I

Today, five thousand Datong troops are besieging the city, and dozens of cannons are bombarding it in turn. It is estimated that they will receive news of the destruction of the city tomorrow.

Before tomorrow, Jiang Liang received the good news that night.

The next day, a cavalry unit was sent out, led by Qinghai cavalry, and went southwest to capture Luobu (Lop Nur), Jitai (near Qiemo), Hotan and other places.Another cavalry force was sent out to attack the northwest with thousands of infantry, but failed.

It is also in the south of Urumqi, which is the sphere of influence of Turpan.

And Urumqi, still called Yangji Bali at this time, was the grassland of Kuben Nuoyat, the Mongolian leader of the Heshuote tribe.Although this person belongs to the Heshuo Special Department, he nominally obeys the Junggar Khan.

In other words, Jiang Liang sent troops this time only to the south of the Tianshan Mountains, facing Urumqi across the mountain pass.

After winning and losing power, leaving an army stationed to prevent the Mongols from coming from Urumqi, Jiang Liang led the main force towards Aksu.

……

Aksu.

The king of Yarkand here is called Ismayel, while the king of Yarkand in Kashgar is called Yaolevas.

Before the two kings fought, Aksu was already fighting internally.

The exile and Zhuo Padisha of the Montenegrin faction, with the help of their religious influence, murdered the governor of Aksu, and turned the king into a puppet, controlling the power of Aksu alone.

Hearing that the Han army was coming, King Ismayel was not panicked, but privately a little excited.He didn't want to be a puppet for a long time. Governor Aksu controlled him before, and now Padisha controls him.

After surrendering, he might be able to regain his freedom.

But Padisha panicked, this Montenegro Pai Hezhuo had a strong desire for power.He will not hand over power even if he dies, he will never surrender, and he can't run away, because further west is the power of the Baishan faction, and the heretics of the Baishan faction are more hateful than the heretics of the Han people.

"Jihad, order the nobles and civilians of Aksu to launch a jihad to defend their homeland!"

He Zhuo, who was supported by thousands of people, launched a holy war. In just half a month, tens of thousands of people gathered, and even slaves came with farm tools.

Then Padisha started to have a headache.

Due to the repeated wars with the Kashgar area, Aksu's food has long been almost exhausted.Tens of thousands of jihadists also had to eat. He simply couldn't provide enough rations, and the nobles didn't bring much food.

If you wait in place, you don't need the Datong Army to take action, and you will have to starve collectively after a month.

After several days of hesitation, Padisha was forced to take the initiative and took the puppet king Ismayel with her.

The battle-tested governor of Aksu has been murdered by Padisha, and his cronies have also been liquidated.

There are no generals in the army, and Padisha herself has never fought a war.Not to mention fighting, the march was messy, after all, there were too many civilians and serfs in the jihadist army.

Some aristocratic generals feel bad, this kind of army is fighting ass.

Several nobles, with their own personal armed forces, deliberately slowed down the march.As he was walking, he suddenly ran away and went to Kashgar to join King Yao Levas.

Padisha didn't even notice that the troops under her command were deserters.

He only had the experience of preaching scriptures to thousands of believers, but he did not have the ability to command tens of thousands of troops.The cargo drove forward without paying any attention to the situation behind, and finally someone came to tell the truth the next day.

Padisha was a little flustered, but she pretended to be calm, saying that those deserters were sent back to defend the city by herself.

After marching for three days, Padisha's jihadist army collided with the vanguard led by Liang Zhen.

Liang Zhen only had [-] cavalry in his hands. He originally planned to retreat, but he saw tens of thousands of enemy troops chaotically, like refugees gathered together.

"Strike the enemy's left flank!"

Of the five thousand cavalry, two thousand were dragoons, and the remaining three thousand were all cavalry.

They rushed to the most chaotic formation of serf soldiers. When the Datong cavalry rushed in front of them, Padisha hadn't even fully deployed the formation.

First, two thousand dragoons fired a salvo of muskets, making the serf soldiers even more chaotic. Then they put away their muskets, drew their waist knives and rushed into battle with the Xiao cavalry.

Thousands of serf soldiers who were still more than ten steps away were scared and fled, and the serf soldiers nearby followed suit.The real elite of the enemy army gathered around Padisha, and it was too late to rescue them at this moment, because the jihadist army was too chaotic, and the motley crew blocked all the passages for dispatching troops.

The [-] Datong cavalry were divided into battalions when chasing and killing the rout.

A group of [-] cavalrymen was divided into ten groups to chase the rout soldiers and kill them.Those rout soldiers would help charge the formation, disrupting all nearby formations, often five hundred Datong cavalry, and quickly crushing thousands of enemy troops.

Not long after, all the left wings of the Jihad army fled, and the front army also became chaotic. When Datong cavalry charged from the left, the entire front army collapsed completely.

The elite troops under Padisha's command saw routs everywhere in front and on the left before even engaging in battle.

"run!"

The aristocratic generals, who had felt something was wrong for a long time, immediately ran away with their private soldiers. They all had the same idea and fled to Kashgar to join another king.

Padisha stood up from the carriage, staring blankly at the chaotic battlefield, he had no idea how to command.At this time, he wanted to shout a few jihad slogans, but he saw that the elite around him were also fleeing, and even his cronies started to flee, and no one listened to him anymore.

Finally, Padisha drew out her dagger, cut the rope of the carriage, and fled the battlefield with the rebels on horseback.

Ismayel found that no one cared about him anymore, so he rushed out of the carriage excitedly and shouted: "I am the Great Khan of Yarkand, and I am willing to surrender!"

But seeing countless routs coming, Ismayel's expression changed drastically, and he shouted, "I am the Great Khan, don't come here!"

Regardless of this, the rout soldiers fled from the king one after another, and finally someone knocked the king down.Immediately afterwards, another rout stepped on the king, one foot after another, and trampled the puppet king to death.

Chapter 1048 [Li Bai's Birthplace]

In the Aksu region, the exiled Baishan faction Hezhuo murdered the governor.

In Kashgar, Yao Levas, who killed his father and usurped power, is also engaged in religious struggle.He had only introduced the Black Mountain School for more than ten years, and there were still a large number of remnants of the White Mountain School among the people. When they first publicly rebelled, they purged a group.

Historically, Yao Levas was assassinated.The Great Khan of the Junggar bribed the remnants of the Baishan faction, and assassinated Yao Legas in public in a way of burning jade and stone together.

In another time and space, Junggar was able to rise, thanks to the civil strife in the Yarkand Khanate.The Baishan faction even actively became the leading party, voluntarily following Galdan's army, bravely captured the city of Yarkand, and killed all the followers of the Black Mountain faction in the city.

To be honest, if the Datong army killed the nobles without seeing them, they could easily recruit tens of thousands of Baishan faction troops, and then take these troops to attack the Black Mountain faction.

Hearing that the Han army had occupied Aksu, Yao Levas was a little flustered.

Because the nobles who escaped described the Han army as "zhenni" (devils, elves).It is said that Jiang Liang, the commander-in-chief of the army, is a "big town nun", and the other Datong soldiers are all "small town nuns". Everyone can use evil magic, and they can also summon meteorites to crush tens of thousands of enemy troops.

Of course Yao Levas didn't believe such nonsense, but he also knew the strength of the Han army.

The mission that escorted Aqiyu back to the country had passed through Kashgar with cavalry. The horses were horses and well-equipped, and they were not very annoying at first glance.

But Yao Levas annexed his father's tribe, and now there are a large number of nobles armed, who were frightened by the Datong army and came to him.He has more than ten thousand "elites" in his hands, thousands of miscellaneous garrison troops, and tens of thousands of serf soldiers.

With such a powerful army, how could Yao Levas be willing to escape?

Yes, run away.

Yao Levas never thought of surrendering, at most he was running away.With his strong strength, he can't get along in Kashgar anymore, and he can escape to Central Asia to dominate.

Just like more than 100 years ago, there was a pair of cousins ​​who couldn't get along in Central Asia, and each led more than 1000 people to escape.One fled to India and established the Mughal Empire; the other fled to Xinjiang and established the Yarkand Khanate.

……

Ush.

This is the largest city encountered on the way from Aksu to Kashgar.It originally belonged to Aksu's territory, but it was defeated by Yao Le Gas last year, and [-] troops were stationed to prevent Aksu's counterattack.

Yao Levas gave the guard a death order, and he must stick to it for more than 20 days, so that he can recruit more soldiers to fight a decisive battle.

Wushi City is more than two feet high and one foot and five feet thick, built with rammed earth.

More than ten steps outside the city, there is a moat, and the spring water is continuous all year round.

The bazaar (market) outside the city was already empty, and people of any ethnicity fled upon hearing the news.There are even Han Chinese shops here, but the Han people have to flee because they may encounter revenge from the Montenegrin faction.

The few civilians who did not flee were arrested and sent to the city to serve as soldiers. Most of them were engaged in hard labor, helping to carry supplies for the defense of the city.

The guard is called Abdullah Tif, who is the illegitimate son of King Jaulwas (the first son has been killed).Now Yao Levas doesn't believe anyone but his own son, so he throws his son to garrison Wushi city.

"His Royal Highness, the Han army is already several miles away, only a few thousand cavalry, and no infantry is seen." The general came to report.

"understood."

Although Abdullah Tief is young, he fought with his father at the age of 14, and he can be regarded as a veteran in the battlefield.

He only has [-] elite soldiers in his hand, and they are mainly infantry.

This kind of people can only defend the city, and absolutely dare not go out of the city to fight in the wild.After all, the nobles who fled said that the Han army had hundreds of artillery pieces.

But if there were hundreds of cannons, it would be dead to defend the city, and the city wall would be destroyed by the bomb.

Abdullah Tief could only take chances, hoping that those were noble exaggerations.

Liang Zhen led the leading troops to approach the city, and found that the city was tightly defended, so he knew that the defender would be a good fighter.He immediately divided the army into three, scattered out to sweep the surrounding villages, and got some food from the nobles who hadn't escaped by the way.

The effect of harvesting grain was extremely poor. All the rural nobles in the Wushi area ran away with their families ahead of schedule, leaving only a group of impoverished serfs.

A few days later, Jiang Liang came with the main force.

It's still the old routine, too lazy to fill up the moat, and set up artillery to bombard the city wall directly across the river.

At the same time as the bombardment, all the cavalry detoured to cross the river, blocking the enemy's retreat when they fled.

Looking at the cannons lined up outside the city, Abdullah Tief fell into despair for a moment.He only had four cannons for defending the city, and they were antiques decades ago, but the Datong Army had tens or hundreds of cannons for attacking the city.

After two days of continuous bombardment, the city wall due east collapsed in many places.

Due to the dry climate, the rammed earth walls here are too brittle to withstand the pouring of shells.

Father asked himself to hold the Han army for 20 days, but in the current situation, he couldn't even hold it for ten days.Abdullah Tief really wanted to abandon the city and flee, but he didn't dare. First, he was afraid of being killed by his father for disobeying the military order, and second, the Han cavalry had gone around to the west to intercept him.

"Captain, the southeast wind!"

"Rising a hot air balloon."

Following Jiang Liang's order, several hot air balloons rose across the river.Most of the eastern city wall had collapsed, and the defenders' artillery had been crushed under the broken wall. The defenders could only watch helplessly as the hot air balloon rose into the sky.

A guard shouted, "Jennies (devils), they have jinnis!"

As soon as this remark came out, the defenders all changed countenance, looking at the hot air balloons in horror.

"boom!"

The first ten thousand enemies fell, only killing and injuring a few people.

But the subsequent panic caused by the explosion caused the defenders to begin to collapse.They were already in a desperate situation, a large section of the eastern city wall collapsed, and they heard many terrifying rumors about the Han army. At this time, their tense nerves finally couldn't bear it.

"Run away, Jinny is here!"

Numerous defenders ran towards the west, opened the city gate and rushed out.They didn't care if there were enemy cavalry blocking them, they just wanted to escape from the city as soon as possible, as far away from those hot air balloons as possible.

Abdullah Tif didn't stop it, and couldn't stop it.

Historically, after Yao Levas was assassinated, he was supported by the Montenegrin faction as king.When he met Galdan's army, he was also defeated. It was not because of his command ability, but because Yeerqiang's hearts had long been scattered.

Infighting all day long, clansmen fighting each other, who wants to fight?

Ten years ago, if the Datong army came, they would definitely encounter stubborn resistance.At that time, Yarkand was unified and could be twisted into a single rope, but now it was divided into several forces, which were easily defeated by the Datong Army.

Almost all the soldiers defending the city escaped, leaving only a dozen loyal guards.

Abdullah Tif said to the guards: "You also flee. I must stay in the city. This is my father's order. You also know how strict my father is. If I dare to escape from this city, I will be executed."

Several guards bid farewell immediately, and a few guards stayed behind to accompany him to die.

The 1000 defenders and more than [-] civilians who were captured as strong men fled to the west in panic.Only two or three miles away, the Datong cavalry who had already crossed the river rushed over to kill these routs.

In particular, the Yarkand cavalry was taken care of by the Datong cavalry.

The infantry of the Datong Army also began to cross the river and rushed into the city, but there were only Abdullah Tief and a few guards.These guys did not commit suicide, but charged forward with knives and were shot and killed by the Datong army.

There are always a few fish that escaped the net and fled to Kashgar in a panic on horseback.

Yao Levas asked in surprise: "How long have you been defending before the city of Wushi has been breached?"

The nobleman who fled back said: "The enemy can summon the Zhenni..."

"Nonsense!" Yao Levas was furious.

"Khan, it's true," said the nobleman, "the jinni summoned by the enemy are big, big balls that can fly into the sky. Then they drop small balls that explode when they hit the ground. A small ball Dozens of people can be killed. If the Khan doesn’t believe it, he can ask other soldiers who have escaped.”

Of course Yao Levas didn't believe that it was the devil summoned by the Han army, but the nobleman spoke so seriously that it didn't seem like he was lying.

Yao Levas guessed that it was probably the secret weapon of the Han army.

"The enemy really has hundreds of cannons?" Yaolevas asked.

The nobleman replied: "I don't know if there are hundreds of doors, but there should be a hundred."

There are one hundred cannons, so how many muskets should there be?

"Khan, it's not good!" Another minister ran over in a panic.

Yao Levas asked, "What is it?"

The minister said: "A nobleman fled from Hotan, and the Han army appeared there, with more than 1 cavalry. And the news was ten days ago, and now I am afraid that they are almost approaching the city of Yarkand."