which was a good time to kill and set fire.

It's just that the battle was imminent, and both the Chu and Xia armies were heavily guarded, and they didn't give the other side a chance to steal camp, so the night passed without any unexpected fighting.

When the sun rose from Dongshan again and sprinkled the autumn sunshine on the water of the Hulu River, the Chu and Xia armies also had enough food, fed their horses, lined up neatly, and went out one by one. The camp is set up at a distance of three arrows.

Looking at the smoke dispersing from the other side's camp, the soldiers of the Chu Army and the Xixia Army thought that the other side had eaten the last breakfast of their lives, and disliked the other side for wasting an extra portion of food.

For such a big battle, some people in the Xixia Army did not want to participate directly, and this person was Ren Dejing, the magistrate of Xi'an Prefecture.

For some unknown reason, Ren Dejing tossed and turned in his barracks and didn't sleep well all night.

After waking up in the morning, Ren Dejing, who was restless, ran to Li Liangfu's camp and asked to stay and monitor the defenders in Pingxia City.

Li Liangfu didn't think much of Ren Dejing's [-] Han army, so he agreed to let Ren Dejing's army monitor Ma Kuo and Liu Qi's troops in Pingxia City.

After Ren Dejing got the order, he brought [-] troops full of food and drink, and came to the outside of Pingxia City to block the gate.

At the same time, Ren Dejing asked his brother Ren Degong and his clan younger brother Ren Deren to take their confidants to quietly pack up important items in the camp, preparing to slip away when the war is not going well.